The Japanese have always given people the impression of being "rigid", "disciplined" and "craftsman spirit". Compared with these consistent impressions of Japanese car companies, there is a car company in Japan that is "deviant" and pursues the uniqueness of technology, regardless of sales volume, but it makes people want to stop. This is Mazda.
Have nothing to do with this matter
Mazda's start-ups have nothing to do with cars, or even the name "horse". At first, Mazda's business was wine bottle stoppers. It was named "Toyo Cork Industry Co., Ltd." and its former president was Noba Haizhu. 1920, he encountered the problem of capital operation and had to reorganize the factory and hand it over to a young man, that is, Jujiro Matsuda, who founded the Mazda brand.
Almost all founders of automobile companies have crazy mechanical dreams, and Jujiro Matsuda is no exception. 14 years old began to learn mechanical manufacturing technology and shipbuilding technology, 3/kloc-0 years old invented the "Song Tian pump" for sewage treatment. At first, he started his own business and set up an iron products processing factory. After being summoned by his hometown enterprises, Jujiro Matsuda entered "Toyo Cork Industry Co., Ltd.".
Who knows that there are unexpected events in the sky? A fire destroyed the cork factory in 1925. Jujiro Matsuda made the local headlines for the first time, not because of the products, but because of the fire.
Stand up after a break and return to the machinery manufacturing industry.
Because of the fire, Jujiro Matsuda was forbidden to continue to produce corks. At that time, during the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake, machinery and materials were urgently needed for post-disaster recovery. Jujiro Matsuda patted his head-"I want to produce tricycles"!
1927, the company was reorganized and renamed as "Toyo Industrial Co., Ltd.". Three years later, Jujiro Matsuda introduced the first fuel tricycle.
Mazda? go to
The first tricycle Jujiro Matsuda named it "Mazda? "Let's go,? Mazda is not only the homonym of Song Tian's own name, but also the Latin meaning of Zoroastrianism. The first fuel tricycle, with reliable quality, became an explosion as soon as it went on the market.
After the outbreak of World War II, fanatical Japanese enterprises more or less wanted to make a fortune from the war, and Mazda was no exception, and began to manufacture guns and produce military weapons for World War II.
The atomic bomb "awakened" Mazda
Mazda's original factory address was located in Hiroshima. Speaking of Hiroshima, the most famous historical event is "Hiroshima Atomic Bomb". Conan's atomic bomb destroyed downtown Hiroshima and Mazda factory, which was a good thing for Mazda. Because of this, Mazda can get rid of almost crazy military production and turn to its old line to develop civil and agricultural machinery.
1950, in order to rebuild after the war, Mazda launched the first small tractor truck, Mazda? About.
California Mazda
In 195 1 year, 76-year-old Jujiro Matsuda handed over his business to his son Tsukiji Matsuda Falcon. Opened a new chapter in Mazda.
The son took the baton and finished his father's unfinished business.
When the enterprise was in the hands of his son Tsuda, Mazda began to directly attack the automobile industry, and a new official took office. After Tsuda took office, it was stipulated that all models' names should be identified by Japanese pseudonyms. This practice has been maintained until 1972.
Matsuda Tsukiji
1958, Mazda officially sold the previously designed truck under the name of Romper. The twin-cylinder engine makes the load of this minivan reach one ton. 1959, the monthly sales of this car once exceeded 5000 units.
Jumping person
Matsuda Doi, who tasted the sweetness, began to look to the small car market. 1960, Mazda officially launched the landmark? R360？ Coupe, this car is widely regarded as Mazda's first car by later generations.
R360？ Two-seater four-wheeled carriage
This car is basically a product of the same period as Honda Civic, and its characteristics are "small and cheap", two-cylinder engine, aluminum alloy+plastic body, and the front and rear windshields are made of acrylic material, so a car that can only accommodate two adults and two children weighs only 380kg and sells for 320,000 yen, equivalent to RMB/kloc-0.8 million. As soon as it went public, it snapped up more than 60% of the total sales of Japanese light vehicle market.
As I said just now, Honda's original Civic is also a product of this era. Almost all Japanese car companies are developing this small and exquisite car, R360? The space of the coupe became its biggest injury, so Mazda developed a four-door car Carol. This car directly influenced the design trend of Japanese K-cars, including Suzuki Alto, which became popular in China in the later period.
ode
Mazda finally gained a foothold in the market with Carol, and then introduced Familia and Capella. These two names may not be familiar to everyone, but we all know their descendants, which evolved into Mazda 3 and mazda 6 respectively.
Blow the horn of the "rotor"
196 1 year, Mazda obtained the patent authorization of rotary engine in Germany. Yes, Mazda's proud rotary engine was not invented by itself. Matsuda devoted almost paranoid enthusiasm and energy to rotary engines. Rotary engine does work differently from ordinary engine piston. Inside the rotary engine is a triangular rotor called Leroy Triangle. The advantages and disadvantages are obvious.
