Seriously thinking of buying mazda 5, but have some concerns the most important of which is seating. I have 3 kids 13,12, & 9 and am a little concerned re roominess and comfort. Love everything else about the car though.
Thanks for the advice Mike

 

Not sure about the 5 ... but I'll tell you that my 3 is certainly spacious enough ... and after a recent 7-hour road trip, I can confirm that the seats never got uncomfortable.

 

Your main problem will be with the rear fold down seats. That said though, I just had 5 Adults in mine two days ago and everyone was comfortable. The middle seats are on sliders so as long as they aren't slid all the way back there is enough space for middle and rear passengers.

My main complaint about the car so far is that the A/C seems very weak for a car this size. I haven't tried to take it to the dealer and see if there's a problem with it yet or not.

 

the A/C is a poorly designed system which is mostly the same between the 5 and the 3. most 3 owners complain about inadequate A/C. the problem is that the evaporator unit just doesn't get adequate air flow. there is nothing dealers can do for this, it is just a weak design. they did issue a TSB for 04-05 3's which adds a diffuser plate in front of the evaporator to help improve air flow, but that was already incorporated into the 06 models (and presumably the 5's as well). one DIY solution is to add a resistor in parallel to the thermistor at the evaporator. a resistor of about 35k ohms will "trick" the PCM into thinking the temp inside the evap unit is a few degrees warmer than it is, thereby directing the compressor to cycle on more frequently and bring the vent temps down a couple of degrees. this helped with my 2006 3. however, the big risk with this DIY mod is that the evaporator may freeze up, causing a block to the air flow until the ice melts. so to avoid this problem, i hooked the resistor up to a simple switch. i can turn it on for a few minutes to help cool down the cabin after being parked in the hot sun. then after about 10 minutes i can turn it off and just rely on the unmodified A/C to keep the car cool.

 

rear AC vents would be real nice as would more armrests, all of which are coming for 2008