Ok here it goes.....i have an '04 with 125, 500 miles and the engine was replaced at 92k under warranty for failing a compression test. I replaced the coils and spark plugs about 10k ago (without changing wires). I gutted out the honeycomb in the cat because it was clogged and from reading posts on here, it's fine to run it straight. Prior to changing the coils/plugs, it ran very rough and wouldn't go above 40 and would smoke real bad.

Well it ran beautifully for about a week, then i started noticing more issues. i changed the oil about 1000 miles ago and i've already gone through 2 more quarts of oil. My oil light comes on all the time, even after adding more oil. i have smoke coming from my exhaust that's slightly gray and the smell is worse than when i first gutted out the cat. i understand there's nothing to filter so the exhaust will smell strong, but it almost smells like a burning smell as apposed to carbon dioxide and gas. my engine coolant level comes on and off, but my container is at the fill line. there's a metallic noise that sounds like it's coming from around the engine when i turn on the A/C or when i'm at idle. It feels sluggish like it did before i got the new engine. my transmission also has been grinding shifting only into 4th gear. any advice would be tremendously helpful!

 

the metallic sound is almost like a vibrating noise*

 

First thing that comes to mind is to sell your car, this is just my opinion, it may just save you a headache in the future

But is the smell is like a rotten eggs/sulfur kind of smell?

Coolant lights, off the type of my head, is just the sensor, apparently they're just sensitive from last week when I searched.

Metallic noise can either be you didnt fully gut the cat, or could be your throwout bearing

The trans issues that's out of my reach cause I never had anything of that sort so I never looked it up before.

Either way good luck !

 

yea it has way too many miles on it to want to spend an extra 5 grand on it, if that were to be the price of everything. but yea it smells sulfury. would the engine mounts be an issue with the noise? i don't understand why it's burning so much oil though.... it's not leaking, i can only think it's coming from a mixture in the exhaust

 

The transmission grinding problem can be solved using redline transmission oil. Look it up.

 

Coolant light is a sensor, can be replaced but it will eventually fail again. Grinding tranny, might want to look into swapping out the fluid. Metallic sound is either your motor mounts have completely failed or your ssv needs cleaning. Pull the mounts and fill with poly if you are looking to save money and the ssv is a bitch to get to but it only cost you a can of carb cleaner. Burning bad smell and grey ish could mean you are burning a lot of oil. Might want to get that checked. OTHER THAN the oil issue your car does not sound like it has any major issue. If you want to fix things for free/cheap with the help of forums you need to put in the work/searching. Otherwise you're better off having some shop look at it.

 

ya a buddy of mine told me the same thing, looks like i have a weekend project ahead of me. thanks!

 

would the oil issue cause any effect on the power output though? it feels sluggish almost like it's misfiring, but the plugs and coils are fairly new, less than 10k miles, so i would hope that's not the problem. however, with the exhaust being catless, it's throwing all kinds of codes, i just haven't checked it with the computer out of laziness assuming the CEL is only on for the O2 sensor going nuts

 

Burning that much oil, with oil smoke out of the tail pipes, means you have a failed oil control ring. This is like due to housing warp from localized heat buildup, either from an unmentioned overheating or the clogged cat. Usually housing warp will also leak coolant into the engine.


I'd honestly recommend a compression test if you want to know the state of the engine, and I'd guess that you are going to fail that test.


Coils failing leads to clogged cat, clogged cat can warp a housing, warping a housing can lead to coolant and oil consumption problems. All for the want of $140 in coils.

 

before i gutted out the cat it was running terribly like the engine would overheat and i couldn't go more than about 55 mph. i let the issue drag for about 2 days before i gutted out the cat and changed the plugs/coils. this was at the end of January. i imagine i would fail another compression test. I just had a new engine put in about 30,000 miles ago b/c it failed a compression test; will mazda replace that engine too b/c it didn't reach the 100, 000 miles?

 

As long as you are still within the terms of the extended warranty (8 years or 100k miles), they will replace the engine as many times as needed, or until they can find a way to invalidate your warranty.

BC.

 

well my clutch went out.....i think there is a master slave issue. had the same problem in the past, so i'll be taking it to mazda to get a second opinion and to go ahead and do a compression check. hopefully there's engine failure and they yank it out again b/c the last dealer that swapped the engine left me with all kinds of issues. for example they left a spacing block somewhere near the housing and it burned up and dropped and made a bad clunk noise when it came out, but it went into traffic so i couldn't pick it up and take it back to Mazda. they denied it when i called them, go figure.

 

Here's your problem.

Never drive a car when it is over heating.

Let that be a lesson and hope the dealer replaces the engine.

I have never seen a car that hasn't cracked a block or failed after driving it when over heated.

Good Luck