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Hatchbacks Mazda 323 Mazda 323
419 messages, Last post on Nov 22, 2009 at 12:45 PM
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My son's car is getting near the 120K mark. I know it is due fir timing belt tensioner and waterpump. Unfortunately It is also going to need a clutch. I would assume the bearing and pressure plate should be replaced as well. Anyone have an idea of how big of a job that is. I would guess the maintence stuff is about 300 I doubt he could do that job. My younger son has done a clutch on an 83 datsun I am wondering idf the job is similar on the Mazda 92 323. I know my subaru required the whole engine to come out and ended up costing me $ 1000 for a clutch! I know my son cannot put that kind of money out. If anyone has done a clutch can you let me know how tough it was. Thanks
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Here is parts link: Buy or AVOID, (looks kinda sketchy and not something I would buy without advice) http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1-6L-1-8L-MAZDA-323-MX3-PROTEGE-Timing-Belt-Water- -Pump_W0QQitemZ270187412477QQihZ017QQcategoryZ33625QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZ- ViewItem Anyone let me know if its not cool to post this for any reason!
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Replying to: thevine (Nov 16, 2007 12:07 pm) The reason for O'Reilly's being first is service. I need a part and it is in Alabama, a lot of the time it is here the next day. Wrong part, no problem. A lot of parts like new water pumps have a lifetime warranty: Keep a receipt file. Not a bad idea to keep copies as well. Our 323 has more warranty on it at 260K miles than it did brand new. For example, they have replaced the radiator twice now. No questions asked. Water pump once. They use to warrant hoses until they discovered people like me, yup I take the hoses back as well! If I plan a major job on a car, like a clutch job someone just mentioned....I take care of any other problems I may have to deal with then or soon. Good example would be servicing struts, front wheel bearings and maybe replacing the front brake rotors. Yes, we have a 20 ton press here. They do not tell you in the repair manual, but the front wheel bearings last to about 150K. Some more, some less. But in a car where you have to dismantle so much to fix one thing, it makes no sense to cut corners. Take the major job slowly over a few weeks and be done with it all at one time. End result is you have a car that lasts a whole lot longer. Yup, I may drop a grand in parts on something major. On the other hand, I have dealt with all of the trouble makers coming at me down the road. If it is a front wheel drive with a belt driven over head cam set up, they are built nicely, but when all hell breaks loose from neglect the dollars go flying if you try to pay a pro to keep it. Best to dot your i's and cross your t's the first time. So for buying parts off the net, that is my last resort. Down time is key here. Does not matter if the car is 1 year or 25! Nothing I hate worse than someone telling they can not get a part for a two year old car! Now you know why I drive older ones! The last car we bought was a 86 Toyota which got a serious driveline overhaul shortly after wards. $5K's dollars later. 2 years of service already. 15K miles later. I could not have bought a nerw car for that! Guess what, next year she gets a new a/c! Found a place in San Antiono for that. Put one in the 89 323 for $780 plus. So, unless you can not get a part locally, only then would you want to consider web or mail. Comes down to service and down time. |
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Replying to: sschmid (Nov 16, 2007 6:50 am) I always suggest to people to take a good overall assessment of a vehicle before going into a major rebuild investment. Look it over very carefully. If the car is suitable to do what you want it to do long term, then by all means work it over to keep. Forget about resell value, because you can not get your money out of it that way. But when you compare to cost of buying a new car, you will win every time the longer you operate it. In fact we even stock extra parts for ours as well! The number of tranny's I pulled in the past, I deftly go into one and have it out in a couple of hours. You will need to plan at least a weekend just for a first time tear down. Best to have someone with some knowledge near by. If you choose to consult with me, it will take more time and I suggest you get the same book as I. Ours is a 89, not the same as yours. But I could review the books out there and suggest the best one for you. That way I can direct to a certain page or picture. The 92 is closely related to our 89. I most likely myself could tear it down without reading the first word from a book. Experience has taught me that it is always best to have info handy. Now for the entire scope of the job you should consider. Front wheel bearings are good for about 150K miles. Replace them this service point. Too much trouble to go after later. You will need experience and have a hydraulic press for this. I bought that also from Harbor