I'd love to see a skyactive motor in the Mazda 2's. It seems kind of embarrassing to have an SUV that's rated the same MPG as your super small, underpowered, econobox. A 35/45mpg Mazda 2 would make them MUCH more attractive than the current 29/35, and it certainly doesn't seem terribly unrealistic.

Every market other than US already has this diesel in the CX-5...

I have it in my CX-5 AWD auto and am currently seeing 33mpg city.

How much can you tow with it?

You know whats funny? Since the engine in it right now is so pathetic, they could even call it a Mazdaspeed! More mpg and horsepower.

Kind of off topic but does anyone know if the AWD used in CX5's is "real" or just a bit of torque vectoring nonsense?

AWD refers to vehicles that can power all 4 wheels, doesnt matter if they are are all open diffs including the transfer case.

He said 2000KG earlier in the thread, so 4400 LBS.

Well that pretty much seals the deal. If Mazda offers the diesel/AWD combo in the US I will buy one. I will be ecstatic if I could buy it with a manual as well but thats not likely. This way I can retire my Mazdaspeed as a DD and make it a track car, with the CX5 being my DD/tow vehicle.

I don't know much about all this so what do you want if your requirement is to drive safely on ski trips? If the CX5 has nothing but open diffs does it even help in snowy situations?

I don`t know all the details other than it has been called a "haldex" type system with a max rear bias of 50%.

I don`t know how the roads in your area is, and I have yet to really put it to the test, but so far I have been impressed. It`s not an offroad vehicle, but the AWD is more than enough to get you to the slopes...

awd system with all open difs is garbage. 1 wheel turns while the other ones dont. Some old subbies had this. Some manufacturers use the brakes to fix that so some power goes to the rest of the wheels. Many use limited slip diffs. The hard core offroad trucks use locking axles of some sort but thats for more main stream offroad models such as the hummers and wranglers.

Personally my fav is the common part time 4wd models (wranglers,fjs and tons of others use this system). Those simply disconnect/connect the front wheels directly. This means that its only rear wheel drive until you turn 4wd on. At that point both driveshafts are locked directly and theres no slipping possible.

That's all well and good if you're willing to deal with a body on frame construction and the added weight and mechanical drag of a traditional transfer case.

I disagree that they are garbage. Perhaps back in the day if they were utilized without any sort of traction control but with the newer vehicles they employ awd systems very effectively.

Dont know if any of the diffs are limted slip or not, but I absolutely don`t care as I am not going offroad in this thing. Nor am I planning to take it ice racing or sliding around on the street.
This car is a utility that will haul my gf, our soon to be first newborn, groceries and our cat offcourse. A damn nice utility for this use I might add...

I can however tell you that I have a pretty steep hill the last 100meters to my house and have tested the AWD on snow there. From a stop, mid hill, with tcs off and flooring it produced an immediate and stout acceleration leaving nothing to be desired in my experience.

SkyActive huh... well hopefully the domestic versions work better than what was debuted this weekend at the 24hrs at Daytona - all 3 of the Mazda SkyActive GX cars puked within the first 3 hours. I'd wait a year or two before concidering one - remember the re-released renesis in the early RX8?

Not dissing the car or engine - but for now I'll stick with my 7.3L Turbo Diesel Excursion :)

Skyactiv is nothing new... It's really just direct injection and some spiffy swirling. failing in a racing application in LM really has very little to do with street reliability...

The RX8 was a failure because the rotary is a failure. Cool engine, no doubt, but not practical.

It would be interesting to see if there ever would be a racing package using a "SkyActive" petrol engine. 125+bhp/liter at 8krpm (and meeting emissions) would not hurt at all.
Where do I sign up for using my car as a mule :D

The SkyActive Diesels will work, it was just the car used that was wrong ;)

That's what i said straight open is garbage unless some sort of traction control of is used.

My brother bought a 2012 skyactiv 3 auto this summer, he's getting an average of 5L/100km on his 90% highway commute. He tells me he's hit 4.6L/100km and got 1100km from a tank!

The car is gutless if you leave it in drive but manually selecting gears lets it rev higher and seem to actually open the throttle fully. If its in drive it feels much more muted in it's acceleration.

And I'm another that's waiting for a diesel cx5, awd 6sp manual preferably.

What happened to the system that shut itself off at a stop? My friend's 2013 skyactiv 3 does not do this. Major disappoint.

Ok thanks lassi for all your real-world experience with the CX5. If Mazda offers the diesel CX5 here I will buy it.

It is eliminated for the US market because the EPA testing cycle would show no impact and so Mazda decided people wouldn't pay for something that showed no benefit to their window sticker MPG. So basically, stupid EPA and stupid people = no stop/start technology for us.

Mine does this and I was certain I would hate it and turn this feature off, but it starts up nice and easy every time and seeing the counter that tells me I have already saved myself 16 minutes idle time helps me keep it on.

Do take my comments with a grain of salt. I am probably blinded by my new ride which off course is the cat`s meow, but will have shortcomings for others.

Because EPA estimates don't include idle time I'm assuming? Retarded. Sounded like an awesome system.

It's funny I came across this thread because my friend (who has a mazdaspeed 3) was talking about upgrading his fuel pump to do a simple retune and I thought he was just full of it. It all makes a lot more sense now. But he is actually kind of full of it sometimes and he's about to put in a stronger high pressure pump on the engine and I'm supposed to help him out with it. Anyone know what the precautions are when doing this and are there common mistakes that result in the mixing of gasoline and internal organs?

One of the first big upgrades a lot of folks do is the fuel pump internals on the Mazdaspeed3. Interestingly enough, in the small tube or bore size that we're talking for a fuel rail, it really doesn't take too thick of a cylindrical cavity wall to contain that high of pressure. From the video, it sounds like Mazda went to great lengths (literally) to keep the cylinders cool. If long term reliability is good, then this is a slam dunk. If not, 07-09 Mazdaspeed3 cough cough, then it's a huge stepping stone for the company.

I have two Skyactiv cars. The automatic transmission is pretty fun to drive, although I think the low speed 'slush box' is definitely not a selling point. Neither of my cars shut off at idle, however they do shift to neutral after a few seconds of being stopped. By the time you hit the gas, you're out of the smooth slush box 0-5mph zone. I find that the car feels like it's automatically shifting a manual transmission, which is actually the fun part of driving an automatic. At low speeds, or coming up to a stop light, then deciding to start driving again, you can feel the shift. I'm sure Mazda has had complaints from people about that behavior since it's NOT a slush box, although it is working properly. ;)