4 ms·

And not just the Miata! Almost every Mazda is the best handler in its class. It’s somewhat tragic they don’t sell as well as they should. They are objectively b

by tinbad 9y ago

And not just the Miata! Almost every Mazda is the best handler in its class. It’s somewhat tragic they don’t sell as well as they should. They are objectively better in many ways. It’s one of those that having an objectively superior product is not a guarantee to perform well in the market. I truly hope Mazda will be around for many decades to come.

busterarm 9y ago
The truth is that most car buyers do not want "objectively better". They want a mobile appliance that they spend no effort to maintain and won't take a significant loss on the resale. The want the Toyota Corolla (now Camry these days). For most people it is the correct buying decision, though driving a Mazda may convert them.
- haecceity 9y ago
  I'm looking to buy a new car. How do you measure goodness of a model of car objectively?
  - bovermyer 9y ago
    There are way too many factors for there to be any single objective way to measure quality of a vehicle. Personally, I look for an aggressive appearance, good utility in bad weather, and (now) plenty of cargo space. I'm less concerned about safety and reliability, though obviously I don't want to be driving a deathtrap with loads of maintenance costs. To sanity-check the latter, I look at https://www.carcomplaints.com/ https://www.carcomplaints.com/ .
    - mikepurvis 9y ago
      Out of curiosity, what drives the "plenty of cargo space" requirement? We're a family with three kids and bought a 6-seat Mazda 5 this year as our only car, on the theory that it has almost no trunk space, but mostly we're just bombing around town doing grocery runs anyway. In cases of cargo moving (dump dropoff, IKEA pickup, Home Depot), it's typically adult-only trips, so it's really just vacation that's the case where we need a full load of both passengers and cargo. Since vacation is only a few times a year, we figured we'd optimize for the common case and plan to rent a larger van for those instances if necessary, or look at other alternatives, such as a roof box, trailer, whatever.
      - bovermyer 9y ago
        For my fiancée and me, we need cargo space for two primary use cases: 1. short-distance hauling of large objects and/or numerous objects, and 2. road trips. It's the frequency of both that encourages the purchase of a large vehicle rather than the rental of one.
  - pwaai 9y ago
    I'd say for new folks I highly recommend Doug Demuro's youtube channel. Unlike other car reviews that focus on the high end market, I like how he still focuses on extreme details around ergonomics to performance and look. It's the only rating system where I trust. If you are look for value go with a Hyundai. And I'm not saying this because I'm Korean (or the fact that my birth city is known as Republic of Hyundai due to their reach into every economic sector) but it just doesn't make sense to pay for a Toyota or Honda badge when all the stuff Hyundai gives you included with base costs extra at other dealership. Especially now with the release of i30N (possibly coming to N.A.), built by the guys who brought you Audi and Lamborghini cars (basically an Audi), it's hard to shrug off Hyundai for the extra options and value they include for the base price of competitors. TLDR: You want to go from A to Z for the best bang for your buck. Having said that, stay away from KIAs if possible. No Korean I know will ever defend it.
    - ilikepi 9y ago
      > I'd say for new folks I highly recommend Doug Demuro's youtube channel. Unlike other car reviews that focus on the high end market, I like how he still focuses on extreme details around ergonomics to performance and look. Are you talking about this channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsqjHFMB_JYTaEnf_vmTNqg/videos https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsqjHFMB_JYTaEnf_vmTNqg/vid... I'm guessing not, since it seems to be almost entirely focused on the high end market. Does he have another channel or something? What am I missing? My preferred channels are Alex on Autos[1] and sometimes saabkyle04[2]... [1]: https://www.youtube.com/user/TTACVideo/ https://www.youtube.com/user/TTACVideo/ [2]: https://www.youtube.com/user/saabkyle04/ https://www.youtube.com/user/saabkyle04/
  - munchbunny 9y ago
