Okay, I hit 7,507 miles (3 months and 3 days since purchase) as I was rolling down my driveway this afternoon, and decided to do the oil before it got too dark.

I rolled her up on the ramps, crawled underneath with a 10mm socket ready to do battle with the lower shield when I noticed that there was a hole kinda-sorta under the oil filter. I tried to reach through and loosen the filter, but gave that up as a lost cause after only a few moments. Out came the seven bolts and down dropped the rear of the shield, hanging from two stupid plastic push-pin style fasteners.

Ummm, okay, what genius at Mazda designed this shield? Whomever he or she was, I'd like the meet them in a dark alley some time. I mean, come on, make a hole that is completely ineffectual, and then compound that by making a shield that is virtually impossible to remove without doing damage to either the fasteners or the mount points. Dumb, really-really dumb.

Once I'd invented a few new curse words, I slid myself under the car, feet first, far enough so that I could drop the rear of the shield above my head, allowing me to access the filter from the rear. The good news was that I didn't make too much of a mess (no more than a dozen drips or so), however, I'm thinking that I was lucky and that I'm going to devise a new (removable) fastener system to replace those two plastic jobs so that I'll have much easier access to the filter in the future.

Once the lower end of the car was buttoned back up, I pulled my dipstick, inserted the extraction tube, and pumped out the rest of the oil. With that bit complete, and with the light fading, I pulled out the case of Mobil 1 0W-20 that I bought last weekend and started pouring in the new oil, and as the last of it was flowing in, I thought I noticed in the dim light that the bottle said "0W-30" on the side. What the? In the end, the box and one of the bottles said 0W-20, and five bottles said 0W-30.

Thinking back on my trip to the parts store, I remember being in a hurry, and remember not seeing any 0W-20 on the shelf and having to ask at the counter for the oil. They told me that they had an open case behind the counter that they'd just fill with a couple of bottles from a different case.

Ummm-hmmm, one out of six was the correct weight.

Given that the engine in the Mazda3 2.0 4dr Sport sold in Europe is virtually identical to 2.0 liter engine in my Mazda3 i Touring, and given that the European cars call for 5W-30 oil (contrary to the 5W-20 recommended by Mazda USA), I'm thinking that the 0W-30 will be just fine in my engine.

 

The only thing the 0w-30 might cause is a tenth of a mile or so on the fuel economy, it was something to do with CARB for them running it as it is. Also since it was all Mobile 1 I don't think it will even notice.
As for the whole hole thing, it is an inspection hole for use at the factory and those 2 plastic push pins have not been in my car since the first oil change and I will be doing the 7th next weekend.

 

Those are easily removed with a flathead screwdriver, but like Siber said, your better off just leavin them out.

 

Yea i pretty much said the samething when i did my first oil change but 0w-20????u might as well put water in it haha, it seemed the thicker the oil i had the better my car liked it, started with factory 5-20, moved to 5-30 full synthetic finally stuck with 10-30 full synthetic and i still average 25mpg city in my autotradic shytbox.

 

I tried 5W-30 my first oil change and seemed to make the engine noisier.

 

I'm at about 150 miles post oil change and so far at least, there is no apparent change in engine operation or noise. I'll report the fuel economy when I fill up (probably Thursday or Friday).

 

reg, part-syn, or full syn?

 

Full syn

 

7507 before the first oil change?

Did mine at 1000

 

One thousand miles?!? Why on earth for? I'm thinking a serious waste of time and money with absolutely zero down-stream gain.