Dead cars - What do you do with them?

[Crow555]

A mate of mine has just had a bit of misfortune. His Mazda6 diesel has been leaking oil a bit and took it to his mechanic. However, the damage is so bad that the mechanic was looking for replacement engines but with no success.

Without getting too technical (I'm not privy to all the information), the engine has severe internal wear with the pressure pushing out the seals, causing the oil leaks. With no replacement engine, the other option is to repair the engine but that is quite expensive. Trade-in won't be possible because new seals won't last too long and it'll smoke like cracker.

In his situation, what else is there to do? Would insurance cover this? (Car needless to say is out of warranty)

[SystemParanoia]

burn it in an ally, claim it was stolen

[ohtari]

sell the stuff that's worth anything, and shoot the stuff that's not.

(Yee Haw)

[IanMorewood]

stick it on ebay buyer collect describe it as having a serious engine problem 99p reserve and see what he gets.

[Crow555]

Yeah, pretty much what I thought then. This is going to sting then.

[JAHetfield]

Strip off all the resellable parts and bale the rest.

[bob1179]

I used to park them down the side of my parent house until they started getting annoyed. In the end I sold a few to some banger racers for twenty quid a piece and scrapped a couple.

[Captain Muppet]

Aren't Mazda 6s basically just Mondeos? Surely it can't be that hard to find an engine?

Please note: this is one of those ignorant couldn't-be-bothered-to-check-on-google posts that are so annoying. Mazda 6 engines could be made of diamonds for all I know.

[Waugh-terfall]

I have a a feeling they're different. The Mazda will have a 2.0MZR-CD, either an RF2002 or RF2005 dependent on pre/post-facelift, the Ford uses a FoMoCo/PSA DW10.

[Life Saab Itch]

Captain Muppet said:

Aren't Mazda 6s basically just Mondeos? Surely it can't be that hard to find an engine?

Please note: this is one of those ignorant couldn't-be-bothered-to-check-on-google posts that are so annoying. Mazda 6 engines could be made of diamonds for all I know.

Ahem.

Are we ready?

Ok.



Mazda 6s (the previous shape) are great cars.

The RF series of Mazda 6 diesel engines are made of molten brie. They are pathetically designed and you can expect to see a comedy of errors in each one that goes bang.

When my 6 died, these are the issues it had and where I traced them back to.

• The injector seals were under-specced and were made from a very thin copper washer. The pressure within the engine had soon made short work of these and then any burnt gasses that leaked out were vented to the crank case and oil galleries.
• The oil got saturated with carbon deposits very quickly.
• The DPF self cleaning thing puts the injection of fuel very late into the cycle to try and have most of the combustion occuring in the exhaust to clean the filter. The flip side of this is that you get diesel washing the bores and ending up in the oil. This makes the oil thinner.
• The carbon deposits within the thinned oil blocked the oil strainer in the sump.

So what happened with my car (and many many others if you read the Honest John forums) is that when going around a right handed corner and getting on the power, the engine was starved of oil and number 4 big end bearing gave up the ghost. I suppose this is the time to point out that the oil pick up really doesn't want to be at the front of the engine. Again, poor design.

So, I found a company in Manchester that rebuild these engines (3 a week the fella reckoned) and bought a re-con lump from them.

When it was installed in my car the DPF needed resetting or doing a "manual clean", so I took it in to my local Mazda dealership. This was in the cold snap of october/november 2010. I drove the car in on my way to work at 5am and left it with 497 miles on the new engine and waited for a phonecall from the dealership to tell me that the work had been completed. I heard nothing, so at about 3pm I phoned up to be told that the engine had blown up just after lunch. When asked what had happened I got three different stories from various people and nothing matched up. I phoned Mazda UK who, put bluntly, were less than fking useless. The poppet who was my "case manager" couldn't have sounded less interested and she did fk all.

The end result was that Mazda UK sided with the dealership's statement that because the plastic engine cover was missing from my car, they couldn't be 100% sure that the standard of the workmanship was up to scratch for the engine change.


Complete and utter ery.



Anyway the costs to me were.

Mazda 6 (to buy 18 months earlier) £5000
Re con engine £1500
Sump spacer from Mazda £240
Mate's rates for engine replacement with me helping out £500
Car hire whilst my 6 was fked and I was having fruitless discussions with Mazda UK £300

Saab 9-3 as a replacement car £5000.




I gave the car to a garage owning mate as I was sick of the sight of it. I think he scrapped it, genuinely not sure though.

[y2blade]

JAHetfield said:

Strip off all the resellable parts and bale the rest.

This^^^^

[crocodile tears]

conveniently drive it off a cliff and say it just vanished?

[Life Saab Itch]

To add detail to the above

• My car didn't have a plastic engine cover when I bought it. So that was a moot point.

• I accused the dealership of not warming the car up properly when they did the DPF reset. They told me that the computer programme does it for them and that it's standard practice for it to rev a diesel engine up to 3000rpm from cold...in minus 5 conditions.

The fact that the cam bearings seized and the 7 of 8 rockers snapped kind of proved my point...but, you know.

[Crow555]

F**kin hell, I never realised they were as bad as that. You'd think the Mazda name meant it was as reliable as the tide.

I've directed my friend to this thread and it looks like it's gonna be a massive loss for him. Gutted for the guy.

Thanks everyone for your replies.

[Life Saab Itch]

Crow555 said:

F**kin hell, I never realised they were as bad as that. You'd think the Mazda name meant it was as reliable as the tide.

I've directed my friend to this thread and it looks like it's gonna be a massive loss for him. Gutted for the guy.

Thanks everyone for your replies.

My advice would be bail now, rather than "invest" any money in it which you'll never see again.




Ironically I'd have another one. Just not a diesel.



I heard a rumour that the generation after the on in my profile had a chain-cam engine and the chains had a nasty habit of stretching.....apparently Mazda UK deny that there is any problem at all with any of their diesel engines.


Out of the frying pan....

[Waugh-terfall]

I wonder, could you stick a DW10 in there?

[Crow555]

Looks like he's gonna patch it up with the hope of fobbing it off to a trader or an auction. Insurance company didn't want to know so he's kinda stuck, dishonest as it is.

[new_bloke]

Not that it's quite appropriate in this case perhaps, but if you're ever considering scrapping / dumping / burning a car you want rid of, consider donating to the fire brigade - they always need vehicles to practice rescuing people from.
It's what I did with my hateful Renault 19 diesel. The thought of it being chopped apart with pneumatic cutters by axe-wielding fire fighters was more than adequate compensation for the few quid that I 'lost' by not weighing it in.
I only wish I could have watched it die...

[Matt UK]

Crow555 said:

Looks like he's gonna patch it up with the hope of fobbing it off to a trader or an auction. Insurance company didn't want to know so he's kinda stuck, dishonest as it is.

Nice

[g3rrd]

IanMorewood said:

stick it on ebay buyer collect describe it as having a serious engine problem 99p reserve and see what he gets.

Did this with my VW Mk4 Golf Pd150. Off the road for well over twelve months. Replaced engine and turbo. Mate/mechanic still couldn't get it running correctly. Eventually I ran out of patience (and dosh) and decided to list it on EBay. It sold for £1800.

Guy turns up to inspect the car but cannot take it because he forgot his trade plates and didn't want to risk it breaking down on his trip back, also engine fault was a bit of a puzzler so he needed more time to think about it. But he was kind enough to suggest a possible fix.

Pick the car up tomorrow