This DIY is based on this thread discussion “Loose storage compartment door”
http://www.rx8club.com/showthread.php?t=40325
Although this fix does not address the side looseness of the lid it self, some members have reported a slanted release button. As for my self I only experienced a slanted release button at 8K miles. My guess is that the heat of the summer caused the stop tabs to become bent, thus making the bottom pop out of their housing. Luckily, the button assembly is made out of nylon so it does not break easily like ABS plastic.
Again, you can have the dealer fix this issue by replacing the lid under warranty. But for my self, I rather go there for major work or repairs. So far after 4K miles the button has not giving me problems.

Here are the steps:

1- Slide and open the center console.

2-Press the highlighted button of the second picture and slide forward the lid.

3-Once the lid is out, proceed to unscrew the seven small screws by using a Phillips screw driver. Note that there are five black screws in which are machine screws. The other two silver screws are regular screws.

4- Remove the lid and the button assembly should fall by it self

5- Carefully, spread the side tabs and push forward the little arm. Once done that the button should pop out. Do not loose the two small springs.

6- At this point you will notice that one of the stoppers is bent inwards. So, with a hair dryer or heat gun, heat the button and spread the tabs out until straight. Be careful with the hair dryer/heat gun TEMPERATURE!

7-Once done let the button to cool and reassemble by using the reverse procedures

Very cool little DIY, Romulus! Well done! :D

thanks so much it was getting really annoying looking at it :D

Very Kind of you sir!

Thank you!!!

Hey i have this same problem and now i can fix it,

thanks very helpful!:)

No problem :) Right now I have 16K miles on my car and so far no problem with the button. One thing I forgot to mention, when you guys open the lid (hard plastic cover) make sure not to loose the litte rubber bumper located near the button assembly. This little bumper might fall off when you remove the button. See picture. Let me know if you have any questions.
cheers!

thanks romulus i have 4k on mine and that button was getting anoying
thanks again this worked like a charm

cool! glad to help :)

Had just bought the car last month, noticed the slanted button yesterday...you can imagine how upsetting it can be to feel as though your new car is already falling apart. First time using this DIY portion of the forum, worked perfectly! Didn't have a glue gun though...just heated it a little on the stove, hahaha. Thanks Romulus.

Glad to see that my DYI still in use since it was posted almost a year ago :) Just for update. I have 24K miles on my car and so far no problem :D

woot! I have 9300 miles on my car - the button has been jacked up since about mile 8500. :)

I'll hope to try this DIY this weekend! :D

great DIY. took me about 5 minutes and my button is fixed. hopefully for good. thanks!!

I took mine to the dealer and they are ordering me a new lid.

It hasn't come yet 2 weeks. but that should fix it. Cool DIY

Bill

Sweet, I'll be doing mine soon.

wouldnt it be easier to just take it to the dealership??

Take it to the dealer and they replace it but then 7-8 thousand miles later its right back to slanted... I'm speaking from experience.

I wonder if I could melt the tabs out and reinforce them with metal somehow to prevent them from EVER moving again...

thanks for the write up

A year and a half later and you've helped fix another slanted button. I actually didn't know it wasn't supposed to be slanted till I found this DIY....????

Took all of ten minutes from taking the lid off to putting it back on with the new, straight button.

If you're still around, thanks man!

Licid,
You are welcome! :) Yes, I am still around. Just not as active as before because I have been busy most of the time.
Since my last update (24k miles), I want to let everyone know that so far so good. Now my car has 38K miles.

Wow I brought this up to the service department at my dealership and the dude actually told me it was normal and that they were all like that ????? I could have sworn it was not like that before, but he assured me.

smh

=\

Ah hell, I'm going to give this a try tonight, I HATE dealerships sometimes.

EDIT

Wow that seriously took 5 minutes to fix. Could it be that Mr. Mazda Service Mgr. really thought this was normal due to the high number of 8's that its apparently a problem on ? Or could it be that he really did not want to have somebody spend 5 minutes fixing ?

:Eyecrazy:

Thanks so much man, its the little things that count. Boy was that one litte thing getting on my nerves. :mdrmed:

Awesome.

Thanks for this DIY. It was such an easy fix and it looks much better now. Hooray!

Good write up, I'll try it again if my new replacement lid installed yesterday takes a crap on me again. My first one actually had the legs on the back of the button break off. Luckily the dealer had a lip in stock and they are actually redesigning the whole center console to be tougher so I will go in for the new entire center console when parts are available.

Is this to fix the consoles problem of sliding closed when breaking hard. Or is my problem a completely different one. Does anyone else have this problem of the center console sliding closed very easily and loosely when just braking sometimes. It is really starting to bug me

Mine slams forward all the time as well. Course the little "height" tab that slides the cover on the left side of mine is broken and the button is now popped up in front. Figured they were all releated but maybe not.