    You can't really measure it objectively because your reason for buying a car won't be someone else's reason. The most important question is "what are you using the car for?" Most people don't need a car that's fun to drive, they need a car that is safe, reliable, seats X number of people (depending on family size, carpooling, etc.) gets them and their stuff from point A to point B consistently (differs if you ski, or are a contractor, etc.), and does it at a minimum annual cost once maintenance, gas, insurance, etc. are factored in. If you drive for fun or race, then reliability isn't your biggest concern, and you probably don't care whether it has more than two seats or any semblance of trunk space. You're going to care mainly about performance metrics. And then there's aesthetics - which again depends on how much you care about those things.
  - hutzlibu 9y ago
    You don't. It is subjective, to your personal use-case.
    - dj-wonk 9y ago
      The choice of values (what to measure) certainly has many subjective components. That said, a good chunk of people tend to value (to some degree or another): cost of ownership, reliability, fuel economy, performance, appearance, seating/cargo capacity, and resale value. Many of these criteria can be measured, more-or-less, in objective ways. Some criteria tend to vary more across individuals (such as appearance or driver "feel"). I mention this because if a person states their preferences across the attributes they value in a vehicle, it is quite feasible to have a detailed (if not "objective" then at least a rather neutral-point-of-view) discussion about the matching set of vehicles and what they offer across the dimensions.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- mikekchar 9y ago
  My first car was an early generation MX3. As well has been incredibly fun to drive and also practical (it had a rear hatch), it was practically indestructible. I literally spent no effort to maintain it. Additionally, Mazda (at the time) had the interesting idea of introducing cars a low price and then increasing the price every year. This kept the resale price high. I suspect that historically Mazda made a mistake of pricing their cars too low. The Toyota Corolla appealed to NA buyers because it was seen as a "good" car. Mazda cars, in comparison, were seen as "cheap" cars.
- JohnBooty 9y ago
  My wife has a Corolla. It's completely fine. It's so functional and inoffensive that I think they should simply call it the Toyota Car or something. That's not even an insult, exactly. It's just that... functional. I have a Mazda 3. It is honestly a driver's car. Not in terms of raw performance. But I've been driving it since 2008 and it is still a joy to drive every single day. (It's matched the Corolla for reliability, too! Aside from the damn wheels. 17" rims with low profile tires = rims perpetually getting banged out of whack by potholes. Annoying, but not exactly a mechanical issue with the drivetrain)
  - busterarm 9y ago
    There are many times while daily driving the RX7 that I thought I should have just gotten a Corolla. It's an absolutely fantastic car. But then I'm driving again and the smile is ear to ear.
skolos 9y ago
Major decision factor in buying a car for me is a reliability scores. Mazda's models usually quite low on those scores.
- BeetleB 9y ago
  I was about to say the same. Whenever I buy a used car I check and Mazda is never near the high end.
- lloeki 9y ago
  > Mazda's models usually quite low on those scores I distinctly recall Mazda topped reliability charts in Germany (ADAC? TÜV report? memory fails me) a couple years ago.
faultyerwin 9y ago
> It’s somewhat tragic they don’t sell as well as they should. They are objectively better in many ways. Mazda is basically loosing all comparisons tests in Europe. They do not beat competition with economy or performance. Build quality is also not the best. https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/vergleichstest/golf-octavia-focus-mazda-3-astra-schlaegt-der-focus-die-nummer-1-9129644.html https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/vergleichstest/golf-octa...
chadcmulligan 9y ago
I'm on my 2nd Mazda (technically 3rd - had a ford laser which was a sub license of some sort of the Mazda 6 (or 3?)). They require very little maintenance, don't seem to have any problems, service is great, they are great cars.

