The Saga of the Sportwagen Replacement Continues - Mazda???

Today was our TDI buy-back day. Bittersweet, really going to miss our Sportwagen, but VW cut us a decent little check, we made a profit on the car, if you exclude tax and insurance.

Test drove a few things at the dealer (VW/Mazda) since we were there. Haven't made up our mind if we're just going to take the money and run, or put it toward another car? We could use a newer, more efficient, more reliable, commuter, which is exactly what the Sportwagen was, but we have a fleet of beaters, and the Grand Marquis, so we're not hurting for transportation.

To prevent burying the lead a bit here, we drove a few cars, sat in a few others, and damned if we didn't fall for a Mazda 3.

Drove a '17 Golf Sportwagen S 4motion TSI, I didn't know you could get AWD without getting the Alltrack until today, it was pretty meh, and felt like a downgrade from our '14 Jetta Sportwagen, power was a little wheezy, and the interior felt "cheap." Maybe the higher optioned SE or SEL would be a better comparison. Got a "quote" on an SE FWD with sunroof, and the color combo we want, I'd want them to sharpen their pencil a bit, and try again, but of course they'd have to ship one in from elsewhere, so I'm not sure it's even worth the effort to haggle.

Sat in a '17 Golf Alltrack, it seems like it'd be a real nice place to be, but the price as equipped was a bit much, just almost V60 money, and I'd probably buy the Volvo over the VW.

Salesman wanted us to look at a Passat R Line, maybe we should give it a shot, but we turned our attention to the Mazda side of things instead.

Drove a '17 Mazda 6 Grand Touring. Man is that a nice car, looked great, white with dark gray wheels, inside was BMW/Mercedes like, two tone leatherette, heads up display was a little gimmicky, but tugged at my inner Maverick. (RIP Goose ) It really was a heck of a lot nicer than any of the VWs we sat in, but as equipped it was knocking on BMW 3 series territory. I will definitely be looking on the pre-owned market, there's the potential for an exceptional bang-for-the-buck from these cars.

Finally, we drove a bit of a unicorn, a '17 Mazda 3 S Touring 5-Door (hatch), white, sunroof, auto. The S gets the "big" 2.5l same as the Mazda 6, instead of the little 2.0l the i trim gets. I was standing slightly behind it when the salesman started it up, the slight growl from the dual exhaust tips put a smile on my face, and I must say I was smiling the whole time I was behind the wheel.

I originally told the salesman that I wanted to at least see a 3 Touring or Grand Touring, I mentioned that I wanted an S, hatch, and that I didn't expect them to have any, based on previous searches online, it seems dealers in AR only order the i trim models. Well be damned if they didn't have the exact model and trim I'd build myself if I could, setting right there on the lot, still had some of the exterior protective plastic from transport on it even.

The price on the 3 was cheapest of anything we looked at, inside was just as nice as the 6, same 2 tone leatherette, and nicer than any of the VWs, but it is smaller, quite a bit smaller than the 6, and noticeably smaller than the Sportwagen it'd be replacing.

I obviously have some concerns about the size, I'm a Mazda novice, I know they are very well received with most of GRM, and I'll do my due diligence shopping around, but what's y'all's thoughts on the current generation Mazda 3? Anything to look out for? Anyone had a '14 or '15 long enough to really put a lot of miles on it? We'd be hoping/planning on having it at least 10 years/200K miles.

I did a bunch of comparisons, and filtered searches on fueleconomy.org, excluding hybrids, and CVTs, that pretty much lead me right to Mazda. Anything else we should be cross shopping? Safety is a bit of a concern, though there was an IIHS "best safety" award sticker in the window of both the 3 and 6, so I guess that's covered?

SWMBO and I carpool together, our commute is roughly 70 miles a day round trip, 70% interstate, 30% city, looking for, comfy, efficient, safe, modern tech amenities, what's going to do it better for the money than the current Mazda 3?

The one thing that would give me pause about buying any Mazda right now, is their claim that they will begin building cars with an engine running HCCI (Homogenous Charge Compression ignition - A gas engine that runs on the Diesel cycle) in another year or year and a half. Basically a possible game changer for gas engines, with a potential ~30% improvement in fuel economy. The initial release is supposed to be in the next gen 3, and my guess would be that they at least do it on the 'upgrade' (2.5L or equivalent replacement) engine that will be shared across the most of their platforms.

In reply to Driven5:

I've read about that, here I think, but they've also been going to release the Skyactive-D diesel, "soon" for ~5 years now.

I like the 3 but for DD what is wrong with a 6?

They depreciate like a Land Rover so getting a good deal on a slightly not new one should be easy.

Mom and dad have a 15 3 skyactiv. Already have 50k on it, all over north America. Nothing odd, no failures. There's no good reason for me not to like it, but I don't.

"Salesman wanted us to look at a Passat R Line, maybe we should give it a shot, but we turned our attention to the Mazda side of things instead."

I fell in love with the R-Line when I was looking for a GTI, especially the price. Then I realized that it did not have any upgrades to power or handling. Dang, seemed like a real poor-man's 330i.

