{"id":22499,"date":"2022-05-18T09:03:50","date_gmt":"2022-05-18T13:03:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=22499"},"modified":"2022-05-18T09:03:50","modified_gmt":"2022-05-18T13:03:50","slug":"2022-mazda-mx5-road-test-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=22499","title":{"rendered":"2022 Mazda MX-5 Miata Road Test | Old dog, new trick | Autoblog"},"content":{"rendered":"

Miata fans live by a simple mantra. Whether you\u2019re behind the wheel of a spankin\u2019 new 2022 Mazda MX-5<\/a> or the 1990 Rustpile Edition\u2122 sitting in my garage, one truth unites us all: M.I.A.T.A. \u2014 Miata Is Always The Answer. Sure, it\u2019s exclusionary tribalism with a welcoming smile behind it, but for a long time, it had the benefit of being true. As bargain-priced, rear-wheel-drive models evaporated from the market throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, Miata became the enthusiast\u2019s entry-level car of choice if they wanted rear-wheel drive.<\/p>\n

Even the ho-hum alternatives we take for granted today were fewer and farther between back then. Remember, the DaimlerChrysler partnership didn\u2019t spit out a Challenger<\/a> with a decent V6 until 2011 and we went nearly an entire decade<\/em> without a Camaro<\/a> of any kind. The Honda S2000<\/a>, Nissan 350Z<\/a> and Mazda<\/a>\u2019s own RX-8<\/a> were only inexpensive by 2022 standards; back then, they eclipsed the 4.6-liter V8 Mustang<\/a> GT\u2019s MSRP \u2014 by a lot, in the case of the Honda<\/a>. So, for a long time, your options were Miata, Mustang or making do with front-wheel drive.<\/p>\n

It helps of course that the Miata has always been good. Very good in fact, despite following a formula that most modern car buyers eschew. Light, low and limber \u2014 three terms you\u2019d never use to describe today\u2019s crop of performance SUVs \u2014 were the name of the game then just as they are now. The ND MX-5<\/a> adheres to the formula even better than the intervening NB and NC models did, in fact, but for some reason, Mazda keeps tinkering with it.<\/p>\n

Certainly nobody (apart from owners of 2016-2018 models, maybe) complained a few years ago when Mazda upped the 2.0-liter 4-cylinder\u2019s power output from 155 hp to 181. The 2.0 may not be any more characterful or engaging with another 26 horses, but they\u2019re certainly welcome. Ask any clear-headed Mazda fan how best to describe the manufacturer\u2019s offerings and you\u2019ll hear some variant of \u201coutstanding chassis, acceptable engine.\u201d That\u2019s gone double since the Renesis rotary was discontinued (yeah, they\u2019re as reliable as politicians, but equally entertaining right up until they fail).<\/p>\n

But for 2022, Mazda looked not to the powertrain, but to the chassis for opportunities to improve. Finding none but wanting to do something anyway, Mazda\u2019s engineers came up with new braking<\/a> software that helps mitigate body motion in hard cornering, reducing roll and making steering response more linear. Mazda calls it \u201cKinematic Posture Control<\/a>\u201d (KPC) and it requires no additional hardware to implement \u2014 just what the doctor ordered.<\/p>\n

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While you\u2019re busy doing the business of hustling a Miata around tight corners, KPC will digitally sneak in and drag the inside rear brake juuust a tad. Applying the brake in this fashion will help counter the natural upward movement of the body over it, flattening out the car’s cornering attitude and giving the impression of a firmer suspension setup without the added cost, complexity and ride quality penalty of actually engineering it that way in the first place. If this is ringing a bell to you, it\u2019s very similar to Nissan<\/a>\u2019s \u201cActive Ride Control.\u201d<\/a> Mmm, yes. Nissan Altima<\/a> tech in my RWD roadster. That\u2019s exactly what I wanted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s good,\u201d you say. \u201cMiata Internet told me the ND handles like a yacht, unlike previous Miatas, which are basically race cars.\u201d Hey, I remember my<\/em> first Internet. And I remember when the exact<\/em> same thing was said about the NC. But \u201c4×4 ride height\u201d and \u201cleans like a container ship\u201d are only valid measures of performance in magazine racing world, and let\u2019s make something perfectly clear: body roll has been a product of Mazda\u2019s aforementioned triumvirate of L-words since the very beginning. Yeah, your buddy\u2019s \u201994 R-Package corners like it\u2019s on rails after $3,500 in parts from Flyin\u2019 Miata. Bone-stock, that thing had its inside hip in the air going around every. single. cone.<\/p>\n

