Mazda: New CX-9 will be better than Toyota rivals

Mazda has bullishly predicted the second-generation CX-9 will be a better vehicle than the two Toyotas that dominate the large SUV class – the Prado and the Kluger.

At the same time, Mazda Australia managing director Martin Benders has made it clear the new CX-9, which is expected to debut at the Los Angeles motor show in November and go on sale in Australia next year, will be the only seven-seat SUV from the Japanese brand for some time to come.

Earlier this year motoring.com.au was told by Mazda sources the CX-7 badge would be revived in 2016 in the form of a stretched CX-5 medium SUV with a third row of seats.

But that plan still does not have an official green light at factory level, prompting Benders to dismiss its arrival any time soon as "not impossible but highly improbable.

"It's a thought bubble," he said.

With Mazda also already making it clear it won't be using the basis of the BT-50 pick-up to develop an equivalent of the Ford Everest ladder-frame SUV, the CX-9 is left unchallenged as the company's largest SUV.

Recent spy shots of a disguised second-gen CX-9 in California have revealed a sharper evolution of the wagon exterior.

But it is under the skin where the CX-9 is expected to make big gains, trading its thirsty Ford-sourced 3.7-litre petrol V6 engine in for a more efficient new SKYACTIV-G 2.5-litre turbo-petrol four-cylinder engine.

"Even today the CX-9 still gets really good raps and the only complaints we really get about it are fuel economy," said Benders.

"So if we can deliver a similar drive experience and torque experience and bring the fuel down to manageable levels then I think we are on to a winner, because from a packaging point of view when you stack a CX-9 up against a Prado it's a lot more comfortable, a lot more easy access, a lot more room.

"Against a Kluger? Well, I think we will be better than that."

Being developed primarily for the US market – like the Kluger – the CX-9 will again come without a fuel efficient turbo-diesel option, but Benders said he is confident the new petrol drivetrain will calm any concerns in that regard.

"The new engine that is going into the CX-9 will perform as well as a diesel would," he insisted.

Toyota has already announced that it will plug the Kluger's diesel hole with the Fortuner ladder frame seven-seat SUV based on the HiLux, but Benders explained Mazda's rationale in not following that route.

"It [a ladder-frame SUV] was talked about when that program kicked off and we thought that an off-road truck-like vehicle was not going to be that big for that long," Benders said.

"So trying to fight our way into that [sub-segment] against Toyota we didn't really think was an option."

The CX-9 is the last all-new Mazda scheduled for reveal and production before the next generation of Skyactiv II vehicles start rolling from the factory in about 2017 led by the second generation CX-5. That car will introduce Mazda's homogeneous-charge compression-ignition (HCCI) fuel delivery system, which is the Japanese brand's equivalent to the Mercedes-Benz DiesOtto system – diesel-like compression ignition for petrol engines.

"It's really the transitional vehicle to take us into the next generation of cars and that is another new ball game again," Benders confirmed.

The CX-9 went on-sale in Australia in 2007 and has performed consistently for Mazda. According to VFACTS registration figures for 2015 until the end of July, it sits 11th in the category with 2070 sales. Toyota has sold 8926 Prados and 8096 Klugers in the same period.

Its official fuel consumption figures are 11.2L/100km for the all-wheel drive and 11.0L/100km for the front-wheel drive.