2010 Mazdaspeed 3: Fender Gap

Considering the roots of the Speed3 are a simple economy car, I'd say it looks fine.

If you can get past the hideous grill, the fender gap is nothing.

This car is begging for for a set of Bridgestone Potenza's. You know, the cool looking ones they use across the pond on touring car racing. I love a meaty side wall with white lettering. Why don't more tire companies offer this? Looks bad ass

The fender gap (almost transposed the first letters there) is much less noticeable on MS3 with black paint. A co-worker has the last generation MS3 in black and it seems about right.

For the price, one can swap out the rims and tires for something that fills the wheel well and still make out like a bandit in terms of cost (compared to other hot hatches).

Maybe it's a thing about performance FWD cars? My car's stock ride height was dump truck-esque. Forgive not having a better picture, but this is the only profile picture of it I can find as I've now lowered the car and changed the rims...

http://tinyurl.com/yzslrnk

Does not look as bad as the fender gap on the latest MX5(Miata).

The answer we always got from Mazda reps in the past was that there needed to be enough clearance in between the wheel wells and tires for chains. Of course, the manuals all state very clearly that you are not to use chains with alloy wheels because they will damage the wheels. Bigger gaps will also allow you to have more suspension travel, and allow a wider range of wheels and tires, which is probably important if the car is sold all over the world and comes in flavors ranging from I can't get out of my own way but super efficient to direct-injected turbocharged menaces. I have also heard that bigger gaps are specified so that snow or mud don't get packed in. Regardless of the reason, it's not as attractive as a wheel/tire pair that fills up the wheel wells (barring that Buick Lacrosse I saw on my way back from lunch wearing 24" chrome wheels with more ground clearance than most small trucks).

I suspect most people consumers would take the practical wheel well gap rather than the filled-in look. Personally, I think this MS3 looks fine considering it's stock. If you want to see ridiculous, go look at a current stock Miata. Now there's some ground clearance! (It just looks that way, there really isn't much clearance... I lowered a 2006 Miata by 3/4 of an inch, bringing it down so that it looked like the MS3 above, and it scraped over everything...)

My 2000 Mustang GT suffers from the same problem- it looks pretty high on the stock 17" Wheels but the reality is that it isnt

adamb1,

so true...

worst wheel gap of any new vehicle is the chevy silverado or its gmc cousin. it is hideous how much you can see of the underbody from that HUGE gap, especially with base wheels. i pulled up next to one at a light and it was the truck version of marilyn monroe's dress flying up in the 7-year itch! i wanted to be like, "gees, chevy, have some couth." i understand it is a truck but come on!

bmw is the king of proper wheel gap.

gmc should study their dear-departed g8 to learn something about proper wheel gap.

looks fine to me. tight gaps are not practical. Go up to Big Bear right now without chains and see how far the CHP lets you go. I guess you can look cool or you can enjoy your life.

Cruiserhead1, you can't use chains with the MS3. One thing I love about my E46 BMW is that even the stock 17x8" wheels (with the sport package) looked substantial in the wheel wells, and the 18s I have on it now look absolutely great, especially in the rear, even without lowering.
I don't mind how this MS3 looks in photos -- it looks better in motion and leaves some room for the F&F set to put their 19s on the car.

It's not stock MY2002-2007 WRX bad, Josh! :o)

Man thats an ugly little car!!

I would rather have a car with a huge wheel gap than a girl with a huge gap in between her teeth.

That is not to say the wheel gap is acceptable.

Wait, people are complaining about the wheel gaps on the silverado? You do realize that offroad suspensions need space for your tires to travel, right?

Personally, I never even noticed this about the speed 3, so I guess it doesn't bother me

Living in Texas, I've never used snow chains, but I imagine that is a practical consideration (you could use them if you mounted your snow tires to cheap wheels, right?)

Anyay, I never noticed the Mazda's gap before, and even after looking at it, it really doesn't bother me at all. Maybe we need some photoshop guru to show us what could have been, but I honestly don't see it here. Too many SEMA shows and video games for you guys. Not every car should be Fast and Furious.

Every angle of this vehicle is hideous. Its a shame its so nice inside and drives so well, but is so awful on the outside.

Shrug. You don't buy a wagon for appearance. Or logically any car. Most are ugly/plain.

My '08 MS3 doesn't seem to have as bad as fender gap with the stock suspension and wheels. Maybe it's just me. But this picture does look pretty bad. Reminds of the new Eclipse's fender gap.

Boy, from that angle it sure does look dumpy.....ick. I dont think they look too bad from other angles but jeese it looks terrible from the side.

My '07 doesn't seem to have this problem, and the overall diameter of my standard wheel/tire package is less. It seems Mazda destroyed the entire exterior of this vehicle. Truly terrible- from every angle. In fact, the only thing that looks good are the Speed3 rims which are a huge improvement over the last gen Speed3.

The 2010 definitely has a larger opening than the old version. Even looking at pictures of the non-speed versions, an '08 has a much tighter fit between the wheel and fender than the '10. Everything on the 2010 seems to be sculpted to the extreme--the big flares on the fenders, the giant schnoz sticking out front, and the bigger wheel openings. I think the old version was a much more timeless packages style-wise.

What I think is funny is that a Mazda executive said they worked hard to reduce the "dead cat space" on the 3. And then you guys complain about the large amount of “dead cat space.” I think the OP must have seen the same video that I did with the “dead cat space” comment in it. I can’t remember where I saw (maybe fox news Sunday car report) the video but I just remember that comment since I have never heard it called that before.

The gap doesn't seem to be a problem on any other picture I've seen for the 10' MS3. Is the surface level? The angle of the picture doesn't help also.

that's why lowering springs and coilovers were invented.
mazdaspeed did a secret contract with aftermarket companies to make the ride higher lol.

http://www.rx8club.com/picture.php?albumid=1177&pictureid=11234
my car after coilovers dropped it for 1.5 inch