In 2020, under the shadow of the epidemic, the Mazda brand also celebrated its 100th birthday. As a small automobile company, in this special year, in addition to celebrating birthdays, Mazda actually did not have an easy time at all. In order to save money, Mazda has announced that it will not launch major new cars until March 2022.
Now, the two-year period has arrived, and Mazda has not reneged on its promise, officially releasing the new CX-60 model on March 8, which is also the new car released by Mazda after three years since the release of the new generation Mazda 3 in 2019. Along with the new CX-60, there is also a new longitudinal engine platform. This is a very informative new car, and it is also Mazda's first work after turning around for the electric age, so the importance of the new CX-60 is self-evident.
The afterdrive is the soul, and the hybrid is life
It is undeniable that in people's concepts, luxury cars should be rear-drive layouts, and Cadillac's brainwashing advertising slogan "no rear-drive, no luxury" is deeply rooted in the minds of domestic consumers. Obviously, this is just a marketing measure taken by manufacturers to promote it. But the words are not rough, the advanced foundation of the car is not in the sky to tell stories, nor in the first layer of calf skin, but in the mechanical structure and driving mode of the advanced. The rear drive should not be on par with luxury, but the rear drive is definitely one of the criteria for luxury access.
In the history of Mazda, there have actually been many rear-drive models. Whether it is the RX series sports car or the entry-level Funcar MX-5, for Mazda, who was born to pursue sports and is mechanically paranoid, creating a rear-drive car is actually a matter of hand.
But when the whole world thought that this longitudinal rear-drive structure should be placed in a sports car or at least a sedan, Mazda debuted it on a mid-size SUV.
A major highlight of the new CX-60, a new SUV developed for European, Japanese, Australian and other markets, is the new chassis platform, and for the first time, it provides a powertrain of 2.5-liter 4-cylinder PHEV plug-in hybrid and 3.3-liter inline 6-cylinder diesel. The powertrain of the CX-60's early models was mainly in the form of plug-in hybrids, which was officially named e-Skyactiv PHEV.
Attentive friends have noticed that the CX-60 does not carry the long-rumored inline 6-cylinder gasoline engine, which is actually reserved for the higher-positioned Mazda 6 and the flagship CX-80 released in the fall of 2023. At the time of the CX-60's release, Mazda also revealed details about the new inline 6-cylinder engine: the 3.0-litre displacement with Skyactiv-X compression-ignition technology, smooth and silky acceleration, a beautiful exhaust sound and fuel economy comparable to that of a 4-cylinder engine.
Yes, you read that right, Mazda's main purpose with a large displacement straight 6 engine is to save fuel. As a small traditional automobile company, Mazda, which has always loved to study fuel engines, is now facing great problems. On the one hand, the global market environment is becoming more and more unfriendly to pure fuel products, and the tightening policy of continuously increasing the size is also increasing the research and development costs and sales costs of large-displacement engines; on the other hand, under the wave of electrification, investing in pure electric and intelligent requires a lot of capital investment.
Mazda, which does not have rich pockets and is still iron, can only continue to rely on the technological upgrade of gasoline and diesel engines to meet the trend of the times before entering the era of pure EVs.
So, we saw the engine change from 2.0 liters to 3.0 liters (diesel 2.2 liters to 3.3 liters), from 4 cylinders to 6 cylinders. Mazda of the head iron believes that as long as the displacement is large and multi-cylinder, it can effectively reduce the engine load, and at low speeds, it can also burst out more torque, so as to make the driving experience smoother. In order to take care of the diesel vehicle market, the second-generation Chuangchi Blue Sky diesel engine on the CX-60 also introduced DCCI space-controlled pre-hybrid combustion technology, which can reduce the fuel consumption of the CX-60 to about 5L/100km equivalent to the CX-30 level.
In addition to "getting started" with the engine, another major improvement on the CX-60 is the 8AT gearbox. We all know that in order to make the engine output smoother, almost all AT transmissions are equipped with torque converters, which can make the shift smoother, but also reduce the transmission efficiency, Mazda even called it "the black history of the transmission". To this end, an 8-speed gear shift mechanism composed of wet friction plates and four sets of planetary gear sets was born. According to the official statement, Mazda's 8AT gearbox can reduce energy loss by 22% and respond faster than its own 6AT.
