ND rumored to get 181 hp

I've had an NB and NA8, along with an E30 318. None of them are underpowered. The Twins, which I've test driven three times because they should be perfect for me, are underpowered--actual numbers and times be damned. 

In reply to mtn :

I felt the opposite. I felt like my NA6 was nearly dangerous in how underpowered it was. I had to flog it away from stop lights to prevent getting run over by everyone, because even a minivan makes nearly three times the horsepower of it these days. Autocross launches were basically 4k clutch dumps to keep it from bogging and then taking a while to get up to speed. Then my Miata broke at an autocross and I got allowed to drive a D/S BRZ and that thing felt like it had so much power in comparison. 2500rpm launches on RE71Rs was instant wheelspin and I could induce oversteer just by punching the throttle.

Keith Tanner said:

iceracer said:

In reply to Keith Tanner :

TPMS ?    Thought that had to do with tire pressures

It totally does. The ND used to measure tire pressure using the ABS sensors along with steering angle and a few other factors. This meant you could change wheels any time you wanted without having to deal with a freaked TPMS system or paying $200 for a bunch of life-limited sensors. In 2018, they went to a "direct" system which is the type with sensors in the wheels. A step back, IMO. It's enough that I had decided that my ND would be a 2016-17 - but this power bump is making me wonder if I'd put up with it...

Huh.  It's been my experience that the indirect systems can be the easiest to freak out.  Toyotas will set the light after 5000mi or so if you don't rotate the tires.

Direct systems CAN be simple.  Ford will retrain to new sensors in as little as two wheel revolutons.  Hyundais will do it in about a block.  If a company as electronically asinine as Hyundai can figure out how to do painless direct TPMS, why can't anyone else?

I guess like anything else, when they're good, they're very good, but when they're bad...

NickD said:

In reply to mtn :

I felt the opposite. I felt like my NA6 was nearly dangerous in how underpowered it was. I had to flog it away from stop lights to prevent getting run over by everyone, because even a minivan makes nearly three times the horsepower of it these days. Autocross launches were basically 4k clutch dumps to keep it from bogging and then taking a while to get up to speed. Then my Miata broke at an autocross and I got allowed to drive a D/S BRZ and that thing felt like it had so much power in comparison. 2500rpm launches on RE71Rs was instant wheelspin and I could induce oversteer just by punching the throttle.

I've never driven an NA6, so I wouldn't be able to comment on that one. 

Knurled. said:

Keith Tanner said:

iceracer said:

In reply to Keith Tanner :

TPMS ?    Thought that had to do with tire pressures

It totally does. The ND used to measure tire pressure using the ABS sensors along with steering angle and a few other factors. This meant you could change wheels any time you wanted without having to deal with a freaked TPMS system or paying $200 for a bunch of life-limited sensors. In 2018, they went to a "direct" system which is the type with sensors in the wheels. A step back, IMO. It's enough that I had decided that my ND would be a 2016-17 - but this power bump is making me wonder if I'd put up with it...

Huh.  It's been my experience that the indirect systems can be the easiest to freak out.  Toyotas will set the light after 5000mi or so if you don't rotate the tires.

 

Direct systems CAN be simple.  Ford will retrain to new sensors in as little as two wheel revolutons.  Hyundais will do it in about a block.  If a company as electronically asinine as Hyundai can figure out how to do painless direct TPMS, why can't anyone else?

 

I guess like anything else, when they're good, they're very good, but when they're bad...

The Mazda one is simple enough, but I don’t like having to buy and maintain expensive sensors for multiple sets of wheels or deal with an errant light. The indirect system in the Miatas can determine if you’ve installed oversized tires (some cool voodoo there) but one button press will reassure it that all is well. 

After 5000 miles with no tire rotations on a fwd car, it’s quite likely that there is a difference in tire diameter front to rear. So the Toyota warning light is actually a reminder to rotate your tires and thus save money by wearing them evenly!

mtn said:

NickD said:

In reply to mtn :

I felt the opposite. I felt like my NA6 was nearly dangerous in how underpowered it was. I had to flog it away from stop lights to prevent getting run over by everyone, because even a minivan makes nearly three times the horsepower of it these days. Autocross launches were basically 4k clutch dumps to keep it from bogging and then taking a while to get up to speed. Then my Miata broke at an autocross and I got allowed to drive a D/S BRZ and that thing felt like it had so much power in comparison. 2500rpm launches on RE71Rs was instant wheelspin and I could induce oversteer just by punching the throttle.

