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Manufacturer Technical Specifications
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General
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Country Of Origin
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Japan
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Year Of Introduction
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2008
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Base Price When New
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N.A
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Miles Per Gallon
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N.A
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Body Type
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N.A
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Curb Weight
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N.A
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Powertrain Layout
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torque-split all wheel-drive transmission
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Transmission
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6-speed electronically controlled sport automatic
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Engine
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Configuration
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MZR 2.3 DISI turbo petrol
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Displacement
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N.A
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Power
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450 HP
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Torque
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N.A
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BHP / Liter
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N.A
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BHP / Weight
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N.A
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Redline
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N.A
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Performance
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Top Speed
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N.A
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0 - 62 mph
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N.A
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0 - 100 mph
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N.A
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0 - 250 mile
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N.A
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Skidpad
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N.A
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Braking, 62-0 mph
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N.A
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Slalom Speed
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N.A
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Sponsors
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Wallpaper Gallery: 1600x1200
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Manufacturer Press Release
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PRESS RELEASE
1. Introduction
Nagare Design - A New Expression of Movement
Last year Mazda wowed the show car world with a trilogy of design concepts
that were talked about on three continents. From Europe's Sassou show car
with its unique Shoji design principle and hidden features, to Tokyo Motor
Show's Mazda Senku concept car, winner of the Grand Prix du Plus Beau
Concept Car at the XXIst Festival Automobile International in 2006 in Paris,
to North America's sports car study Mazda Kabura, winner of the Detroit
Motor Show's Aesthetic and Innovation Award _Mazda Motor Corporation wrote
another chapter in its global reputation for eye-catching, Zoom-Zoom
designing.
The new show car season features four concepts from Mazda that express a new
design language called Nagare, (pronounced na-ga-reh) developed by Mazda's
new global design director, Laurens van den Acker. The word Nagare means
"flow" and "the embodiment of movement" in Japanese and applying it to car
design involved analyzing motion itself and how forces like wind and water
move in nature. Natural flow lines are all around us _wind blowing shapes in
sand, wave forms seen from above _and are literally symbolic of movement
itself. Nagare, then, is the application of natural flow to automotive
design that combines surface language and proportion to communicate movement
in a new way.
"Through the success of the current generation of cars, Zoom-Zoom has
managed to focus our company and delight our customers at the same time.
Nagare builds on this newly regained confidence and gives it a unique and
distinctive identity", says Laurens van den Acker.
Its first expressions were the Mazda Nagare concept car presented last
November at the LA Auto Show, and the Mazda Ryuga, which premiered at the
Detroit Motor Show this January. Both Mazda concepts are an evolving
expression of Zoom-Zoom, inspired by the movement of nature's elements
_Mazda Nagare's surface articulation was inspired by geological flow
patterns, and Mazda Ryuga's side body texture was inspired by Karesansui, or
Japanese raked gardens. Both evoke energy and lightness, translated into a
beautiful language of lines and forms that are powerful yet effortless,
simple yet strikingly seductive.
Now Nagare is coming to Europe with this season's third all-new concept car,
the Mazda Hakaze, which was designed at Mazda's European Design Centre near
Frankfurt, Germany. Mazda Hakaze is a compact crossover coupe with roadster
feel. It combines the best attributes of three traditional types of cars.
Part of its roof is removable, which gives a feel similar to a roadster; it
is agile and fun to drive like a compact hatchback, and it has a high hip
point and interior functionality like a compact SUV. It expresses Nagare
"flow" on the outside with sand-dune like surface iteration, and combines
these with shapes from machines that move through water or air. On the
inside, it boasts "flowing"Nagare forms, natural surfaces and insightful
functionality to meet the demands of adventurous lifestyles like
kite-surfing.
"Nagare is expressed in the Mazda Hakaze, not only in the iteration on the
side of the car, but also in a lot of the details," says Peter Birtwhistle,
Chief Designer, Mazda Motor Europe."If you look at things like the execution
of the wheel design, the spokes have a nice flow in terms of the way they
move, the way the surfaces move, the way they integrate into the tyre
design. The interior too. The basic form of the interior is like looking at
sand dunes. It's got all this movement, winds blowing. I find that
inspirational in terms of trying to find a new way of expressing design. Of
course, you have to think about functionality. But Mazda is all about
emotion. And this is emotion."