Of course, for the Chinese and European markets with high degree of development and popularity of vehicle electrification, Mazda will mainly provide a plug-in hybrid version based on a 4-cylinder gasoline engine, which is the e-Skyactiv PHEV system mentioned above. The system consists of a 2.5L four-cylinder naturally aspirated engine optimized for PHEV and an electric motor with a maximum power of 100 kW, a maximum power of 327 hp, a maximum torque of 500 N·m, and an acceleration time of 0-100 km/h of 5.8 seconds, making it the most powerful production car Mazda has ever produced. If the CX-60 is introduced into China, it will most likely be equipped with this hybrid system. But the problem is that according to Mazda's time node, I am afraid that it will also miss the dividend period of the current domestic PHEV development.
At a time when automakers around the world are exhausting ways to control R&D, production costs, and the transition to electrification, Mazda is doing something that no one else understands. Relying on the funds saved for them by selling a generation of Chuang chi blue sky models in previous years, and the time cost of "no new models in two years", Mazda finally got the rear-drive platform and the pressure burning straight six out.
The perfect Mazda in the eyes of "Horse Powder"
The appearance of the new car makes the CX-60 perfectly present mazda's ideal appearance, and it also attracts a lot of applause. But another problem ensues, which is the high price of the price due to higher R&D and production costs. The CX-60 starts at 47,390 euros in the European market, and for reference, the "predecessor" CX-5 starts at 28,290 euros in the European market, while the BMW X3 entry-level model costs 47,000 euros. The price of the CX-60 and BMW X3 overlaps highly, and from the body size, the CX-60 is almost the same as the BMW X3, and it is also highly overlapping.
That is to say, the CX-60 is already the pricing of the luxury brand mid-size SUVs, and the domestic price should also exceed 400,000 yuan. If that's the price, will anyone really consider Mazda?
I think this problem Mazda should have thought of at the beginning of the transformation, if you want to continue to survive, there are only two ways: either change your positioning and turn to a larger mainstream consumer group; or on the basis of sticking to your own positioning, push the product to the high-end market that is willing to accept Mazda's style.
Apparently, Mazda chose the latter.
In addition to the powertrain mentioned above, Mazda engineers test-drove many of the 1960s cars without power and electronic systems in order to develop new platforms. Mazda wanted to build cars with good basic qualities, not cars armed with electronic systems.
In terms of suspension, the CX-60 uses the front double wishbone, rear multi-link independent suspension structure commonly found in mainstream luxury vehicles, while also providing the I-ACTIVAWD all-wheel drive system, which distributes power to the front and rear axles through an electronically controlled multi-chip clutch. However, Mazda stressed that the CX-60 structural concept is inherited from the MX-5, and the electronic system also uses the KPC (Kinematic Posture Control) motion attitude control technology specially developed for the MX-5, which can control the suspension to make the vehicle have a smoother body posture under different dynamics to improve vehicle stability. For example, when the vehicle decelerates, it provides a "reverse lift" to pull the body down, and when turning under high gravity conditions, it can also apply less braking force to the rear wheels to provide a more stable and balanced dynamic handling performance, once again sublimating the "man-horse" driving experience.
Of course, this "man-horse" driving experience is difficult to feel if it is not really started, and the interior design and layout are the most intuitive reference system for consumers to judge whether a car is luxurious or not. If the interior layout of the Mazda CX-60 is very trendy, I agree, but if there is any sense of premium, I don't see it at all. Nowadays, the suspension central control horizontal screen, full LCD instrument panel, leather and wood grain interior are already the standard of the domestic 200,000 yuan independent brand models. It can only be said that Mazda has achieved self-transcendence in the interior hardware and materials of CX-60, although there are many highlights, but the target group seems to be those hardcore car fans, which may not be able to impress the vast majority of consumers.
Master observation
Apparently, Mazda wants to turn itself into a luxury car brand with a 6-cylinder engine, rear-wheel drive, driving pleasure, and plug-in hybrid layout. With the launch of the new generation of rear-driving CX-60, the atmosphere of public opinion at SKYACTIV was created, which eventually paved the way for Mazda in the era of electrification. Looking at the world, this is the right approach, but if Mazda wants to serve the Chinese market well, it should go to a deep understanding of what kind of new demand for "luxury cars" has for China's young generation of consumer groups.