Has anyone else experienced this with their manual P5:

Hold your accelerator at a set speed, then take your foot off. The car holds speed for a beat then lurches forward, almost like downshifting. At times it is mild, and others more noticeable.

I'm not sure if this is the rubber banding that people have been talking about (which I thought had to do with the clutch springs). Am I just going crazy, because I swear it didn't behave like this 4 months ago.

Any input would be super appreciated.

 

Sounds like engine braking to me. But if you are doing this in fifth gear you might want to take your car to the dealer. It should not give you a good lurch unless you are in a low gear at a decent RPM.

 

lol, that is exactly what is happening. 2nd or 3rd gear, ~3000 rpm, and if you feather the gas you are in for a rocky ride.
I spent almost the entire day at the shop arguing about this with the guys at the shop, who all said that it was normal, and after digging for a while have found the previous threads on the same subject here.

However, I definitely found a difference between my 4 month old car and a brand new factory car. While the same symptoms could be coaxed out of the car, they were noticeably less severe. Apparantly the Mazda rep is oging to be contacted, and I'll get some BS excuse/evasion later this week from Mazda corp.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to alleviate this problem, without riding the clutch too much in city driving?

 

To avoid it (which I try to do when other people are in the car) I try to keep the tranny in the highest gear possible. Then if I need acceleration I just need a quick downshift. Just alter your shift points. Also it doesn't hurt to get good with the accelerator. You can minimize the effects by avoiding harsh or sudden movements.

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Gnome
[B]Has anyone else experienced this with their manual P5:

Hold your accelerator at a set speed, then take your foot off. The car holds speed for a beat then lurches forward.

I'm not sure if this is the rubber banding that people have been talking about


It really seems to me this is "rubber banding" caused by the soft engine mounts. I think the engine just shifts around too much on the mounts when changes in throttle are made to it. Some people here on the forum have also complained about bucking if you input throttle quickly at low engine RPMs, which also seems like its caused by the engine bouncing around on the engine mounts. I'm sure Mazda made the decision to go with softies to keep the vibes down inside the cabin.

Yesterday I had my wife start the car while I watched the engine to see how it moved during starting. The bottom engine mount on the front of the car is the one that moved the most.

Both of my previous 2001 Civics, the first of which was a lemon (not a flame, it really was), had excellent vibration damping and absolutely no rubber banding from the engine mounts, it was rock solid, you could mash the throttle all day long at any RPM and it wouldn't make a fuss. But Im pretty sure the literature said it also had hydraulic or liquid filled engine mounts.

Does anybody know of anybody/ any company that could design and produce hydraulic or liquid filled mounts for our P5's. I heard of someone replacing their engine mounts with some harder ones which took care of the rubber banding, but the mounts were too hard which just sent big vibes into the cabin. I would imagine with some good engineering someone would be able to produce some better engine mounts with the best of both worlds (no vibes and no rubber banding).

What do you guys think?

 

I've never noticed anything like that on my car. Drives like just about every other manual transmissioned vehicle I've ever had (or driven). Actually pretty good given that it is an econobox.

 

The rubber banding doesnt really show up in normal driving if you are smooth with your throttle input. Even the slight "sticky throttle" sensation the first poster noted is really hardly noticeable to me.

Where it has really shown up for me is in rush hour traffic if you dont use the clutch at moderatly slow speeds, for example the transition between light on throttle and off throttle movements at around 10 mph in 1st gear. Compared to other sticks Ive had over the years, this one seems to be the hardest to drive smoothly in this situation.

It also shows up during performance driving. For example during quick off throttle if your coming into a corner, and then quick full throttle to pull out of a corner, you can tell there is a slight hesitation as the engine shifts in its mounts.

Dont get me wrong, this doesnt seem like it would be a huge issue to most especially since its not an issue if you have a smooth driving technique (at least it makes you improve your driving skills), but I do think this is a potential area of improvement the aftermarket could address.

Does any one know if the MP3 uses the same mounts?

 

It all equals normal operation in the eyes of my dealer. He put me in a new P5 to see if I had the same issue there, it was, but not to the same degree. The clutch was a hell of a lot smoother, though I've already put 13.5k on mine.

Either way, he attributes the roughness to the miles. Hate to see what it'll be like at 40k.