2009 Mazda RX-8 R3 - Sparco Seats - Super Street Magazine

Now let's address the interior. We wanted to produce an interior that was comfortable and pleasing to the eye. Keep it nice and simple, if not stock looking. I think it is extremely important to keep the driver comfortable in the car and create a no stress environment. Justin has enough to worry about drifting next to some crazy driver. We actually positioned Justin's Sparco seat in what I like to call the lazy, cruising the boulevard mode. I've done this before with the Mazda 6 drag car and most drivers feel comfortable in the driving position. Again, the comfortability theme has come to play. To make things feel more at home for Justin, I measured the pedal/e-brake/steering wheel heights and distances from his seat in his old Mazda RX-7 to match that of the RX-8. The Sparco seats, steering wheel and belts are identical between his two cars. The only thing I did not bring into play from his former car was the "fishbowl" shifter. Nevertheless, Justin would enjoy the shifting performances of a HKS full sequential transmission. From Justin's feedback he does not mind missing the "fishbowl" shift knob mated to a stock RX-7 tranny. Even though it's a completely different car, we wanted Justin to feel at home with the RX-8. All Tilton pedal assemblies, e-brake handles, Sparco steering wheel tilt or heights are fully-adjustable. I might even want to take it out for a spin. In addition, Justin had requested an old school Wink mirror. I had surveyed the market for one and most of them had come up as the cheap Chinese plastic black mirror that you would find at Pep Boys. I was able to acquire a great billet Wink mirror from an off-road shop. The dash is very simple, removable and stock looking. Overall, it is clean and comfortable but striking enough so that Justin does not fall asleep.

We have implemented in all of our cars MoTeC engine management. It is by far the best engine computer in the world. We run a MoTeC M800, a MoTeC full enabled dash, complete with dual CDI-8 ignition boxes. To add more painful expenses to the mix, we also implemented MoTeC's new PDM module (aka Power Distribution Module). All I know about this expensive gadget is that the car no longer requires fuses; everything is run from this module. It helps decrease any chances of shorts and on top of that is hooked up to the MoTeC M800 to do all kinds of tasks. Nathan Tasukon of MoTeC engineered the complete system. To make matters even crazier, Ed was able to hook up all the MoTeC hardware to another computer for telemetry. Ed is a computer geek by trade and mating the computer geekiness with Nathan's expertise makes for a very serious setup. We are able to have live data from the car anywhere on the track. Ed is able to monitor any of the RX-8's conditions on the track. No wires are required to connect a laptop to see what the car is going through. I must admit it's really trick. A lot of the engineering is used in higher forms of racing such as Grand AM, American LeMans and IRL. The whole MoTeC setup is really expensive and reliable, but worth every penny.

I can't forget the tires either. This is extremely crucial because all this work could get mutilated if we don't put a kick-ass set of tires on the Mazda. With all the custom work done to the Mazda RX-8, the only thing planted to the ground is ultimately the tires. Tires are key to making all this hard work succeed. Nitto's new NT05 was the ultimate choice for our build because the tire delivers superior performance in grip and is very predictable on track. Justin has no problems telling the RX-8 what to precisely do on the Nitto NT05. He has tried other tire brands and by far loves the performance of the NT05. If we're going to put nothing but the best components as well as the best fabrication on this Mazda we might as well put the best tires on the sucker.