Freight. Front struts should also be considered along with all of the proper rubber dust boots, upper mounts and bumpers. Ball joints, replace. Inspect and replace if needed, sway bar bushings. Half shafts should be carefully inspected as well. Also inspect the tie rods and steering rack. Plans on a front wheel alignment after the job. O'Reilly's has lifetime warranty on many of these parts. I recommend them. They fixing to eat all of these parts for the first time nowon our 89 that we have logged over 100K since the last time I did this major job. As for the clutch itself. Replace clutch disc, pressure plate, throw out bearing and the pilot bearing. Most of this comes in a clutch kit. Always use a good bearing brand like BCA, Bowers or Timekin. Stay away from brands made in China. The metal hardness is too soft. I would also replace the rear main engine seal as well. It will fail otherwise in a short period of time causing the engine to burn up from lack of oil. There is a trick to removing that seal without removing the seal holder and oil pan. I will tell it to you later if you need it. Price that seal around. I found O'Reilly's to be high on seals and Advance more reasonable. O'Reilly's will match prices on parts. Here they know I will come in with a bunch of stuff printed out from websites with prices. I have been known to shave hundreds of dollars off of several major jobs here! Then again it gets even bettter if the part has a life time warranty! See ya all in another 20 years! I tell them! Speaking of which, Hubby home and hungry. Guess I better go feed him. The supply house could not get the front wheel bearings for our 89, so I had to go to a bearing supply house like Motion Industries. Auto Suppliers have realized regular mechanics who cut down time search for parts. Therefore in recent years, they have gotten onto the web very nicely. Here are the companies I use here locally. They may have a location near you. http://www.advanceautoparts.com/ and http://www.autozone.com/home.htm and http://www.oreillyauto.com/EW3/HomePage.do . You may wish to read an earlier e-mail about parts houses I posted. Ah, younger son. He will be most valuable. Not the same as a front wheel drive, but if he remains open minded and keeps a open link to me for questions no matter how smart or stupid it may seem to him, I think you could pull this job off. Use those websites to price parts and print them out for future refrence. Take your time on this job and you will be fine. Over all, you should spend a lot less money than a newer car. Also what you learn here, transfers to other cars as well. Oh, pay close attention to torques specs given for nuts and bolts. Buy a good torque wrench. On foreign cars, you screw up on torque amount, you get screwed in the end. |
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Replying to: thevine (Nov 16, 2007 2:15 am) Just keep a close eye on your coolant. Just a quick hood open in the morning and check the resoivor and a once the week pull the radiator cap should be good enough. If you find coolant lower in radiator that means there is no vacuum to pull back from the resiovor. That is caused by a leak in the system. Any loss would be a cause of concern with regards to that pump. O'Reilly's and NAPA are excellent parts suppliers. Bottom line you get what you pay for. In terms of brand names, Gates, Goodyear, Borg Warner, Wix filters. A timing belt with nytrl is what you want. Costs a bit more, but worth it. Now for the Halloween noise. Good idea to pull the wheel off and turn the hub. I strongly suspect from what you told me that that brake drum is warped. That is rare, but does happen if someone brakes hard all of the time. Like I tell people, the more you drive like grandma, the longer the parts last. Someone's clutch job in earlier posts I mentioned earlier at 120K. I said a bit early! Well hubby had to have one around 138K when I put the new engine in. I retaught him how to drive. When we changed the 4 speed out for a five speed, his new driving lessons showed no wear on that second clutch after 100K more of service. We reinstalled that same clutch into the 5 speed gear box back then. Back to rear brakes. before you even take off the hub nut, be aware that you need a torque wrench to set the bearing clearance I think on this car. Check the manual to be sure. I mix my models up sometimes after a while. I do know for sure that the lock nut is a special one that is available but hard to find at times. The dealer should still be able to get one for you as a last resort. Motormite brand has them also at O'Reilly's. You will have to have them. I think there are right and left hand threads on this model as well. Be aware of that possibilty. Dealer can lay a hand on the right part the first time, O'reilly's will need an old one to match up/order. Bottom line on noise, plan on a brake drum, brake shoes and wheel bearings and seals. Give yourself more distance behind someone else while driving and you should be able to make those brakes last a lot longer. Take your time shifting as well. That will increase life of transmsiion as well. Hard shifting is an indicator of a missing nylon bushing in the linkage.
