Two Cars, One Garage, Zero Pistons: Members’ Rides

Over the last 18 years, I have owned 27 vehicles. The number of wheels has varied from two to four, the number of doors has ranged from none to five, and I’ve had models with rear-wheel drive, all-wheel drive, front-wheel drive and four-wheel drive. Manuals and automatics, motorcycles and minivans. But for all my variety, one thing has been consistent across all my vehicles: they’ve all ignited a mixture of fuel and air to make power by moving pistons through cylinders. Yes, that’s standard fare for the majority of car owners, but this is where Autopian Member Tom has me rethinking my life and what boxes I still need to check. Tom is an engineer living in Australia who currently has two unique and awesome cars, each representing a rebel faction against the tyranny of piston-powered vehicles – and one eschewing internal combustion altogether!

Welcome to Members’ Rides, where we share the cars and stories of Autopian Members. The potential to be featured here is a perk for Autopian Members of every level, from the ultra-affordable “Cloth” tier all the way up to “Rich Corinthian Leather.” Click that link and join today!

We talk a lot about EVs on this site, and with good reason. The future is looking more and more likely to consist primarily of these battery-powered torque monsters. Tom understands this, and recently picked up a 2023 Cupra Born, a great example of an electric hot hatch forbidden on American streets. But that doesn’t mean he has given up on burning dead dinos! Alongside Tom’s Cupra is his 1990 Mazda RX-7, a machine which (as you surely know) skipped a piston-based engine in favor of a dual-rotor Wankel design (cue GIF).

Mazda has long had an affinity for the Wankel rotary engine. The brand’s history with the fascinating yet incredibly simple design goes back to 1967 when the Mazda Cosmo debuted. The Cosmo was a fancy RWD sports car, and while Mazda may be best known today for rotary-powered sports cars, they put these fascinating engines in everything from a pickup truck to station wagons and even the legendary 4-rotor 787B race car. If you’re not fully up to speed with how rotary engines work, Top Gear has a decent rundown if you’d like to learn more.

Now let’s look at this pistonless pair of Member Rides from our friend Tom!

How did you get into cars?

I’ve been into cars since I can remember. In fact, my first sentence was apparently telling my mum her car broke when the handbrake failed and rolled down the driveway! I even made my parents get me a subscription to CAR from the UK because I thought it was better than any Aussie mag at the time. Most of my family, apart from my grandfather, didn’t really care for cars that much so I didn’t get much exposure to any “cool” cars until I could drive myself.

I studied mechanical engineering at Uni with the vague hope of getting into car design. Unfortunately, all the auto manufacturers in Australia closed down during my degree so I’ve just ended up playing with them instead! My RX-7 is my first car and I’ve been slowly building it and modifying it to my liking! I’m really excited for this new wave of electric cars coming too!

What led to the Cupra?

Early last year my wife and I found out that we were expecting our first child! That meant that happily, it was time for the trusty old i20 to get upgraded as the boot would have been too small to fit a pram, and I really disliked driving the car anyway, wifey bought it whilst I had my license suspended so I had little say in the test drive process. Ideally, I wanted something that was either full electric or at least PHEV for 2 reasons:

1. If we’re going to bring a new little human into the world, we should make every attempt to protect the world for his (and our) future as much as practical.
2. The Australian government had just announced a program where you didn’t pay any tax on the proportion of your salary that you sacrifice to a lease of an EV or PHEV (up to a limit of about $90,000 on the purchase price of the car) which works out as quite a large saving, so I figured it was a good time to sign up for the deal!

 

After test-driving the limited selection of EVs on the market that we could afford in April/March 2022 we came away with a deposit down on the Cupra due to its good ride and handling, packaging, and looks. And very importantly, it didn’t make me car sick like the runner-up BYD ATTO 3 did.