Body motion is not inherently bad, it\u2019s merely a tangible expression of a chassis\u2019 weight management characteristics. When Mazda re-jiggered the seating position for the current Miata, the entire point was to put the driver closer to the car\u2019s roll center so that its attitude (as in pitch and yaw, not how smiley the grille is) could be more easily interpreted. This change had the side effect of reducing the Miata\u2019s perceived<\/em> body roll, even though it did very little (not nothing, but we\u2019re not going to dig into that here) to alter the amount of weight transfer taking place.<\/p>\n

How? Go sit on the center of a see-saw while two of your buddies take the good seats. Now, close your eyes. How much is the see-saw moving? While you may feel the rocking motion, your body isn\u2019t ascending or descending. To you, it\u2019s not moving at all. To your friends, it\u2019s moving a great deal. Who\u2019s right? If this were a philosophy class, the answer would be \u201cboth,\u201d but at a performance driving school, you’ll learn that it\u2019s the see-saw\u2019s perspective that ultimately counts.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s because driving fast is all about managing that weight transfer. Whether you\u2019re at the drag strip or chasing cones, being quick is all about putting weight where you want it and not where you don\u2019t. Body roll is the car\u2019s most effective tool for telling you how well you\u2019re managing its weight. Reducing it, whether in practice or merely through perception, is equivalent to reducing the volume of the chassis\u2019 communication system. That\u2019s why you want a roly-poly ride in a big, heavy, unwieldy truck<\/a>; it\u2019s there to tell you where the lines are so you don\u2019t cross them.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, the Miata\u2019s limits are relatively low and approachable \u2014 again, part of the formula \u2014 and it\u2019s highly unlikely somebody upgrading from an earlier ND into a new 2022 is going to overdrive the thing ass-first into oncoming traffic because it\u2019s infinitesimally firmer than the car it replaced. In fact, an experienced \u2018shoe may even be able to wring a couple tenths per lap out of it on their track of choice if Mazda\u2019s claimed limited-slip enhancements actually translate to higher real-world exit speeds, though I\u2019d wonder at what expense to brake longevity.<\/p>\n

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Back-to-back, I\u2019m sure it even makes a perceptible difference on the street. Since I haven\u2019t driven an ND since 2016, I can\u2019t speak to what it does for the handling except to say that it certainly doesn\u2019t detract from the experience. I\u2019d simply argue it wasn\u2019t needed, as the car\u2019s ride\/handling balance was already brilliant. At least there\u2019s no weight penalty; the only cost associated with it is money.<\/p>\n

Where a system like this makes more sense is in Mazda\u2019s new premium-oriented crossovers<\/a>, where similar trickery can actually be useful in the real world. While Kinematic Posture Control is ostensibly exclusive to the 2022 MX-5, Mazda could easily adapt the tech to other applications. We’ve already seen what Mazda’s G-Vectoring Control can do<\/a> to help facilitate front\/rear torque transfer (pitch rather than roll, in other words) with the all-wheel-drive system to improve turn-in and various other parameters. Pairing it with Kinematic Posture Control could provide benefits to both on-road handling and off-road composure \u2014 exactly the sort of jack-of-all-trades stuff consumers think they want from crossovers. That said, I understand why Mazda did this; in fact, the reasons are likely twofold.<\/p>\n

First, as good as the Miata is, it\u2019s a roadster living in what has transformed over the past two decades into a segment of coupes. As modern as the current MX-5 is, it shimmies and shakes in a way the BRZ and GR86<\/a> don\u2019t. And it\u2019s old. Yeah, the BRZ<\/a> and GR86<\/a> are on what amount to carry-over platforms that were first introduced in 2011, but even they are measurably stiffer than their immediate forebears. The MX-5 is comparatively longer in the tooth \u2014 a poor candidate for significant developmental investment but an excellent guinea pig for anything cheap that might help keep sales afloat as it approaches lame-duck status.<\/p>\n

Second, for better or worse, the MX-5 is Mazda\u2019s halo performance car. You can\u2019t go debuting performance upgrades in something like a refreshed CX-30<\/a>; from a marketing perspective, that\u2019s no good. Give it a couple model years and I\u2019ll wager this terminology will have trickled down (dampness spreading between paper towel plies may be a more apt metaphor) to the rest of Mazda\u2019s lineup, both in nature and in name.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, the MX-5 is certainly no worse for it. It may be showing its age, but the little roadster is still as wonderfully engaging and thoroughly pleasing to drive as it has ever been, whether we\u2019re talking about the junky NA I bought in 2008, this 2022, or the various others I\u2019ve owned and sampled in the intervening years. Miata may not always<\/em> be the answer, but it is very frequently mine.<\/p>\n

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