Mazda2 Thread

Max, you & I are in the same boat. I'm torn between both wheels. I like the 6UL a lot but not sure if I want the "murdered out" look as the car is black.

6UL $130 • 15x7 • +36 offset • 11.3 lbs • 4x100 • Low pressure cast monoblock construction • T6 heat treated • 67.1mm center bore • Double valve design • JWL approved • Semi-Matte Black painted, durable clear coated finish • Color matched black cap included • Valves not included • Uses standard 60° conical seat lugs Fits 195/50 , 205/50 , 215/45 , 225/45 , 225/50 tire

C1 $90 Front and Rear • Size: 15x7 • Offset: +42mm • Backspacing: 5.70" • Bolt Pattern: 4-100 • Rec. Tire Size: 185/55-15 • Weight: 12.8lbs. • Finish: Light Grey Painted • Construction: 1 Pc. Gravity Cast • Finish Warranty: 1 Year • Manufactured in China

My vote is for the 6UL's

PseudoSport wrote: My vote is for the 6UL's

That color scheme reminds me of this Mazda....

I like the 6UL's better but I can understand not wanting the played-out "Murdered Out" look.

You guys are making me feel all bad about my steelies, I do so want a set of 6UL's.
In other news, I put a zip tie around the drivers side strut shaft to see how much travel I was using in a normal drive. I didn't do anything wacky, just driving the kids to school and then back and forth to preschool. Everything felt normal. The zip tie is now up inside the bump stop. Quite far in fact. I'm not sure I can get it back out without disassembling the strut. It seems that the 2 is like a lot of cars and uses it's bump stops as a sort of progressive spring in normal every day driving. The fact that you never feel it says that Mazda did a fine job with the engineering. I suspect that the rear bump stop comes into play as well, but it's much softer than the front which means.....I don't know exactly. I suspect that the front rate rises faster than the rear (much harder bump stop) which means that the harder you're cornering the stiffer the front is in relation to the rear, and the more under steer you'll have. Maybe. I think there's some tuning that could be played with in this regard for pretty cheap.

PseudoSport wrote: My vote is for the 6UL's

This belt line is interesting, especially considering that it does not use any of the body lines of the car but it still works very well.

I'm really digging this thread. I think I may just have to swing by the Mazda dealership this evening to drive another one....

poopshovel wrote:

EvanB wrote: They look good with 6ul wheels.

SOLD!!! Holy berkeley. That's the first one I've seen that I liked the looks of. Contemplating Fit trade-in....

anybody know what springs those are? the wheelwell proportions look right on to my eye though the tires look a tad fat (if thats really possible..)

H&R springs, here is the thread: http://clubroadster.net/vb_forum/showthread.php?t=50221

I believe those wheels and tires are for her LS6 Miata and she just put them on to see how they would look. That would explain the fat tires.

In reply to WilberM3:

Or you can drive mine.

WilberM3 wrote: though the tires look a tad fat (if thats really possible..)

The tires being that way make it look better IMO.

MA$$hole wrote: In reply to WilberM3: Or you can drive mine.

sure man i'd love to. you should come up to Devens on the 29th for the next BMW autocross. if you bring a helmet (they have loaners but theyre a little smelly sometimes) you can catch rides with anyone who'll have you.

I saw a pic somewhere of silver 6uls on a gray 2 and they do look pretty great on it. I wish you guys hadn't put the idea in my head, haha, I'm gonna end up spending $160 extra when I finally get wheels.

In reply to WilberM3:

I usually work the p/t job on Sunday's. We can figure something out.

More on bumpstops. I'm not sure how important this is but I want to get it written down just in case it is at some point.
The front bump stop is a FoMoCo part. It measures about 62mm long and it's quite a lot firmer that the rear. It looks like a pretty simple cone, but it's not, the first half inch or so is a double cone. The outside tapers all the way up and has those grooves in it, but the inside also tapers for the first half inch from a fair amount wider than the shaft down to shaft size. The nose of the bump stop is really like a knife edge, not rounded like it looks. In normal driving, a zip tie around the shaft is pushed up into the bump stop showing that even at street speeds with a bit of spirited cornering the car is using the bumps as part of the suspension.