In terms of spec, it comes with the 82kwh battery and a 170kw (228hp) motor good for a 511km (315 miles) range. With my usage at the moment that seems conservative. I’d probably get more like 560km (350 miles) off a full charge! We got in in Aurora blue which is one of the best blues I’ve seen, and with the interior pack that has heated seats and a nicer stereo. For some strange reason it deletes the middle rear seat, making it strictly a 4 seater, but we needed to get the interior package in order to guarantee delivery before the all-important early November due date for bub! All in all it’s a somewhat sporty and good looking rear-wheel drive hatchback. What’s not to love?

How is it?

We ended up taking delivery after what felt like an age in September last year, and I’ve been loving it so far! It still feels special and it’s my first time buying a new new car so that’s very cool. It’s working out to be a great daily driver, the boot is juuust big enough to fit all the baby gear in it, and with the seat folded down we have enough space for the three of us and the dog to get away for a family holiday. We’re about 5000km in now and the shine hasn’t worn off yet. Apart from some struggles with the infotainment system we’ve had a good run with it. No issues to report, and I’m hoping to continue the trend.

How’s the charging infrastructure in Australia?

We’re fortunate that despite only having a single-car garage (which is reserved for the RX-7 much to my wife’s annoyance) we are still able to charge at home so to this day I haven’t had to charge on the public charging network. In fact, with rooftop solar that we got installed just before the car got delivered, we have done most of our charging for “free”. This is very fortunate because the state of the charging infrastructure in Australia is, if anything, worse than what you have in the US! The chargers are few and far between and not always reliable. Chargefox for instance recently left Australia and just bricked most of their chargers here so we couldn’t even plug in to charge, very frustrating!

What’s your favorite and least favorite thing about the Cupra?

My favourite thing is probably how well it blends being a daily and still feeling a little special. It handles well, looks good, and makes me happy I purchased it versus the more mainstream BYD and Tesla choices. Least favourite thing is definitely the VW touch-only interface for all the controls – it’s buggy and very difficult to use whilst driving and can’t even seem to have wired car play work properly.

How did you get into the RX-7?

Growing up I used to search the classifieds and eventually the online websites for cars that I could own as soon as I got my license. One day I stumbled upon an ad for a first-gen RX-7 which claimed that the engine had been balanced so that it could rev to 11,000rpm, and I fell down the rabbit hole of rotaries. I became obsessed, as any good 14-year-old would, and read everything I could about them and promised myself that that would be my first car. Probably a better choice than my previous obsession, a triumph TR7.

Doing my research I obviously wanted a third gen RX-7, aka FD but my budget wouldn’t stretch that far. But I liked the improvements the FC (second gen) had over the first (turbo engine, physically bigger to fit 6’2″ me, independent rear suspension); so that’s what I searched for. Around this time New South Wales brought in a rule that P-Platers (provisional license holders, effectively a graduated licensing scheme for new drivers) could not drive any turbocharged cars or anything with 8 or more cylinders, so it ended up delaying my purchase a bit until I turned 20.

When did you get yours?

A couple of months before my 20th birthday, I started searching for an RX-7 that ticked all the boxes, and eventually I found my car. It was a JDM import, with no sunroof, and in a nice shade of red which was resprayed before leaving Japan from what we could tell. It was manual swapped, on coilovers, had an aftermarket exhaust, and was riding on way-too-big 19″ rims but was otherwise pretty much stock with a very straight and rust-free chassis. The PPI gave the engine a 5/10, but that was good enough for me as I figured that I would have to budget in a rebuild for it anyway at some point.

I drove it stock for a couple of years and changed a few things. I put on some more sensible 17″ wheels, and tyres with more meat. Swapped in a working LSD, swapped it back out again when it blew up (but not before swapping out the gearbox because I thought that was the culprit). I added a temp and boost gauge, the usual suspects. The whole time saving for the required engine rebuild; hoping that I could get it done before the engine decided it was time for me. Unfortunately, just before I had the funds ready for a rebuild the engine overheated on a 40 (104 F) degree day stuck in traffic on the way to work and I had a loud bang and all of a sudden it ran like it was one rotor…

Uh-oh. What did you do then?

