After 170,000 trouble free miles, my 2010 Mazda 5 threw a rod, which luckily caused a engine compartment fire, which allowed me to make a claim under my insurer and they total the vehicle out for 3700$. After doing some research on the internet reading various forums, it became apparent that the 2.3 and 2.5 MZR motors in both Ford's and Mazda's have a tendency to burn oil quickly as they age and get a lot of miles on them. I changed the oil myself on the 5 and have been very religious about keeping up with oil changes. The other problem that I found with these motors as they age is that the low level oil sensors plastic housing will fall apart dumping oil everywhere quickly and leading to catastrophic engine failure and the driver won't get an engine oil low light warning because the sensor and the housing is what failed. The biggest problems with those oil sensor failures was in production year 04-09. Regardless, if you have a high mileage Mazda 5 check the oil weekly, if not daily because it could save you a lot of headaches down the road, because for some reason these engines burn oil quickly as they age and roll up high mileage without any visible evidence of smoke, or oil leaks...the Mazda 3 and Ford focus forums are full of info on owners who this has happened to...I think in the end it goes back to crappy engineering on Ford's end with the design of the engine blocks, like always...so glad Mazda is on their own now, Ford really dragged them down in my opinion.
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