I have a serious dilemma!! You see my “Gearbox” (Affectionately named as such for reason that will become clear) needs its annual service and I need a very convincing argument as to why I should honor my commitment to Redlands Mazda and have them service my “Gearbox” when the situation does not appear to be reciprocated.

Let’s complete the picture. I originally bought my MY2015 Mazda CX5 from Redlands Mazda in May 2015 and have had it serviced per schedule exclusively by them ever since. I am 67 years old, and you can call me outdated but, when buying, my thinking was to highly preference a company contributing to the local economy. Silly concept?

In the May ’23 service (60,000km) I was advised that the tensioner pully and rear brake pads would need to be replaced within the next 6 months. Brake pads OK, they are a consumable item, and a large percentage of my driving is in the city and short distances. In these circumstances a lower-than-normal service life could be accepted. However, tensioner pully? 60,000km? That is a very poor service life. In late ’23 I had the tensioner pully and the brake pads replaced per recommendation (by Redlands Mazda of course). Cost of repairs Circa $1k.

Driving from Redlands Mazda to home the car felt slightly sluggish when I took the foot off the accelerator. Like when you put slight pressure on the brake coasting gently to a stop. Drove less than 2 km to the shops the next morning and same thing. Got out and the burning smell was obvious. The rear right brake was extremely hot. Returned the “Gearbox” to Redlands Mazda via tow truck who advised that,

“The caliper had corroded, and it had seized it in position lightly clamping the rear passenger side brake.”

The repairs advised by Redlands Mazda were new pads, new caliper and rotor machined. The agreed repair cost of circa $500 on the basis that the “seized” rotor was placed in my “Gearbox” so that I could have an independent review it. OK, a couple of things.

1. If the rear passenger side caliper was corroded to the point of failure. What about the rear driver's side? Not a mention by Redlands Mazda. Does that make any sense?

2. I was stupid and didn’t confirm the caliper was actually in the car when I left. Of course, it wasn’t there despite assurances from the service rep that it was.

3. If I felt the sluggishness when driving home. Can anyone explain how a trained competent person test driving the car after replacing a brake pad could not feel the same sluggishness particularly when that is so pertinent to the work just completed?

4. Let’s talk dollars. Financially, Redlands Mazda said it accepted responsibility for repair of the rotor and new pad but said that the failure of the caliper is not their responsibility. Fair enough if that’s what it was. (Refer above where the faulty caliper was not returned to me to assess this nor any mention of the rear driver's side one.) So, $500 to replace one caliper? Seriously? I would have thought that that would almost cover the cost to Redlands Mazda to complete all the work and not just one caliper replacement.

5. Me being stupid again. I should have taken the vehicle from them there and then and had it repaired by an alternative competent mechanic.

But that is not the end of the story. Some weeks after the above fiasco, I accelerated from the traffic lights to enter the Stanly Street on ramp and suffered a catastrophic gearbox failure. Excuse me if I get this wrong as I am not a mechanic and I am trying to paraphrase what I was told, but as I understand it, the retaining ring holding the “sprag gear” in place came out of its retaining groove. Anyone with imagination can picture the extent of damage with all that free metal running around the gearbox internals. Suffice to say, without totally replacing the internals, my 40K vehicle (purchase price) was a $500 dollar piece of scrap. After considerable thought as to what else could possibly go wrong and commercial reality, I replaced the gearbox at a cost nearing $10k and now refer to the vehicle as the “Gearbox”. The “Gearbox” was just under 70,000km when this happened.

For nearly 50 years I have conscientiously maintained my various vehicles adopting a preventative rather than a breakdown maintenance approach. In my professional life I have investigated many failures and can say from experience, that the part failures I have experienced recently all have a root cause. Things do not break unexpectedly or have such shortened service lives if they are appropriately maintained after being designed and manufactured correctly.

So where do my problems fit? I think it is obvious from the above which brings me back to my dilemma. Why the hell would I ever touch another Mazda, and have it maintained by Redlands Mazda when the above are the results? Unfortunately, I am stuck with the “gearbox” but, I am not stuck with Redlands Mazda. I am asking if anyone can suggest an alternative that is competent to undertake my next service?