On to the rear. At the rear we have a very tall very soft bump. It's about 132mm tall and the narrow end is stuck in the plastic shock boot which can be pried off without too much effort. This is also a FoMoCo part. The bump stop sits nicely in a metal cup that's part of the shock mount. The plastic shock boot makes impossible to do the zip tie trick because you don't have access to the shock shaft. However, if you leave the bump out of the cup, it will have been pushed back in during normal driving indicating that you're running into that during your regular driving as well.

What does this all mean? Hard to say. The longer softer bump in the rear makes sense for a couple of reasons. The first is that the motion ratio in the rear is about 1.3 because the shock is way out behind the hub. The front ratio is .95 or there about, normal strut stuff. The back moves more, and needs less force against it, longer, softer. The other part is that you have the opportunity to stuff 600 lbs of friends and their stuff in the back seat and hatch area and that's ALL directly over the rear axle. That's more than the springs can handle, that's the bump stops job.
Again, what does this all mean? When you're under braking and turning into a corner you're on the front bump stops and the spring rate has gone from whatever it is normally to whatever is plus the bump rate, it's getting high. On top of that, if you have stickier tires and you can brake/turn harder, it's even higher which is upsetting your front/rear spring ratio and contributing to understeer on corner entry. (probably) Now off brakes, onto throttle, still in the corner and you're less on the bumps in the front, and now on them in the rear and your front/rear spring balance has changed again. Neutral (ish) in the corner! Yay! Thankfully we don't have enough power to move balance rearward to mess up corner exit. Boo.
I suspect that because the bumps are designed into the suspension then we have the opportunity to mess with them and change stuff. Exactly what we're supposed to do and how we're supposed to do it I don't know yet. I think it's going to involve a lot of reading and making assumptions and then testing them to see if it works. I'd like to mess with the fronts first, but that involves disassembling the struts to make changes and that's not really that much fun, so I might start with the rear.

The fact that they're FoMoCo parts raises an interesting point, by the way. Hearsay has it that our stock suspension is identical to the "sport" setup you can buy from Ford Racing for the Fiesta. I wonder if the whole setup is actually made by them.

Showin' my GRM pride on the 2!

Representin' my favorite magazine with the license plate frame. by MaxArcher, on Flickr

Max_Archer wrote: The fact that they're FoMoCo parts raises an interesting point, by the way. Hearsay has it that our stock suspension is identical to the "sport" setup you can buy from Ford Racing for the Fiesta. I wonder if the whole setup is actually made by them.

It would be a reasonable assumption that everything suspension on the car is FoMoCo. The really odd thing about that, is that someone (Corksport maybe?) on the Mazda247 forum claims that the spring seats on the struts between them are different so you can't swap springs between the two with stock shocks. That's nutty.

Cleaning out the car and thinking of adding height to the dead pedal area on the floor and wondering how to attach it. A little investigation shows that the dead pedal is really a carefully shaped block of foam held in place by the carpet. Mazda cares enough to add in the dead pedal for our driving enjoyment. I love you Mazda. There are also two threaded holes just up and to the left of there that should work nicely to hold a taller dead pedal in place. Project for next week.

Interesting that the dead pedal is just foam. I was thinking I'd like to put an aftermarket one there, mostly because I don't want to wear the carpet out and it has a foot on it more of the time than any other part of the floor.

Did your Sport not come with mats or are they just out of the car?

On another subject, I was at a big Mazda meet at Dublin Mazda near SF, and talked with the owner for a while. He mentioned that his guys can order the B-Spec parts individually instead of as a kit. Anybody here interested in trying the B-Spec suspension on their car?

The mats were out for a good vacuuming. Dirt is heavy. Because race car. I'm very interested in the b-spec suspension bits. I was wondering what their prices would be through Mazda Racing. I need to join.

I apologize if this was addressed, I didn't read the whole thread, but why not Fiesta? They are the same thing with 20 more hp right? Has anybody spent time with both that can compare them? Thanks.

Yes, I think that all of the Mazda 2 owners did. It weighs a lot more. The 20 hp is totally lost. The Mazda 2 chassis tuning is much taunter than the Fiesta. Also, the simplicity of this car is perfect.

Thanks singleslammer. That makes sense.

it really is funny how different they are even though they are "the same"

Also cost, the 2 is cheaper.