I'm not sure if this is a common problem for anyone else, but I find that if I even start up my 2011 Mazda3 for a very short period of time (ie. to move it to the other side of the driveway, or back it up a few feet) that it won't start up normally next time.

I thought maybe this was a battery thing, but I'm seeing this even with a new battery.

No problems when it sits for a full week without use, or when I'm using it every day for work, but if I use it for less than 1 minute, and try to start it again after an hour or so, no dice.

Any tips?

 

Sounds like you are flooding it.

When cold, the engine injects extra fuel to help with poor combustion due to cold conditions inside the engine. If you don't let it run long enough to warm up, the excess fuel can wet the sparkplugs causing them no to fire/spark when you restart it again later.

So if you start it up when dead cold, let it idle for a couple of minutes.

 

grim_reaper That's an interesting theory....my thought wouldn't he have gotten a P0172 ?

 

From my memory banks, P0172 is system running rich.

A/F sensor & o2 sensors don't operate when cold. They need to be full warmed up before the PCM looks at them.

 

The H02 are suppose to report during the cold start up. When I do EFI/ECU Performance Calibrating on some platforms with modified engine CAT removed or even a hedder and CT back system I shut the H02 completely off and compensate for a cold start environment. Although in some places it makes the car a bit pesky for starting and idling smooth in cold ambient below 40F.

In this members case I still think he should have gotten a DTC during his problematic starting?
However re-reading what you and he said the spark energy may not be there because of the age of spark plugs? Maybe he should attempt a start and then pull a plug and have a look at it to see if it is very wet?