2. Market Inspiration
A Look at Advanced Product Planning
Cross-Functionality for Concept Development
While the new Mazda Hakaze design concept is a look into a possible future
compact crossover vehicle from Mazda, it is nonetheless a concept rooted in
reality. It meets the unmet needs of a growing compact segment trend towards
SUV-like crossovers in Europe, making it a valid proposal, despite its
futuristic attributes. To ensure Mazda Hakaze and all upcoming concepts from
Mazda Motor Europe are not merely flights of fancy, an Advanced Product
Planning (APP) team was assigned to Mazda Motor Europe's Research and
Development (MRE) centre in late 2004 with cross-functional team members
from design, marketing and engineering.
The APP team was responsible for the initial planning phase of the Hakaze
project. This began with lifestyle and automotive trend research, and
included spending time with"normal"consumers in Germany and the UK, to see
exactly what kind of lifestyles people lead, and what kind of attitudes
these customers have towards their cars. Combined with market data, it
became clear that compact SUVs _ those able to meet emerging and more active
lifestyle trends _will become more popular over the next 10 years.
"Traditional segments in Europe are declining,"said Benno Gaessler, Manager
APP who, along with Stefan Meisterfeld, Assistant Manager APP, was
responsible for analysis and strategy."What the team found was that
potential customers have emotional needs that are unfulfilled. They would
like to drive a coupe, to drive a convertible, to drive a vehicle that is
expressive. But these normally come with a very big price tag and expensive
running costs. How we can fulfil these needs is what Hakaze is all about."
The APP team clearly identified an overall concept that would appeal to
these kinds of customers. It should be just as agile and fun to drive as a
compact hatchback, while offering attributes like open-top driving, a higher
seating position, more sporty driving attributes and a modern, upscale
design.
"What is unique to this vehicle is that its realization was a tightly-knit,
cross-functional effort," says Jose R.G. Santamaria, Director of APP and
Consumer Insights."We have engineering, planning and design professionals
working together as one group. From this point of view, Hakaze is the first
of this new and effective process of future development."
After identifying the key attributes of the new concept, the APP team turned
the plan over to two cross-functional members of the team - a designer and a
packaging engineer. Together, they worked to develop a vehicle concept that
meets the needs of the target customer mentioned above, while making sure it
stayed true to C-segment hatchback values. This robust process at the
beginning of development was a major asset to the actual designers of the
Mazda Hakaze, when they took over realization of the project at a later
stage.
3. Exterior Design
The Compact Crossover Coupe with Roadster Feel
In Japanese, the word Hakaze (pronounced Hah-kah-zay) comes from "ha" for
"leaf" and "kaze" which means "wind," a fitting combination for a vehicle
that looks like it is effortlessly cutting through the air while standing
still. Mazda Hakaze has very compact proportions. At 4,420 mm, it is roughly
the same length (+15 mm) as the Mazda3 hatchback _ which ensures agile,
sporty handling _ but is wider (1,890 mm, + 135 mm), and taller (1,560 mm, +
95 mm) with a high seating position, a very large glass area and large
suspension travel _all attributes usually associated with a C-segment SUV.
This insightful package is clothed in a modernistic body work with no door
handles and no mirrors _ exterior cameras replace these _very compact
proportions and flowing major feature lines and side textures that create a
muscular and taught look. Mazda Hakaze has no B-pillar either and the rear
two-thirds of the glass roof can be taken off in two parts and stored in a
slide-out compartment in the rear bumper. Lowering the car's four frameless
windows then converts the concept into a fun to drive, four-seat coupe with
roadster feel.
Mazda Hakaze's exterior design was a cooperative effort from the same
successful duo that designed the Mazda Sassou, presented at the 2005
Frankfurt Motor Show: Mickael Loyer, whose design was selected this time for
the final proposal, assisted by Luca Zollino."The design team took
inspiration from sports and outdoor activities in the wind or in the water
giving the sensation of being free and allows us to break boundaries," says
Mickael Loyer,"like kite-surfing, flying, diving, driving a jet-ski or a
motorbike. We were looking for shapes moulded by natural elements, and how
the wind shapes the sand is a key element in the exterior design of this
concept."
At the front, they pushed forward the design idea of the Mazda Sassou _with
a large grille design that has chevron-shaped front indicators and
headlights _to which they added Nagare flow lines. At the rear of the car, a
unique illumination system is used with light flowing directly into the
lower part of the rear window. Because the rear lights have flowing shapes
integrated into the design here, this creates an impression of floating
light. Mazda Hakaze's silhouette features Nagare flow lines at the front of
the door panel, with a visual link to the front of the car created by a line
falling over the top of the front wheel well and into the side panel. These
are combined with a rising beltline extended into the hatchback door, a
steeply angled windshield similar to Mazda's crossover SUV CX-7 and a roof
line that gives Hakaze a modern body shape that integrates the strong look
of a Samurai sword when seen from the side.
