Tein 2004 Mazda RX-8

It's easy to believe that if more is good, then more is better, and even more is even better still. That's why there are Honda Civics running around with exhaust tips big enough to shove a pig through and why you can buy a 10-pound box of Oreos at Costco. But just because something is easy to believe doesn't mean it's true. The flat-Earthers out there can stop reading now.

Tein's business is suspension and the company put together this RX-8 in Japan for use in promotions and advertising. There's nothing on this car that fights against Mazda's essential design or detracts from its everyday usefulness. Instead, a bare few modifications accentuate the inherent virtues of the RX-8 without loading in any vices.

The essential element in this car's tough countenance is its stance, and that's achieved by rebuilding the suspension around Tein's Electronic Damping Force Controller (EDFC) and Flex dampers. More than just a way to get the car to eye level with squirrels, the EDFC system lets the driver tune the car's ride and handling on the fly to optimize its performance for whatever situation arises. And critically, it puts more buttons in the cockpit with which to play.

The EDFC unit itself is basically a computer into which can be programmed up to three distinct damping force-level settings that can be swapped on the fly. Other adjustments can be made beyond even that. For instance, there can be a squishy mode for floating across freeways, a moderately stiff mode for those times a driver feels like being moderately stiff, and a coccyx-shattering race setup should Michael Schumacher decide to carjack the machine and set track records at Suzuka. It's not a big piece of equipment (about a quarter of the size of a normal car radio), so it can be positioned nearly anywhere in the cockpit.

To actually vary the damping, the EDFC sends a signal to stepping electric motors fitted to the top of the shock absorbers on the piston rod. The motor then twists the rod in the same way it would be adjusted manually. It's like having your hand on the shocks while the car is moving and it can be adjusted through all 16 damping steps on a Tein shock. In fact, because the motors have finer control than your ham-fisted mitts, the EDFC can actually distinguish 32 different steps on a Tein shock.

What the EDFC is controlling are Tein's Type Flex Control Master dampers. The damping force adjustment (of both rebound and compression) is actually the metering of oil flow in the bypass through a control needle built into the piston rod. The coil-over spring's seat and seat lock can be manipulated for ride heights ranging from so low the RX-8 could scrape a cancelled stamp off a discarded envelope, to so high, the driver risks altitude sickness. Preload can be adjusted separately from both ride height and damping force, and much of the assembly is Teflon coated to prevent rust intrusion.

Along with the restructuring of the suspension, Tein's RX-8 wears a set of Enkei NT03+M aluminum alloy wheels. In this application's 18x8.5-inch size (with a 38mm offset), these 12-spoke wonders weigh in at a scant 19.6 pounds each. Around those rims are 235/40R-18 Dunlop SP Sport 9000 tires with an overall diameter of 25.4 inches. Considering the RX-8 comes from Mazda wearing 225/45R-18 Bridgestones of nearly the same diameter and not that much less tread width, the visual statement achieved with the new rollers is astonishing. Bigger (and heavier) wheels and wider (and heavier) tires may have added even more aggression to the RX-8's looks, but wouldn't have necessarily increased its abilities.

The final elements in this car are a Fujitsubo cat-back stainless-steel exhaust system which definitely gives the Wankel rotary a vibrant voice, and a set of Performance Friction brake pads to add a critical measure of fade resistance and knock some yardage off some high-velocity anchor heaves.

There's little difference between a Japanese- and American-spec RX-8 beyond the obvious swap of the steering wheel from one side to the other, so there's nothing Tein did there that wouldn't apply here. But that's not the important lesson this car teaches. While there's nothing wrong with going to extremes with an RX-8-adding wings the size of window awnings, bolting on wheels larger in diameter than a radio telescope and covering the body in a carbon-fiber and cash laminate-it's not always necessary.