unhappy with Mazda

Frank Fusco

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12,782
Location
Mountain Home, Arkansas
My 24 year old daughter has a three year old Mazda CX7. Nice enough car but it has always given lousy gas mileage.
Last week she had a very traumatic day of driving. Within an hours time: a rock, not a little stone, hit and smashed her windshield :eek: while she was on an Interstate; a short while later she was pulled over by the State Police. Stressful enough :confused: because she was actually slightly under the speed limit. The Trooper told her her car was on fire. :eek: Fortunately, on inspection it was found to not be on fire. But a huge amount of smoke was coming from it and that caught the Troopers attention. What happened was her a/c compressor had frozen and the belt kept being pulled around the pulley.
Stuck on the highway (thank goodness for cell phones) she called us to express panic; a friend to pick her up and a tow truck to take to the nearest Mazda dealer.
With some Googling we found that many-many complaints had been filed with Mazda for the identical problem. And all of them were right at 45,000 miles, just what her car has.
Windshield $250.00 to replace; a/c and belt $850.00. :(
Then, when fixed she found she was getting much-much better gas mileage. Before the a/c was changed, in other words the entire time she owned the car, it had given really poor mileage.
This indicates to non-mechanic me the a/c unit was bad the whole time and was dragging. Bad news.
We don't know if Mazda will make good on the replacement. But we do know this is the last Mazda ever for anyone in our family.
 
Sorry to hear all of the trouble..

Bright side 1. No speeding ticket
2. No one injured by the rock and now a CLEAN windshield.
3. Better MPG
4. Cool air

No Mazda for me! after reading this.
 
That is too bad Frank, I'm glad that your daughter is OK.

I had a Mazda GLC and it was a Great Little Car. I put a lot of miles on it and the only thing I ever had to replace were the front struts and one CV joint, and to be fair that was at the 150,000 Km mark, and for those of you that don't speak Canadian, that was right around 94,000 miles. I got great mileage and I really did like the car, the only reason I sold it was I could not afford to own a car living in Vancouver, and I was moving to Japan. My parents had a Mazda 929 and they loved that car, they put a lot of miles on it and they eventually traded it in for a Ford Taurus. My dad said that is the second worst car move he ever made, the first was trading in his 68 Dodge Dart for a 71 Chrysler Newport, boy he hated that Newport :D

All I'm saying is because of one bad car, you can't cross the whole company off the list :dunno:

Heck Ford make some good cars, but remember the Pinto :eek:

Again Frank, I'm just happy all it cost was time and money :rolleyes: :wave:
 
Sorry to hear of your daughter's problem with the car.

I want to add my experience with Mazda, however. I owned a 91 929 and it was a great car. I finally sold it to a friend in about 2007 and she still has it and drives the heck out of it. To replace it, I bought a 2007 CX-9 and have been more than satisfied with it.

Prior to the 929, I owned a Nissan Maxima and it was trouble from the beginning. I know that Nissan has made improvements in their quality, but I will NEVER own another Nissan. If someone gave me a brand new Nissan, I'd sell it and buy some other brand.

Good luck on getting Mazda to pay for the A/C. Try to compromise with them, like offering to pay half. After all, she did use it for 45K miles.

Mike
 
I was thinking the Mazda CX7 was the same as the Ford Edge, but it's actually the Mazda CX9, like Mike has. The Mazda CX7 is it's own platform.

Bummer on the WS and AC, glad she is ok. My wife's car is having the same issue with the compressor on her Isuzu. Isuzu wants $1400 to replace the compressor. I've bought the vacuum and manifold gauges and plan to do it myself, but still an aftermarket compressor is still $450. :eek:
 
I was thinking the Mazda CX7 was the same as the Ford Edge, but it's actually the Mazda CX9, like Mike has. The Mazda CX7 is it's own platform.

Bummer on the WS and AC, glad she is ok. My wife's car is having the same issue with the compressor on her Isuzu. Isuzu wants $1400 to replace the compressor. I've bought the vacuum and manifold gauges and plan to do it myself, but still an aftermarket compressor is still $450. :eek:
You also need a vacuum pump to evacuate the system before you put the freon in. Try to find a friend who does A/C work and s/he will have all the equipment.

Mike
 
Sorry to hear about your Mazda. My father has had nothing but good luck with his Mazda3. I wonder if the issue is in part with the dealer - any competent mechanic would have noticed that years ago during a service. Our dealer - Don Miller Mazda of Madison - has been very responsible.

That said, be happy it's just the A/C system that was malfunctioning - while the smoke was a bit scary, it wasn't life-threatening. For a while, some VW products were having frequent transmission failures - and repairing them often cost more than half the Blue Book value of the car!
 
1. The broken windshield was not Mazda's fault. And why $250 to replace? Comprehensive insurance should have replaced it free of cost, or at most, the deductible.

2. Did she ever complain to a dealer about lousy mileage? If so, they might have done something. There was likely a Dealer Advisory about the problem.

