I'm currently looking into purchasing a FD. I'd like to start off by saying that I am mechanically knowledgable except for rotary engines. I understand these cars are old, and with any car that gets old and used, parts wear and/or fail. I've been reading a lot of testimonials from FD owners about its reliability. My question is, with all said parts having been replaced, rebuilt, etc. how reliable has your FD become? Let me rephrase this question if it doesn't make sense. After diagnosing the problem with your FD's, whether it was the turbos, engine, transmission, etc. having done repairs and replaced with properly functioning parts, would u still need to worry about the FD's reliability? Was the car poorly engineered to the point where even with new working parts that it could still become unreliable within a short time span? I have no problem maintaining this delicate car, but from reading some posts on this forum it almost sounds as if ALL FD's are 100% guarenteed to fail constantly..

 

Then why are you asking the same question thats been answered 100x before

 

Welcome, there is a lot of great info on this forum. Do some searches and a wealth of information will be yours.
My opinion is a little different from most. Keep your car as close to stock as possible. This will reward you with great reliability. Do a search for reliability mods. IMHO this car is plenty fast in stock form. If your going to track your car there are some great threads on that as well. If you are racing/tracking your car than things like a larger intercoolers, single turbos make sense.
Add these items and you will have a rewarding ownership experience: (assuming a sound motor and turbos to start with)
Do a vacume hose job.
Replace stock radiator with Koyo or Fluidyne
Replace pre-cat with a downpipe
Replace stock AST with a metal AST
Add boost gauge and engine coolant temperature gauge.(several pod types are available)
Depending on the mileage of your fd's someone should inspect your bushings, replace springs and shocks.
Check out a rotary shop in your town.

If you want lots of horsepower than follow what most of these guys are doing to their cars, than be prepared to replace motors often.

 

It's a high-end sports car with many of the systems being very race-car like in design. No, it's not reliable compared to the typical car and parts are expensive. This topic has been covered approximately 569 times since I joined this forum....

 

Yea, now it's 570 times. I don't post very often in this section so I thought I would. You mean I should have bought a Ford Taurus.

 

abuse, improper tuning, and over moding causes pop on this car like any car. My friend blew his motor and turbos twice on his $80k porsche..does that mean porsches are unreliable? He blew the turbos on his supra... are they unreliable?

A few reliability mods and they run strong. 110k, 320 rwhp, tracked often, running strong seems pretty reliable in my book?

My repairs? Replaced leaky oil pan, new battery, reliability mods, some go fast mods and some good tuning

 

They don't fail constantly. Yes, it is possible something could go bad at any point (solenoid, for example) but it is possible to stay ahead.

Usually, having found the source of a problem, it's fixed. As well, unless it's a superficially mounted part, I change a couple of other parts while I'm in there. It's hard for me to speak authoritatively on reliability because I've only put on 10k in the 2 years I've owned it. But in that time I've never had a day of downtime that wasn't my decision. (So far, the problems I've been fixing are nuisance, failures found in early stages, installing reliability mods, or maintenance). I'm certain it's more reliable than before.

100% of the cars with a failed part seem to start a thread here, so that explains why it seems they're always broken. I will say this: Mazda made a very complicated turbo control system, and many emissions components. All of them can be attacked by heat, but it's too expensive to replace them all in one shot with new parts and so there is always the chance another will fail. Worrying about it will make you grey - generally it's not bad if you keep your eyes out for early signs and use your head.

Dave

 

Remember this:

no one posts saying "My FD is running so well and reliably!" I am sure there are a bunch out there. Instead they post about blown motors etc.

 

my FD is running so well and reliably!

actually it's true, for 7 years now....it's all about staying on top of the pm and doing the reliability mods, contrary to what Jeff says

 

I'm not asking "Is the FD a reliable car?", I know it's not, thats a given. But I assumed the reason they've become unreliable was due to the cars age, 93 until now. For those who posted suggestions, thank you. I went to the beginner site links on this forum and already read about the reliability mods etc. I just wanted to know from actual owners who have had the old parts replaced with newer ones if their cars infact are more reliable as the parts arent as old.