RX-8 faces extinction

Reports out of Europe are signalling the end of production for the Mazda RX-8. According to European publication Auto Motor und Sport, the rotary-engined sports car may not be long for this world, since it would struggle to meet the upcoming Euro 5 emissions standard.

Based on talks with the head of Mazda Germany, Joseph Alois Schmid, the magazine has suggested that 2013 is the earliest Mazda could schedule the launch of a Euro 5-compliant rotary sports car, either the RX-8 or a newer design. Schmid, according to Auto Motor und Sport, claims that the RX-8 in its current guise would be too expensive to upgrade "quickly" to meet the Euro 5 standard for its sales volumes. The magazine has further suggested that the withdrawal of the RX-8 from the market may precede a new RX-7, with a compliant engine.

Talk of abandoning the petrol version of the rotary flies in the face of remarks made by Mazda's global head of sales, marketing and customer service, Masazumi Wakayama -- out here recently as a guest of Mazda Australia.

"The rotary engine is something like a symbol or symbolic engine for Mazda's technology and there are many new engineers who joined Mazda because they have this aspiration about the company that develops the rotary engine," Wakayama-san told Australian journalists through an interpreter.

"We have the brand essence of 'Zoom-zoom' and the rotary engine is something else that really embodies that 'Zoom-zoom' brand essence. We are going to continue the development [of the petrol rotary] and also improvement of the petrol rotary engine."

That doesn't mean that the RX-8 has a long future ahead of it necessarily. Mazda -- and Audi with its A1 e-tron -- are investigating rotary engines as range-extenders in hybrid-drive passenger cars. That may be where the future of Wankel rotary engine technology lies -- as an electric power generator fuelled by hydrogen.

Such a concept is already being trialled by Mazda in Japan, with a hydrogen-fuelled rotary engine in a hybrid-drive Mazda5 people mover.

"The rotary engine is very suitable for that kind of electric generation because it is very stable at high speed..." says Wakayama-san.

When asked whether the rotary engine would get the SKY treatment (set aside currently for reciprocating engines), the Japanese executive's further remarks seem to support Schmid's views, as reported by Auto Motor und Sport.

"We are not selling too many vehicles with the rotary engine. When we consider the environment and how we can introduce our new technology in the models... that we are selling the most... of course we would roll out these new technologies into the various models...

"However the first thing we need to do -- or the approach that we are taking -- is to be introducing these new technologies into the area which will have the most impact in the society."

In other words, the rotary is a longer-term project in a CO2-wary world. That leaves us to wonder why Mazda wouldn't opt for an E85 production vehicle?

Read the latest Carsales Network news and reviews on your mobile, iPhone or PDA at www.carsales.mobi