Hi All,

Another new poster to join your (un)happy band I'm afraid!

We stumbled across this website at the weekend - with a feeling of impending doom nipped out to have a close look at the inside edge of our front tyres (06 Sport Nav model) to find to our horror that at 11,000 miles we were down to the white threads!!

Rang John Smith at Mazda at 9am Monday morning - by 11.30 the car was lifted off our drive by the Mazda Assistance guys and transported to our local dealer. Dealer tells us we are the third to come in with a tyre problem - but the other two Mazda 5s had the problem on the rear tyres.

Courtesy roller-skate was delivered to me at work by 14:00 yesterday too.

Waiting for the dealer to ring back - advised me last night that they will be speaking to John Smith today!

Can't fault the efficiency and politeness of everyone concerned with all the above actions - felt quite reassured by the end of the day.

The 48 hours of courtesy car provided by the Breakdown Assistance guys expires at lunchtime tomorrow - after that the dealer are responsible for extending the hire! At which point I'll be insisting on a vehicle that meets the spec of my car more closely ...... fitting 2 adults, 2 teenagers and one small boy into a Nissan Micra just isn't going to happen ... that's why we bought a 7-seater!!!!!

This is one band I really don't want to join ... but looks like I'm in it with you too!!!!!!!

 

Have your tyres ever been rotated? The people with rear wear could have worn them down on the front before rotation.

 

Hi,

Yes, I thought of that too ... but the dealer has checked our service record and they weren't rotated - they only do it on request of the car owner and we hadn't requested it.

Still waiting to hear back from the Dealer - will chase him tomorrow morning as the clock is ticking on my hire car!

Thanks for the suggestion though.

 

In reply to the rotation question. My first set never had time to get to the first service and the opportunity to wear. They were illegal after 6500 miles! changed after much persuasion at 9000 miles. The second set were rotated, but that was to allow the rapidly wearing rears to move to the front to get a little more wear out of them. That was done after 3500 miles!! Tyres were shot at 10000 miles.
Since the first set my car has not eaten the fronts at all.
After looking at the thrid set of Dunlop 2050's from the rear on flat tarmac. The tyres appear to address the road fully across the whole width of the tyre with no apparent bias towards the inner edge, which it always had previously.
Only time will tell....

 

So you had a rear wear issue? I wish I could see pics of all this mahem. Some people have worn fronts, and others the rears. What was done to correct it?

My Saab 9-5 wagon had the rear camber issue. I rotated every 3K miles or less. I also jacked up the pressure when I took long trips with unusually large loads. Some owners had shims installed by a Saab expert in Eastern USA. I never experienced the severe wear after I started rotating more often. I did notice that different tread patterns wore better than others. The harder the compound, the better the wear was as well.

My Mazda5 has that same negative camber. I plan to keep the tires rotated, so I don't believe I'll see any extreme wear.

What I don't understand is the front wear issue. I wish we could pinpoint the cause. I thought it may have been something to do with a heavier diesel angine and trans combo see in the UK, or maybe some sort of mis-alignment due to UK roads being tilted in the opposite direction of NA roads. But the Japanese drive right-hand models as well. You'd think they'd have it set up the same way.

Maybe I should use my stock tires as a part of a non-rotation test. I'd like to replace them with winter tires anyway. I have a feeling the NA people may rotate tires more frequently.




[IMG]local://upfiles/8780/DA4AD71F19C842F4ACBF1B32FB3A81A8.jpg[/IMG]

 

They have changed the advice on tyre pressures.
They say now to keep them @ 35psi for unladen driving 40psi when loaded.

They have also changed the rear alignment settings to make the tyres sit flat on the road rather than resting on the inner edge.
If you look back through this thread there are some good pictures of severely worn tyres P17 i think...

 

Is this the tire?

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tires....nSpeedRating=H

 

No the tyre fitted is a Dunlop Sport 2050

 

Interesting about the higher pressure suggested for the tyres, I have always had mine set to the high end of the range, the car seems to ride and handle far better to me, and I have very little by way of tyre wear after 8000 miles.

 

And....another 2006 Sports that crabs sideways along the road!

Took the wife's Mazda 5 Sports in for the first service at 12,000 miles (along with the usual litany of loose seatbelt trim, wandering rear view mirror and problematic reverse gear).....and was then advised by the dealer that I may want to get all four tyres changed and try to claim against Mazda or just run on until I wore the tyres out!

Tread pattern was 3/4/2 - Front - 2/4/3 and 4/6/3 - Rear - 2/5/4

Contacted Mr Smith at Mazda UK and got the same generic email passing me onto an unnamed case officer as everyone else and pursued it in parallel with the dealer - without any success.

Dealer so far has been very good - car went in today and has come back with four newDunlop SP Sport Maxx 205/50R17.....The dealer's calculation is that the split will be 68% Mazda, 32% me. And that will be the subject of some heated debate!

What astonished me was the geometry result pre and post alignment. Before any alignment changes the Left Front had a toe of 1.4mm and the Right Front had a toe of -1.2mm ( diametrically in the opposite direction!) Rear had 1.1 and 0.5mm respectively. Post alignment they are all at 1.0mm with a total toe of 2.0mm. Camber's were similarly all over the place.

I'm now pretty annoyed at the attitude of Mazda UK who's attitude of denial and secrecy is approaching that of Wilful Misconduct - it's one thing to be flailing around trying to find a solution but once the solution has been decided upon to then deliberately mislead and misdirect customers in an effort to avoid a recall is unethical and shoddy business practice.

To add insult to injury when my wife picked up the car she was given the same tired old tosh about Dunlops tyres - no mention of the geometry issue - until she then pointed out she wasn't born yesterday.

However, I'm pretty peeved that I have been charged the full £480 for the tyres and then have to wait for subjective % to be granted to me. So, after having had a little chat with Visa, I shall be inviting the dealer to credit me with the full amount and to pursue their claim with Mazda UK....and then come back to me if they fail to recover all the costs. No doubt they will decline..which is where a little department called Retailer Disputes in Visa comes in very handy (Tel 0870 3339091).....they will freeze the payment and take up the dispute on your behalf.... I'll let you know how it goes!