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Reedy, WV Car Consumer Discussions

Car Mags review of the DT 3.0

by zzzoom6 on Mon Jun 11 16:05:00 PDT 2007

These are some quotes about the DT 3.0 in the Mazda6: from car and driver When I drove a preproduction four-cylinder, five-speed Mazda 6 i, last fall, I came away impressed, yearning only for another 25 horsepower and a slicker gearbox. Yearn, and you shall receive. Instead of a couple dozen more ponies, Mazda added 60, courtesy of a 3.0-liter V-6. It has variable valve timing, and smooth and quiet power delivery reminiscent of a BMW in-line six's. from automotive.com The 3.0-liter V6 in the 6s greatly increases the fun. Like the four-cylinder, it has continuously variable valve timing (VVT) for its intake camshaft; but on the V6, this feature seems to be used more effectively, providing better low-down torque along with a willingness to rev, with good gas mileage and a nice set of sounds from the air intake and the dual exhausts. from motortrend: Mazda's variable-valve timing sure brings Ford's 3.0-Duratec to life. At part-throttle in the midrange, it almost feels like a light turbo." Another editor wrote, "While it's not as sweet and reedy as the Honda 3.0-liter V-6 and gives up a few horses to the Altima VQ family 3.5, it's still a fine piece and fully competitive in this class." from AutoWeek: The exterior is a lot louder than the interior, though, where you need to eyeball the tach to see if the engine is running at idle, and the drivetrain doesn’t even make a lot of fuss up near redline. Zings right up there, though, delivering a strong dose of performance—after you get off the dime. from Esquire's Best 10under50K The secret of the 6's appeal is in the details-the chunky feel of the shifter in your hand, the smooth, eager power delivered by even the base four-cylinder. Though this is a bread-and-butter family car, it's clear that the people who tuned the steering and suspension care about driving. The 6 constantly surprises with its abilities. Go ahead, put five golf bags in the trunk. Somehow, they fit. This is the kind of car you name and keep driving long after it's paid for. Maybe you could afford something else, but the 6 gets under your skin. from Car and Driver: Twist the key and blip the throttle to transform a quiet idle (at 40 dBA, it's 5 dBA more hushed than the new Honda Accord V-6) into a feral snarl. Under way with the hammer down, there's 76 dBA of baritone roar, the timbre of which suggests it originates in Yankee cubes rather than high-tech cams.

Re: brightness [fitman548]

by Mr_Shiftright on Mon Jul 17 10:50:17 PDT 2006

Now be nice. Opinions are just opinions and all are valid. Is this really an issue of Reality vs. Perception all over again? Are today's subcompacts really "cheap"? REALLY? Do the doors close with a reedy THWANG and vibrate like tin foil? Do pieces break off in your hand? Does the hood or roof "oilcan" up and down as you drive down the road? Do the engines buzz your rearview mirror? Do broken-down Yaris', Fits and xAs litter the roadways of America? Or is this just a perception foisted on us by inborn prejudices from the past? Do we look at a Fit and some of us see a 1986 Hyundai Excel? SAFETY -- ditto. Can anyone prove statistically that you are more "vulnerable" in a 2006 Honda Fit with front and side airbags than you are in a 1994 Cadillac not so equipped? How could you prove this? Is there any good science on the fatality-to-vehicle-weight ratio being linear and direct? Doubt it. And let's say there WAS good science, that smaller cars WERE in fact more "vulnerable". Vulnerable to what? Big cars? Well then, why don't we call big cars "killers"? Why don't we have a safety campaign that says "Improve auto safety nationwide. Don't drive a big killer car!" How did subcompacts become the bad guys and big high HP cars the paragon of virtue? Why does everyone smoke in old movies and not anymore? Why is littering now punishable by huge fines but once was a totally acceptable thing to do? These assumptions about what the best car is....these are all up for grabs because some may be purely perception-based, and don't really make sense. (I remember as a bat swinging little leaguer reading an old ad for Camel cigarettes I think it was, where Mickey Mantle or one of those legendary players is telling readers that cigarettes relax him before a game. I believed it).

Re: You guys are scaring me [jhartmann2]

by explorerx4 on Mon Jan 03 18:35:50 PST 2005

i have a similar distance to drive to work. my trans has a slightly reedy whistle when very cold, but it goes away pretty quickly. 13 mpg is definitely too low. push the button at the end of the shift to turn the overdrive off when at normal cruising speed. do the rpms change (rise)? the other thing that can make a big difference is tire pressure, especially in the front. what is the air pressure in your tires?

2002 Outback LL Bean - Air Conditioning Problems - saxophone noise

by nowakj66 on Tue Jul 15 10:27:14 PDT 2003

Anyone else have problems with their air conditioning on an Outback LL Bean, VDC or normal Outback? Our AC would cut out after 15 minutes or so, only to return when the car was restarted. I think it was related to a sensor that cuts off the AC for hard acceleration that was keeping the AC cut off. The dealer said there was a service bulletin on this and went through a 6 hour multipage, multistep repair. Now the AC works but we hear strange sounds of a kind I have never hard coming from a car. Every once and a while, particularly when stopping the car, a noise that I can only describe as an a reedy "hooooo" like a saxophone being played by an amateur. When my wife was driving I "felt" a vibration under my left foot in the front passenger wheel well when the noise came. I would say the noise came up 5 times in a 2 mile city drive with stop and starts on 25 mph streets. My guess would be a vacuum tube was not connected properly when the service bulletin repair was done. Any other ideas?