Fortunately, by this point I had found a mechanic nearby who was deep into rotaries himself (shoutout to Rob Ciampi!). He agreed let me do some work on the car in the back of the shop, stripping the car down and removing the engine. We tore down the engine and turns out I’d done a number on it. The whole front housing and rotor, and both the front and intermediate plate in the engine all had significant gouging from the broken apex seals to the point where they weren’t salvageable and needed replacement. In addition, the turbo exhaust turbine’s fins had been destroyed by the apex seals as they exited the engine too. To add insult to injury the engine had been previously in good condition and would have been an ideal candidate for a rebuild. Alas, it wasn’t to be.

After talking with Rob, We decided to get a half-cut to try and salvage enough parts from the two cars to make one running engine. But unfortunately, it turned out we still didn’t have enough with the parts from that engine. So I ended up having to purchase a new aftermarket turbo garret GTW series turbo and two new rotor housings (the rotor housings need to have similar wear to each other, so if one had to be new, both do).

Any other upgrades?

As tends to happen with these kinds of things, this turned into a “whilst you’re in there” situation. We ended up doweling the engine, nitrate-plating the end plates, and added a small “tic-tac” bridge port to give nice high-end power and that signature braaap, but also still be street-drivable. All these changes necessitated a few supporting mods, such as uprated radiators, a front-mount intercooler, and a standalone engine management system. We went with what was current in 2015 – a Haltech PS1000 (which has been super user-friendly and reliable) and replaced all the aftermarket gauges with an IQ3 dash too. Oh, and I had the power steering removed for better steering feel (this was a very rare factory option on the cars, but there’s a way to properly depower the rack and I’ve been loving the depowered rack for many years now).

When all was said and done the car had a pretty significant power boost, it was now making about 350 horsepower to the wheels on low boost (a big jump from the stock 200 brake horse from the factory), and I’ve slowly but surely been adding things since then – some water/methanol injection for knock resistance and engine longevity, I’ve upgraded the wheels to Volk CE28ns, and switched out the IQ3 display for the more modern IC7 LCD display and used it to replace the whole dash cluster which was slowly dying after 30 years.

Any future plans for it?

As always, a good project car is never done so we still have a few mods in the wings. The front mount intercooler hangs very low, and is a driveway magnet so I’m going to get that switched out for a V-mount setup. The old coilovers are getting tired so they’ll need to be switched out for a new set. As is the differential, so I’ll need a new one there too which will almost certainly be a nice new mechanical LSD. And last but not least I’ll also need to install a new head unit. I broke my one when I installed the battery wired on the wrong terminals whilst chasing down an electrical gremlin late one night so it will be nice to have some tunes once again!

Hopefully, I’ll be able to get it out onto a track sometime soon. But even still she’s a very good drive through the mountain roads outside Sydney. It still puts a smile on my face every single time I drive it even after 12 years!

What’s in the dream garage?

• Two RX-7s (both mine and an FD)
• Citroen DS for classy comfortable cruising
• Porsche Taycan Sport Turismo for daily duties!

Excellent options one and all, but why do you want them?

The RX-7s are pretty self-explanatory given my history. With an unlimited budget, I’d love to turn my FC into the ultimate version with a 20B triple rotor and full build gearbox and driveline and then have the FD RX-7 in as the example of a stock Rotary.

For the DS, it’s probably my weird engineering brain showing through. I love alternative solutions to the established norm (see my love of rotaries above) and the hydro-pneumatic suspension just tickles my fancy in that way. Couple this with the gorgeous looks and amazing interior and I just have to have one!

The Taycan Sport Turismo I suppose is the most interchangeable one. To me, it is currently the best-performing “practical” EV, assuming money is no object. I really do think EVs are the way for daily-driver cars. Something as special as the Porsche is a great way to do it!

Thanks, Tom! If you’re a member keep your eyes open in the coming weeks for a link to a new member survey (we’re still working our way through backlog). And if you’re not a Member – what are you waiting for? Join today!