Recent content by julybighouse

I finally got the car back. Over a month in the shop and lots of headaches. New engine, turbo, intake, clutch, timing belt, water pump, and more. Final cost was over $9K, but the car is practically brand new at this point. Everything under the hood has basically been replaced with new stuff. I...

Finally got a response from the dealership: "Car has been in and out of the shop at this point. The turbo went bad on it, the worst-case-scenario situation. Apparently, the bearing in the turbo burned out, ate a whole bunch of oil, then disintegrated, sending pieces of sharp metal into the...

So far, total time is 1 week and we don't have a specific diagnosis. Just one dealership charging the $90 to do their general check. I don't know how good that would be for diagnosing WHY the engine failed. Yes, I am definitely frustrated with the dragging of feet that has been the norm for...

Currently the car is two states away. I agree that the oil is the leading suspect for engine quitting and I'm frustrated that I was not there when it did go, because then I would have checked a number of these things if I could have. I will pass along these suggestions to those who actually are...

They may get me nowhere fast but they help me to at least come up with possibilities until I KNOW what happened. Without theories (BS or not) you can't plan for eventualities. How can you take action IF someone is at fault. We've had the car for less than 6 months and the engine already blew...

I really wish I knew the answer to that question. Unfortunately the Dealership has not gotten back to me. My wife had taken it on a trip, so I wasn't even there when this all happened.

I had the car towed to the mazda dealership that my buddy works at. He's been talking with the service guys and they've been offering a few Theories. Top Theory: MSP had conventional oil all its life. We purchased it in December and changed the oil to AmSoil (Full Synthetic) in February (We...

Hopefully we'll find that out later today

Thanks! We're going to be replacing the engine. It's actually cheaper than buying another used vehicle (and lets face it, we couldn't get anything as fun to drive at this mazdaspeed!) and we'll be pursuing several options to get the engine paid for by someone else. I'll know more in a few days...

How do I prove that it was their fault? I've got circumstancial evidence (personal accounts and such) I'm working to get a signed statement from the Pep boys station who confirmed a loose oil cap caused by the first shop, and I've got the receipt from the first shop which shows nothing about...

yeah, it would be great to get it rebuilt, and I'd seriously consider it even more if it wasn't two states away. I'll have to look into options, maybe it can be rebuilt there and we make another trip to go pick it up. seriously ticked at the cut rate shop that bungled a simple job! Shows what...

Aaaaaand they just got back to us. Car is completely dead. New engine or "trade it in". We've had the car for 6 months. About 75,000 miles on it, and worked beautifully before that repair store got to it. Looking online, a used engine is about $3-4K (not to mention the labor to put it in)...

still haven't heard back from mazda, will let you guys know more when I do

One of my buddies who knows more about Mazdas than I do was saying that Mazda has a fail safe in their engines that when oil is below a certain threshold (somewhere below the bottom of the dip stick) that it will freeze the engine before any damage occurs. He thinks that since the car was...

Thanks. The kicker for all this is that the oil shouldn't have been touched by any of them! The thermostat replacement only really touches the coolant (which is why I was surprised to hear that he touched the oil cap at all). The Coolant Fan replacement and A/C Charging shouldn't have touched...