In order to solve the fatal defect of rotary engine, Mazda assembled 47 top engineers in the enterprise at that time to tackle key problems, which is the famous "rotor 47" in the whole automobile research and development history.
Rotor 47
After trying hundreds of materials and failing, Mazda went crazy, even tried cow bones and horse bones, but everything paid off. 1963 rotor engine achieved practical results. 1967 Cosmo, the first model equipped with rotor engine? With the appearance of Sport, Mazda has become the only automobile company in the world to master the application technology of rotary engine. Mazda specially changed a logo representing the rotary engine to commemorate the listing of the rotary engine. The listing of rotary engines did not disappoint Mazda's painstaking efforts and won the championship in major events. Later, in order to compete fairly, the FIA banned the participation of rotary engines, and Mazda also stopped.
Fatal "oil crisis"
In the early 1970s, this was the peak period of Mazda rotary engine. With its unique technology, the motion model developed by Mazda has been widely praised at home and abroad. At that time, RX-3 and RX-7 were called national sports cars and were very popular. But who knows that a huge change is extending its claws to the rotor.
With the advent of the oil crisis, the price of automobile fuel has advanced by leaps and bounds, and the ultra-high fuel consumption of rotary engines has become its most fatal shortcoming. Due to the oil crisis, Mazda's sales have also dropped to freezing point. In order to survive, it made a wrong decision at that time-developing a multi-brand strategy, which is a bit like setting up a high-end brand by its own brand. In the most extreme case, Mazda owns five brands at the same time.
So many brands operate at the same time, which completely disrupts the rhythm of dealers and consumers' cognition, and the sales volume has not improved, and a lot of R&D funds and brand costs have been invested. 199 1 year, Mazda finally had enough, and the five brands were reunited. 1996, Mazda suffered a serious financial crisis, and Ford injected capital into Mazda, holding 33.4% of Mazda's shares.
The indomitable "rotor" spirit is born again.
So far, Mazda has been relying on "black technology" to survive. Since Mazda didn't master the rotor from the beginning, it embarked on a "research and development point of no return". Minority and individuality have become the labels of Mazda, and even Matsuda Tsuji once said, "As long as 2% of people in the world recognize our products, I will be satisfied". For technological breakthroughs, Mazda is not afraid of long research and development time, so how long will Mazda release the technology that shocked the world again after the rotor? Mazda's answer: 50 years.
In 20 19, Mazda Chuangchi Blue Sky -X(SKYACTIV-X) engine was officially mounted on the brand-new Angkor Sela, which is the first mass-produced gasoline engine in the world with homogeneous compression ignition technology. The appearance of this engine makes people feel that Mazda said that he is a "revolutionary" engine, which is a bit modest. Theoretically, the thermal efficiency of 48% makes the fuel engine have the same fuel consumption performance as the hybrid new energy. You know, Toyota's engine with the highest thermal efficiency "Dynamic? Force? " Engine "only reached the thermal efficiency of 465,438+0%. In view of the limitations of current technology and materials, how much energy and money is needed to improve the thermal efficiency of 1%, and Mazda has raised this standard by several orders of magnitude at once.
SKYACTIV-X
Not only engine technology, Mazda also has absolute achievements in vehicle control. The "acceleration vector control system" is called "GVC". This black technology is to control and adjust the torque output of the engine by collecting the angle of your direction through the calculation of the driving computer. What does this mean? That is to say, it can control the G value when the vehicle turns, making the turn smoother and smoother.
Power and control are the foundation of a car company, and research and development is understandable. However, Mazda is not satisfied with this. It has shifted its research and development to automotive coatings. Yes, Mazda's famous "Soul Red" car paint is also called black technology. Soul red car paint is more transparent than ordinary car paint, ensuring that it can look so deep in different light and different angles. There is also an embarrassing question about this multi-layer paint: "I know your red car paint is very advanced, but I don't like red." What else can I do? This technology will not be used. A set of data shows that only 7% of the owners of new cars currently on sale choose red paint, and this technology directly shuts 93% of consumers out. However, compared with Matsuda's sentence, "As long as 2% people in the world recognize our products, I will be satisfied", which is 5% more.
Mixed red car paint
Constantly reflect, how can we be more "niche"
As mentioned earlier, Mazda introduced the fourth generation of Kopera. At that time, the fourth generation of Kopera sold very well in Europe. At the same time, Mazda began to reflect on itself: "Is my car too ordinary? So many people buy it? Is there anything wrong? " Here we can see Mazda's different brain circuits. It is this artist's paranoia and pursuit of works that makes Mazda go further and further on the road of "niche". Of course, the niche here is not a derogatory term, but an alternative explanation of the Excellence of the work.
It is such paranoia that Mazda has a brand culture that fans can't stop. In the era of new energy wave, Mazda still insists on internal combustion engine. This can only be done by car companies that "don't care" about sales.
This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.