I've never driven an NA6, so I wouldn't be able to comment on that one. 

It's a little overstated. If you can't steer with the throttle, you're not close enough to the limits of adhesion They're as fast in a straight line as a lot of other sporty cars of the period, and Miata drivers have been complaining about minivans for 28 years. No worries, I have the tools to solve these problems.

That cam/header dyno is pretty nice.  I imagine that would really spice up the car.  I rented an auto ND in Hawaii for a few days last year and really liked it but the power did indeed fall off up top which takes away some excitement.  

Interesting to hear that Mazda is going from indirect to direct, the overall trend seems to be the other way these days.  Audi has gone from direct to indirect (What?  The Germans are taking complexity OUT of a vehicle?!?!), because with the newer software these days they can actually tell you which wheel is low and by how much just from the differences in wheel speeds.

The amount of hyperbole in this thread is more than amusing. 

codrus said:

Interesting to hear that Mazda is going from indirect to direct, the overall trend seems to be the other way these days.  Audi has gone from direct to indirect (What?  The Germans are taking complexity OUT of a vehicle?!?!), because with the newer software these days they can actually tell you which wheel is low and by how much just from the differences in wheel speeds.

I've learned a lot about the Miata TPMS system as part of our V8 conversions. It's amazingly sophisticated. The first time it was able to detect all four tires being a different diameter I was baffled. It's using differential wheel speeds based on corner radius to calculate the absolute tire diameter, not just relative diameters. So if it got cold outside and all your tires got soft, it'll spot it. My 2002 BMW has an indirect system and it's not as smart as that (I don't think) but I love the fact that it's simply crunching available data in a different way.

Ironically, the new direct Miata setup cannot identify to the user WHICH tire is low.

In reply to Keith Tanner :

Mind = blown

In reply to Keith Tanner :

In can, but it won't tell you.  And that's on my minor rant list (as Ford does the same thing)

Actually, the Mazda unit can't. It must have one central antenna, not one at each corner as in my Dodge. If you want to know which one is which, Mazda recommends you set each tire to a different pressure (3 psi increments), drive the car 2 km, then read four PIDs from the car and match them up to the four pressures on your tires. Not that you can do much with this information, but now you know. The TPMS system only knows wheels 1, 2, 3 and 4. Not where they are. 

Confirmed via the wiring diagram, only one antenna. Looks like it's integrated into the same unit as the keyless entry antenna. To be fair, for my Dodge 2500 to run off a single antenna, it would have to be sensitive enough to pick up signals from the ISS. The wheels are much closer together on the Miata 

Jeep had a great solution on their early TPMS implementation.  The learning process involves going around to each of the 5 sensors (including the spare) with a magnet in the specified order.  That way it knew which sensor was where and could properly display the pressures for each of the 5 tires (it didn't just tell you they were low, but it would tell you the exact pressure in 1 PSI increments). 

I think the newer Jeeps still do something similar in terms of display (at least some models), but I don't know if the learning process has changed. 

If it's like the Dodge 2500, the new Jeeps figure it out by location. All you do is put the tires on and start driving, it works everything out. No learning process. Yes, 1 psi increments on the display, I can even tell which side of the truck was towards the sun when I first get in. Good info on a work vehicle that's usually towing. Even better would be if it monitored the trailer tires 

Still, I much prefer a system that crunches info already being measured and does not need $200 worth of sensors every few years. The 2017 Miata has it working, I really wonder why they abandoned it on (some? all?) 2018 Miatas. Apparently only some of the Fiatas got the direct system, some models are still using indirect.

Can a mod change the title of this thread to "ND rumored to get direct TPMS" please?

The TPMS is not rumored, it's a fact! Plus the 2016-17 implementation is really technically interesting.

I've been trying to dig up how legit the power rumor is. I know Mazda really only has enough R&D capacity to work on one major project at a time, and I'm pretty sure the Skyactiv-X is taking it all. So far, no luck in determining anything more.

I have to admit to being slightly disappointed that after daily driving an S2000 for over 18 years, choosing a replacement , like the Miata, may not be as big of an improvement as I had hoped.  I would definitely consider a Flying Miata conversion, but I would certainly have wished for more technological advancement over a nearly 2 decade time frame. Oh well, I'll keep enjoying the S as long as it keeps running. Hedonic adaptation be damned.

mtn said:

I've had an NB and NA8, along with an E30 318. None of them are underpowered. The Twins, which I've test driven three times because they should be perfect for me, are underpowered--actual numbers and times be damned. 

