Look at This Rad Seven's Day Celebration in Japan

Among a certain enthusiast crowd, July 7 is an automotive holiday. Known as Seven’s Day, every year, fans of the Mazda RX-7 and its fellow rotary-powered brethren gather together to celebrate the obscure yet ever-interesting rides. Thanks to Alexi over at Noriyaro, we now have a chance to check out a packed Seven’s Day event at the Mobara Twin Circuit in Chiba, Japan.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise to learn that Japan is home to a stout rotary fanbase. While not the first rotary-powered vehicle, the Mazda Cosmo Sport debuted in 1967 as the first production vehicle with a two-rotor engine. Mazda would hold onto that unique powertrain design until 2012, when the RX-8 left production. And while there was a noticeable lack of Mazda’s early rotary cars at this particular event, there were plenty of RX-7s on display from each generation, as well as some stray RX-8s. Other unique models like a Series JC Cosmo and a handful of rotary-swapped vehicles also made appearances, with engines of varying rotor counts to behold.

That aforementioned Cosmo built by Anniversary Racing Factory features an insane six-rotor engine, which doubles the rotor count that the car left the factory with. The large engine bay of the JC Series Cosmo is a great place for such a powertrain experiment, with the engine looking properly sporty with those 50mm throttle bodies on top. The shop used the Seven’s Day festivities as an excuse to start the motor for the first time, as the project is still underway. While the six-rotor certainly doesn’t jump to life with the anger of a Lamborghini V-12, that doesn’t take away from the technical achievement on display. With some more tuning, it has the potential to be a ridiculous-sounding motor.