Mazda is killing it right now. I'm shopping for a 3/6 with the 2.5 myself. Apparently they even manage to avoid the carbon buildup most DI motors develop by doing something weird with the intake charge. I really want a 3 Grand Touring 2.5 hatch with the stick, but owners must love them because I can't find anything on the used market.

Great deals on the 6 used if you're patient though. I may very well buy that if it's around in a month.

pointofdeparture wrote: Mazda is killing it right now. I'm shopping for a 3/6 with the 2.5 myself. Apparently they even manage to avoid the carbon buildup most DI motors develop by doing something weird with the intake charge. I really want a 3 Grand Touring 2.5 hatch with the stick, but owners must love them because I can't find anything on the used market. Great deals on the 6 used if you're patient though. I may very well buy that if it's around in a month.

That thing is tempting. I love the current 6, and having driven $2000 cars my entire life...It's starting to wear on me.

Schrödinger's Flight Service wrote: I like the 3 but for DD what is wrong with a 6?

I really liked the 6 too, but we like the looks/utility of the 5 door 3, well honestly looks are probably a wash, utility of the hatch is a plus, but there was just something about the 3, I sure didn't expect to have a connection with it. The big deal was that, as equipped the 6 we drove was ~$8K more than the 3 we drove, granted it was one of the swankiest one they had on the lot.

They had a white '17 Miata RF in the show room on the Mazda side too, good gravy, I've mostly thought all you Miata fans here were bonkers all these years, but that thing was gorgeous. I declined the salesman's oh so generous offer of letting me set in it, I didn't need anymore temptation.

bigdaddylee82 wrote: I declined the salesman's oh so generous offer of letting me set in it, I didn't need anymore temptation.

chicken E36 M3

bigdaddylee82 wrote: In reply to Driven5: I've read about that, here I think, but they've also been going to release the Skyactive-D diesel, "soon" for ~5 years now.

Gas engines are the backbone of sales in North America. Diesel engines would at best a niche for them here. As 'small' (relatively speaking) as Mazda is, such that they have to maximize their engine development and production resources by consolidating as much as possible across platforms, I would guess that the 'Skyactiv-2' engines will probably end up replacing the current generation of Skyactiv-G engines rather than just being a supplement to them like the Skyactiv-D would have been. Much like Ford has gone all-in on the Eco(LOL)boost engines, I expect (hope?) Mazda will be doing the same on Skyactiv-2.

Obviously, only time will tell...And while I haven't had a very good record of automotive predictions over the last few years, for me personally, I'm willing to wait a year or two to find out.

To answer your questions, I haven't had any negative experiences with the 16/17 model year 3/5/6s. Within my family or circle of friends there's probably 4 or 5 Mazda 3s, 2 or 3 6s and we have our 2016 Mazda 5 (with the 2.5). No real problems outside of oil changes. Mazda 3s often need the rear engine mount done at about 60-70k, it'll shake and clunk the engine a bit when it wears out. It should cost <$100 and take <30 minutes to do. Expect that people will tell you the shocks "wear out early," but based on my experiences the shocks wear out the same as they do on a camry, but the handling is so numb on a camry that you can't really tell unless you're an enthusiast. Plan on replacing shocks by the 80-100k mark or so.

I know it's not current generation, but we put 198k on my wife's old 2005 Mazda 3, it was comfortable and big enough as long as we didn't have to have two rear-facing child seats in the car. In the 200k timeframe, the only other non-maintenance thing I did was the rear suspension bushings, cost about $250 for all of them (I think?) and took me a weekend of on/off work to do.

Now that we have a third kid, we've sold it off in favor of the 2016 Mazda 5 that we've since put about 28k on. Nothing to report there.

In reply to Driven5:

This seems to be the article that most of the other articles I've found, site as their source:
Mazda's new engine boosts fuel efficiency by 30%

"End of '18," not sure if I want to wait that long. Though they also state, "Mazda plans to incorporate the new engine in 2018 in the new Mazda3, dubbed Axela in Japan, which will undergo its first overhaul in five years." Odd that they'd do a "refresh" for '17 only to ditch it for a new model in '18, maybe that "end of '18" is for the '19 year models?

In reply to WonkoTheSane:

Thanks! Have you or any of your cohort, experienced any of the down sides of DI, i.e. carbon build up? I know that pointofdeparture mentioned earlier that it doesn't seem to be a problem on these.

I didn't realize the '17 3 I drove yesterday was a "refreshed" model, until I started doing some more research, I guess I need to look at '14-'16 model to see how different they are. I also noticed what I was calling an S Touring, isn't really, apparently they dropped the "S" for '17, what I actually drove was a "Mazda 3 5-Door Touring 2.5." I noticed in some reviews the center gauge was a tach, but those must be Grand Tourings? The Touring we drove had a central speedometer, no HUD, digital tach on the left.

