Consumer Complaints
| Fail date | miles | occurences | Purchase date |
|---|---|---|---|
| UNKNOWN OR OTHER | |||
| 02/16/2013 | 24500 | ||
| The tire pressure monitoring sensor mounted in the rim failed and the tire lossed air pressure while traveling on an interstate highway until it was flat and the spare tire needed to be mounted. the flat tire was later taken to a tire service dealer who determined that the flat was caused by corrosion of the threaded aluminum stem on the tpms causing the plastic retaining nut to crack and fall off resulting in a leak around the rim and stem. the corrosion was so severe that the tpms could not be used, and a rubber valve stem inserted. the corrosion was not obvious as the owner of the vehicle routinely inflates the tires, the nut concealed the corrosion. corrosion this severe was not anticipated at 25k miles of driving, the tires were not yet worn to the point of requiring replacement. the design and application of the tpms used for this vehicle is dangerous as rapid deflation of the tire could have resulted, the outward appearance of the valve stem does not provide any indication of pending catastrophic failure, the exposure of the tire and valve stem to de-icing materials in the northeastern usa is a normal environmental exposure that would warrant significantly better corrosion protection than the oem tpms that is installed provides. a full recall and replacement of the tpms's installed in this make, model and year needs to be made. this type of failure has never been experienced by the owner when rubber valve stems were used in the past, it is unfortunate that a new safety device - tpms - presents a higher risk for catastrophic rapid deflation of a tire at highway speeds than would ever be expected. | |||
| 12/26/2012 | |||
| 12/26/12, tire pressure light came on, pulled off highway immediately, tire flat, nut holding pressure stem had disintegrated and stem went inside tire. 1/2/13, another tire went flat in parking area, neighbor came over to put air in tire, nut holding pressure stem had disintegrated and stem went inside tire. mazda dealership made repair and said the other two tire stem nuts would go in about two weeks. all four tire stem nuts were replaced. research on internet shows that this same problem has occured to many people owning different make/model/year vehicles. apparently a defective nut and stem system with one of three serial numbers were on all the vehicles experiencing this dangerous situation. i believe these nut and stem systems with these serial numbers should be recalled as soon as possible as to avoid anyone experiencing a dangerous blowout. a nut on the wheel should not be made of a material that disintegrates in less than 4 years even if it is in contact with road salt. this is very dangerous. the fact that two nuts disintegrated in 8 days and probability of next two in two weeks should raise red flags immediately. this should not happen to anyone! i am submitting this information for my daughter as she is still very upset over this having happened and having incurred great expense on her part. | |||
| 11/09/2012 | 36750 | ||
| Tpms valves badly corroded and leaking air, these need to be recalled and replaced by mazda due to thousands of complaints about this occuring under normal use and care. this is definitely a major safety issue because of possible blowouts at highway speeds. | |||
| 06/30/2011 | 15000 | ||
| Driving on the highway at highway speed, there was a sudden loss of air pressure in the right rear tire. the tpms warning came on. on inspection the tire valve was missing, it looked sheered off. took the car into a tire repair/replacement center and had a new tpms valve installed. i've since discovered that this is a very common failure in mazda 3's, and likely many mazda's. at the time, i contacted a mazda dealer who offered no explanation as to how a valve stem can sheer clean off while driving on a flat, clean highway. all they offered was a replacement part, not warranty, even though the car was under the basic warranty at the time. since then we've had another tire air valve sheer off on a second mazda 3 (2009) we have. we bought 2 - 2009 mazda 3's at the same time. the second mazda 3 had low tire pressure. on inspection, the valve cap was removed and the valve broke off. it broke was the cap was being removed. this is a verydangerous condition as these things can sheer off any time while the car is in motion, and you have a sudden loss of tire pressure at highway speed, which is extremely dangerous. we've now experienced 2 failures on 2 cars, and one failure occurred at highway speed that resulted in a very scary experience for a younger lady of college age. this is dangerous. mazda needs to properly address this problem and manufacture a proper valve that can be used in a very common use scenario, namely, driving during the winter months when salt is being used for safety reasons. that should not be used as an excuse as to why that part fails. here are at least a couple of websites where you can see this problem is common. http://www.arfc.org/complaints/2009/mazda/mazda3/tires/problem.aspx http://www.aboutautomobile.com/complaint/2009/mazda/mazda3/tire+pressure+monitoring+system | |||