Scary Tire Wear on 2006 Mazda5

After reading multiple threads about the 2006 Mazda5 rear inside tire wear, I'm a little confused on the best option to alleviate this problem. Some people did not have the problem, some said increasing tire pressure fixed it (my mechanic said that is impossible), some said it's a toe-in problem, some said it's camber, some said it's tire selection, some flip the tires on the rims occasionally (my tires are directional so can't do that - but will be needing to be replaced soon at this rate). It seems to be just the 1-1.5 inches at the inside edge that wears a lot.

I'll buy the SPC adjustable camber arms if needed, but don't want to spend $$ if it's not going to fix the problem. My wife drives the car most of the time and she's not racing, or needing the aggressive handling alignment settings. I'm not going to lower the suspension. I may put on 16" rims for next winter, but have the stock 17" on it now.
 
I too am a little confused over these tire issues. Is it toe, camber, tires, tire pressure, or rate of rotation? I noticed the slightly higher rate of wear on my inner rear tires but negative camber is what it is and adds to the driving enjoyment. Maybe the OP just got a lemon of a tire or maybe there was previous accident/suspension work (don't know if he bought new or used). From personal experience of driving for 22 years and probably close to 400000 miles, every set of tires I've had, I've rotated only once at midlife. Never experienced a blowout or abnormal tire wear. My Mazda5 had fairly new Kumho Ecsta SPT on it when I bought it used at 37000 and now it has 69000. Rotated once and no problems. Can't really expect much more mileage from Z-rated tires so I do plan to replace them late this Summer at just about 40000 miles. I guess my question for the people who rotate religiously, if I rotated every 5000 miles, would my Kumhos have lasted longer? If so, approx. how much more mileage might I have gotten. I want to compare the cost and time involved because I do my own oil and cannot see myself paying a shop just to rotate tires.
 
I bought a used 2006 Mazda5, and see the same tire wear issues. I have never seen this before on any other car, strange that Mazda messed it up so bad. This is my first stray away from Honda and Toyota, hopefully i won't be disappointed. I have only had it for a few days, but the road noise is very strange, not very impressed so far. If i can get 30mpg out of it, it might be worth keeping.

As for the tire wear, is there a documented solution to it? Seems like poor engineered alignment causes all the problems, possibly aggravated by crappy struts/shocks? Too bad Honda doesn't make a 30mpg minivan that i can buy for under 10k, that would be sweet.

Jive
 
I just purchased the SPC rear camber adjusting arms off eBay. I'll put them on and get it aligned and report back.
I plan on asking the alignment guy to set it up with no toe in and minimal negative camber, but to offer his opinion about that.
The rear tires are near shot and I'll probably have to replace them, too.
 
I just purchased the SPC rear camber adjusting arms off eBay. I'll put them on and get it aligned and report back.
I plan on asking the alignment guy to set it up with no toe in and minimal negative camber, but to offer his opinion about that.
The rear tires are near shot and I'll probably have to replace them, too.

Did you ever get confirmation from a shop that your toe in alignment was good before? I have yet to check mine. Please report back on the adjustable camber links, sounds promising. The only problem is that it will take 20k mi to verify that the problem went away!

My rear tires are severely worn on the 1 inch inside edge compared to the fronts, which look fine. This is a used 2006 i just bought with Nitto 225/50-17 tires on it which the previous owner installed. Very troubling pattern indeed, and loud as hell too. Gonna take it to a friends shop to check it out, will report back on what he diagnoses the cause to be.

Jive
 
No, I didn't get the rear toe-in checked - and I probably should have done that first. One of my faults is that I just make a decision and jump in.

The guy at the shop did visually look at the car and commented on the amount of negative camber, but he did not measure it on the alignment machine. I think I'll probably put the adjustable arms on regardless if the toe-in is correct or not.

I figure that more adjustability is better than less. Who knows, I may get a wild hair and lower the 5 someday.
 
springs, camber links, and alignment done! turned out rear shocks were blown. so I got KYBs. the car has only 70k and was already on 2nd set of factory rear shocks. when I did my snow tire switchover I noticed a bit of oil on the rear shocks. the shocks weren't dripping wet and the ride felt fine so i ignored it. now with spring kit and new rear shocks the ride and handling is more to my liking!
 
The SPC arms were delivered today. I'll try to get them installed within the next few days and eyeball the camber for now. Will drive the car for a couple weeks (if there's nothing drastically wrong with the alignment) to give the bushings time to settle before taking it in for an alignment.

I also called SPC today to see what they suggest for alignment settings. They said about -.5 degrees camber on the rear, and to reduce the rear toe-in by about 1/32" or so per side. The alignment guy said he'd have no problem doing that for me.
 
Great to hear guys, keep up the updates!

I was also thinking that another helpful tool to see if any progress is being made would be to use one of the "thermometer guns" and scan the tire from shoulder to shoulder after a highway run. I imagine that the OEM factory setup on the 2006-2007 years results in an increased temperature on that inside shoulder when compared to the other parts of the tire carcass.
 
I put the arms in yesterday. I took a little more than 2 hours.

