Mazda: The Art – and Science – of Manufacturing

During the unveiling of the redesigned 2019 Mazda3 hatchback and sedan, Mazda has been screening a short film documentary, The Art of Manufacturing.  The film gives the audience a brief but detailed explanation of the painstaking process incorporating the Mazda’s KODO (‘soul of motion’) design language into their vehicle architecture.

The film is less than three minutes long, but will give any Mazda owner or fan a sense of pride toward this always-unique automotive manufacturer. Companies like Ford and GM, or Honda and Toyota, are always seen side by side, like a burger and fries. Mazda has typically been regarded as a stand-alone, with a history of iconic vehicles that nail the apex between fun and affordability.

In The Art of Manufacturing, the film opens with this: “We are a company of craftsmen”. In order to create the master metal molds used to stamp body panels, Mazda’s manufacturing engineers went through over 12,000 grinding stones before finding one that worked. The accuracy of the metal moulds are a fraction of the width of a human hair. The point of this video is to show Takumi (master craftsmen) sculpt the metal moulds by hand using the specially developed grinding stone that met Mazda’s requirements. It takes twenty years(!) of apprenticeship before one can achieve the title of Takumi.

When looking at the latest vehicles Mazda has to offer, all you have to do is run your hand down the side to sense the work that went into making its shape. One usually associates this level of detail and presentation with vehicles boasting Italian names and six-figure price tags. When you consider that the new 2019 Mazda3 has interior layouts catering to how the human body moves, you start to see Mazda in an all new light. The cherry on top is that with a slogan like “Feel Alive” you can trust that a new Mazda will be fun to drive, also.

See the video for yourself below.