Frank said:
It's exactly the same thing. The 2.3 from the 6 is also inverted. New Honda too are Inverted. Why? Ask someone else, I do not know the answer.
-Frank
All inverted engines for the most part are done so the cats can be placed as close to the engine as possible. Some even as part of the exhaust mani.
I'm supposing that's why Mazda did it to this engine.
This is actually a little beneficial for N/A engines because alot of heat is left far from the intake (towards the rear of the engine bay), makes intake pipes shorter for inproved throttle response, and makes headers/exhausts shorter and easier to produce. In a perfect world this would make aftermarket parts cheaper... But this aint no perfect world...
Unfortunately it makes it a pain to add a turbo to where it's most efficient, right next to the exhaust outlets. Sure, the SRT-4 and most RSX and Celica turbo kits have it there, but some kits also encounter problems with turbos heating up alot, and more risk of oil coking and turbo failure if a timer is not used.
Not to mention the added piping needed to make a complete round trip of the engine bay from the front (Cold Air), to the back (turbo), to the front again (IC), then to wherever the inlet is.... Can you say LAG? You'd need smaller piping or I/C in order to keep lag in check, hurting performance... The SRT-4 has almost a 1 second lag as it is... on a 2.4L engine with a not-so-big turbo...
I've been debatin on getting an MSP or waiting for the new 3... I think the MSP sounds better the more I think about it...