Until 1981 this mid-engined van was Mazda's best-selling vehicle of any kind.
Median 63 hp across 29 similar cars
Lead trim: 1.8 VC
Mazda Bongo second generation1977–1983
- 0spots by members
- Unclaimednobody has spotted one yet
- 0sets it belongs to
Nobody in Burbles has spotted a Mazda Bongo second generation yet. See one on the street, point the app at it, and the first card is yours — with your @handle permanently credited on this page.
FactUntil 1981 this mid-engined van was Mazda's best-selling vehicle of any kind.
After a two-year gap the second-generation Bongo van appeared in September 1977, now mid-engined with rear-wheel drive. It was exported as the Mazda E1300, E1400, E1600 and, with the 2.2-litre diesel added in October 1979, E2200, and Ford sold it as the Econovan, Econowagon and Spectron. A January 1981 facelift replaced the round headlights with rectangular ones and added a grille. Kia built it in South Korea as the Bongo and Ceres, and until 1981 the Bongo was Mazda's best-selling vehicle.
Collectors Spotted in the Mazda Bongo Lineage
No member has published a public street spot of the Mazda Bongo yet — the First · Worldwide stamp is wide open.
Trims & Figures
5 published trims in the catalogue. A blank is a figure not recorded, not zero.
| Trim | Years | Engine | Power | Torque | 0–60 | Drive | Gearbox | MSRP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1.3 TC | 1977–1979 | 1.3 L Inline-4 | — | — | — | RWD | — | — |
| 1.4 UC | 1979–1983 | 1.4 L Inline-4 | — | — | — | RWD | — | — |
| 1.6 NA | 1977–1983 | 1.6 L Inline-4 | — | — | — | RWD | — | — |
| 1.8 VC | 1978–1983 | 1.8 L Inline-4 | 94 hp | — | — | RWD | — | — |
| 2.2 S2 diesel (E2200) | 1979–1983 | 2.2 L Inline-4 | — | — | — | RWD | — | — |
Owning one
We don’t estimate running costs for a car like this. What it costs depends on its condition, its specialist and how it is driven, and an average would mislead.
Owners’ builds
Nobody has claimed one yet.
Photographs
Mazda declared this the last Bongo it would design in-house, then quit commercial-vehicle development for cars.
Plenty of Bongo Friendees never worked a day as a minivan in the UK — imported and converted into camper vans, many got an 'Auto Free Top' roof that popped up at the push of a button to sleep two more.
Toyota, Nissan and Mitsubishi all tried selling vans like this in America and failed, so Mazda never bothered sending the Bongo.
Until 1981 this mid-engined van was Mazda's best-selling vehicle of any kind.
Back in 1966, Mazda already had an electric Bongo prototype running — capable of 47 mph with a 37-mile range — decades before EVs became mainstream. It never reached production.
Rivals
Same body, same money, other badges — tap any card to flip.
Chevy pitched the Astro as the anti-minivan, telling buyers life was too big for one, while it rode on a rear-wheel-drive truck frame.
The IIHS rated the Astro Poor in a 1996 crash test, yet 2001–2004 Astros later had the lowest driver death rate of any US passenger vehicle.
The boxy, unglamorous Astro quietly posted one of the best real-world safety records in America: IIHS found 2001-2004 models had the fewest driver deaths per million vehicles of any passenger vehicle on US roads.
The third-generation Tourneo Connect, released in Europe in October 2021, is a rebadged fourth-generation Volkswagen Caddy, assembled by Volkswagen in Poland.
Ford beat the 25% "chicken tax" by importing the Transit Connect as a passenger van — rear windows and seats included, then stripped out and recycled once it landed in the US.
Ford spent years in federal court over the second-gen Transit Connect: in June 2019 the US won its appeal, and judges ruled the van was cargo-only — ending Ford's workaround for the 'chicken tax.'
GM sold a rebadged Nissan NV200 as the Chevy City Express for four years, then killed it in 2018, citing weak sales and the fact that its parts weren't even compatible with GM's own parts catalog.
Its name is a pun: "S-Cargo" means "Small Cargo" but sounds just like escargot — French for snail, the shape the whole van was built to resemble.