Mazda 767B hits 9000rpm on dyno

Remember rotary engines? Mazda loved them for a while, and we’ve been feeling nostalgic. So we found this.

The Mazda 767B was a late-’80s development, which eventually turned into a 1989 24 Hours of Le Mans competitor under the Mazdaspeed racing team.

Though the two 767Bs in the race only finished 17th and 19th overall, they were 2nd and 3rd in their Mazdaspeed-dominated GTP class. To be fair, there were only three entrants in the GTP class that year.

The powerhouse creating the gorgeous noise you can hear in the above video is Mazda’s quad-rotor 13J, capable of pumping out approximately 470kW at 9000rpm. If you want to know what that sounds like, that’s the rpm reached in the video.

In our quest to find more 767B goodness, we were reminded of one example which recently sold at Amelia Island for a pretty respectable US$1.75m.

Chassis number 767-003 was the last of three 767Bs built, and was the class winner in the 1990 Le Mans, according to sellers Gooding & Company.

The one seen in the video is the same ‘003’ that recently changed hands, we discovered with a little research, which has gone by two race numbers – 77 and 203.

The reason we love this car isn’t just its rarity. We love the sound it makes at 9000 revs. And the fact that it shoots flame.

We would have loved to have been in there, even if it did us some permanent ear damage. Plus, we know we’ll probably never get to drive one. Forbidden fruit is always the most appealing…