I too am experiencing the pronounced tyre wear on the inside of the tyres on my Mazda 5 Sport (purchased new Feb 2006). The worrying thing is that there appears to be no fix for this making me assume I will be replacing my tyres every 10, 000 miles or less. I have read the posts where tyre pressures are increased but I suspect this is not a real cure, especially as wear is assymetric. This problem is totally unacceptable and I thought I would post on this forum to let other sufferers of this in the UK know that I am going to raise this with Which? (I am a member). I will also consider raising this with Watchdog as well. Anyone else interested doing the same?

My car also has the problems with squeaking suspension and needs front lower suspension arms and anti-roll bar bushes replacing. First Mazda purchased - likely to be my last. Car also demonstrates very bad bump steer/tram-lining and can feel twitchy under braking - anyone else find this?

 

I certainly would be with you.
You will probably have read my posts on this and other forums.
My last conversation about the car was with the dealer principle. He listened to my complaints. There is much more than simply tyre wear. wind noise on the drivers side, amongst others. He said that he would get back to MMUK and speak to Nicole. (has shefallen out with Papa and Renault?)
To date I have not heard back.
I told him that my second set of tyres which have already been rotated, are showing serious signs of wear. I suggested that MMUK would get pretty fed up of fitting new tyres every 12 months. He took my meaning.
My main worry is to do with resale. Have we got ourselves lemons that will not be worth the tyres they are standing on when it comes to selling on?
I have also wondered about sticking two fingers up at MMUK and passing the car to a local tyre dealership, who said that the rear tracking (thrust) is out and until that is put right the whole car would never be true.
It might make the waranty null, but if it stopped the wear problems.............????

Let me know if you get any more support. I know that there are at least a dozen UK cars out there with the problem.
Apparently it is only the Sport models with the 17" tyres that are affected.
Nig

 

Thanks for the reply. Yes I have seen your posts and it was your posts that got me thinking action needs taking. I fully agree with your theory that we are proud owners of lemons that will have a very poor trade-in value. No doubt problems such as we are experiencing spread like wild fire round all car dealers.

Anyway, I have subscribed to Which? Legal Services and so will be speaking to a legal advisor on Monday as I want to know if I can reject the car. As you point out there is an inherent fault and putting new tyres on solves nothing. I am also convinced that the way the car is it is not as safe as it should be. It is evident that the weight of the car is not distributed evenly across the width of the tyre and so the contact patch to the road must be smaller than designed. I don't feel the car is right when braking in the wet and this is due to the weight transfer to the front wheels on braking not being distributed evenly across the tyre's contact patch.

Interesting what your tyre dealer has said and I suspect he is right. Not sure why Mazda can't see that there is an inherent fault. I have had the rubbish about loading of the car. It's a 7 seater for goodness sake and mostly it is 4 of us in it. Let me see what Which? legal services say before you go ahead with a wheel re-alignment. If we can reject the cars we may be be able to get rid of the dodgy things . Other avenues I am considering is BBC Watchdog and getting an independent automotive engineer's report, the cost of which I will claim back off MMUK.

I'll keep you posted

Cheers

Dave

 

I took would like you to take this to which and watchdog you can count on my support if you do take this further. I am very dissapointed with my mazda 5 and feel like returning it to the dealer and telling them exactly what i think and how i feel. Although this would probably get me arrested, Im sick of going to the dealer and being fobbed off with excuses after excuses.
So yes you can count on my support!!!!!!!

 

My car is Sept 06 and was wondering if any of you could take a wee peek under the back of your cars to see if you too had these blocks of steel bolted onto the cross member, I have looked around the blocks and there are no visible brake pipes or wires, or perhaps someone already knows what they are, I did get a reaction from a specialist geometry and alignment company when I showed him, more on that later. See photo below...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v7...deUnderCar.jpg

 

Yes mine too has these ugly blocks of steel attached to it!!! Whatever they are for!!!

 

Yip mine has it too!!

 

My car has this block also. Any further info would be very useful.

Further to my posts I am getting an independent engineer's report on the car. The legal position is that if the car has been sold with an inherent defect then you can return it to the dealer who sold it to you if they cannot repair it, after a major legal battle mostly likely involving court action - yes, we are stuffed! The biggest downside is that you will get market value for the car, not what you paid, minus legal costs assuming you get that far. There are arbitration services which are a better bet.

Re-examined my tyres and the wear is extremely bad on the fronts and the severest wear is confined to a 1cm wide band. See linked photo - note darker band of wear which is now down to the rubber layer below the tread rubber layer. Everyone else's tyre wear like this? My car has done 12.5K miles

http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/Minty6...81689387750050

 

Hi Minty, your tyres look just like my first set looked like at about 12.5K Mazda replaced them for me.
Nig

 

Follow this link for an interesting article on a similar tyre wear problem on MG Fs. One imagines the 5 problems are similar.

http://www.mgf.ultimatemg.com/group2...n/tyrewear.htm