New (to us) Mazda CX-9

[CurseTheSky]

Whelp, I was planning on posting here to get opinions first, but we're already pretty much set on it.

My wife and I have a 10 year old and another little guy that just turned 1. We also have a little girl due in late November. A normal sedan just wasn't going to work with two car seats plus another kid, so we needed to look into something with a third row.

At first we were looking at used Explorers, but we happened to see a 2008 Mazda CX-9 with 49k miles on the lot. It seemed pretty nice, drove well, and my wife absolutely fell in love with it. It's Stormy Blue Mica, and the color is gorgeous in person (image not mine):

We have it on loan right now, already put $2500 down, and we're going back to finish up the paper work on Saturday. I know it's a little late now, but anything in particular to watch out for on these? Everything I searched for seemed to say that they're pretty reliable.

Thanks guys.

 

[bigi]

CX-9s are great. You'll get ~15 MPG in city.

New ones are about to be announced though - Skyactive, 4 banger, turbo. Not Ford based anymore.

 

[CurseTheSky]

Yeah, we knew the mileage would suck, but that's what you get with 4500 lbs and 270 HP. I'm kind of disappointed that it doesn't get THAT much better fuel economy compared to the 2008 Explorer V6 that we were looking at, but the engine sure is a ton more refined. The old 4.0L SOHC was a decent motor, but this 3.7L is awesome.

 

[MiataNC]

Grats on the new to you Mazda.

I have never heard of any chronic problems with the CX-9. Here is a link to the most active CX-9 forum.

http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?248-Mazda-CX-9-Forum

All Mazdas are built to be drivers car. Your CX-9 should be pretty sport for what it is.

Enjoy the Zoom Zoom.

 

[ThatsABigOne]

Keep on the lookout for rust above your rear license plate holder. There is either a chrome strip, or painted plastic trim and the way it is attached may cause rust. Last two out of six CX9's that I saw on the road had that issue.

 

[CurseTheSky]

Keep on the lookout for rust above your rear license plate holder. There is either a chrome strip, or painted plastic trim and the way it is attached may cause rust. Last two out of six CX9's that I saw on the road had that issue.

That's exactly the type of stuff that I'm talking about. I'll check it out and see if I can get some kind of oil or sealant in there. Thanks!

 

[desy]

http://www.carcomplaints.com/Mazda/CX-9/

Not too bad but maybe a small sample size, there is known problems with CX-7 tho

 

[IgoZoom]

So how are things going with the CX-9? Is it the Sport, Touring or Grand Touring model? And it is AWD (all-wheel-drive) or FWD (front-wheel-drive)?

I have a 2012 CX-9 Grand Touring FWD that I bought new in November 2012. I’ve already racked up 34k miles in less than two years and I couldn’t be happier with it! The Stormy Blue Mica is a beautiful color and really looks good on the CX-9. I wanted either Liquid Silver or Dolphin Gray, but since I was buying previous model year leftovers, my choices were limited. To get a FWD with the Bose/Moonroof but without Navigation, my only option ended being ‘Crystal White Pearl Mica’. But I got an incredible deal on it (sticker was $38,385 and I paid $29,207), so I learned to live with the Pearl White.

If you guys were looking at the previous-generation Explorer (2006-2010), the CX-9 is by far the better vehicle! Prior to my CX-9, I had two Explorers- a 2003 XLT 4WD and 2007 Eddie Bauer 2WD (both with the standard 4.0L V6). My sister is still driving the 2003 and it has just over 260k miles on the original engine/transmission and it’s still going strong. The 2007 was the worst vehicle I have ever owned in my life! It had 132k miles on it when I trade it on the Mazda and I had spent over $7000 in repairs after the warranty expired. I went thru 3 radiators, the entire A/C system had to be replaced twice, the power driver’s seat motor failed, the digital display screen in the instrument panel fried, the gearshift lever got stuck in PARK, the solenoid that allows the transmission to shift into O/D went out and the ‘PowerFold’ 3rd row seat was permanently stuck in the down position on one side (so the 3rd row could only seat one, never two) because the gear and motor were stripped out. The moonroof also developed a leak when it was barely two years old and it ultimately caused the headliner and moonroof motor to be replaced (which I forced them to do under warranty even though I was way over the mileage limit). And that’s only about half of the things that went wrong with that heap…

When Ford redesigned the Explorer for 2006, they made the interior look nicer (floor mounted shifter and console, nicer gauges, even nicer door panels and trim materials). But they cut corners with mechanical quality to compensate and I learned that very painful lesson. KBB valued my Explorer at $8,200 trade-in and Carmax offered to buy it for $7,500. After I negotiated the price on my CX-9, I told them to match the Carmax offer and that would close the deal. They might have offered more but I just wanted it to be gone.

The Explorer’s fuel economy was rated at 15/21mpg (4.0L RWD) but my fuel economy was around 18mpg overall until around 115k miles. For some unknown reason, it started to drink gas and my mechanic couldn’t figure out why. I was struggling to get 14mpg overall by the time I got rid of it. My CX-9 is rated at 17/24mpg and I get 18.5-19mpg average in mostly city driving. On the highway with the cruise set at 80mph and A/C on, it gets 21mpg. So it manages to get better fuel economy than the Explorer ever did and it has a LOT more power! In some Ford forums, the 4.0L V6 is called the “boat anchor” because that’s the only thing it would very good at it. The additional 63hp in the CX-9 paired with a much more responsive 6-speed Sport Automatic (vs. 5-speed Auto) moves the 400lb lighter vehicle much faster.

I’m sure you’ve noticed that the CX-9 handles more like a sporty mid-size sedan than a large Crossover/SUV. It’s very easy to forget how big it is because it never ‘feels’ big from behind the wheel.

Anyway, I hope you guys are as happy with yours as I am with mine! =)