HELP!! Rear doors won't shut!!

[Phantom_5]

(rant) Got home from the store 20 minutes ago, and the sliding doors on my 5 won't shut, they just bounce off the latch. seems like the latch was stuck in the wrong position. I opened the other one to see what position that one was in, and now neither one will shut!
Anyone ever experience this???

[Antonio DiMarco]

(rant) Got home from the store 20 minutes ago, and the sliding doors on my 5 won't shut, they just bounce off the latch. seems like the latch was stuck in the wrong position. I opened the other one to see what position that one was in, and now neither one will shut!
Anyone ever experience this???

Did you try playing with the power door locks. Maybe the selenoid is stuck. Both doors having the issue seems odd though. Are the child-proof locks enabled? Also try disconnecting the engative side of the battery and see if it resets the locks.

My doors have been working flawlessly. A big deal since many first generation sliding doors like those on the Honda Odessey and Nissan Van have issues.

[fam]

It happened to me on a freezing cold day after it sat, im thinking water may have frozen and messed it up. I played with the rubber bumpers and fingered around with it and they shut and never did it again.

[the_saint]

It happened to me on a freezing cold day after it sat, im thinking water may have frozen and messed it up. I played with the rubber bumpers and fingered around with it and they shut and never did it again.
Same here. At teh backside of the door you can see the "bear claw" thingy that actually latches the door shut. I took a pen and ran it through the 'fingers' of the 'claw' and moved them...they had a little bit of ice on them which must have made them stick open or something. Any ways, I ran the pen through, pulled the interior handle, then slid the door forward and it latched up fine.


I'll snap a pic of what I'm talking about and post it up in a bit.

[Phantom_5]

thanks for thr replies.
i got the passenger side to close.
i pushed the latch mechanism down to simulate like it had hit the striker and was holding the door shut, pulled the outside handle, pushed the door shut, and it latched.
i was pumped.
so then i tried the same thing with the driver's side door, and nothing works.
i'll keep messing with the power locks. and try the interior handle instead of the exterior. in the mean time i'm thawing out my beater to drive to work tomorrow just in case :)

thanks again.
Andy

[Antonio DiMarco]

Same here. At teh backside of the door you can see the "bear claw" thingy that actually latches the door shut. I took a pen and ran it through the 'fingers' of the 'claw' and moved them...they had a little bit of ice on them which must have made them stick open or something. Any ways, I ran the pen through, pulled the interior handle, then slid the door forward and it latched up fine.


I'll snap a pic of what I'm talking about and post it up in a bit.


Ahhh, Ice. We garage both our cars so that maybe the difference.

[Antonio DiMarco]

Ahhh, Ice. We garage both our cars so that maybe the difference.

Phantom, where are you located?

[Phantom_5]

Phantom, where are you located?

near Detroit.

[the_saint]

Looks like you've got it under control. The driver's side might have more ice inside the mechanism (nervous). Maybe try hitting it with a blowdrier...just be careful for water.

Here's pics just to eliminate any confusion lol.

[Phantom_5]

thanks for the pics.
it's not THAT cold outside, but i did get the car washed today, so it could be ice.
I'll try that blow dryer trick tomorrow.

[Fran82]

We had that same problem this morning @ 6am. It was around 5 degrees last night. What I don't understand is that the doors didn't freeze shut, but neither door would close. I tried some lock deicer and the door closed after another 4 or 5 tries.
Hopefully I'll be living in a warmer climate next year, but Mazda needs to come up with a resolution to this. Maybe water shields around the latches inside the door. The first weekend we had the 5, I couldn't even get in the car because the driver's door was frozen locked. Now this. Especially irritating because the car seats are in there. What happens in an emergency and I can't get the doors shut?

[CoryRunning]

We have had several instances of the rear doors not being able to shut. I brought it to the dealer and they greased the doors one time and sprayed silicon another. Now they are taking the doors apart to look at the lock mechanism.

So now we are driving around in an F-150 for a few days while they try to figure it out.


They tried to say it was my washing the car (which I admit I do way to often) but if I cant wash it all winter then the car really wont work for me.

I will let you all know what they come up with.

[Tushawn]

Guys
I had the same problem after the first snow storm here. I touched the mechanism and gave it one final try and it closed. The people in my car pool are getting sick of my new car! Is there any chemical de-icer that someone could recommend?

[the_saint]

I don't know if you'd want to use a de-icer per se. The chemicals in it might wash the lube off of the latch/lock mechanism causing more headaches. I do not have an answer for you, but you might look into different lubricants and see if any will help keep the water away from the mechanism while NOT attracting dirt. (dunno)

[fam]

Im thinking covering it with ball bearing grease would do it. Its be a hell of a mess, but itd work :-)

Mazda you had better be reading these boards so you can get these doors taken care of during our oil changes or something so you wont have to pay millions in rental car fees.

[CoryRunning]

They told my wife that there have been several reports of this issue.

The reason they gave (and this is my wifes version of what they said) is that the grease used in the lock mechanism is very "thick" and when it is super cold can get too hard and not let the mechanism work properly. The fix (that has worked for others) is to clean off all the grease from the factory and replace with another grease.


Makes sense to me. So we are going to get the 5 back today and it is supposed to cool down so we will know within a few days if it worked or not.

[Gobe_Air]

(headshake Welp...I'm another victim of the rear door not closing shut. I went to the store to get groceries, got my 4yr old out of her car seat, attempted to close the sliding door, and the rear door would not shut!!!

I called my Mazda dealer, and they said why didn't I call roadside assistance...WTF? Anyhow I sat with the heater on high for about 30 minutes and kept playing with the lock mechanism, and it finally shut.