To set them up "in the ballpark" I matched them up with the stock arms and put the mounting bolts through both of them to get the SPCs to the same position as the stock arms. Then, I turned the adjusting nut 8 flat-sides out (I guess that'd be 1.5 turns since it's a hex head). Eyeballing it, it looks like the driver's side is nearly straight (0 camber) and the passenger side appears to still have a little negative camber, but I'm going to leave it for a week or so before I take it in for an alignment. My rear tires need to be replaced anyway.

A test drive doesn't seem to be very much different than with the stock arms, but I didn't really test it that hard - just took a couple 50mph corners at 80mph.

I'll follow up after the new tires and alignment.
 
I only have 30k miles and both rear shocks were replaced because they were leaking. Thankfully it was still under warranty. I've never had shocks go out so early in a car. Maybe its because they reused the same rear suspension as a Mazda3 and it just wasn't meant to take all this extra rear weight?
 
I only have 30k miles and both rear shocks were replaced because they were leaking. Thankfully it was still under warranty. I've never had shocks go out so early in a car. Maybe its because they reused the same rear suspension as a Mazda3 and it just wasn't meant to take all this extra rear weight?

Yes, mine were leaking too, but not covered under Mazda warranty. I opted to replace the struts with the KONI FSD for their performance, as well as the fact that KONI uses a different strut/shock between the 5 vs. 3, meaning the KONI FSD part number for the Mazda5, was different than the MAZDA3. Unlike any of the other strut/shock manufacturers, who used the same parts for the 5 vs. 3.

I think that Mazda5 (3330 LB) vs. the Mazda3 (2700 LB) = 630 LB curb weight is not the only difference. You must also factor in the assumption that the Mazda5 will average carrying 2 more passengers as well. This makes the total driving weight with passengers somewhere near ~1000+ LB difference between the Mazda5 vs Mazda3.
(limb)
 
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I'm having excessive wear on the outside portion of the rear tires, I got them aligned last week and the guy told me he corrected the toe but its still out by 0.5 on the right rear side saying te camber is off. Today I installed the SPC camber kit and I can see that the rear wheels are not like / \ now but are more parallel. The mechanic told me that my spring sagged from when I initially installed them, the reason why my first alignment didnt need the camber kit. I am lowered an additional 0.5 inch than when i first installed the springs.

Initial impression of drivability....it feel better with the negative camber but I need to save my tires.
 
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A Mazda 3 GT with automatic transmission is 3078 lb. The Mazda 5 has a carry load limit of 810 lb? (Not at home).
 
(Sorry, hit enter early) From the looks of it, they are showing the same fitment for the 3's also, or at least according to this site: http://www.jdmultimate.com/Product/i-226937.aspx?Year=2005-2007&Make=MAZDA&Model=5

How do you like them anyway? I think I might go with the GR-2's also unless the Koni's are really really noticeably different.

If you are looking for a direct OEM replacement, the GR2 should be fine, but personally I dislike all KYB products (had AGXs and have read poor reviews on GR2) b/c the competition is much better for about the same price. KYB products are inferior to Tokico (Tokico blues are better than KYB GR2 and Tokcio Illuminas are better than KYB AGX); Koni's sit on top of both. Personally, I am a big fan of Bilstein but too bad they dont make anything for the Mz5, but I think they do offer something for the Mz3

IMHO Bilstein>Koni>Tokico>KYB. Best would be JIC Magic or Ohlins :D

My ideal setup would be JIC Magic coilovers but reali$tic setup would be H&R springs + Bilstein shocks.
 
I put the arms in yesterday. I took a little more than 2 hours.

To set them up "in the ballpark" I matched them up with the stock arms and put the mounting bolts through both of them to get the SPCs to the same position as the stock arms. Then, I turned the adjusting nut 8 flat-sides out (I guess that'd be 1.5 turns since it's a hex head). Eyeballing it, it looks like the driver's side is nearly straight (0 camber) and the passenger side appears to still have a little negative camber, but I'm going to leave it for a week or so before I take it in for an alignment. My rear tires need to be replaced anyway.

A test drive doesn't seem to be very much different than with the stock arms, but I didn't really test it that hard - just took a couple 50mph corners at 80mph.

I'll follow up after the new tires and alignment.
I did get the car aligned after replacing the camber arms.
The SPC people recommended going to about -.5 degrees on the camber and reducing the toe-in about 1/32 on each side. So, that's what I told the alignment guy. No new tires yet since mine are still just OK, but worn on the inside and making road noise.

The handling does feel different, though I'd have a tough time trying to explain what is different. Still not bad.
 
rkhanso, thanks for the keeping us abreast of your progress, I may have to follow your lead if my 2008 is eating tires. Rediculous what we have to do to make a car reliable.... what sense does it make to tune a passenger minivan with sport suspension settings, nonsense. Lets see, maybe they though people will want to road race on their way to dropping the kids off at school, yeah, that sounds about right. At least the kids would like it!

Jive
 
I would be willing to bet that without the sporty ride, half of us wouldn't be on this forum today. Mazda almost went bankrupt trying to attract the Toyota buyers... their focus on people who want fun to drive cars have paid off.

Koni shocks for the Mazda 5 have heavy duty valving. These could be the ultimate lifetime shocks (or at least maybe 150k miles) for those who don't push their cars.
 
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