Palerider had one of the top tuners tune his car & it blew. JerseySpeed's car was tuned by Jordan at CP-E.

The tune won't save you.

LOL! I think we went to the same driving school! lol!

:beerchug:

Here's the deal...what these engines are doing is far from normal...tune, meth, mods, light mods...I don't give a shit, the engine should do what its doing unless it is pushed REALLY hard.

Out of all the sports cars I've ever owned...only one other had had catastrophic failures like this...it was the 3.4L Yamaha V8 cam issue...

I don't know a single "light mod" Mustang owner chucking his connecting rod through the side of his block...or a LSx owner...it's not normal to throw internals through the side of your block when you're only pushing some >30% more hp over stock...I don't care what the excuse is.

I know I'm comparing a V8 to a 4cyl but come on fellas...blaming this bullshit on something like a fucking tune or the lack of meth or whatever is absurd, this is a serious design/build issue.

The FACT is that this engine is not designed/built for what Mazda did to it. Period. Some a re lucky (my SHO didn't explode), other's aren't. The point is its a little luck, a little use. I guess we're all rolling the dice a bit.

Are a lot of 08.5's and 09's blowing? I'm just wondering if Mazda changed anything for those years. I bet we see even fewer instances of zoom zoom boom with the 2010.

you also need to take into consideration you are trying to compare N/A motors to a Forced Induction motor. Shit will blow quicker in a FI motor if its not done right.

People have been using forced induction on many motors for many years... bone stock SOCH 4.6 V8 will handle quite a bit of boost with no modifications on the internals...same with the LSx blocks...then there's the Mitsu engines and other factory turbos...

Boost or no...pushing 15lbs of boost should not be this damaging to an engine.



BTW....are MS6's popping like this? Haven't heard much about them.

i still say there are less ms6's blowing.... however there are less on the road so who knows.

wow i just bought one of these cars and now i dont want one anymore. smoking turbos, bad mm. blown motors. if this motor is so bad why is mazda still putting it in the new mazdaspeed 3? this is disappointing and im affraid to drive the thing.

dont worry about. drive it like you stole it. nothing to worry about unless you are heavily modded. its really a tiny % of cars that are being affected. despite all these posts, im still happy as fuck i got my car and am enjoying the thing to the fullest. if my motor pops in the future, ill worry about it at that time. and despite other posts, warranty is worth something in these instances. im just staying under 300 hp, maintaining it like im supposed to, and not doing anything stupid.

Replace the MM and deal with everything else....drive it, love it and trade it in before the warranty runs out. That's my plan. I have a SRI and a BPV on my car...and other than the motor mount, that's it. It's a fun car that's not a rocket ship but still a good experience.

I too went through the whole "Holy fuck! What have I got myself into?" thing once I started reading threads but I eventually had to let it go. I don't have a thing on my car that I can't pull less in less than one hour. If my car pops under warranty, I'll remove the SRI and BPV...simple simon.

I wouldn't suggest driving it like you stole it though...Mazda seems to have a thing about voiding the warranty on abused vehicles.

I agree with you about the warranty aspect, stock or close to stock cars have blown as well. I really dont think the mods matyer either in all honesty. I dont think anyone has actually reached such a high level of power on these cars that the engine just couldnt handle i and let go. I do think it is crankshaft play. This has been an issue for many cars in the past including a few mazdas. I agree with a previous poster about the v8 sho's. Those hing were popping left and right, until they learned about the cam welding. I think it is just a factory defect like that. If it worries you that much stay stock and let mazda fix it. That is unless it happens after your powertrain warranty ! Trust me i dont want to blow, but if i do that just gives me an ecuse to go forged and run a much larger nitrous shot !!

I know what you mean...before I bought this car last June, the most work I had done on an engine was change the spark plugs on a 1970 something Pinto back in '92....lol

I have never had a car with more than 115 hp in my 34 years....

Come to find out that I, we, pick one of the hardest cars ever to tune and do it safely...thank God for this forum to guide me on everything...

