Faults:

1. Front shocks leaked oil and were replaced.

2. Front brake pads replaced.

3. Front brake discs warped and re-faced DIY.

4. Coolant water level dropped 1 litre every day. Suspected head gasket failure. Pending re-torquing head bolts, or subsequent repair.

General Comments:

Cons:

1. Slow acceleration from a standstill.

2. Clonking front axle.

3. Very difficult to replace the front suspension, cos the anti-roll bar links have rusted bolts, making it necessary to prepare for hack-sawing the thing off.

4. Weak head gasket.

5. Boaty drive around corners.

Pros:

1. Cheap second hand.

2. Plenty of aftermarket parts on the cheap.

3. No rust at all.

4. Comfortable driving position for 5'8" guy like me.

5. Plenty of space for 5 adults + 2 children in the rear third row seats.

6. Relatively easy on gas costs compared to 2.0 litre passenger cars taking 5 persons.

7. Noise insulation not bad at 100+ km/h speeds.

8. Sunroof has no leaks, indicating good build quality.

Faults:

Bad corrosion!!! After 2.5 years, small rust bubbles started to show on the rear arches. I thought it was from stone chips etc, so I didn't rush to sort it. It turned out that the rear arches were corroding from the inside out due to a design fault. In the end, because I like to have a car right, I paid £500 to have the rear arches cut out and repaired/painted.

Most recently I discovered that the inside of the front suspension turrets, at the top on both sides, had rusted through, which also led to large holes in the inner wings (having found this by accident when removing the front suspension struts, I feel that a lot of Premacys out there will have this problem, as the area can't even be seen for MOT inspection, only when the struts are removed). The inner wing around the where the engine stabiliser bar bolts too had also rusted through. This resulted in myself learning to weld, buying a MIG welder and having the car off the road for 5 weeks to weld repair the 5 areas that needed it. As most of these problems probably started when the car was only 3-4 years old, I feel it is a bad indictment of Mazda quality as a whole. I WILL NOT BUY ANOTHER MAZDA!

Mechanically there has been very little that has gone wrong over the 9-10 years I've had the car. I've had to replace 3-4 anti-roll bar links (through knocking). The cat, after I drove the car a few miles on only two cylinders, after one of the ignition coils packed up. Just in the last week, when you come to a stop in traffic, the revs drop to 100-200 like it is going to cut out, but it doesn't, and after a few seconds the revs pick back up again to the 600-700 mark. I'll be looking into this problem this weekend... (edit - the problem turned out to be a faulty ignition cable...)

General Comments:

I won't buy another Mazda as mentioned above, but this actual car I will keep going as long as possible, as it offers everything I need.

The cavernous load space (carp fishing).

Reliability.

Reasonable running costs.

Looks smart (hand washed from new using Autoglym).

To be fair, if this car wasn't just my everyday runner/work car, I would have replaced it some years ago for something newer. The fact I have a 4.6 V8 Range Rover to play in/enjoy, means that as a cheap/reliable car, the Premacy suffices.