3. The problem was fixed, so why bash Mazda for it? Nearly every brand on the road has had recalls and Dealer Advisory repairs.
 
Stu, Jim, I understand all manufacturers can have problems.
But my gripe with Mazda is a documented history of this problem with the a/co unit and no action or compensation from Mazda. Plus, they, apparently continue to produce the same troublesome unit. Bad company faith is why I'll never use their products again.
 
I'm another former owner of 3 Mazdas that I thoroughly loved. '74 RX3 with the rotary engine....talk about poor mileage :eek:, but man would that thing git up and scoot for a small car. Wife was driving it one day in the rain and and a Ford PU pulled in front of her and she T-boned him at 55 mph. Totaled both vehicles. Neither hurt seriously. '81 626 that we drove for 13 years. '87 B2200 PU that went 15 years. Both of the latter still running when we sold them.
Just like we do when we have a woodworking tool, don't make any rash decisions based on one incident. Pursue Mazda and make them make good on it. Point out to the MGR, Dealer Principal, and their service rep the information you've found in the net. Make copies for them, don't expect them to look it up. Show that you have done your homework. Don't be nasty, but be matter of fact with them. And let us know how it turns out. Jim.
 
Stu, Jim, I understand all manufacturers can have problems.
But my gripe with Mazda is a documented history of this problem with the a/co unit and no action or compensation from Mazda. Plus, they, apparently continue to produce the same troublesome unit. Bad company faith is why I'll never use their products again.

Well, If gas mileage suddenly improved with the new compressor, then they're apparently installing an improved unit, not continuing to use the old one.

BTW, I checked the NHTSA recall and engineering investigations site, and they make no mention of the problem.
 
not completely related, but I stuck with a problem on a car and finally, after a year and half got it taken care off.
long story:
I was insulted by a salesman at bmw, so I swore off the car even though I wanted one. when I went to another showroom, just to show my wife what I wanted, the saleswoman was the complete opposite of the original moron who insulted me, and I ended up with a 525, 1991.
I drove it out of the showroom and to work to show my manager, and got into an accident 2 hours after I drove the car out of the showroom. 12000 dollars damage, bmw picked up the car, kept it for a month to get parts, and returned it to me.
I started to notice after a few months, everytime it rained out, the next day I had problems with the car hesitating sometimes on acceleration.
back to the shop it went, and this was an ongoing problem. they kept changing everything, said it was working fine, kept it for days to test, and it always worked fine. as soon as it rained, it hesitated.
so they took it again, said let them keep it for a few days and they would spray it down with water to see whats going on.
nothing happenned it worked fine.
after over a year of the same recurring problem, I told them Id had enough.
this is ridiculous, a luxury car with an unknown problem, take it back.
I loved the car, but this was too much to overlook.
One day the owner of the dealership called me and said the master mechanic from germany is in NY a certain day, to make sure my car is there, he wants to look at it himself.
and amazing, he and his team discovered that after the first day accident, the moon roof was knocked off a tiny tiny bit, unnoticable even.still opened and closed mechanically fine, water never leaked or anything.
but each time it rained, not the same as spraying it down, water found its way down the doorway, down to the floor, under the carpet, the padding was damp, and there are sensors below the back seat in the car, and whenever they got a bit of moisture, it was messing up things.
I stuck with it, they finally figured it out.
they ripped the entire car apart and put all new carpet and padding, everything was new. but it worked fine and I drove it for 10 years after that problem free.
 
Now there is a dealer with connections and knows how to use them!! Not only would I stay with that company, I would stay with that dealer! Good for them.

I have read all of the James Herriot (sp?) books, about the English animal vet. A story about a family that only calls a vet after they have exhausted all of their home remedies and about all that is ever left is to put the animal out of their misery. So after another animal visit the farmer sees him at the market and screams and hollers out loud for all to hear about another animal the vet looked after died! A little later on another farmer, very quiet spoken whispers in the vet's ear about an animal that was a total loss and the vet actually performed a miracle and the animal was up and about and doing well. Quite the parable, do something wrong and it is shouted from the heavens, do something right and it is barely whispered in your ear!
 
Well, If gas mileage suddenly improved with the new compressor, then they're apparently installing an improved unit, not continuing to use the old one.

BTW, I checked the NHTSA recall and engineering investigations site, and they make no mention of the problem.

We can only hope it is an improved unit. If it is, that would be proof the original was a bummer.
Not being safety related, I am not sure NHTSA would list it as a problem. My daughter researched the issue and found a boat load of complaints that had been filed. I'll ask her what agency these were filed with.
 
Good news.

My daughter got a letter from Mazda regarding her a/c problems.
They state there have been an "inordinately high number of failures" with this unit. Mazda will reimburse her for all her related expenses. She didn't request this but did voice displeasure to the dealer that put in the replacement.
Good for Mazda, they do take care of their customers. :clap:
Her reimbursement will be in the range of $1,000.00.
My faith in the company has been restored. :thumb:
 
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