...but what a reward it will be if we can get safe power....:firedevil:

if you stay lightly bolted or stock you are safe.....there has been no proof that stock cars are blowing...what maybe 2 compared to 40 with mods...i don't buy it...and i do believe that whatever damage is causing these engines to grenade is because PRIOR damage was done to them with extra boost and high heat, "oil hydrolocking" ( new theory) or something else with a combination of mods...and after many miles later randomly blowing at 3000 rpms or on light throttle somewhere low in the power band.....stock cars at stock boost are not blowing. If stock cars were grenading than a CALS would of been already been filed.

We are working on it, I think we have a pretty good idea. Give us a week or 2 to figure it out.

Its not a matter of over boosting, or beating on the car. The problem lies eleswhere. We are looking for the problem now.

Yes it does, I think those that have beat on the car have had the best luck to date.

Really, I cannot think of more then 2 motors that have popped under full boost and WOT. Most of the motors pop during cruise or right after getting off the freeway. Its a flaw.

I have checked 4 motors now, all have good near to stock thrust bearing clearance. I don't think that is the issue. I still think its a hydrolock issue or ECM gremlin that is causing the motors to blow. I have been checking these motors over very close, if you need any info please PM me or call us at the shop. I can dive into any of the questions you have on them.

We have had the rare opritunity to check 2 motors now that have not gone boom. Both of them had bent rods and no visisible signs of detonation or pre-ignition. I still feel is a hydrolock condition in the motors.

I would have to say 20% of the MS3 and 6 owners are on the site. Every time a blown motor shows up at any of the 3 local dealers, the parts managers call me. I head down, talk with the tech a bit and look around at what happened. They all appear to be bent rod problems, that appear to look hydrolocked.

Yes a very small percentage, but if you look at other platforms... we have a very high amount of motor failures. Just like with the Neon clutch blowing up and cutting the trans in 1/2, we saw several that did this. Sure it was a very low % based on the number of cars that were out there, but none the less more so then any of platform out there.

Yes they do, no, I don't think this is the cause of the blown motors.

We are working on the problem now. If I could get people sending me there pistons, rods and numbering them in how they came out of the motor this would allow us to get a general status quo on what is happening. I would have to say that if motors are bending rods in the order of the intake valve opening events, that would lead me to belive that the motors are sucking something in from the intake manifold. The only thing that should be in there is air, other then that the PCV system could be filling them up with oil. This would cause the hydrolock in the proper squence (to match that of the intake opening events).

Yep, you have the right idea. Now if we could just get your car to make some power...

Its a flaw somewhere and we are working with the intentions of finding what is going on. When we do, I will make sure to let everyone know what we found. Thanks.

I am tring to compile the list with an excell spread sheet. I am using STAT data files to figure something out. I still have to say that something it locking the motor up. No idea as to what, just that it is happening.

So no pictures of the carnage? I would like to see the rods and pistons to see if the motor infact locked up an bent the rods.

A better question you guys should be asking. Is how many have blown with a proper OCC on the car? That might get us somewhere.

I talked to the dealer and they'll give me copies of the pics they take since the core is going back to mazda, I'll post them as soon as I have them

http://i317.photobucket.com/albums/m...5072009200.jpg

http://i317.photobucket.com/albums/m...5072009201.jpg

and the front

http://i317.photobucket.com/albums/m...5072009202.jpg

I bet there are many more unmodded disi engines blowing than we know of. Forums are generally for those who mod their cars. Not every ms3/6/cx7 owner in the world are forum members you know. Are sure there are many blown stock engines. I know of a a local soccer mom who threw a rod in the family cx7 on her way home from work. Trust me they are out there.

Seems like most of those stories are from early mileage disi engines and in general something was wrong with the injector. I think this is the cause for a lot of our early low mileage blow ups.


I figure if most of us have made it this far we should be ok. Other failures I believe are from people really just pushing the limit on this car. maybe 330-350 is all it can take. I think most of us are worried about the OP story though. We have had a fair bit just blow cruising and there does not seem to be any reason for some of them.



It is what it is I guess. I dont really feel like we're all in danger of blowing, but I know its a chance for nearly any of us. I think most of us with modded cars will be fine, but fuck its not like it cant happen.