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Replying to: girlcarbuilder (Nov 16, 2007 5:15 pm) As per driving-I was in a bit of a fun phase when first purchasing this car as opposed to my usual motto "creep to the green instead of racing to the red". Oh yes, the trans. is an auto, only car I owned which I would opt for manual. On the search for parts & BTW I really drive very little, 100 miles monthly in cold months. Many thanks, ~A |
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All fixed~new timing B, W pump replaced ignition swithch, fuel filter, air filter & new rear wheel bearings. All parts & labor around $400. Runs & drives like new  90,000 being a 20 yr old car. The noise was the wheel bearings, I had it in my head it was something else. Reason for posting is mainly-listen to those who know more than you, especially if you know nothing, be flexible & have an open mind. I could have figured out the problem via simple process which would have come around with more thought. I putzed around the shop & watched how easy some of these things would have been to do myself. Although my bottom line was cheap, I found quality parts for REALLY cheap spending time on the web & researching the quality from the crapola. Although nobody to back them, and as girlcarbuilder pointed out, this is a big plus. thanx all!
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Replying to: thevine (Dec 16, 2007 12:05 pm) Interesting note for you here. Back in 2000, we bought a new crate engine from Mazda for our 89 after the crank broke on the original engine. Complete from oil pan to valve cover, timing belt cover to rear main seal! All we had to do was bolt on manifolds and a bunch of other small stuff. Price was $2K. That was 7 years ago. We having that thought of rebuilding again when the time comes. If it works well now, why part with it? Especially if you have the know how to keep it working well. The establish service intervals we have for rear wheel bearings is 50K miles and 150K for the front ones. Set your service record markers for that. I do not recommend reusing the front ones after 150K of service. The rear, re-pack and reinstall for another 50K. Trash after 100K of total service. Last note, I learned a lot of my mechanics from reading, talking, success and messing things up! After almost 50 years, you have a lot down pat. Like Banshees coming out of the rear wheel. We thought it was brakes at first, but remember I am here depending on your ears. I feel pretty good I got you in the right area on the car considering how far away I am! I have ever amazed friends diagnosising a valve job by e-mail. No, not genius, just a bunch of carefully asked and hopefully carefully answered questions and guidance. Hashes out a lot of problems, if as you pointed out, someone listens carefully. |
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I was recently given a 1988 Mazda 323 hatchback 1.6 liter FI SOHC engine. It's doing strange things I believe tied into the electrical system. It has 38K original miles. It was making a belt squealing sound that has stopped since driving home 200 miles. Not sure what was causing the belt squeal. The temperature gauge fluctuates between off the charts HOT back down to cold and vice versa. This corresponds with the car shifting back and forth between overdrive and 3rd. Within normal ranges or "hot", it will stay in overdrive. When it goes back down to "cold" on the temperature gauge, it downshifts back into 3rd gear. Also, the front blinkers don't work and neither radiator nor condenser fans kick on. I've thoroughly cleaned the battery posts and clamps and cleaned what appears to be one negative ground connected to the transmission dipstick mount. There appears to be another ground on a brace on the opposite side of the engine which I have not cleaned yet. Anyone have any idea where to look first? |
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Replying to: kujhac (Jan 07, 2008 12:22 pm)
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