27th Apr 2006, 13:33
Yes, that is pretty typical of the automatic's behavior with the V6. The poor torque and the slow auto transmission were the biggest faults I with the car when I owned it. It was very slow to react in either auto or "manual" mode when I wanted it to downshift... almost to the point of being dangerous in certain situations. Then it would suddenly do so, I would have "too much" power for the situation, and have to brake... which often resulted in a very noticeable "clunk" from the drive train. I also found the need to downshift at every (even slight) incline annoying.
Gas mileage is not a strong point of the V-6. It is rather thirsty for its size. During the time that I owned the car, I averaged about 20 mpg. On road trips I could get as high as 24-25, but in city driving, mileage fell to about 17-18.
I think that with a manual transmission, this is probably a very good car for the money, but I think that the engine and the automatic transmission are poorly matched.
Aside from the powertrain, the only problems I had with the car were some rattles, that the dealer could not seem to fix, and brakes that constantly seemed to need attention (warping rotors every 5K, breaking clips [about 1 every 9 mos.], and groaning noises).
15th May 2006, 14:20
I have a 04 wagon with a manual transmission. I love the car and am very happy with it. I get about 24 miles/gal during my normal daily commute. Better on long trips, but not much better, maybe 25 or 26 a the most. I rarely get under 22miles/gal. I bought this car because of the availability of the manual transmission.
It does have a rattle in the rear that I have not been able to find. That is annoying.
16th Apr 2008, 18:57
I posted the original review on this car. Since then I have taken the car to the dealer who replaced a fan control and updated the transmission software. Now when the car slows down, the shifting is gone and this car has quickly regained my affections.
Now with over 45k miles on it, and the wagon version being no more. We are planning of keeping it until well over 100k, which is very very very rare for us. Thanks for all the feed back!
25th Mar 2006, 22:46
We have a 2004 Mazda 6 Sportwagon and love everything about it except the gas mileage. With a 16 gallon tank, we are lucky to get 320 miles out of a tank in mixed city and highway driving. Of course, it is a six cylinder engine and we have a five speed manual transmission.
Overall, the handling is excellent. The interior controls are great. Ours is a pretty basic version, not the Touring model. But overall, I would give it 9 out of 10 stars. I'm going to go look at a MazdaSpeed6; it is a 4 cylinder turbo charged version of the 6.