D M R H - (MY COSMO)

. . . My personal Cosmo . . .

DEC-09

Mazda may have spent a fortune developing the Cosmo but in hindsight it appears they may have added up the cost at the end, then sought ways to cut-costs once the reality hit them. That reality may have meant costs cutting was done on the brakes. They have the most powerful Mazda ever produced to date & went for below average 929-series styled brakes. Its well known that the little 280mm front discs warp with amazing ease after a few hard stops so something had to be done & regular disc machinings was not the solution...

An oppurtunity came up from a Chinese manufacturer seeking an Aussie distributor for their products. Being open to manufacturing for Japanese cars such as the Cosmo, the decision was made to order a "Sample set" of up-graded brakes & suspension with the propect of placing an order once tested & proven. The sample set arrived & from the outward appearence, they certainly appeared worthy. The proof would be in the practice. Like anything "Made in China". You never accept its quality on looks alone.

Not that 330mm full floating discs with 6-pot calipers doesnt look acceptable. The ease of installation was the first thing to catch me by surprise. Everything bolted into place just as if it was OEM with very few delays. I particulary liked the braided lines to the calipers that give a greater pedal feel thanks to non-expanding lines under pressure.

For those who are curious, the "Full floating" design of disc removes the solid steel centre & obvious weight associated with it. Weight attached to any "un-sprung" part of the car reduces handling performance. The total weight of these new 330mm discs was a few grams less than the OEM 280mm discs. The 6-pot calipers are all alloy so weigh near 1/3 the weight of the OEM calipers. Thus a net gain in size with a weight reduction to boot. The total time for installation was 12-hours with regular garage tools with at least 4-5 hours of this time chatting, eating, drinking amongst mates that had joined in on a Sunday afternoon. The brakes bled up correctly & compared to the factory.

As can be seen from the pic, the look was so much more worthy of the 19" wheels now gracing the Cosmo but how did they stop..? Wow in a word. As one would expect, little or no change over the 280mm OEM for normal traffic but when you pick up speed & start going hard into corners. Then you start to notice how much deeper your going, how much harder its pulling up & all without any fade to speak of. Finally a set worthy of pulling up 1600kg without costing a fortune.

At the same time, a set of adjustable height platform suspension with adjustable struts was also fitted. The standard set up these days for any RX-7 but so hard to find on a JC Cosmo. Like the brakes, they looked the part but would they shape up too.? Fitting was pretty straight forward but as with most of these conversions the brake lines dont attach the same way so they provide a typical cable-tie method. Still, the lines where secured & the height adjusted to what was thought best.

Took a few attempts to get the ride height set right but the result was excellent. Now the Cosmo can sit exactly the way I wanted & along with the brakes, the combined look was a significant upgrade on the previous set-up. The struts have been set to "max" on the front with "mid" setting out back to give the car a much better feel on the road. The spring rates are the suppossed "Street" settings from the manufacturer but they can go harder still if required.

On the road & the Cosmo was now handling like an RX-7. Point & shoot is the new aim-of-the-game with braking to match. Instant problem popped up with the car lowered further was gaurd scrubbing. So after getting all 4-arches lipped & cracked paint fixed thanks to GAS-250 restorations, the Cosmo was ready to tease the tarmac again without fear of scrapping expensive rubber to tender metal. There is little doubt that the Cosmo can now keep with the best streeters around but the sweetest part of these mods has been the low cost to the project. Time will tell if the "Made in China" quality exposses itself but for-now, its all smiles....