I occasionally see these. And I’m not sure why it never got good attention from racing community. They are super rare. But awd, Mazda, and I believe turbo 2.3?
I occasionally see these. And I’m not sure why it never got good attention from racing community. They are super rare. But awd, Mazda, and I believe turbo 2.3?
The engine has a tendency to burn all the oil (locked up) and a bunch of the drive line parts are or were discontinued.
Nice cars, almost bought one.
I also believe they handled a bit like a smooth, flat rock in stock form. I only drove one once, though.
Thought the AWD system in those was kind of flawed and probably not worth the weight/complexity/drag costs vs. leaving the car FWD.
I remember hearing about them and thinking that the 626 Turbo was back! Then the reviews came in and I decided that no, it wasn't.
IIRC, the Speed6 had a number of issues, including pretty bad heatsoak.
Had they come out a year earlier, we probably would have bought one. By that time, we already had a Subaru Legacy GT... basically the same thing, better executed (IMHO).
That car was Mazda's first iteration of the 2.3L turbo, and it had a ton of teething issues. Bone stock examples throwing a rod weren't uncommon. Things were so bad that COBB quietly withdrew their tunes for the car and refused to touch them afterwards.
That’s too bad. What’s with Mazda awd being so promising, and then they skip town on the parts support? C’mon Mazda!
In reply to _ :
It's a Volvo AWD setup and they're a bit fragile.
Turbos smoked and had a tendency to liberate themselves.
Injector seals were always an issue.
Carbon build up on intake valves.
The engine bay is tight so upgrading the intercooler (or anything for that matter) was tricky.
Limited aftermarket support for a model that only lasted 2 years.
Tuning wasn't really completely sorted out for them until about 2010 which lead to the engine emptying it's internals into the oil pan.
It's the kind of car you have to want to own rather than one that you'd buy on a whim for transportation.
Immensely difficult to work on - engine bay absolutely crammed with engine, turbo, AWD hardware.
Rods weren't safe at stock power with the stock map. "Zoom zoom boom" is possible any time you accelerate on the freeway without downshifting.
Other than that, a total spaceship and the only car to have gone from Worcester MA to Rockingham NC in under 12 hours.
Don't forget the seeping center differentials that where a huge cost to rebuild and would just tear itself apart once they seeped dry if you didn't watch it.
I would like to add to this tale of E36 M3ting on MS6s that i just bought one with 23k miles in about as close to perfect condition as is possible. South Texas car its entire life, seat covers on its entire life etc etc.
I will definitely agree that they are flawed from the factory. A lot like every other Mazdaspeed. Some combination of uncompelling, breaks while stock, and sure you can upgrade it but in the end you'll have more money in it for equivalent performance than if you started with something else. Par for the Mazdaspeed course.
God, I wish they weren’t so flawed. I have always wanted one. They get about a ten times worse wrap than the MS3, I guess because of the AWD system.
a Great car on paper, kinda rushed onto the dealer lot.
the speed 3 launching a year later and being a lighter car with the same power it caught on quickly and left the speed6 behind.
If you’re willing to completely rebuild the car and are a gifted driver it has a place in autocross. There is a Speed6 campaigning in ESP (against the Shelby GT500s and such) and absolutely crushing them. It’s a badass ride but a bit fragile. Guys name is Clint.
KyAllroad (Jeremy) said:If you’re willing to completely rebuild the car and are a gifted driver it has a place in autocross. There is a Speed6 campaigning in ESP (against the Shelby GT500s and such) and absolutely crushing them. It’s a badass ride but a bit fragile. Guys name is Clint.
I've had the pleasure of seeing Clint Griest's E/SP Mazdaspeed 6 in action at the Finger Lakes Champ Tour last summer. What an absolute monster. I was out working on course and had my back to the starting line and heard some wild, anti-lag, open-wastegate AWD launch and turned around expecting to see an Evo or WRX and instead see this thing go roaring by. I believe this was the fastest doorslammer at the event.
Damond Motorsports has a 9 second stock turbo MS6.
They're supposedly looking to get it into the 8s at the moment.
It's not that they're bad cars they're just basically the 3000GT VR4s soulmate in terms of parts and how easy they are to work on.
A lot of the zoom zoom boom rap was due to the fueling. The Cdfp (cam driven fuel pump) was notoriously fragile. The turbo is undersized for the motor (stock k04, stock power, full 16psi at 2800 rpm) and the stock pump could not keep up. People would put 2 psi on it, it would spike to 20 (the airflow is a whole other issue....I should dig out my old paperwork from the potted mani on my speed 3. Its hilarious) and the cdfp would run out of puff or straight up grenade. Of course when you only have two of the 3 correct ingredients in correct amounts, bad things happen. The bottom end is shockingly stout with the correct care and feeding.
The speedy did suffer from additional issues, a flat out recall of the transfer case, and a rear end made of glass and chewing gum. Total q ships though, especially after the 2006 front end refresh across the line.
NickD said:
Good lord that's a good looking car
edizzle89 said:NickD said:
Good lord that's a good looking car
I wish I had video of it, because it was an evil-sounding machine too. Like I said, I expected some wild Evo and then this thing goes flying past my worker station
In the northeast they rust to hell too. Cool car, almost got one
I feel like somebody we know did a video on that car.. oh yeah here it is.
I'm not sure how much of the hard to work on comments i can agree with. It's a transverse 4 cyl car. That's generally about as easy as a modern car gets. The only two notable things I would say are that theres an intercooler on top of the motor, and the turbo mounts below the exh manifold rather than on top of it. If not for those two things it would more or less be any other 4cyl Mazda6 under the hood.
Nobody has mentioned this yet so I'll add it: The powerband is boring because it de-throttles above 5500rpm. Makes it feel like it has an artificially worse top end than it really does. Tune fixes it, but from the factory it feels like power comes on too early and leaves too early too.
In reply to Vigo :
Changing the CDFP out fixes the falling flat on the face problem at 5500 RPM.
There's also a restrictor pill in the K04 reference line which is the primary cause of the sudden onset of boost. Removing it and remapping ECU to provide a more linear path really changes the feel of the car.
Changing the flaky turbo is a complete PITA. Downpipe work is the same. It's not something you need to do often but when you do it sucks. Pretty much everything required for routine maintenance is accessible on them though.
I still want one.
In reply to NickD :
I hung out with Clint and his very cool finance for a bit at last summers' Bristol national tour.
The car did break, but a bunch of things did that weekend (Bristols site is more rallycross with grip than autocross). The exhaust ends at about the drivers' seat and shoots flames regularly.
I had a chance to drive a Speed6 and standard 6 (6 speed, 6 cylinder) back to back. I liked both, but the regular 6 felt a little more lively and lighter despite being front heavy with the duratec 6. This could also just be due to my familiarity with FWD and lack thereof with AWD. I think if the Speed3 hadn't launched in the same year and Mazda continued to sort the bugs out of the speed6, it woulda been a something truly special.
Changing the CDFP out fixes the falling flat on the face problem at 5500 RPM.
It's possible the tune dethrottles because they knew the stock fuel pump was already questionable, but if the fuel pump itself was directly changing the powerband, it would be by leaning out and the engine would blow up. Not that stock MS6s don't blow up, but if that was the case they would ALL blow up.
I want to put a tune on mine but I wont do it until the fuel pump is done.
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