In reply to bigdaddylee82:

When the Touring 2.5 was still called the "S Touring" from '14-16, it had the big center tach and HUD (along with Blose stereo). As of '17 those features are Grand Touring only. The older 3 models also had a mechanical handbrake instead of the new electronic one.

Some discussion of Mazda's carbon buildup solution here at MotoIQ for those interested.

To eliminate the problem of intake valve deposits that plague current direct gasoline injection engines, the engineers at Mazda determined that deposits are formed when intake valve temperatures fall below 400 degrees C. Measures were taken so that the intake valve would operate above this point to reduce deposit formation.

In reply to bigdaddylee82:

Correct, most likely '19 model year, but I thought I had seen something indicating that the '19 redesign could actually come out more like mid-18. Either way, yeah, I guess more to the year and a half side than the year side.

In reply to pointofdeparture:

They were only available in that configuration recently (2016? not sure on exact year) and not upon launch of the 3rd gen, so those owners are likely to still be enjoying them.

Driven5 wrote: The one thing that would give me pause about buying any Mazda right now, is their claim that they will begin building cars with an engine running HCCI (Homogenous Charge Compression ignition - A gas engine that runs on the Diesel cycle) in another year or year and a half. Basically a possible game changer for gas engines, with a potential ~30% improvement in fuel economy. The initial release is supposed to be in the next gen 3, and my guess would be that they at least do it on the 'upgrade' (2.5L or equivalent replacement) engine that will be shared across the most of their platforms.

Why would this give you pause about buying a Mazda vs buying something else? It's not like anyone else is shipping HCCI engines, so buying a Honda or Toyota or whatever leaves you in the same situation of having the game changed out from underneath your purchase as buying a non-HCCI Mazda, doesn't it?

As for current Mazdas, I agree that they're doing a good job. We just replaced our '07 Odyssey with a 2016 CX-9 Grand Touring and are very pleased with it.

Three Mazdas now -- CX-9, FD, NB. All turbo. :)

Can't speak to the latest 3, but our 2010 hatch was bought new and 7 years later I still have no intentions of replacing it. It's a killer DD (wife's) that's fun to flog when you get the urge. It's not fast, has love it or hate it looks, but hands down has been my second best automotive purchase to date.

My GF bought a new 2017 3 a few months ago. 2.0, 6MT, hatch. She's very happy with it thus far, and I was quite impressed with both the interior and the driving dynamics when I drove it. If I could wrap my head around FWD I'd definitely consider one myself.

In reply to codrus:

There is a reason I specifically didn't say "vs something else". If I was in the market for a new Mazda, especially if I wanted to keep it a long time, a potentially game changing development on the horizon would give me pause on purchasing one now vs making my current "not hurting for transportation" situation work for long enough to see what happens with said development... Hence my later comment about being "willing to wait a year or two to find out".

I would bet it will take a few years for them to work out the bugs of HCCI in actual production models, and that's assuming they're good on their word (all we have right now is a press release to go from, they haven't even shown an engine yet). Hyundai was trumpeting that they had figured it out back in ~2010, and then suddenly stopped talking about it when they tried to move the tech from a lab to production vehicles because of the cost/complexity challenges they ran into. Mazda is an engineer's company, I would hope that they have truly figured it out but I wouldn't hold off on buying one of their current cars because of it.

In reply to pointofdeparture:

You could also be ahead of the game to simply install an air/oil separator on the intake track to further reduce the chance of this happening at all. I've had great luck with the Bob's Auto Sport ones. They work fantastic, the price is less then others on the market, it is american made, and they offer free shipping on them.

In reply to pointofdeparture:

Yes, there is certainly the potential for failure in any new endeavor. But also remember that for the past 5 years while everybody else has been playing with turbocharging downsized engines, Mazda has been hard at work studying (and implementing) significantly elevated engine compression ratios. People may have been similarly skeptical when Mazda said they were going to produce a 13:1 compression engine family that ran on regular (87 octane) unleaded, and 14:1 in some markets. And yet, as far as I know, those have been good engines from day one of production. In fact, at this point it would seem that the current generation Skyactiv-G might have been almost more of a calculated stepping stone than goal unto itself.

In reply to Driven5:

Yeah, they have certainly been doing good with the current Skyactiv Atkinson cycle mills. They have significant experience with non-Otto engines when you think about it, going back to the Miller unit in the Millenia. Nobody is perfect though, I seem to remember the DISI turbos had some teething issues, and of course there was the awful Renesis rollout. I do feel like if anyone can perfect HCCI it would be Mazda (or maybe the Germans) but what can I say, I'm a skeptic

bigdaddylee82 wrote: In reply to WonkoTheSane: Thanks! Have you or any of your cohort, experienced any of the down sides of DI, i.e. carbon build up? I know that pointofdeparture mentioned earlier that it doesn't seem to be a problem on these.

I haven't heard a peep.. The only time I've heard of one of them in the shop for unscheduled was due to a deer. Probably only 50% of that fleet is DI (I think they started in 2013?), though, but based on what I've read (including that MotoIQ review), I wasn't concerned about buying the new 5 with DI from Mazda.