[SkyMan 08]

i was just reading the June Motor Trend and came across an ad for the New MX-5, they were still calling it the MX-5 Miata, I thought they were dropping the Miata name? Then I just looked on the Mazda USA website... they are still calling the 2006 MX-5 the Miata there too...... HMMMM i bet they are aftaid of the Sky and Solstice and the new name for the Miata may not be recognized by former owners and think that mazda has dropped the Miata....

 

[LS2 MN6]

i was just reading the June Motor Trend and came across an ad for the New MX-5, they were still calling it the MX-5 Miata, I thought they were dropping the Miata name? Then I just looked on the Mazda USA website... they are still calling the 2006 MX-5 the Miata there too...... HMMMM i bet they are aftaid of the Sky and Solstice and the new name for the Miata may not be recognized by former owners and think that mazda has dropped the Miata....

I think in print/ads it will still say Miata, but on the car it only says MX-5.

 

[skyster]

the mx5 is a miata no matter if the company dropped eth name or not. also... even though the car was redesigned it still looks old. maybe that was teh way mazda wanted to go but i think its just an old miata for the next gen of owners who want a sporty 2 seater. i'll take the sky over the mx5 anyday of teh year.

 

[brentil]

Mazda is in the process of phasing out the Miata name. It was Miata, now it's the MX-5 Miata, eventually it'll just be MX-5.

 

[skyster]

when did it become so important for companies to go with an alpha-numeric setup then an actual name? BMW and merc started with it but everyone has adopted teh generic meaningless crap. MX-5?! its a miata. RSX?! it is still an integra in japan. even saturn was doing it for a time. the SC2, SC1... you guys get it rite? i said it before, i de-badge my cars but still the car should be named. call me old fashioned but i cant take a car serious when it goes from having a name to some letter followed by a few numbers. im active duty military, i have a hard enough time keeping up with all the alpha numeric things here let alone have then transfer over to the cars and trucks. its good to see some companies have not forgotten that though. even if they are using old skool muscle car names, its still better the G6 or whatever is out rite now. sorry to vent but i get aggrivated about that.

 

[rick112]

Have you seen the thing. I don't mean to bash Mazda or the Miata, but they have ruined the car. It was a nice piece of work and they ruined it. I was thinking about picking up a 2005 (tempting) but the 2006 forget it.

 

[Preston]

Have you seen the thing. I don't mean to bash Mazda or the Miata, but they have ruined the car. It was a nice piece of work and they ruined it. I was thinking about picking up a 2005 (tempting) but the 2006 forget it.

I was about to start off by saying I would never try to do something, and then proceed from there to try and do that very thing. Maybe I should just backup and start over. The first car I ever owned was a '64 MGB. I later bought a '78 MGB (very different from the '64). Anyway I was feeling abandoned when British sportcars disappeared from the American market. When Mazda presented us with the Miata I was pleased. Here was a vehicle missing from the US market to take the place of the "B", Spitfire, etc. Since that time Mazda has been lazy. They haven't invested the effort necessary to fully develop and exploit that market. Now, along comes GM with TWO cars designed to do exactly that. As a result the 06 Miata, or MX-5, whatever, looks like what it is -- a tired and overworked design that has not evolved in over 40 years. That's why it looks "ruined." For that matter, the S2k and the 300Z are not much better. They all suffer from the mindset that a roadster has to look a certain way, be a certain way. The two GM cars show that isn't the case -- and it isn't just the humps. Both these cars enclose, envelop the driver. They give to the driver a feeling of being part of the car. Someone on this forum or the Solstice forum said that these were "personal vehicles." That's what they are.

 

[carbuzzard]

The reason, I believe, that Mazda is officially dropping the Miata name is for consistency across its product line. Mazda, with a few exceptions, has always used alphanumerics for its model designation in the U.S. Note: R100, RX-2, RX-3, RX-4, then RX-5 Cosmo (a revival of the Cosmo 110S sports car that was Mazda's first rotary model), plus 808, 626, even the GLC, even if it stood for "Great Little Car." The prefix "RX" has always meant "rotary engine" in Mazda-speak.

(Side note: Mazda was named after the family name of the company's founder, Jujiro Matsuda. In their ever inscrutible way, the Japanese named the company Mazda because (a) it sounds like Matsuda pronounced Japanese-style and (b) Mazda is the Zoarastrian god of light. Long ago GE used it as a brand name on light bulbs. True. You can look it up).

Anyway, the Miata, when it was introduced was the MX-5 Miata, but was called the MX-5 everywhere but the U.S. And the name was fine, except that it had little carryover to the rest of the line. People knew that the car was a Miata, but didn't know that it was a Mazda. So while it was the top selling sports car in history (again, you can look it up), it didn't have any coattails for the rest of the Mazda line.

So now Mazda will slowly wean the MX-5 from its Miata moniker and hope that MX-5 and RX-8 have some resonance with the Mazda3, Mazda5, Mazda6, etc. Speaking of which, I feel silly saying Mazda Mazda6. Whose idea was THAT anyway?

 

[kingarthur]

I heartily agree with the poster who doesn't care for meaningless alphanumeric nomenclatures when it comes to model designations. The
German cars started the whole business, if I'm not mistaken. Possibly
the reason was that any name they chose would have to be different in the various countries they sell to, whereas a few meaningless characters and digits translate the same - because they don't have any meaning to being with. People can remember meaningfull names far more easilly than random
alphanumeric strings.

 

[Fformula88]

Officially the car is just "MX-5" already.

Mazda is still using the Miata name some of it's advertising so people realize that the MX-5 is indeed the next Miata (or Miata replacement if you prefer).