Went to the dealer with mods
 

I just wanted to take the time to share my first experience with the dealership with my modded Gen2. I have an excessively bad vibration coming from the dash, and rather than rip it up myself I gave the dealership a shot at it. I have purchased two cars within a year from this dealership, and went in friendly and happy with everyone. Shook hands with some of the techs and all as I dropped it off.

Went back a few hours later, and they were unable to identify the vibration which, as they stated, was "due to the exhaust being too loud". There words to me were as follows:

At this point with the exhaust, and we see you modified the suspension and removed the stock airbox (TIP/SRI), you are pretty much out of your basic warranty. Powertrain warranty is still unaffected. For your knowledge in the future, adding aftermarket parts may void your warranty. We want you to know you haven't called up Mazda and voided any of your warranties, but just be aware of that in the future.

Conclusion: I want to exercise a word of caution to those of you preparing to take your modded vehicle to the dealership. I know there is plenty of material out there regarding what can and cannot legally be done with "voiding" warranties, but things change quickly once you're actually facing the demon. I studied up before I modded my car in regards to warranty coverage and thought I was prepared. I have to recommend some serious thought before taking it to the dealer once modified. Regardless of what is and isn't legally right, it felt, in my opinion, like a dark, scary, endless tunnel trying to fight them later down the road once they render your warranty as "void". Just like some people think they know it all when it comes to the law and what their rights are, I feel the same goes for some of us who feel we are strong as steal and can fight them on what is "legally" right. It could come back to bite you in the butt when you realize they have people on their end who are trained to fight those of us who think we may know what they can and cannot do.

I'm not recommending you do or do not take it to the dealership once modified. I'm simply saying be careful and want to open your eyes to what I feel an experience could end up being. I am not on the "black list" and still have my warranty, but it made me concerned enough to not take my vehicle back to the dealer until it is stocked out again.

Happy modding!

tl, dr, nce

The dealership has to prove that the mod caused the issue on your car. They CAN"T void it just because you have an intake on your car. Don't let them try to scare you with all there bs. Find another dealership

FAIL

Right, I understand that completely, which is why I didn't fight them to find the vibration since that could very obviously stem from the exhaust. I just feel like it could get nasty fast based on where you are. I would hate for someone to have to go as far as hiring an attorney or something because of management who wasn't aware of the laws themselves.

I still plan to find an in at one of the dealerships in the area.

I would think that they entered your info into a database.

your research time should have been better spent finding out which dealer in your area doesent care about mods.

or you should have called and asked them what their policy was on the mods that you do have.

i just got warranty work done with after market intake, boost pipes, and forge BPV. they didn't say a single word about any of the above.

and my car has CEL for running lean. which could "easily" be blamed on an after market intake...


i would put your stock exhaust back on, and see if the vibration is still in your dash- if it is- bring it back to them and ask them to kindly figure it out now

i think its funny how much misinformation there is about the magnusson moss act.

lawl.

I like how this is counter to logic.

The parts of your car that were affected by the mods (powertrain) are still covered by warranty. The parts that are affected in no way by the mods (e.g. AC, cd player, etc...) aren't covered. WTF?

Your best bet is always to go in with no mods. I brought my car to mazda fully bolted and tuned for a pulley but I went there knowing the risk and accepted that.

@socks, what are your thoughts on the law?

I'm interested in weeding that misinformation out.

That is exactly what I was thinking while sat there listening to him...but I figured I'd keep my mouth shut :shhh:

For some of the others on this thread: Let's settle down, I'm simply sharing my experience with them. I had looked into the various dealers but not many of the people I found in the area had experience working with any of them. I was pretty much on my own to figure it out.

I thought the reason for lightly modding a car was to be able to change out mods quickly for a dealer visit. Almost sounds like you went there showing off your "modded" speed for a rattle.

All I'm saying is don't give those bastards a reason to deny warranty work. It's expensive to hire a lawyer and an expert on the subject matter to prove them wrong.

I won't be lightly modded in about two weeks. That's why I'm doing this little trial and error now with the few mods I have.

I may try another location, or just get mean and go back and fight the issue...not sure yet. To tired right now to do either! ;-)

spoof3r

fuck dealership experience and can you post pics of your headlight? lol that looks awesome

Welcome to 2002. I got this on my SRI.

http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t...s3/sticker.jpg

the law is null and void unless your sitting in front of a judge with a lawyer........

I thought that was his thought! lol

Yes. Paying the lawyer to do the legwork may actually cost more than paying for the Mazda service work in many cases.

Sad but true.

You, good sir, just happened to get a Dealership that cares about its ass. They gave you a fair warning about the fact they don't dick with cars that have mods and at least they didnt call Mazda.

My dealership here - the guy was oogling my mods like no other and had no problem with warranty work for things of the same nature you had.

This is old news.. everyone knows mazda is brutal with mods and warranties.. hence the thread where people list mod friendly dealers.. but, just consider yourself lucky they didnt call your vin into mazda..

Warranties don't get 'voided' over stuff like this, the warranty claims simply get denied...

if you really read the law, i mean really read it, you'll see it was never intended to apply to automobiles. this was meant for consumer products, like vacuums for instance. belts needed replacing, they required bags, etc.

The law was there to allow consumers to use aftermarket (other than oe) bags and belts, and maintain their warranty on the product.

this law DOES, as written, apply to cars. HOWEVER, it wasnt intended to protect tuners from getting warranties voided for installing performance parts. Again, the law applies to servicable items, such as oil filters, air filters, spark plugs. Aftermarket replacements intended to perform like their OE counterparts. What it's saying, is that if you replace your OEM mazda air filter with an STP factory replacement filter, the magnusson moss act protects you from a dealer voiding your warranty for using an aftermarket filter, unless the filter is what caused the problem at hand.

hope this helps, I became very familiar with this law when I went through a bout with my local dealer. I too thought I was protected, for having an intake, and fmic, etc. Unfortunately, that's just not what the act was intended to do, and not many people are aware of that.

