Will a 300-HP V-6 Swap Change Your Mind About the NC Mazda Miata?

• Rocketeer has been V-6-swapping Mazda Miatas since 2013.
• Unusually, the V-6 is sourced from Jaguar, but you can’t argue with around 300 naturally aspirated horsepower.
• Now, the sometimes-overlooked NC is getting the V-6 treatment.

If you want to know what it’s like to be Luke Hemsworth, just ask the third-generation Mazda MX-5. Overshadowed by its brothers, the NC-chassis is often dismissed as the worst of the Miata range, not as lighthearted as the original or as lean and focused as the current car. The thing is, the NC is actually terrific to drive, and it has huge aftermarket support to make it even better.

The latest tweak to help the NC shrug off its unfairly maligned reputation comes from jolly old Britain, where the population buys more convertibles than anywhere in Europe despite it raining all the time. Spiderwebbed with excellently wriggly B-roads, the U.K. is a paradise for MX-5 owners—top up or down, as conditions permit—and it’s also chock full of man-in-a-shed innovators.

In this case, the shed man in question is Bruce Southey, and the innovation was stuffing a Jaguar engine into a first-generation Miata back in 2013 and calling the result the Rocketeer. This was not as ludicrous a move as it may seem; while many view performance-oriented Jaguars as oak sideboards equipped with supercharged V-8s, there are treasures hidden in the company’s back catalog.

Specifically, there’s the Ford Duratec 3.0-liter V-6, as found in the S-type. Bearing fingerprints from Porsche and Cosworth, it also turned up in a couple of Fast Ford products overseas, as well as the odd Morgan. Revvy and punchy, its aluminum construction makes it lighter than the iron-block four-cylinder in the first couple of MX-5 generations, making it a penalty-free horsepower upgrade.

Now, you can get that same punch in an NC from Rocketeer, tweaked to fit far back enough in the chassis to preserve a 50/50 weight distribution. How much power? Over 300 horses delivered from naturally aspirated revs rather than supercharging. There’s a new carbon-fiber intake and free-flowing exhaust, and it all sounds excellent.

Cost? Well, that too seems reasonable in an age where every five minutes a new seven-figure restomod is announced. A full turn-key package, with the engine swapped but otherwise factory-spec Mazda bits, starts at the equivalent of $28,000. That’s enough to get you into a nearly new ND MX-5, but it’s not out of reach.

Further, Rocketeer doesn’t just offer full bespoke building services; it also sells engines separately if you’d care to do the work yourself. In the U.K., those start at the equivalent of $8000 for a slightly lower-power version, and you don’t have to ship your MX-5 across the Atlantic either. Last year, Rocketeer announced a U.S. partner in Kansas that would start providing turn-key operations over here. Obviously, supply-chain logistics will affect some of these prices, but it’s basically a V-6-powered, super Miata for lightly used ND pricing.

The NC is also slightly roomier and less claustrophobic than the ND, and it has a huge list of potential chassis and braking modifications for tailoring the handling. Mazda’s engineers are rightly proud of the ND for being sharper than the generation that preceded it, but it sounds like it might be more fun to sharpen up an NC yourself.

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Brendan McAleer is a freelance writer and photographer based in North Vancouver, B.C., Canada. He grew up splitting his knuckles on British automobiles, came of age in the golden era of Japanese sport-compact performance, and began writing about cars and people in 2008. His particular interest is the intersection between humanity and machinery, whether it is the racing career of Walter Cronkite or Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki's half-century obsession with the Citroën 2CV. He has taught both of his young daughters how to shift a manual transmission and is grateful for the excuse they provide to be perpetually buying Hot Wheels.