The Mazda Miata and Fiat 124 Spider: The future of platform sharing?
Richard Truett
October 25, 2016 AutoNews.com
The Fiat 124 Spider is a rare car. Not just because its U.S. sales (so far) are miniscule, but because it’s better than the car that spawned it, the Mazda MX-5 Miata.
I recently put more than 500 miles on a Spider from the press fleet, and I have also tested the Miata this year.
Can you think of another “badge-engineered” car quite like the 124 Spider? Usually, when automakers build cars for a partner, such as the Mazda2/Toyota Yaris or the Subaru BRZ/Scion FR-S, the changes are limited to different badges and perhaps a new front fascia and not much else.
The Fiat 124 is very different, and the changes could be the blueprint for a different type of car-sharing among automakers.
At Honda, the CR-V is now just 20,000 units behind the Civic as the brand’s top-selling vehicle. At Toyota, the RAV4 is only about 30,000 units away from being that brand’s top-selling nameplate. And except for the Silverado, the Equinox is the top-selling Chevrolet.
If gasoline stays cheap and sales trends continue, there likely won’t be a lot of profit in building cars. And it wouldn’t surprise me to see more automakers make deals like Fiat and Mazda as car sales evaporate.
The Miata and the Spider show that two cars can share a majority of their underpinnings and be completely different in performance, appearance and personality. Making sure there are those differences could keep cars true to their brand’s DNA and prevent them from becoming commodities in a depressed market.
Sergio totally messed up on the return of Fiat to the US.
What was needed was lots of dealers so people actually SEE the cars.
That meant not being picky on how the dealerships looked for the first decade or so.
Instead he demanded that dealers build to design specifications.
The result was few dealers and lots of distance between them.
I won't buy any vehicle that doesn't have a dealer in my city.
I'm not about to drive 40 miles for warranty or recall work or any repairs that are dealer specific.
While the limited sales for this type of car make the Fiat 124 fairly irrelevant to the brand's success it does get some flashy product in the showroom which is desperately needed. So overall I think this was a good move for FCA and maybe a bit of how they hope to addressing the Dart & 200 issues. The problem is while most consumers know very little about car platforms everyone learns quickly (from the reporters) that Company X is building cars from Company Z and that isn't really a good thing for Company Z's generally. The exception being when a fairly exotic manufacturer is building for a mainstream brand.
I did have one acquaintance comment that my Charger was riding on the old MB S-Class platform, which isn't quite accurate but was still interesting to see someone paying attention. I think the future of platform sharing works best where companies X and Z co-develop something and share it out the gate so it's not seen as someone providing it to another. Similar to what Chrysler, Hyundai and Mitsubishi did with Global Engine Manufacturing Alliance.
And to what Ford and Peugeot did with the Duratorq diesel engines in Europe and wayback in the 1970s to what Peugeot, Renault and Volvo did with the V6 PRV.
The only way I see for everyone to satisfy their small, cheap, entry-level RWD car is to have SERIOUS collaboration between the interested parties.
Toyota, GM, Nissan, FCA, Mazda, and whoever else is interested collaborate together and do some fancy engineering work to minimize cost and maximize necessary flexibility. You'd imagine it could serve as a template for future mass-collaboration and huge cost-savings by commonizing major engineering elements for many products across many brands.
^Thinking about the Miata a little more, one way to garner some excitement would be to drop a rotary engine in it. I have never understood, why they didn't put one in the Miata as its top trim level, seems like it would be a perfect fit. Supposedly development of a new Rotary is back on at Mazda:
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