All the concept's Nagare flow lines combine to visualize movement by making
it seem as if the wind itself has etched natural flow lines into the carÅLs
surface. Even when parked, Mazda Hakaze looks as if it is moving _as if wind
is blowing over the front wheel wells, down and along the side panels and
across the bottom of the rear window.
Mazda Hakaze not only took its inspiration from Nagare natural flow, but
also from technological objects like helicopters, speed boats, jetfighters.
These are strongly related to flow and examples of human interface to fast
movement through natural elements. The design team combined these kinds of
forms with shapes directly moulded by flow in sand and water. Examples of
this are Hakaze's glass roof cockpit and its 20-inch wheel design. The
wheels use a mixture of forms inspired by sand dunes and propeller shapes to
express flow and movement _including extensions of the spoke design into the
tyre rubber bordering the wheel _and adds a three-dimensional depth to lend
Mazda's new show car a modern sophistication.
"The Hakaze is an agile yet tough coupe that takes you wherever you want to
go,"says Luca Zollino. "Its design is also unique because of the
unconventional shape of its hatch. The continuity of the beltline through
the hatch allows us to close all the volumes above it: this together with a
very angled and long windscreen enhances the compactness of its
proportions."
Exterior Colour and Materials – Nagare Surface Treatment enhanced by "flop"
technique
Mazda Hakaze's exterior forms are combined with colours, materials and
surface treatment that also express Nagare flow. A desert image is the
source for its golden colour, reminiscent of a desert at sunset.
"The exterior colour was selected to support the surface language, its
articulation and its texture," says Maria Greger, Senior Designer for Colour
and Materials,"so that the whole surface impression is one of natural flow.
We want to have a feeling of sand. So if you look closer at the colour, you
see small particles like sand."
The natural look to the exterior surface was further underscored by
employing a"flop"technique in the colour treatment of all panels that are
bent at an angle to form two sections with a smooth edge between them. The
paint used for such panels was designed to give the upper part of the panel
a more transparent feel, which is created by a transparent layer over the
colour. Then the colour"flops"over towards a darker impression below the
edge, an effect achieved by additives to the paint and by a slightly
different use of particles in the paint. The final effect is similar to a
sand dune or a wave in sand, which is lighter above and darker below.
4. Interior Design
A Natural Environment
The interior of the Mazda Hakaze is a triumph of form, texture and
functionality. Its two large, pop-up doors are keyless, one-touch and give a
wide opening into one of its four bucket seats. Once inside, Hakaze's
interior gives an intense open feeling, even with the roof on. The
windscreen extends to behind the front occupants, creating an enormous
viewing angle. The A-pillar dives into the instrument panel just in front of
the door, making this feeling even stronger.
"Nagare is visible on the interior in the main surfaces, which are a
combination of gently flowing volumes with edges that slowly fade away,"says
Jo Stenuit, Assistant Chief Designer who, along with Masato Ogawa, Lead
Designer from Hiroshima, designed Mazda Hakaze's interior."Inspiration was
taken from a dune landscape with the technical parts, like the steering
column, being pushed into the surface like a shell that is partly covered in
sand on the beach. Also the textures follow this gentle flow of form in a
natural manner. All this creates a sensual feeling for the interior and
makes sitting in Hakaze like sitting in a natural environment."
The interior design, and especially the instrument panel, is asymmetrical
with a strong focus on the driver. The wrap-around cockpit features a long
steering unit that gives a feeling of sportiness and depth. It has
orange-lit meters on each side of the steering wheel _speedometer and
tachometer _and in the centre of the steering column is an LCD screen with
navigation information, images from the car's rear view and side cameras and
warning indicators _all of which give an enhanced feeling of control to the
driver. The centre of the steering wheel is fixed, only the rim and the
lower arm can rotate.
There are also unique sliding controls to the right of the driver on the
centre console, which follow the three illuminated lines in the surface.
These lines have a dune wave design to make it easy for the driver to slide
his finger up or down along the surface. Doing so adjusts seat positions,
heating, audio and multimedia devices, with light below the surface moving
up or down with the finger. The wave strip furthest from the driver has the
controls for the car's hard disc drive multimedia system and an LCD screen
that electrically rises up and out of the dashboard surface on the passenger
side. This screen can be turned by hand so the driver can also see it when
the car is parked.