It's about 30 degrees outside, so I'm sure this is why the lock got stuck, but this is unsafe, I'm going to the dealer to see what they can do, this will be annoying if this continues.

[Phantom_5]

WOW
i didn't think this issue would be so wide spread.
this has happened to me several times since my first entry in this thread.
they each seem to correspond with washing the car, but not always. they do always correspond with cold weather. (5 to 30 degrees F)
but this happened last night, as we were leaving the restaraunt, and it was really cold and really windy, and we had our two kids. i ran across the street and grabbed some of that lock de-icer, and it seemed to work. i don't know if it was the de-icer, or just the heat from inside the car.
I can't believe a brand new car would have this problem. do they not have cold weather in Japan? didn't Mazda do some cold weather testing.
anyways. must be a bad design or something. maybe there will be a recall on the grease used in the hinges for cold climate customers :)

i guess i'll just have to let my car get really dirty, and only bring the kids with us on sunny days.... uggh.

[mcstark]

Guys...my wife loves the 5 and will probably get one in a year or so. She has the same problem on her current car. Before winter hits I psray the "bear claw" down with silicone spray. That seems to fix the problem. I've tried white lithium spray, but it thickens up just like the stock lube. I know silicone doesn't last as long as a grease, but I never have a problem with her doors or mine.

[CoryRunning]

And it has been nice and cold up here in Minnesota. We havent expirienced the issue again. But time will tell. My dealer has since had a few other Mazda 5 owners in with the same problem so I would assume it is an issue with all of the cars.

[the_saint]

Did they say what kind of lube they ended up using instead?

[miatafied]

Finally happened to us 2 nights ago! We had weird weather first torrential rain, then dropping temps turning everything to ice, along with strong gusts of wind, and snow (on top of that) Next day we can't get one door open, so we leave it - let the kids hop in the other side. We get home after our errands and my husband opens that door to let the kids out then it wouldn't shut. I brought the kids in and when I came out 15 minutes later he was still trying to shut it. I was trying to figure out where to even look and I kept grabbing the door handle and actuating the release button - I guess I did this enough times because when i shut it it stuck.

[Zoom5Zoom]

(cheers) Heya

I have a Mazda Tip bulletin for this issue. You can reference M-TIPS.

Quote

Water may accumulate and freeze in the latch mechanism for either of the rear side slideing doors. The ice guilduup may interfere with the levers of the latch mechanism, not allowing the sliding doors to latch closed.

Fix

A temporary fix has been developed to address this issue. Basically they remove the sliding door panels and at the latch cover a hole with tape and then with a special grease fill the latch etc etc more stuff. This grease prevents ice build up.

At the end of the day this will temporary fix the issue and a replacement latch is on its way.

I have experienced the freeze and used a hairdryer to move forward then got the above fix done with no issues after.

Cheers
Zoom5Zoom

[the_saint]

Cool, thanks for the heads up.

[5thAve]

Thanks. I will enquire about this fix while I'm at Carling Mazda having them look at the FRONT doors (frozen shut twice on days not so very cold). Lock mechanism won't budge manually nor electrically so doors can't be opened. Has anyone had this problem?

(huh)

(cheers) Heya

I have a Mazda Tip bulletin for this issue. You can reference M-TIPS.

Quote

Water may accumulate and freeze in the latch mechanism for either of the rear side slideing doors. The ice guilduup may interfere with the levers of the latch mechanism, not allowing the sliding doors to latch closed.

Fix

A temporary fix has been developed to address this issue. Basically they remove the sliding door panels and at the latch cover a hole with tape and then with a special grease fill the latch etc etc more stuff. This grease prevents ice build up.

At the end of the day this will temporary fix the issue and a replacement latch is on its way.

I have experienced the freeze and used a hairdryer to move forward then got the above fix done with no issues after.

Cheers
Zoom5Zoom

[Zoom5Zoom]

Fifth Ave

I have noticed this issue with cars on the lot only on GT models (why I don't know). Seemed once the moisture has melted out with CAR heat it seemed fine after that.

If I didn't mention it the fix above is for GS sliding doors only. The GT model have electric closing assist.

The note about the interior lock latch also happened on a GT on our lot, so maybe there is something there eh ..... only in the great white north.

Hope it all works out.

FYI My sliding door froze open even after the grease job so I can't wait also for the latch replacement.

Cheers
Zoom5Zoom
(cheers)

[EFDisaster]

is there a bulletin or something I can bring with me tomorrow (my appointment with service to get my radio options installed and get my inspection sticker and such)? ... because one of my sliders got stuck open a couple times the other night. Is there, or is there going to be, a latch replacement?

[Kid Red]

Glad I'm in Florida :)

[Zoom5Zoom]

Had my GS sliding door Latch Assemblies changed today. We are doing an experiment with my GS version to see if the freeze condition will re appear on a different latch. The greasing of the lock assembly did not help my car much. I will let ya know how things work out. First overnight cold shift seems OK so far.

[theweev]

different latch from.... the factory. As in the ' new" latch?

[Zoom5Zoom]

I can say there is a new redesigned latch coming but it is not this one. I have a different fix for the time being...... as mentioned more to follow. Who knows my fix may not fix issue (but I know it will). :)

[afticarab]

Hey Zoom5Zoom, have you heard any more on a fix for the door latch. I posted a similar problem earlier this year, dealer did the service bulletin but lock still froze while on ski trip to Vermont in March. I ask the dealer each time I'm in if anything is coming and nothing yet. Was in today for 24K service ($130.34 with tax) still nothing and I'm wondering whether to contact Mazda direct.