My HL Experience - 2001 HL, 40K Miles

by personna1 on Thu Oct 31 12:47:41 PST 2002

Just wanted to get a bit of my HL testimony out there... I bought a 2001 HL Limited back in May of 2001. Since then I've put 40K miles on the vehicle and I can say that I am extremely pleased with the performance of it. In my 40K of driving, I've averaged 21.8 miles per gallon performing mostly highway driving in the Seattle area. (In case you don't know anything about the Seattle area, highway driving here is about 50% "stop and go" and 50% "go" depending on the time of day. I say this because highway driving in other areas of the country are much less "stop and go" and thusly gas mileage from those areas will probably be higher.) Interesting, after putting DuraLube in the engine, I had three tanks (within 3000 miles) where I hit between 24.1 and 24.8 MPG. After changing the oil two more times, the MPG went back to around 21.x. I guess you have to keep putting this stuff in from time to time. Anyway, I've only experienced four issues with my HL, all of which I consider minor. (Note: I consider it very good that I've only experienced four issues considering I bought the "first year" model of the vehicle. This is a good testimony of Toyota getting their quality issues right the first time.) The four issues... 1) Occasional reedy like wind noise through front doors during strong side winds. (This issue was resolved, by Toyota, by replacing the door seals. This was fixed under a TSB (Toyota Service Bulletin) and didn't cost me anything.) 2) Glove box rattles. (This issue was also resolved by Toyota via a TSB. It's amazine what some small pieces of felt will do. :) ) 3) Moonroof cracking/snapping noise during warmer weather and/or while driving over expansion joints on various bridges in the Seattle area. (This issue, again, was resolved by Toyota via a TSB. I think felt washers were used to correct the problem.) 4) Paint chips on hood caused by rocks/debris. This issue has not been resolved for me. I suspect the paint is not protected by a thick enough layer of that clearcoat material. Most of the chips are located 10-12 inches back from the rock deflector. I may end up having the hood repainted and a thicker clearcoat applied... It depends on whether I think the cost will worth it to me. However, I still consider this issue to be minor because it doesn't affect the overall performance of the vehicle. Other than these issues, my experience has been nothing but positive. On a related note: The tires on my HL are really starting to get worn, so based on the discussions I've seen here, I'll look into getting some Michelin CrossTrains for it shortly. Thanks for the recommendations!

no title

by Mr_Shiftright on Sun Jul 21 14:11:12 PDT 2002

Hi JR, Real world price for an '81 300SD that is immaculate? Well,here's my reasoning. There is no sense in paying much of a premium for these ridiculously low miles. Why not? Because if you start to DRIVE the car, then you put on miles and the very thing you paid the premium for disappears. If you DON'T drive the car and try to preserve the low miles, all you have is an old Mercedes diesel that will never be worth much anyway. What exactly are you saving? I'd say this particular 300SD with only 10K miles is basically unsaleable, because the owner obviously does not really want to sell the car. If he did, he would not have such an absurd price on it. I mean, get real. You can buy some REALLY NICE used cars for $20K, including mint S Class Benzes. Anyway, I'd say the car is worth perhaps, at best, $5,000-6,000, maybe $7,500 if you want to establish new levels of charity to owners of old Benz diesels. Even then I feel like I'm being magnanimous. I bought a mint 300D for $1, 200 with high miles, so I'm giving a 4X value for low miles. Seems fair enough. As for what to look for, I'd say seals, seals and more seals, and all the belts and hoses you can possibly replace. I'd spend at least $1,000 to renew everything and flush all fluids. Tires will have to go, too, no doubt, so that's another $600 or so. Last of all, I"d ask that the 10K be verified. If it can't be, then it's just an old Benz diesel with a new speedometer if you ask me. SPEEDSHIFT -- I think there is something to the mystique of a door closing like it was a "bank vault", as opposed say to the "reedy twang" you hear on some cars when you slam 'em. But it's not just about doors, of course, but about the door locks and striker plates and window construction and door fit and quality of the door seals and steel frame to which the hinges attach, etc. In other words, the old "neck bone's connected to the shoulder bone" theory. Unless I'm missing something, I don't see any more "cheapening" in a Benz than in any of the other premium makes. All new cars are more plastic then they used to be. Nobody lines the inside of the glove box door in chrome anymore like Benz used to do. Forget the days of lavish use of acres of leather and wood and chrome and stainless. It's all "trim" nowadays. Let's face it, we could take any new car and destroy it with our bare hands and feet. Surely we could rip the dash and door panels apart and bend the hood and trunk into curlies no problem, and stave in all the body panels with a few swift kicks. This would really hurt on a 1948 Packard..