Just spotted this in the local Saturday papers...remember these are the
aussie models. It piqued my interest - as an old rotor-head, the RX 8 was high on my buy list when I was choosing the Z.

Gee.

 

Aside from a rear seat, the RX8 has never had anything on a Z. That comparison is massive fail. How they gave the engine nod to the RX8 is pretty damn idiotic considering the mentioned fuel thirst, lack of torque, oil consumption, and reliability. That's not a winning engine to me.

 

I agree Arnie, and I've been driving rotors since I was 22. (my 1st car was a 2nd hand Mazda R100 with 10A motor in a car the size of a mini).

IMO, the Renesis motor is a lot smoother, but thats always been the beauty of the rotisserie as its virtues, amongst other things, include it having only 3 moving parts (2 rotors and the con rod) BUT its a pain in a lot of other ways. It sucks gas like a 'ho in a footy locker room, drinks oil faster then the sheiks can pump it out of the desert, requires expensive extreme temperature spark plugs ans so on

Its no wonder on other manufacturer seriously took on the wankel design.

 

The fact that they picked the torque-less RX-8 motor over the VQ demonstrates how flawed their article really is.

 

Not defending the mag/comparo, but there's more to engine that the power and consumption figures. Character of the engine is sometimes the overiding preference (in particular in a sportscar) ... and if they prefered the character of the RX8 engine better than 370Z then that's a vaid statement.

eg. 370Z engine may have the power figures over a Boxster or S2000 engine, but there's a valid argument why someone would prefer either of these over 370Z's engine.

 

It lacks character though.

 

Boxster I could understand. S2K, no way. It's just like the rotary - a novelty. When you have to make it scream at 9K just to get any power out of it, it ceases to be impressive. I can understand the mags pick of the rotary, it is (was) a technical marvel, but it has proven to be impractical even after what, 30 years.

Hell, if they want to claim they were impressed, they should have looked at the 370 NISMO - it turns 8K RPMs which ought to easily give them something to rave about.

 

the 13b was great but the renesis is just plain limp wristed. N/A rotary's suck, end of story.

btw I heart the S2K motor


high reving n/a 4 bangers are the ****. that car is meant for the track and if you can't keep it in the power band then you have to buisness driving a sports car. i'm a nissan guy and the z series is much MUCH more versitile then the s2k but the track is what the s2k does and it does it brilliantly

 

Yeah, I hear the valid points on both sides, and thats makes it all the more interesting as I chose the Z over the RX8 for my latest acquisition, the RX8 being the car all my friends expected me to choose...

- just from a pure sensory experience of 14yrs years with the 1990 Series 5 RX7 II Turbo slightly tweaked** vs. 4 weeks of the Z. IMO the motor on the Z is very different , inasmuch as it feels to "buzz" at higher than 4000rpm. It starts promising with a deep growl from 2500 up.
The buzz I suspect could be due to the inherent qualities of the motor being constrained by its intake/exhaust restrictions. Wooo Hoooo, lets go aftermarket....

Would love to hear of the differenecs "before" and "after" of these changes to the Z. I suspect it will benefit greatlly from being allowed to breathe better.

I made the right choice going with the Z. I love the boy-racer styling with design cues from porsche and the 240Z. The power, the acceleration, handling (yeah yeah I know I criticised the handling severly elsewhere on this forum, but, don't tell anyone I said so - its pretty good for a stock car at this price-point), is on par and ditto for braking.

Gee


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** 13b ported, boosted, 3mm racing apex seals, forged this , forged that, bilstein suspension, brembo's , sway bars, monkey bars, cocktail bars, blah blah blah
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what about the Lotus?

 

Lets not forget the recall on the RX-8 where the cats heated up so badly, I think they were causing fires because they were so close to the fuel lines? They had a 50-60k car recall from that.

 

what about a lotus?

 

Nope, only 7,500 actually

 

You obviously never heard of the 4-rotor 787B Mazda Lemans race car.

 

I'd take the lotus, just hard to get my fat *** in it lol.