 

Obviously ten year old cars can have problems needing maintenance and repairs and sometimes those repairs don't go as planned. Sometimes ten year old cars need major repairs. But... there are oddities here. I would love to see repair orders (personal info redacted) to see what was diagnosed and performed in detail by your Mazda dealer.

GPTzero put this at a 97% match which is why I ask - giving you benefit of the doubt.

 

Agreed. Need to see more. The one thing I do have to say is that if the caliper was rotting and no good, they should have adressed it before putting in new pads.

 

My, my.
Aside from your last sentence, that sounded more like a therapy session topic or perhaps should've been.
Thankfully we don't charge in here for analysis, and hopefully your willingness to open up, has at least relieved some of your pent-up stress.
And as for the, "I am asking if anyone can suggest an alternative that is competent to undertake my next service?".
You would need to consult someone specifically in your area for insight to that, hopefully that will entail someone on this forum who has seen your post.
May the force be with you.

 

Therapy Session? Somewhat. More to point out that the obvious issues with a the CX5 whether it is design, manufacture or maintenance. Additionally, motor mechanics are not held in too high a regard in this area. It is an Australian cultural thing with more than some unscrupulous operators fueling the fire. Knowing "who" is servicing the car and that they are both competent and reputable is highly desirable. I will give praise to an extremely competent and reputable M1 Automatics down at Loganholme, Queensland who rebuilt the gearbox.

More info....... Sorry it is not available and not sure exactly what's wanted.

• The tensioner pully was a leaking seal. There are a number of similar early leaks in CX5's mentioned on the net. The old pulley was not provided so I can't really give any additional info except that the seal was not replaced, the whole unit was.
• I would like to see the brake caliper as the dealer promised but that was not provided. Simple invoice description was to replace the caliper.
• Brake pad replacement? It is not an issue they are a mechanical consumable. Not picking up that the pad was rubbing on the rotor after servicing is.
• The gearbox failure. Once the retaining ring "let go", loose metal went through the whole gearbox internals. There was absolutely no prior warning when driving and discussions with mechanics agree that there wouldn't be. Basically, the only original part retained was the casing. All internal parts were either new or recovered from another CX5 box. There wasn't a recoverable rotating part.

It was mentioned the CX5 is 10 years old. Yes. It is a mechanical unit, and nothing lasts forever. Hence preventive maintenance so that aging/wearing parts can be identified and replaced before they fail. The issue is the longevity of those parts. 60,000k out of a tensioner pully is not adequate and the 10 years should not impact significantly. If this is the new design standard, then people should know. The rotor can have a life of around 7 to 10 years (from what I have read) and I could accept the situation if I had seen the defunct unit. But I have also been advised that this sort of thing can and does result from the brake pad change methodology. 70,000k/10 years is a totally unacceptable life for a gearbox to suffer such a catastrophic failure. Reading various articles reinforces the reputation that the CX5 is regarded as a very competent car in this area and my situation seems uncommon. My maintenance has been performed to spec and I suspect that the root cause of this will likely go back to a manufacturing/assembly defect that slipped through the QA process combined with normal wear and tear. Manufacturers generally minimise these situations, they cannot prevent them and deal with them under warranty for the first "X" years. Generally, without hesitation.

I'd be keen to hear from anyone, particularly from Australia, regarding similar experience with:

1. early failure of the CX5 tensioner pully
2. Brake Caliper
3. Any automatic gearbox issues.

 

Stated "rotor" in the text meant "caliper"

 

I guess that's a solid "no" on any repair orders on this "story".

 

I'll dig out the invoices and post. Be a couple of days.

 

My "Internet research" does not show your vehicle problems be a common issue, in fact I found next to nothing on them.
If you've owned enough vehicles and been on the planet long enough, then most likely you've had a horror story or two to tell, about at least one of them.
They can be a defect, poor maintenance inexperienced or just bad technician or any combination thereof.
Service records would help us better understand what they did or didn't do.
But the bottom line is these type things can happen to anything/anyone, anytime, anywhere and even with detailed analysis we sometimes can't determine the reason why.