The Japanese firm is developing innovative ways to reduce weight on its vehicles

The new Mazda2 is the product of a lightweight attitude at Mazda’s R & D community to reduce vehicle weight of new Mazda products in order to lower fuel consumption and CO2 emissions, while delivering agile handling and safety attributes.

The new Mazda2 is almost 100 kg lighter than the previous incarnation, it reverses the trend towards ever-heavier vehicles while being safer and even more dynamic to drive. Sixty per cent of the weight savings came in engineering solutions, including the body shell, which has an optimised structure and uses high and ultra-high tensile steels for less weight, greater rigidity and better crash resistance.

A further twenty per cent was saved by 'features adjustments' and another twenty per cent saved making the car’s exterior dimensions smaller.

Weight was reduced weight by:

• use of high and ultra-high tensile steels for lighter (and stronger) body and joint reinforcements
• shortening the trailing arm of the rear suspension and giving the front lower arms an open-section design
• making the bonnet striker assembly smaller, the hinges thinner
• eliminating the underfoot catalyst (1.3-litre model)
• moving the fresh-air inlet to the top of the radiator shroud (removing the need for a resonator and baffle)
• making the wiring harness shorter
• changing the door-mounted speaker magnets to neodymium types and making the plastic moulding single-piece.
• decreasing the length of the vehicle by 40 mm and height by 55 mm

These weight-saving measures allow the Mazda2 to deliver some of the B-segment’s lowest fuel consumption figures(the standard power 1.3-litre petrol uses 5.4 litres per 100 km combined) while producing just 129 g/km of CO2.