by tinbad 9y ago

busterarm 9y ago

The truth is that most car buyers do not want "objectively better". They want a mobile appliance that they spend no effort to maintain and won't take a significant loss on the resale. The want the Toyota Corolla (now Camry these days). For most people it is the correct buying decision, though driving a Mazda may convert them.

haecceity 9y ago
I'm looking to buy a new car. How do you measure goodness of a model of car objectively?
- bovermyer 9y ago
  There are way too many factors for there to be any single objective way to measure quality of a vehicle. Personally, I look for an aggressive appearance, good utility in bad weather, and (now) plenty of cargo space. I'm less concerned about safety and reliability, though obviously I don't want to be driving a deathtrap with loads of maintenance costs. To sanity-check the latter, I look at https://www.carcomplaints.com/ https://www.carcomplaints.com/ .
  - mikepurvis 9y ago
    Out of curiosity, what drives the "plenty of cargo space" requirement? We're a family with three kids and bought a 6-seat Mazda 5 this year as our only car, on the theory that it has almost no trunk space, but mostly we're just bombing around town doing grocery runs anyway. In cases of cargo moving (dump dropoff, IKEA pickup, Home Depot), it's typically adult-only trips, so it's really just vacation that's the case where we need a full load of both passengers and cargo. Since vacation is only a few times a year, we figured we'd optimize for the common case and plan to rent a larger van for those instances if necessary, or look at other alternatives, such as a roof box, trailer, whatever.
    - bovermyer 9y ago
      For my fiancée and me, we need cargo space for two primary use cases: 1. short-distance hauling of large objects and/or numerous objects, and 2. road trips. It's the frequency of both that encourages the purchase of a large vehicle rather than the rental of one.
- pwaai 9y ago
  I'd say for new folks I highly recommend Doug Demuro's youtube channel. Unlike other car reviews that focus on the high end market, I like how he still focuses on extreme details around ergonomics to performance and look. It's the only rating system where I trust. If you are look for value go with a Hyundai. And I'm not saying this because I'm Korean (or the fact that my birth city is known as Republic of Hyundai due to their reach into every economic sector) but it just doesn't make sense to pay for a Toyota or Honda badge when all the stuff Hyundai gives you included with base costs extra at other dealership. Especially now with the release of i30N (possibly coming to N.A.), built by the guys who brought you Audi and Lamborghini cars (basically an Audi), it's hard to shrug off Hyundai for the extra options and value they include for the base price of competitors. TLDR: You want to go from A to Z for the best bang for your buck. Having said that, stay away from KIAs if possible. No Korean I know will ever defend it.
  - ilikepi 9y ago
    > I'd say for new folks I highly recommend Doug Demuro's youtube channel. Unlike other car reviews that focus on the high end market, I like how he still focuses on extreme details around ergonomics to performance and look. Are you talking about this channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsqjHFMB_JYTaEnf_vmTNqg/videos https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsqjHFMB_JYTaEnf_vmTNqg/vid... I'm guessing not, since it seems to be almost entirely focused on the high end market. Does he have another channel or something? What am I missing? My preferred channels are Alex on Autos[1] and sometimes saabkyle04[2]... [1]: https://www.youtube.com/user/TTACVideo/ https://www.youtube.com/user/TTACVideo/ [2]: https://www.youtube.com/user/saabkyle04/ https://www.youtube.com/user/saabkyle04/
- munchbunny 9y ago
  You can't really measure it objectively because your reason for buying a car won't be someone else's reason. The most important question is "what are you using the car for?" Most people don't need a car that's fun to drive, they need a car that is safe, reliable, seats X number of people (depending on family size, carpooling, etc.) gets them and their stuff from point A to point B consistently (differs if you ski, or are a contractor, etc.), and does it at a minimum annual cost once maintenance, gas, insurance, etc. are factored in. If you drive for fun or race, then reliability isn't your biggest concern, and you probably don't care whether it has more than two seats or any semblance of trunk space. You're going to care mainly about performance metrics. And then there's aesthetics - which again depends on how much you care about those things.
- hutzlibu 9y ago
  You don't. It is subjective, to your personal use-case.
  - dj-wonk 9y ago
    The choice of values (what to measure) certainly has many subjective components. That said, a good chunk of people tend to value (to some degree or another): cost of ownership, reliability, fuel economy, performance, appearance, seating/cargo capacity, and resale value. Many of these criteria can be measured, more-or-less, in objective ways. Some criteria tend to vary more across individuals (such as appearance or driver "feel"). I mention this because if a person states their preferences across the attributes they value in a vehicle, it is quite feasible to have a detailed (if not "objective" then at least a rather neutral-point-of-view) discussion about the matching set of vehicles and what they offer across the dimensions.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
mikekchar 9y ago
My first car was an early generation MX3. As well has been incredibly fun to drive and also practical (it had a rear hatch), it was practically indestructible. I literally spent no effort to maintain it. Additionally, Mazda (at the time) had the interesting idea of introducing cars a low price and then increasing the price every year. This kept the resale price high. I suspect that historically Mazda made a mistake of pricing their cars too low. The Toyota Corolla appealed to NA buyers because it was seen as a "good" car. Mazda cars, in comparison, were seen as "cheap" cars.
JohnBooty 9y ago
My wife has a Corolla. It's completely fine. It's so functional and inoffensive that I think they should simply call it the Toyota Car or something. That's not even an insult, exactly. It's just that... functional. I have a Mazda 3. It is honestly a driver's car. Not in terms of raw performance. But I've been driving it since 2008 and it is still a joy to drive every single day. (It's matched the Corolla for reliability, too! Aside from the damn wheels. 17" rims with low profile tires = rims perpetually getting banged out of whack by potholes. Annoying, but not exactly a mechanical issue with the drivetrain)
- busterarm 9y ago
  There are many times while daily driving the RX7 that I thought I should have just gotten a Corolla. It's an absolutely fantastic car. But then I'm driving again and the smile is ear to ear.

skolos 9y ago

Major decision factor in buying a car for me is a reliability scores. Mazda's models usually quite low on those scores.

BeetleB 9y ago
I was about to say the same. Whenever I buy a used car I check and Mazda is never near the high end.
lloeki 9y ago
> Mazda's models usually quite low on those scores I distinctly recall Mazda topped reliability charts in Germany (ADAC? TÜV report? memory fails me) a couple years ago.

faultyerwin 9y ago

> It’s somewhat tragic they don’t sell as well as they should. They are objectively better in many ways. Mazda is basically loosing all comparisons tests in Europe. They do not beat competition with economy or performance. Build quality is also not the best. https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/vergleichstest/golf-octavia-focus-mazda-3-astra-schlaegt-der-focus-die-nummer-1-9129644.html https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/vergleichstest/golf-octa...

chadcmulligan 9y ago

I'm on my 2nd Mazda (technically 3rd - had a ford laser which was a sub license of some sort of the Mazda 6 (or 3?)). They require very little maintenance, don't seem to have any problems, service is great, they are great cars.