A limited-production Japanese sports car with a Wankel rotary engine, the Mazda Cosmo was quite the unicorn when it came out in 1966, serving as a halo car for a company that had produced its first passenger car, the tiny R360, just six years earlier. Mazda by this time was known for its cars with rotary engines, the rights to which the automaker had purchased from NSU of Germany. The compact, high-revving rotaries were admired for producing impressive horsepower for their size, and the 110S badging on the Cosmo signified the 110 horsepower coming from its 982cc twin-rotor engine. That, and the car’s ability to reach 110 mph. Over its entire production run from 1966 through 1972, just 1,519 Cosmos were produced; they were never officially sold in the United States and continue to be rare here. The Cosmo 110S version is even rarer, differing from other models as it combines features of the Series I and Series II cars.
