After Hinting Rotary-Engine Sports Car a "Go," Mazda Confirms It

Another "the Mazda rotary engine returns!" article? We know, we know. Ever since the RX-8's demise, rumors about the rotary's return have been a bit like those endless rumors about the next Corvette going mid-engine. Well, y'know, the Corvette did eventually go mid-engine—it only took a few decades!—and so Mazda President Katsuhiro Mogo's rotary-optimistic comments at the Tokyo Auto Salon earlier this year (as reported by the Japanese outlet Response) and now, more recently, outright confirmed to Carscoops, neither can be totally discounted out of hand.

The gist is that, according to Mogo, the Iconic-SP concept was very well received. Count MotorTrend in that camp, as the sleek coupe concept and its cult-classic rotary engine (even relegated to range-extender duty) captured our imagination. We fantasized about it being a very elegant and striking Miata replacement of sorts, distilling some FD RX-7 energy and some of its styling DNA into an electrified package. Mazda pegs the Iconic-SP's output at 365 total system horsepower, and given its lithe shape and Mazda's penchant for lightweighting, we presume it would weigh little enough for those 365 ponies to provide significant performance.

Carscoops got even firmer news from Mazda design chief Masashi Nakayama, who told the outlet: "This concept is not just one of those empty show cars. It has been designed with real intent to turn it into a production model in the not-so-distant-future."

So, now we know the Iconic-SP will preview some kind of production car—whether that is a new RX sports car, the next-generation MX-5 Miata, or something else remains to be seen. But a more compelling consequence is that the reaction to all this got Mazda's attention, and, according to Mogo, the company's rotary engine development team—which had been inactive for several years—was reconstituted to "get closer to this dream." The dream, of course, is the production version of the Iconic-SP.

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Moto says that 30 engineers will comprise the reconstituted rotary team, and a focus will be figuring out how the rotary will fit into a transition to carbon neutrality. While no one could say Mazda's ahead in the EV race with a straight face, the company has decades of experience running rotary engines on hydrogen. We drove a hydrogen/gasoline dual-fuel RX-8 back in 2009. Mazda's been experimenting with hydrogen rotary series hybrid powertrains since that time, too, putting one in a Japanese-market vehicle sold here as the Mazda 5. A more modern patent hints at an update of this older situation, using the rotary as a range extender. (Possibly a three-rotor, at that!)

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Hydrogen, for its obvious disadvantages, burns clean and can be produced cleanly (if somewhat inefficiently). Even in perhaps the friendliest locale for hydrogen vehicle fueling, it's—to put it bluntly—a massive headache. Even if Mazda builds an exceptionally cool high-performance hydrogen rotary coupe, there's a massive infrastructure challenge ahead.

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That said, it's not guaranteed that Mazda will burn hydrogen in its future rotary. The company merely said that the SP would burn a "carbon-neutral fuel," which could mean several things. Green promises are cheap, so it's up to Mazda's 30 engineers to deliver an engine solution that lives up to the Iconic SP's promise.

This story was originally published January 2024, and has since been updated to reflect Mazda's confirmation that the Iconic-SP concept directly previews a production model coming in the not-so-distant future.