Are than any good 3 repair manuals out there other than the $130 or so dealer shop manual? I'd like to pick one up but preferable a more economical one. Thanks in advance. --Mike

 

I take i the answer is "no." What I really need to do is change my A/C cabin filter. Anyone know how?

 

I've used All Data for my Protege and it has good info. May not be as detailed as a shop manual, but it has the info I need and is continually updated.

Plus at $24.95 to start and $15.95 to renew yearly it's a lot less than a shop manual.

 

The A/C cabin filter is probably located where it is in any other car i've worked on.. behind the glovebox. Find out how to remove the glovebox (don't know if it's as easy as on the Protege to remove) and there should be a door, likely labeled, to access the cabin filter.

edit: found the info:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/in...3035803AA8C9Lm

 

I don't know if this is too late but I just recently changed the cabin air filter in my car. this will be a quick write up but I will do and official one with pictures soon if i can get around to it.

1. -- Remove the black plastic panel below the glove box by pulling it off...it just snaps into place.

2. on the white plastic fuse panel there are two wing nuts...loosen those and drop the box down. the nuts will not come off of the fuse panel as they are attached...do not try to remove them.

3.) disconnect the negative terminal on the battery and once that is completed begin removing the large connectors on the fuse panel. these are the large multicolored (green orange etc.) plugs that have wires attached to them. there are ~6 if i remember correctly.

4.) once all of the connectors are removed, remove the fuse panel from it's metal bracket by pushing backwards and pulling up. if you get under and look at it, it just slides into two slots on the metal rack.

5.) once the fuse panel has been removed, remove the long metal bracket that held it in place. there are two bolts that are holding it on. For me these were hard to remove as they were tightened by a gorilla in the Mazda factory. I had to carefully tap the wrench with a rubber mallet to loosen them.

5.) once the bracket has been removed on the far right inside of the passenger foot box, directly forwards of the center console is a small odd shaped white panel that is connected with ~4-5 screws. this is where your cabin air filter is. Remove this panel.

6.) the cabin air filter is composed of two parts. begin by removing the bottom portion of the cabin air filter by pulling on the small black plastic tab that is sticking out. once you remove this the top portion of the filter will fall down. if it does not be sure to remove it by reaching up and pulling the filter out. be sure to note the direction of the filters when you take them out if your filter did not come with directions. my filter was a factory replacement and had a crude picture of how the filter needed to be oriented.

7.) next install the new filter following the directions in the box or following the orientation in which the old filter was removed. you should start with the top portion of the filter first and then place the bottom in. The top portion of the filter will slide/snap into place holding it securely. once that is in you can put in the bottom portion to complete the installation.

8.) reassemble everything following the opposite steps listed above for numbers 5-1

 

I have purchased factory service manuals on eBay for both my non turbo 3 5 door and my MS3.

Both were about $10 with shipping. The 3 manual was html and easy to search through the index but the MS3 is a .pdf and hard to find stuff, but if I need them I got them.


and

 

You might want to check out this link I just ran across. It appears to have pretty extensive Mazda 3 service info:

http://www.mazdaclub.net/mz3ws/

 

This is a great resource. Thanks.

 

I found a nice link for changing the cabin filter and after an hour or more disconnecting the battery, removing the glove box and fuse panel, removing the heater box covers I FOUND NO CABIN AIR FILTER!!!!!!

Every time my wife too her 2006 3 5 door into the dealer they told her she needed a new one for only $173 with labor. The car never had one, there is no filter in there!!! On quizzing the service manager he says "Oh yeah some of the cars weren't equipped with one".

I doubt my Speed 3 has one either.

As far as manuals I found CD OEM manuals for both cars on eBay, less than $10 with shipping. You will never figure out how to change the filter with the factory manual BTW.

 

You can register on Autozone.com and they have a decent online repair manual.

 

Well, I can tell you not to buy a Haynes manual. They are pretty bad. I know from buying them.

Go to www.alldata.com look for the DIY section and buy their online manual.
For $30, a pretty good deal. Plus you can print anything you want out of it. Lasts for 1 year, and then you have to renew. Probably have bought 1/2 dozen from them, and they are better than Haynes, as they are manuals for USA models only.

 

If you do minor stuff with your car, you can probably get by with a haynes - though I agree with the last post that they do suck.
If you plan on doing any serious modifications / repairs, spend the $100-$150 or what you can find for a real factory manual, it's well worth the money, as it's something like 5" thick. I got one and it didn't come as a book, just 3-hole punched so I got some folders to put it in. But it is definitely well detailed, as is the electrical manual / schematics for the car.