Hey all this is my first post, I would really appreciate any and all educated guesses as to what my problem may be..

The Car: 2009 Mazda 3 coupe/4door 4cyl with 43,000KM on it.
the car was just bought 1 year ago from Mazda, it was previously used as a 1 year lease return. The dealer offered us the full warranty as if we were buying a new 2010 model. Thus manufacturer warranty was started from day we bought it, plus we also got an extended warranty.

Problem: When backing up with the wheel turned sharply to get out of my underground parking the car wobbles/shakes almost feels side to side its a very odd feeling. almost like you have a 2 flat tires on 1 side. but no 1 side is prominant. but feels like its coming from the front.
As you ease out of the sharp turn when backing up it continues until your nearly straight. When placing it in drive after doing the above it sometimes continues for 2-3 seconds.

History: About 3 months ago I was driving my daughter to a friends to be babysat and we were T boned going threw an intersection.

We were hit almost dead on the drivers side rear axle.

The rear axle/suspension/rear passenger door/rear tires/rear bumper/ all were replaced.
In addition, we were actually hit so hard on the opposite side of the car , above the passenger door. the A-Piller buckled.

all together there was about $12,500 worth of damage.

ICBC decided to fixed the car, however this above problem started only after we received the car back from being repaired from the accident.

We brought it back to the people whom did the repairs, they could not find a problem. so we also brought it to mazda and they did replace the front rotors as we were also having a issue where while breaking the steering wheel was vibrating, also just started right after the accident.

But beside that Mazda could not replicate the problem could not find a problem.

I know im not imagining this, as it happens every time i back out of my parking spot or every time i back out of any parking spot while shopping exc...

Anyone with any suggestions for something i could go look at that Mazda hasn't where i can go back to them and tell them SEEEE lol... thanks

1. PS, yes the frame was repaired, however mazda and the repair shop both said it was 100% straight and even did tire alignment check.. all good

 

I wonder if the body is twisted or you have something else buckled in the front. You need to take it back to where they did the body work and show them since you can replicate it.

 

Hi Richard (good name,) and welcome to Mazdaforum.

I read this post early this morning, did not quite know how to respond. I was thinking about it on and off all day.
The best educated guess (as you put it) I have involves either an inner CV joint which can cause some really weird symptoms sometimes. And yes I know the accident was mainly at the rear of the car, but accidents in modern cars can cause damage throughout the vehicle's body/chassis.
Or perhaps something to do with the brakes, either the regular disks or the parking brake shoes.
In any case, it does seem that something from the accident, or repair there of, has caused you to experience this situation. I'm guessing to that the body shop did not reinstall something correctly... either in the right order or perhaps missed entirely and no one you've seen so far has caught it.
This is a toughie, especially since we cannot inspect the car oursleves.

 

Virgin1 thanks for the input

So here's the kicker, due to the accident all repairs are covered by ICBC unless they decide to write off the car, which can happen at any time if future repairs start taking onto the price.

The repair shop that did the work however only do body work and for them to check anything else requires them to sent it out to a third party to look at it. If deemed not to be caused by the accident I would get charged. How that's fair I don't know. But because its still under not only manufacturer warranty but also extended I can bring it to mazda to look at it. Mazda's response to my problem is it is a "trait" of the mazda 3 .. Like wtf!
Since it never did it before and only started after the accident its now a "TRAIT" of the mazda3?

So everyone here with a mazda 3 has the car doing the same thing then right?

I'm at my wits end dealing with mazda and will never buy a mazda again for how there treating us.

A little more background, this was my wife and my first large purchase. We went to the Langley BC mazda dealer and fell in love with this car, we talked to there financial manager who after signing the papers and placing a $3,000 deposit he went looking for a bank that would lend us the $22,000 for the purchase.

We got a call back the next day and upon arriving were told he has good news for us. RBC had approved us however they had 2 stipulations for the loan, 1 was we had to increase the deposit to $5000 which was fine, the second was that the bank was requiring us to get Mazda's replacement insurance so the bank would be covered if we wrote off the car and we decided to default on the loan..

Well that made total sense to us... Of course there's nothing in writing about these stipulations and any contracts from the bank are mailed to you after you sign everything and buy the car. So we went ahead
Not realizing that the second stipulation was a lie and a tactic from the dealer to get us to buy their insurance policy. As we later found out that its ILLEGAL for any bank to have that stipuLation as its called TIED SELLING. Upon purchasing the car and the in house ICBC rep doing up our insurance which again the financial manager was there and told the icbc rep we didn't need ICBC's replacement plan as we had mazda's. We were officially done over by mazda..

If we had got icbc's policy we would be in a new car right now. As there policy states if 40% of the cars worth is damaged they write it off. Mazda's policy is useless as it states WHEN icbc writes off the car mazda will give us a new one or a new model.. Again this was paper work we only got mailed to us, we were not allowed to view before hand.

I wish someone from mazda was here to do something about this RBC is also investigating this matter as there using there name to sell a service which is fraud considering the bank could never legally require you to buy there service as a stipulation...


My next step is going to the press regarding this, I'm just fed up.

You hear all over how its getting impossible for young people to get large loans/mortgages and such, well we worked our butts off to better our family and the man screws us over.

I'm throwing my hands up in defeat.

 

Thanks,
I should start posting my English reports on here for proofreading lol<--MOD/Edit Remove

 

Yeah Richard, it does sound like the dealer took you for a ride. I guess in this economy even the stealers in Canada are desperate and relying on shady tactics.

Quote:

You hear all over how its getting impossible for young people to get large loans/mortgages and such, well we worked our butts off to better our family and the man screws us over.

It's not just young people, or just those of you in Canada either. Businesses are desperate all over and looking for ways to help their bottom line more than ever now. The customer's personal situation be damned. This has long been my problem being forced to do business more and more with large corporations instead of a local business.
You've got to watch your financial back more than ever these days. Take nothing for granted and have everything in writing as you've just found out the hard way.