proberts wrote:Hi everyone.
Relatively new to this forum and a mazda 6 owner for the last 2 months or so. I keep getting intermittent turbo lag on my 6 and took it to Mazda a month or so ago and they said they drove it but as it wasnt happening at the time, they couldnt find a problem. My last 6 digits of my VIN is 120287. Car manufacture date is 08/05/2013. It has just under 62k on the clock. 1st question is, does this number fall in to the defective camshaft issue ? And 2nd question is, if so, how do i find out if the problem has been rectified or not ?
Cheers.
Hi there,
Over the two + years that the camshaft problem has come to light, Mazda have tried to confuse matters enormously regarding the specific VIN's that are effected. As various problems surfaced i.e. duff turbos, vacuum pump etc. all of which are in fact because the car had fitted a non oil hardened camshaft, different VIn numbers and build dates were disclosed - therefore, no matter what others may tell you, there is no difinitive VIN series.
Why is that so? Ok - after a year into the 2013 3rd M6 production run, it became evident to Mazda that one of their camshaft suppliers had not hardened a batch at per specification - to wit, they had stupidly left out the crucial oil cooling/hardening element in their computerised production cycle. That particular supplier must have kept bad records as they were unable to state how many and to what Mazda factories the duff batch, which has an unspecified production number, were sent to. Therefore, some went to the two Japanese factories, some went to Australia and some went to Malaysia. None of course went to the USA, as diesel Mazdas are not sold there.
This problem was compounded further as the duff batch was sent to the different factories over a period of months and therefore Mazda have no idea when the batch was used. Had the camshafts been stamped with a serial number and linked to each specific engine, then the difinitive VIN range would have been easy to establish. When fitted, each camshaft looks identical, whether or not it had been oil hardened.
There is no doubt in my mind that although the VIN number of your car is not in the range that some are using on here - i.e. 122521 to 148781, which by my reckoning only 22,260 engines worldwide, you should lodge your complaint to your dealer and make them aware that you are a member of the M6owners club. The dealer is well aware of this problem and will probably tell you that your VIN is outside of the range. However, tell him that you are aware of a TSB (Technical Service Bulletin) that outlines how they should check the engine for the camshaft problem, should anyone complain about loss of power and turbo lag. Theefore, they should check your engine as per that TSB and if a) your vacuum pump or turbos are contaminated with swarff (tiny particals of metal) and or b) the vacuum pump is damaged, they should check the camshaft for serious and very dangerous wear.
Good luck