I've never had an issue with a vehicle in the past, but if a dealership can get out of doing warranty work, they will. I am fortunate enough to have a friend that works in the parts department at the Mazda dealership about 45 minutes from me. I asked him before I modded my car if it would be a problem and he said the only time it ever becomes and issue is if you blow up your engine or transmission. Before I bought the car, I read multiple threads about Mazda being douche bags about warranty work... If it were me, I would look around to see if there is another Mazda dealership near you and try taking it to them. :)

They will remember him if his engine blows, waranty denied. I though everyone on these boards already knew not to take your car to the dealer with mods. My car only has 3000 more miles of waranty and that will be gone in three months. I'm having an issue with my driver side door lock, I might take it fully bolted down to the dealer and get a quote on the power door lock actuator. Will be interesting to see how they act. Could be fun.

Which dealership did you go to?

I've taken mine fully bolted to the dealer. They told me car sounds nice while they have fixed my 6 disc shitty bose cd changer for the 4th time. Again they seem pretty mod friendly but I bet that changes if something else bigger happens :)

Mines got about 5k left on the warranty

Hm .........

old news but thanks for the reassurance for the newbs i guess.

next time tell em SMNF

Mazda makes me shakes my head.

They advertise saying "Mazda is the most raced cars on the street world wide" and they are given us hard time for CAI/SRI.

Thread got my attention due to the same issue I had this week at the dealership with my CX-7. Was getting some vibrations on the steering wheels and took it there for the 10th. time complaining about vibration.

The last time they excuse was my tires was shot with 15000 miles + stock tires. I hold on getting new tires as I could until the car wasn't save any more to drive. Then I got the Nittos. But was still able to feel little vibrations.

After I got new tires, they have no excuses any more with the tires. Now they are saying. First we don't see what the problem could be. Oh BTW your tires are not manufactures conformed. And oh, you have some aftermarket parts also......

It was a long story but I want to keep it short. All the time I was going there they didn't check me in in their system. They were just saying we don't see what"s wrong and let me go home. This means there was no way to track back I visited the dealership with some complains.

After I found this out, I called Mazda corporate and explain them what's going on. The guys was very friendly. He couldn't find my CX-7 but found my Speed3. Then He told me to take the car to the dealership and give him a call to confirmed I dropped the car.

I did what he said and got with him on the phone, He was saying the dealership reported I had aftermarket parts on the car. He told me He can't even talk to his boss without me getting rid first of the aftermarket parts. Just to check if I was screwed up with the dealership reporting the aftermarket parts, I asked him what would He advise me for the next steps. He said before we even look into this further, I'll have to get rid of the aftermarket parts. They He'll see how He'll talk to his boss regarding this recurring issue.


So what I'll do is to drive the car for a little while and once the noise get worst I'll , re-visit the same dealership and engage with that Guy at Mazda corporate.

I'll see how they will deny the warranty work and I'll see how they'll try to charge me. I'm also thinking to change the dealership location.

I'm also smart guys (or I think I am). Couple weeks before I went to the same dealership location and BS them by saying: hey men, I want to test drive the CX-9. I'm thinking to of trading in my CX-7. And I start see they eyes shining even tho I have no intention to trade it my CX-7.

FYI: I got the sways swapped on warranty by 25000 miles. They found out they were noisy and the warranty took care of this. But I'm still have some noise coming from the suspension I'll need to get rid of.

ms'ers please forgive my English, it's late in the night, 00:30 AM in the night and my eyes are almost closed.

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GOD that was painful to read. cheers mate.

You are a fukin dumbass, if you went in bolted then you deserve to loose your warranty

can you find which police stations are cool too? walk in with a bag of coke, and let us know which stations are drug friendly

you should have went back to stock

+2

I'm not modding until my warranty is up. But if I did take it in, I would have taken off all the bolt-ons and mods. It's just not worth it trying to fight them.

Its not hard to call the local dealerships and find out if they are mod friendly. You don't even have to give your name just call explain the issue and ask if they will do warranty work with X mods. Now going in bolted with no knowledge of the dealer's stance on modifications is just asking for a headache.

not quite the case most of the time.

a dealer may want to be "mod friendly" and may think they are, but a district manager will have say on any major warranty work. my dealer told me they were mod friendly. i told them the mods i had, and they said come on in, you wont have a problem. guess what... i had a problem.

not only that, the dealer can warranty work, and then get denied for warranty funds from MNAO. then they get screwed, and thats when they have to be "non mod friendly"

I'm sorry you feel that way. Just as a suggestion, since you are obviously attempting to make me feel dumb for not knowing something you must feel is such common sense, you may want to learn how to spell "lose" properly since that would also be in the book of things that are "common sense".

Thanks for those of you who understand my reason for posting this information. It is just that - information; my experience. Take it for what it is :cool:

Some of you need to stop with the attacks on other people's posts. I've heard some great ideas but and idea is just an idea until it has been tried. Maybe next time I'll call around to some of the dealers before hand and straight up ask. The point is this is obviously one way it can turn out if you end up going to the dealer with a bolted vehicle. It started as an idea, and I wanted to test it to obtain a result. Obviously others on here have stated that they have received warranty work on a modified vehicle with no issues. This simply goes to show us that it can go either way.

Is this old news? Yes, maybe, but with all of the threads lately from those new to the forum or boards/vehicles in general, and other members who flame them all day long for not searching themselves, this is just to put more information out there for their success. Sometimes searching becomes difficult with the misconstrued information that is out there.

Wait who still has their warranty? Nuff said