Data can be transferred to and from the car's computer with a personal"data
shell", which is a further development of the USB stick concept used on the
Mazda Sassou design car.
It is a wireless device that allows the driver to open the car simply by
carrying it in his pocket, and also allows him to save his personal driving
settings and data from his home computer (route, music, movies). After
getting in the car, the driver pushes the switch on the side of the"data
shell"causing the connector to pop out (in way similar to a key). This he
sticks into a designated slot in the centre console and it automatically
downloads the stored information wireless using Bluetooth® technology and
provides ignition. Once in place, the"data shell"also functions as the gear
shift lever for the concept's automatic gearbox. Mazda Hakaze concept also
has a wireless charging pad located in the glove box (also using Bluetooth®)
to recharge the batteries of a mobile phone, PDA, camera or MP3 player. This
insightful solution does away with annoying cables hanging everywhere, and
keeps the device out of view and safe while it recharges automatically.
All of Mazda Hakaze's seats are mounted on the centre tunnel and are
electrically adjustable, sliding fore and aft. For more room in the boot,
the rear seats slide forward with their lower cushions under the front
seats, which give ample space in the hatch for all kinds of gear necessary
for a day at the beach. With the windows down and the top off, there is a
true roadster feel wherever you happen to be sitting in the car.
Interior Colours and Materials
"We want the interior to be a heightened touch experience full of
natural-feeling surfaces. Natural in the sense that you come to the car and
you have one impression. When you look a second time, you see new things
happening everywhere,"says Luciana Silvares, Designer for Colour and
Materials who, along with Maria Greger, designed the colours and materials
for Mazda Hakaze.
The colour scheme on the inside of Mazda Hakaze was chosen to enhance the
natural flow forms and to underscore the car's kite-surfing functionality.
They reflect the ocean, continuing the beach and dune theme, with the floor
a dark brown, the trim, dashboard, doors and centre panel a greenish beige,
the four seats in a deep blue. This is combined with unique texturing of
materials meant to enhance the Nagare flow strategy with natural feeling
surfaces and patterns. Many of the concept's interior materials are grained
using new Flotek® technology, which can create different textures on a
single surface. Before, materials had to be embossed using the same
repeating patterns. With this new graining technology, the Colour and
Material's team was able to make asymmetrical and creatively-patterned
surfaces that mimic natural irregularities.
The floor, for instance, is made of soft, natural leather _great for bare
feet just off the beach _embossed in a flow pattern with a patina of various
textures and slight imperfections that give a natural feel compared to
artificially homogeneous material like carpet. The dashboard also has a
special grain over it that feels sandy in some places and has line texture
in others, which enhances the flowing Nagare forms by making them not only
look natural, but feel natural as well.
This touch experience also extends to the seats of Mazda Hakaze, which are
made of smooth, high-tech leather with a surface coating to make them feel
similar to the material used for wet suits, but with a higher quality. The
driver's seat is surrounded in a cocoon-like cockpit and continues the
kite-surfer appeal with wet suit stitching and badging in orange Kanji
script, while the other three seats have water droplets printed on them for
a wet and wild look. The result of all these efforts is a very interactive,
even sensual interior surfacing where passengers can discover new touch
sensations every time they get into the car.
5. Powertrain & Chassis
Ready for Off-road Fun
The Mazda Hakaze design concept has been conceived to be equipped with
either a powerful DISI* petrol engine or a diesel engine. The MZR 2.3-litre
DISI petrol is a high-performance turbocharged engine with direct injection
that is coupled to Mazda's active torque-split all-wheel drive transmission.
This is Mazda's latest MZR petrol powertrain technology and is an ideal
match to the adventurous and fun nature of Mazda Hakaze. It delivers high
torque and power, 6-speed sport automatic transmission and beach-ready
four-wheel drive traction.
Combined with Mazda Hakaze's aerodynamic shape and lightweight body, the
engine would not only be fun to drive, but would also use acceptable amounts
of petrol. It has MacPherson front struts and multi-link rear suspension for
agile, Zoom-Zoom handling, whether at the beach or in the city.
* Direct Injection Spark Ignition
6. Technical Data
Dimensions Overall length 4420 mm
Overall width 1890 mm
Overall height 1560 mm
Wheelbase 2650 mm
Seating capacity 4
Boot volume 400 l
Engine Type MZR 2.3 DISI turbo petrol
Transmission Type 6-speed electronically controlled sport automatic gearbox.
Mazda's active torque-split all wheel-drive transmission
Tyres & Wheels Type Dunlop 255/50 R 20
20'' x 9 J |
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