Drive a twin with a tune + header. Driving it back to back with a stock one was eye-opening. I'm CONSTANTLY in the 'dip zone.'

Keith Tanner said:

The TPMS is not rumored, it's a fact! Plus the 2016-17 implementation is really technically interesting.

I've been trying to dig up how legit the power rumor is. I know Mazda really only has enough R&D capacity to work on one major project at a time, and I'm pretty sure the Skyactiv-X is taking it all. So far, no luck in determining anything more.

Given the innovation in Skyactiv-X, I wouldn't be surprised if they have unusually high levels of resources concentrated there.  I wonder though, how many people would a company like Mazda assign to tweaking the head, cams and tune for a low volume vehicle like the miata?  I'm going by recollection, but I thought they had like 10 people assigned to the rotary engine project in the years where no obvious product was forthcoming.  If it costs $150k/year per person x 10 people = $1.5M + say a few million for equipment, facilities and testing, it's might not be horribly expensive.  If the MX5 sells for $30k x 10k units/year, that's $300M/year in revenue.  They probably don't have much of a margin on the MX5, but it might be the kind of anticipated incremental cost involved in a mid-cycle refresh (?).

ORIF said:

I have to admit to being slightly disappointed that after daily driving an S2000 for over 18 years, choosing a replacement , like the Miata, may not be as big of an improvement as I had hoped.  I would definitely consider a Flying Miata conversion, but I would certainly have wished for more technological advancement over a nearly 2 decade time frame. Oh well, I'll keep enjoying the S as long as it keeps running. Hedonic adaptation be damned.

Well, it’s considerably less expensive than the S2000 was and is considerably lighter. Those are both good points. There has been a lot of technological improvement in the engine, the F20C (did I get that right?) couldn’t be sold today and is thirstier than the Miata engine, which is very torquey. I’ve run down S2000s on track in an ND with a stock engine. 

The Honda was a halo car with a spectacular engine. The Miata doesn’t make as much of a overt fuss, but just gets the job done and is more playful on the street. 

I think people tend to forget that the F20C is like 20 years old now, and it was based on an engine even older than that.  There's a lot of modern tech that it is missing.

Blaise said:

Drive a twin with a tune + header. Driving it back to back with a stock one was eye-opening. I'm CONSTANTLY in the 'dip zone.'

It's funny that here in 2018 we still have to deal with a torque dip like the DOHC neon had. 

I test drove a 2016 ND. I had no idea it only had 155hp. It's faster than the power figures suggest. 

The only 2 seat sports cars I enjoyed over the ND were Cayman's. I'd have to think pretty hard if I had to choose between a new ND RF or used 987.2 S

Either Mazda underrated the engine or that driveline is REALLY efficient. They dyno higher at the wheels than they should. Plus it's a great example of area under the curve vs horsepower and also of light weight. The ND soft top is more than 500 lbs lighter than an S2000!

Used Cayman is a great alternative. I've had that thought myself. I'm pretty sure that overall running costs over a decade would be tilted in the Mazda's favor due to parts prices, but...Cayman! The boss actually just got himself a Cayman S of some sort (I don't know the numbers), I'll have to ask him his opinion. Of course, he's barely had a chance to drive our RF because we keep using it for science experiments.

Every time I've talked to my friends in Mazda powertrain, it's always all about a specific engine. They always refuse to talk about future product - it's like a religion - but it's quite clear that they don't split their efforts across multiple powerplants. It's amazing enough that a company the size of Mazda has their own unique engine lineup, and a sophisticated one at that. They also make it quite clear that the "real" Miata is the 1.5 sold overseas. The 2.0 was jammed in the car because Americans can't stand the concept of a smaller engine, and that's probably why it's a little low on the top end (restrictive exhaust manifold due to packaging) and why they're having trouble with the trans staying together. I predict that if the 2019 does come with a stronger engine, it will also have a different trans and that trans will be a popular retrofit to the 2016 cars.

Keith Tanner said:

Even better would be if it monitored the trailer tires 

I added an aftermarket TPMS system to my truck which monitors all 10 tires.  Very useful.