KEEPING THE FAITH WITH MAZDA’S ROTARY CARS During the 70s, two great love affairs started in my life, although one has been very much more permanent than the other. The first was with the woman to whom I have been married for 34 years, although I had known her since we were toddlers, and the other was with rotary-engined Mazda cars. My wife always says that if she had a metal body and four wheels I would pay her much more attention, which isn’t true. But if she had a rotary engine… (only kidding, dear). It was the PR man who introduced me to motoring writing who also started my enduring fling with these amazing Mazdas. His name was Ray Boyle and when we first met he worked for Ford. He made a casual enquiry at the paper I was training on to seek out the motoring correspondent (there wasn’t one) but I won a free lunch and the promise from Ray of a car for my next holiday. To an impressionable 18 year old that was like being promised the world. I could have had anything from the Ford range but settled for a four door, metallic green Ford Escort 1.3 which some other soul kindly dented for me in a Cornish lane. I was mortified but the Ford people laughed it off. Ray moved to Mazda when it came to Britain and as my paper was in a outwardly prosperous area of Gloucestershire (really it was as blighted by poverty as anywhere else) and there was a very active Mazda dealer in town I ended up spending a month behind the wheel of the new rotary engined Mazda saloons, the older RX-3 and the newer RX-2. At the time, NSU in Germany had been flirting with Felix Wankel’s rotary engine, too. It broke NSU, which was absorbed by Volkswagen, but Mazda persevered with and largely perfected this revolutionary design of internal combustion engine. Today it’s offered in the RX-8, which also happens to be the world’s only four door coupe (forget the Mercedes CLS, as that’s a saloon with a shaved roof). Mazda claims to be the biggest selling sports car brand in the UK, largely thanks to the two seat MX-5, but sports cars fans ignore the RX-8 at their peril. It’s thirsty but superb, a splendid way to kill the planet. The standard car comes with two power outputs, around 190 bhp and just under 230 bhp. That latter car can also be had as the limited run PZ, of which just 800 are being made after development by Prodrive, which has since claimed Aston Martin as its prize from Mazda’s parent, Ford. Any RX-8 is a great steer, although the PZ is the best. As a used bargain it’s going to be rare, and possibly never a bargain at all compared with the others. Settling for the least powerful car won’t disappoint. They all share the same turbine-smooth engine and while they are not the fastest sports car around they are the most individual. What’s more, the four door design (Mazda calls the rear-hinged back doors freestyle, we used to call them suicide) gives easy access to the rear seats, which really can accommodate adults, albeit small ones. The boot’s a decent size, too. The drawback has to be the running costs – these cars like their diet of unleaded and the oil level needs very frequent checking and topping up, the flaw of rotary engines. Service intervals are 12,500 miles and insurance starts at Group 15. You can get an early, least powerful 2003 RX-8 for about £10,500 while the power boost would lift a same age 53 plate car by &3163;1,000, half difference when new. But I would want a newer car, still within Mazda’s three year warranty for reassurance, so a 55 plate 230 bhp at £16,300 would be the car for me. Maurice Hardy