Use the common sense. She uses “miles”, and the US is almost the only country in the world who still uses mile instead of km. “Mazda” kept her car for 3 weeks and then one more week, and “towed” her car over, these are the behaviors only US Mazda dealer will do. In addition, I’d say 95% of posts here are from the US and Canada.
Points well taken. Mazda sold somewhere in the range of 140,000 - 150,000 units in the US in 2018 alone. Probably 500,000+ CD versions all told. You're going to need a whole sh*tload more anecdotes posted here to make a compelling case, a volume that will never be achieved on this web site. I'll continue to monitor Consumer Reports major engine reliability category, a much larger sample and a more scientific method.
I can tell you’d never experienced Mazda’s rotary engine era back in 1990’s. I’d been at my Mazda dealer many times back them checking out Mazda vehicles because I love the innovations from Mazda since I was small. The pile of failed rotary engines in the backyard of the Town North Mazda was amazing.
I can't imagine obsessing about a vehicle's impending failure. I can't imagine having that uneasiness or sour taste every time I got in the thing or even just looked it. I'd sell or trade it if I were you. Then again, every car I've owned as far back as I can recall has developed engine tapping with age in cold weather. The last two Siennas have gone 100,000 and 60,000 miles at least after developing the tapping. You could not even tell the engine was running at idle when new even standing outside 10 feet away. For years its been tap, tap, tap, run, run, run like a top with no problems whatsoever.
First, I like the vehicle and trading/selling it means losing $$.
My vehicle does not have a rotary engine nor 30 year old GM cylinder deactivation. I have no affinity with Mazda or any other automaker--every purchase starts with a blank sheet of paper. I don't care much for innovation until after others have done all the beta testing on their own dime.
You wouldn't lose much money swapping into a another vehicle of comparable age and mileage. Obsession has its own costs. Knowing when to cut one's losses is an important life lesson.
Actually trading in will result in approx. $4000 to $5000 loss, dealer gets your trade cheap to resell for profit, sells you another vehicle at tidy profit then you pay taxes and tags all over again plus loan APRs have increased. Most of depreciation has already occurred. Run it up to almost end of warranty period then trade is better option. Either way, it's a loss.You wouldn't lose much money swapping into a another vehicle of comparable age and mileage. Obsession has its own costs. Knowing when to cut one's losses is an important life lesson.
I don't recall when exactly my two Sienna's started cold weather tapping but I'm sure it was before the 5 year / 60k mile powertrain warranties were up. It was probably a gradual thing--I'm sure it didn't wake up one morning and decide to get noisy.
Just before leaving for Florida from the cold north a couple of weeks ago I noticed it was particularly noisy, maybe a little colder that day or not driven for a couple of days, can't exactly recall. Did that stop me driving it 1,400 miles to Florida? Of course not. Tapping is what it does at 110,000 miles and will continue to do so for many more miles, I would presume, like its predecessor. Same deal with my 2006 Accord V6 before this Mazda. I took note of a quite old, quite tap-tap noisy Camry in a Florida parking lot the other day, so no cold weather excuse there. I should have asked the guy how many miles he had on it.
Unlucky? I don't see it that way. Did the tapping need fixing in any of those vehicles, warranty or otherwise? No. Once warmed up they quieted down and then ran great. And that's been the state of affairs over many, many miles in multiple vehicles. What's not to like?
I guess you're in one of those states like California that does not reduce the sales tax basis by the value of the trade. If not, you have to redo your math. Tags? You should get credit for the balance of registration on the traded vehicle, so net net there is no additional cost.
Thinking back to the falling rocker arm problem of a few years ago, it's my recollection that there were only a handful of anecdotes (fewer than ten) posted by people who actually had that problem occur on their car. I'm pretty sure I've seen a lot more anecdotes about cracked cylinder heads.
When Go Hawks first exposed the rocker arm falling problem from cylinder deactivation on May 3, 2019, some were questioning his motive at the time. Not until Mazda issued a recall for the problem later, many here believe he’s making a big fuss over a minor issue.
Officially it’s a voluntary recall by Mazda. But someone found the internal communication between NHTSA and Mazda North American Operations for the rocker arm falling problem, it’s the NHTSA who initiated the investigation. That’s why reporting the cracked cylinder head problem to NHTSA is essential.
Yes. But I have mentioned it back then, that Mazda used an easy and cheap way to fix the rocker arm falling problem on the recall. They modified the PCM software changing the oil pressure to those switchable hydraulic lash adjusters used for cylinder deactivation. But Mazda didn’t address the side effects where the original switchable HLAs may not be able to handle the change. I truly believe that’s why we now see the tapping noise and bubble problem on these switchable HLAs. And that’s why Mazda also has revised those switchable HLAs implied in the related TSB and SA on tapping noise concerns.
Yes, indeed. That’s the ultimate protection to those CX-5 owners.
Apples and oranges. The rocker arm issue was deemed a safety issue because vehicles were going into limp mode or stalling. Unless and until a sufficient number of safety complaints are logged for cracked cylinder heads there would not be any reason for a safety recall. I think you'd have to ignore all warnings associated with a cracked cylinder head until the engine fails while on the road and that might be logged as user stupidity not a safety issue.
Well, yeah, voluntary recalls in the true sense of the word are likely non-existent. The NHTSA compiles incidence data from various reports: consumer complaints, police accident reports, whatnot. It doesn't take very many instances with concerning safety issues for the NHTSA to ask an automaker to look into it. If the automaker claims it is not a systemic issue and requires no action, and their evidence for that is not compelling to the NHTSA, then they issue a mandatory recall.
I can see your point and I agree that the cracked cylinder head and tapping noise problem would be more difficult to become a safety recall than the fallen rocker arms.
I'll say for certain that a mandatory recall would not be my preference for any of the major engine issues that we've been discussing over the past few years. I wouldn't even want to think of one of these outfits doing major work on our vehicle's engines, if there are no symptoms of any issue.
No, this’s definitely not the case. Never been mentioned such thing anywhere in the recall notice. The recall notice mentioned only changing the oil pressure to switchable HLAs so that the rocker arms won’t get too loose and dislodged under certain conditions.
