Mazda 2

Remember that cute, cheap, bubble-shaped Mazda 121 that offered so many young drivers their first shot at four-wheel freedom back in the 1990s? It's been reincarnated - but this time as a car destined to be more popular with the wrinkly drivers than ‘yoof' buyers.

The new Mazda2 has grown a big bump in its rear end to create the company's first tiny-tot sedan in more than a decade.

The sedan, which company executives expect will prove a hit with the blue-rinse set, joins the revised Mazda2 line-up which now comes from Thailand instead of Japan.
Favourable exchange rates, as well as a Free Trade Agreement between Thailand and Australia, mean Mazda has been able to sharpen the pencil across the Mazda2 range. All models get more standard equipment and a slightly leaner price, but the three-door model has been chopped to make way for the sedan.

Stability control is now standard across the Mazda2 range. And curtain airbags are now standard on all models except the cheapest one.

Apart from a few different bends in the front bumper, there is little to distinguish the Thailand-made Mazda2 from a Japanese one. Motoring journalists at the media preview were all over the new car like beagles on an airport luggage carousel, trying to find signs of a drop-off in quality. No-one even got a whiff of a problem.

This probably shouldn't come as a surprise given that the Mazda2 comes from an all-new factory in Thailand that was completed last year. It's the same factory that will soon build Australia-bound Ford Fiestas, the Mazda2's twin under the skin. And a lot of the Mazda2's components still come from Japan.

Mazda Australia rightly pointed out that a lot of vehicles sold in Australia already come from Thailand, like most Hondas (Jazz, City, Civic, and CR-V) as well as most Toyota Hilux-style utilities.

But while Mazda was preaching the virtues of Thailand build quality to the press, the people in its customer service department were licking envelopes and sending recall letters to 21,000 owners of its Thai-built ute, the Mazda BT-50, because of a potential bonnet latch failure. Oops.

Even though Mazda's men in white coats have made some minor tweaks to the engine and suspension, the new Mazda2 drives pretty much the same as before. And that's generally a good thing.

It steers more precisely than many cars in this class and generally hugs the road well, although in the wet it still demands attention. The Mazda2 has previously been criticised for below average wet-weather grip so the company switched to bigger tyres. Tropical rain during our test drive emphasised the importance of this. If these are the good tyres, I'd hate to have driven on the bad ones.

And compared to other cars in its class, there's still a fair amount of road noise coming from the little Mazda. I SAID, COMPARED TO OTHER CARS IN ITS CLASS, THERE'S STILL A FAIR AMOUNT OF ROAD NOISE COMING FROM THE LITTLE MAZDA. And there's only a skinny space-saver spare wheel and tyre in the boot (some rivals have a full-size spare while others also have the wheelbarrow look-a-like rim).

Little (if anything) has changed on the inside, visibility all around is still good, and the sedan has among the biggest boots in its class (only the Honda City and Toyota Yaris sedans have bigger cargo holds).
The only (minor) blot on the Mazda2's report card is the fact that curtain airbags aren't standard on its most popular model, the Neo five-door hatch.

The option price of $400 is the cheapest in its class, and reasonable when you consider this is the price most rivals charge for metallic paint (Mazda throws the sparkles in for free). Our guess is that the promotional price of $16,990 looks more attractive than $17,390 if the extra airbags had been included.

There is just one model grade in the sedan, the Maxx, and it is the same price as the Maxx hatch ($19,090 for the five-speed manual and $20,740 for the four-speed auto).
Mazda reckons the sedan is likely to "broaden its buyer appeal". This is a polite way of saying "the car is going to be bought by oldies".

Almost one-third of Mazda2 hatch buyers are young females, aged between 20 and 34. And, like, almost, like, totally 100 per cent of them are, like, on Twitter and FB (that's, like, Gen-Y shorthand for social networking website "Facebook" LOL).

The company says the current model helped reduce the average age of Mazda2 customers from 52 years of age in 2006 to 43 years of age in 2009.

However, the addition the Mazda2 sedan could see the average age climb again, because small sedans are typically bought by older customers.

Only time - and hats on the parcel shelf - will be able to tell us if this prediction is right.

Josh Dowling