MX has long, proud legacy

Mazda’s MX badge isn’t only reserved for convertibles and EVs, writes

Mazda’s MX badge hasn’t just been applied to popular convertible sports cars and electric SUVs. It’s actually a fair bit older than you might think.

According to the company, the MX prefix is given to a car that ‘‘takes on a challenge to create and deliver new values without being confined by convention regardless of vehicle type’’.

When it was revealed in 1989, the Mazda MX-5 was exactly this kind of car, as the automotive industry as a whole moved away from the affordable sports car, Mazda defied convention to create a perfect modern reinterpretation of the classic rear-wheel-drive roadster.

However, the first MX car precedes the MX-5 by nearly a decade.

The MX-81 Aria concept car debuted at the 1981 Tokyo Motor show, created by Italian styling house Bertone which, using Mazda

323 running gear, created a futuristic wedge-shaped hatchback.

With its gold paint, huge glasshouse and pop-up lights, it reflected all the best style trends of the time. Factor in a recessed square steering wheel, TV screen cockpit and side swinging front seats for good measure.

Next in the MX lineage was the

1983 MX-02 concept car, a big flatsided five-door hatch with large windows, aerodynamic rear wheel covers and flared in-door mirrors.

Unique features included rearwheel steering and a windscreen head-up display.

The one-off theme continued with the 1985 Mazda MX-03, which again was a radical-looking concept car, this time powered by a triple rotor

235kW Wankel engine. Conceived purely as a concept, this low-slung coupe, was pure futuristic exuberance, with a cabin that featured an aircraft-style yoke rather than a wheel, plus digital displays and a head-up display.

Its technology tally also included four-wheel steering and all-wheeldrive, while the long low body delivered an aerodynamic coefficient-of-drag (Cd) figure of just

0.25.

While the MX-02 and MX-03 shared a few of the same futuristic design cues, the MX-04 was completely different.

Revealed at the 1987 Tokyo Motor Show, the MX-04 was a front-engine rear-wheel-drive sports car chassis that had removable fibreglass panels, and not just one but two different sets, allowing the car to switch from a glass dome roofed coupe to a beach buggy style open sided roadster.

Powered by a rotary engine this barmy shape-shifting sports car was never a serious contender for production, but little did outsiders know that Mazda was already developing the MX-5, and just two years later, the most famous car to wear the MX badge arrived.

The next cars to wear the MX badge were also production models, both cars built on the MX-5’s success and offered very different coupe styles.

Sold from 1992 to 1993, the Mazda

MX-3 was a four-seat coupe hatchback that disregarded the convention for normal hatchbacks to offer buyers something more stylish and sportier, while it further earnt its MX badge by being available with the world’s smallest mass-produced

V6 engine.

The larger MX-6 coupe conveyed premium coupe style for family saloon money, but in the 1990s arguably the most radical car to wear the MX badge was the Mazda

MXR-01.

After the rotary-powered Mazda

787B took victory in the 1991 Le Mans 24 Hours, the FIA promptly banned rotary-powered cars, leaving Mazda looking for a new car for the

1992 World Sportscar Championship at very short notice.

A solution arrived in the shape of the incredible Mazda MXR-01 prototype race car.

Based on the previous seasons Jaguar XJR-14, the British firms’ withdrawal from sportscar racing, allowed Mazda to adapt this radical Ross Brawn designed prototype and fit a Mazda badged V10 Judd engine.

It was known for massive grip and downforce and just five production examples were built. But sadly the collapse of the World Sportscar Championship at the end of 1992 spelt the end of Mazda’s world level motorsport programme and denied the MXR-01 the chance of success.

Fast forward to the 21st century and the 2002 MX-Sport Runabout concept debuted to preview the second-generation Mazda2 while the

2003 MX-Sportif was the concept that previewed the first generation

Mazda3, which was a big step forward from the outgoing Mazda 323.

And now with the arrival of the

MX-30, it’s appropriate that the MX name returns to a production model – as Mazda’s first production EV, the

MX-30 is a car that represents a new chapter in Mazda’s history.

The MX badge has been around for nearly a decade longer than the car that made it popular.

The first Mazda to wear the MX badge was the MX-81 concept.

The MX-04 preceded the MX-5 by two years. We kind of wish Mazda put it into production, too.

This is the MX-03 concept. Looks a bit NSX-y from behind, doesn’t it?

There are more than a few hints of Citroen to the MX-02.