Fans of rotary, time to rejoice. Mazda has recently been stirring up a new RX-7 successor, which packs a twin-scroll turbocharger making 450bhp. That amount of horsepower puts the upcoming RX7 well into the Porsche 911 Carrera territory.
The original plan, for the RX-7 successor, was to use a non-turbocharged 300bhp rotary engine, but Mazda’s marketing team deemed the car too boring, and wont appeal to potential customers. So they decided on the turbocharge route for the RX-7 successor. Early test mules were using reinforced MX-5 platforms, but with potentially 450bhp on the table, using an updated version of the RX-8 platform makes more sense. Also, Mazda is keen to use their SKYACTIV technology to iron out issues that plagued rotary engines, like bad fuel consumption, poor mileage and average mid range torque.
Considering that the first rotary powered Mazda, which was the Cosmo Sport, was launched back in 1967, it could potentially mean that the upcoming RX-7 successor would be launching to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Mazda’s rotary history, and that is just 3 years away. That should give Mazda ample time to finalize the turbocharged rotary engine as well as fine tuning the successor. Do stay tuned as we will update as this story progresses.