Any idea how far into the warranty the dealer will fix this? I've got about 7 months and 14000 miles on it. What are my chances?

Just did this "FIX". Like new. -Props to the OP.

me too.Just fixed this with your help. Thanx. Great write-up

worked great thank you

Thanks to the OP for a clear How To.

Wow! After three and half years since I posted the fix, I am glad that people are still reffering it to fix the button! I am not sure if this issue has been solved in the later models. I really miss my Rex since I traded in with a current Mazda 3 two years ago because I have to do even longer commute. When I traded my Rex, it had 40K miles and the button did not pop on me after the first fix.
Funny thing is that my Mz 3 has already 73K miles on my in almost 3 years :banghead: But is still running strong :)

Fantastic fix for something I had just planned on living with, thanks Rom.

mine fix worked for a day.... should i bend the tips out little bit more? im afriad its gonna snap

Just got a used 04 button was slanted found this forum now all straight, awesome diy

mine fix worked for a day.... should i bend the tips out little bit more? im afriad its gonna snap
I believe that you did not applied enought heat on the tabs. Try a bit longer and make sure that the tabs are 90 degrees. Perhaps a bit more should be ok.

Rom, I could kiss you! This has been driving me INSANE for months now, but I never brought it up to the dealer because I didn't want to deal with it. I just popped the lid off, pulled the button out and fired up the old 70s hairdryer. Done! We'll see how it holds up in the summer heat, but it's so darn easy to fix that if I had to do it every 4 months I wouldn't even care. Awesome DIY.

i remember this DIY
haven't had a problem for 4 years now :)

I am glad to see that :)
I started to believe that during the molding process of the buttons when pulling out from the mold the buttons still "hot" as it cools down the tabs tends to bend inwards. Of course if they put the buttons in a jig while it cools down is an added expense. Probably the supplier knew that but they let it go since it stayed withing tolerances. Of course they did not anticipated that with the heat of summer and the springs pushing the button upward made the tabs to release the housing.

This is great! Now, someone just needs to figure out a way to fix the looseness of the lid overall. (Side to side, forward and back.)

Butters, if your lid is like mine, then some of the plastic tabs that go in the "tracks" have probably broken off. Unfortunately, I am at work so I can't go snap pictures at the moment, but if you take the lid off, you can see the tabs I mean. They actually should have little plastic pieces on them as well, which are there to keep the lid from sliding left to ride and provide a little bit of resistance for the front to back. Unfortunately, I think that all 4 of my tabs have broken off a bit, and the little plastic "resistors" fell off with them. The tabs are still there, but the corners are all gone, so instead of being about 3/4" long, they're close to 1/4".

I'll try to get some pictures up over the weekend to explain what I mean. I am not sure if this is a warranty fix or not, I will have to check the next time I take my car in.

Interesting, I'll have to check that. If you could snap some photos that would be awesome.

Sorry for the delay, the drive to Chicago yesterday was murderous. And sorry for the crappy Blackberry pictures, it's the best I could get.

http://www.rx8club.com/picture.php?albumid=1143&pictureid=9222

You can see here, where I've circled, that the tab has broken off on the corners. The arrow also points to one of the plastic "resistor" pieces I mentioned. What you can't see is that the tab that is broken also used to have one of those "resistors" on it as well.

http://www.rx8club.com/picture.php?albumid=1143&pictureid=9223

This blurry picture shows the "resistor" from that tab - you can see where there is plastic stuck in there from the corners of the tab that broke off.

I am going to try to either get the dealer to replace these pieces under warranty or at the very least get me some information on them so I can order new ones, because if I can get that fixed, I expect it will make that console lid operate more smoothly. Hope this helps.

NO IDEA WHY IT WON'T EMBED MY PICTURES

YeahYeahYouWere, I pulled my lid off and saw that all my "resistor" pieces were in place and not broken. The "retainer tabs" that are broken on yours are just fine on mine. Here's what I've discovered: The tabs only prevent you from lifting the arm rest up when the lid is extended; they have nothing to do with the sliding forward/backward motion or the side-to-side looseness.

In order to fix the problem where under hard breaking or acceleration the lid slams shut or scoots back, you need to increase the amount the resistor fins stick out. I think maybe over time, the resistors lose their springiness so that they are unable to provide the necessary pressure against the rail that the lid slides into.

What I've done so far is to fold up a couple of really tiny pieces of paper towel napkin and stuff them in the resistors so that the springy fin part sticks out more. I did this to all four resistors. Admittedly this is really ghetto, but now the lid will not move unless I apply deliberate effort to move it. However, this does not solve the side-to-side looseness, though it may have lessened it. To fix this, you'd have to increase the distance the fins of the resistors stick out so that they'd touch the sides of the rails when you slide the lid off the back lid. But you can't really do that because then the resistors would have too much resistance on the back lid rails. I hope this makes sense.

