I'm glad Mazda has extended the warranty on the brake booster and transfer case - though I think I would be happier if there were a full blown recall to replace substandard/defective/weak parts with upgraded replacements. I don't think that will happen with the transfer case, but in the current climate it is possible that NHTSA will eventually force Mazda to issue a brake booster recall. While I welcome the letters we are receiving from Mazda, in the absence of a full recall these letters are like announcements to the general public that these cars have known defects. (What's the current resale value of a ticking time bomb?)
On the other hand, Mazda is certainly not unique in all of this. Public scrutiny of defects is the new normal and few companies come out smelling like roses. Our 2001 Odyssey had a warranty extension for faulty automatic transmissions. Ours failed just after the extended warranty expired and we got no consideration from Honda. Worse, the replacement transmission were apparently just “rebuilt” versions of the original transmissions with most of the defects not fixed. Many owners suffered identical failures with the replacement units. (Sounds like the Mazda transfer cases?!)
Toyota's unintended acceleration debacle is a terrible example of safety fears morphing into a public relations nightmare. I was really shocked to read of Michael Barr's testimony in the October 2013 Toyota civil liability trial. He was granted many, many hours of access to Toyota's throttle position software source code (much more than NASA had) and what he found is really distressing. Toyota's software engineers showed a shocking disregard for industry-wide safety standards. Toyota really had no rejoinder to Barr's testimony and they settled the case immediately after he testified.
It has taken Ford years now to fix their Ford MyTouch software problems. Not everyone listens to Consumer Reports, but I have to believe that all those black dots and the arrival of Ford in the “least reliable” slot cost them a fortune in lost sales. How is it possible that a company of their size couldn't get their software s**t together after so many years?
And what are we to say about GM and there cheap-ass attempt to save a few pennies on ignition switches? Their safety defect monitoring process seems so screwed up that it looks like no one there has any idea of what actually happened and why. How can buyers have confidence when GM itself can't explain what when wrong and why?
Designing safe and reliable cars is apparently a really difficult task. Throw in the normal human inclination to hubris, add enormously large and complex organizational systems, combine with a profit-driven inclination to cut costs and voil: recipe for disaster. Nevertheless, cars are safer and more reliable now than they were when I was growing up. My kids are safer in our CX-9 then my sister and I were when were young, lying on the back shelf of the old Chevy, without airbags, seatbelts or crumple zones.