at 12200 miles. Regardless of the longer warranty, the clutch was only warranteed for 1 year/12k miles. Mazda refused to cover it under warranty as it took him two years to do the 12.2k miles. It turns out there has been a rash of clutch failures on the Mazdas at 10-20k miles and there was a technical service bulletin about it that would only be invoked if someone complains, otherwise it was ignored. It cost him 2600 bucks for the repair. Mazda reliability isn't very good nor is the warranty experience.

This site might be of interest to you . . .

http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/showthread.php?s=11b4afa7e9087ad67c2ac1cc58dd9bb2&t=123699980

http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=315

A guy at work has owned one for the last couple of years and has had no problems with it. Victor's son has one, so he might chime in later with his experience with it.

Me have has several Mazdas in our family over the years and they have been very reliable DD's.

The Mazdaspeed cars have about twice the HP of a regular Mazda 3, so that might have to do with the clutch life issue.
_________________
HarryPR
BMWCCA #19290

I have one right now (automatic) as a rental car, but the sedan not the hatch.
I've been driving it about a week, and put on about a thousand miles so far.
It is really nice to drive, and spacious up front as someone mentioned, but a friend bought one new a couple of years ago and had transmission (or clutch) trouble within the first week.
He continued to have problems and eventually traded it in.
As much as I enjoy driving it, I think reliability is suspect.

and the clutch now starts to grab with the pedal about 1/4 inch off the floor, making smooth shifting almost impossible as you can barely relax your leg pressure. The dealer told him that it will wear so it will be higher off the floor! He also complained about it pulling to the right. If you let your hands off the wheel for more than a second you'll hit a parked car. The dealer says it's because the roads are crowned. Duh. I found when I drove it that if you drove on the wrong side of the road and used that crowning, you could go straight, but on any road it is instant death to take your hands off the wheel. There's something rotten in MazdaZoomZoomLand, or everyone in MZZL is an idiot.

hmmm... she would be getting a auto. I really would like her to get a manual but she isn't going to budge. So I don't think we need to worry about clutch issues. As well she is pretty easy on cars....
_________________
70 2002 w/m42
91 318is w/m42
email for 02 and 02tii parts

jakeb wrote:

hmmm... she would be getting a auto. I really would like her to get a manual but she isn't going to budge. So I don't think we need to worry about clutch issues. As well she is pretty easy on cars....

Hey Jake,
My wife has had her automatic for 4 years now (50K kms), and we have not had any issues with it at all. She has had a 3 Mazdas (626, MPV and now the 3) and the reliability has been great.

For the price, and what they have to offer, I don't believe there is much in the same segment that is as good.

Don

I have a 2.0 sedan. Nice car handles well emough and the manual clutchless is standard, so you can always take it ou of automatic.
_________________
'75 Alpine Weiss I
'94 530iT Dinan
'66 Mustang Conv
'66 Mustang Coupe (Garage Queen)
'05 Mazda 3