I'm thinking that you could probably glue some extremely thin weather stripping or something equivalent into the rails (in the cup-holder) so that the resistors will contact them, thereby getting rid of the side-to-side play.

I'll try to post up a video explaining what I'm talking about. In the meantime, you'll have to decipher my ramblings.

I should probably make my own thread about this. DIY: Fixing loose center console lid. (Or something....)

Butters, that makes sense. Unfortunately, since I don't know exactly when those tabs broke on mine, I can't really tell exactly what difference it makes to not have them. I know that as it stands now, I can flip my cover up along the side without having the slide it back, and I KNOW that isn't right.

As for increasing the "resistance", your paper towel jamming idea is pretty much right along with what I was considering. I was thinking to maybe use silicone to fill that gap, but I don't really know how you'd actually get the little fins to stay bowed out while it set. If I had some silicone fuel tubing leftover from my nitro R/C car, I could use little pieces of that too, but alas, I don't have any. Of course, I need to actually get the tabs fixed and resistors back in place before I worry about much else.

Be sure to keep us posted if you can figure out how to get rid of that side to side!

fix works great, whats frustrating is if u leave ur car in the sun and the interior heats up. its like a counter fix. the heat makes them bend back in.

^^^^ So true. Mine did that in the sun.

yea. so maybe we can like wrap it in some insulation or something, lol. or ill just wait till it cools down before fixing it again

Just want to chime in

This was a great DIY, I bought my car this week and it was almost the first thing I noticed and bothered me to no end. Did this and bam! It was fixed and looks much better.

Thanks!

After attempts to fix, ive had to replace mine for the past two summers. The first came with the car popped off and springs go flying. Same with the second, Im on the third now.
using a cloth to cover voodoo shiftknob and this button helps heaps!

I used this fix it worked for a few months the it just broke. the little hinges split in half owell It a cheap part and i just got a whole new center console

figured that i would mention that this worked great for me. no more slanted button. i just used a hair dryer as mentioned and it made the plastic bendable. i just held the little "clips" out a bit for a couple minutes until the plastic had cooled to help keep its shape. such a relief to not have to purchase a whole new cover just to fix this problem!

This is an awesome diy! I've had this car for just over a month (it's an '04) and the first time my wife rode in the car she noticed that button and said "what's wrong with that, it looks worn out?" I found this write up just after finding the forum and figured I'd tackle it whenever I was bored out of my mind. That was today.
The funniest thing was that I didn't even know that the lid opened after sliding it back! So needless to say, I feel like I got alot accomplished today!
Not only did I get the button fixed in like 5 minutes, I also have a new storage compartment and another power outlet! LOL

I finally did this yesterday, after 1-1/2 years of it being slanted lol. DIY worked perfect, thank you!

^fail

awesome DIY, just did, and works a charm, thanks!!

Can't believe I didn't run across this DIY before. Been looking at that ugly tilted button for years and in about 5 minutes it is fixed!!!


Great DIY!!!! Thanks!!!

Excellent DIY very simple. The slanted button was doing my head in!

someone apparently already tried to do this DIY on my center console because for one the two springs that are supposed to re-engage the latch were MIA as were 3 out of the 5 fine thread screws. Im going to see if i cant find 3 more screws to go in to keep it solid, as for the springs i used a PILOT pen spring, cut it in half and it worked well when i dry fit it. Just have to fix the slanted parts and see how it works all together.
I was quite sick of it sliding back every time i accelerate...

This would have worked on mine, but where the guide pin goes, it was broke, no way to fix (stress point, would of kept snaping off) so i just ordered a new one from the dealer.
part number just for the button so you dont order the whole center console lid is F151-55-28XA-02 it was $11.25

Well actually, when i popped my screws out of my button, one of the guids on mine were broke too. Fell right out into my hand, i decided to give it a shot with some Super Glue since i had it laying around. Im going to install it today and see if it works good. Good to know its only 11 bucks though.

Well actually, when i popped my screws out of my button, one of the guids on mine were broke too. Fell right out into my hand, i decided to give it a shot with some Super Glue since i had it laying around. Im going to install it today and see if it works good. Good to know its only 11 bucks though.

yeah, it will hold but only for a few uses and pop like mine did. got mine from Montgomery and had it with in 4days.

yeah, it will hold but only for a few uses and pop like mine did. got mine from Montgomery and had it with in 4days.



lol, good call buddy. I think mine is slipping already. We will see how it holds though. good to know its a cheap fix.

This worked excellent or me! Thanks for this DIY that's been bugging me since i bought my car.

Ya, right now I just removed the top part of the button, so its just the latch. Then i just use my finger to pop it up when i want to slide it back, mine was to the point of no return, ill buy a new button eventually lol

Another slanted button fixed here! Except all I did was take the whole button fixture out, and take a flat screwdriver and bend out the side tab that was slipping by. Has been working for weeks with no slantyness! Thanks for the DIY

Dammit. I was going to make it DIY for this right now haha.