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2004 owners: Be aware of a new LCA recall BEFORE going on a track
As of June 1st 2017 there is a new recall for 2004 cars to replace the lower control arm.
The ball joint is known to come apart under severe load.
This is exactly what happened to me recently on my 2004... Had to get a tow, but was lucky there was no other damage aside from scraping the inside of my wheel a bit.
There was originally a recall back in 2005 and that had been done on my car. Doing some analysis, looks like the side that failed was still the original (-1) version of the control arm, but was not part of the batch of serial numbers marked as faulty in 2005. The other side on my car looks to be the 2nd version (-2). I just replaced both, and received version 3 of the arms (-3 is cast into the arm). [NOTE that I have made some assumptions in my analysis and have not confirmed any of this with Mazda]
I would suggest anyone planning on taking a 2004 on track check the number cast into their lower control arms. If it is a '-1', I would hold off taking it on track and get it checked out.
(note the recent fuel pipe recall, and the airbags as well)
Pics of my failure:
Ball joint separated from control arm
Failed arm, showing -1 marking and batch number
Arm removed from other side of the car, showing -2, and new oem arm, showing -3. I assume both of these would be OK, but would be suspicious of any -1 arm...
Thanks for the heads up. Glad it wasn't anything catastrophic.
I'll have to check mine next time I'm under the car and see what version they are. The recall is only for 2004's but it wouldn't be the first time they increased the scope of a recall to include later models.
Hoping to have mine done, however haven't gotten any notice of the recall yet. So going into the dealership to see if I can pull some springs. Spent the weekend at Gingerman for 3 days of Grid Life Time Attack and no incident. Supposed to hit up Autobahn Country Club (Full) this Monday. Just going to visually inspect them while bleeding brakes later this week.
Hoping to have mine done, however haven't gotten any notice of the recall yet. So going into the dealership to see if I can pull some springs. Spent the weekend at Gingerman for 3 days of Grid Life Time Attack and no incident. Supposed to hit up Autobahn Country Club (Full) this Monday. Just going to visually inspect them while bleeding brakes later this week.
I don't think Mazda have started to send letters out yet.
If you have a bunch of track time on your car, and did not change anything in terms of suspension or tires, they are probably OK since you tested them already :-D Still worth checking to see if you have the -1 version or later though.
Sounds like we're still a month out from the dealers even hearing about it. If it's like a lot of the other recalls, I would actually be surprised if they had the parts by Jul 31st. It doesn't sound like it's a brand new part, but I'd be surprised if they had even a couple hundred sets of them in North America at the moment. Never mind 33,000.
I don't think Mazda have started to send letters out yet.
If you have a bunch of track time on your car, and did not change anything in terms of suspension or tires, they are probably OK since you tested them already :-D Still worth checking to see if you have the -1 version or later though.
According to the recall notice, my car is definitely in the first production run. So I'm positive it does have those lower control arms we have been speaking of. I have only attended 2 full 3 day weekends on the car. So it's probably best I check the condition of the ball joints.
So it's probably best I check the condition of the ball joints.
Just to be clear, you won't see any wear, play or other symptom for this particular failure. The only thing I think you can do is check to see if you have the "-1" stamped into the arm, in which case I would be suspicious of them.
Of course, you should regularly check the ball joints for wear/play on a track car anyway.
So does using stiffer shocks/springs increase the peak load on this ball join, compared to stock? I feel like stiffer means less weight transfer onto a single wheel, therefore less peak force at the ball join?
Because uh. I have a race next week on a new, stiffer suspension and my car falls in the recall period. Haven't checked for -1s yet.
Maybe it should just be a reminder to carefully inspect your car before any track session, which I suspect many of the street/track guys might be a bit lax about, because it seems like that might have been showing itself for a while rather than just a catastrophic failure from nowhere.
If you're cornering at higher speed/G load the forces on the suspension joints will increase quite a bit
This one did look like a catastrophic failure to me. There was no play in the ball joints that I could tell before it failed.
I am sure stiffer suspension and stickier tires will increase the load and therefore chance of failure. As will hitting aggressive curbs. I did two days on stock suspension with all seasons, one day in the wet with coilovers and then it failed on my 2nd day in the dry with coilovers + 100TW tires.
Interestingly I just checked my VIN and it does not fall into the mentioned range... although my last 6 digits are a match, my middle 3 are 140 vs 540 on the recall report.
Getting the lower control arm recall done at the moment. Quite frustrating....as it's been 3 days. Hopefully to be completed by tomorrow. The Mazda techs had a difficult time with my racing beat sway bar and end links. They had to order new oem end links(on their dime)...which is taking at least another day.
Getting the lower control arm recall done at the moment. Quite frustrating....as it's been 3 days. Hopefully to be completed by tomorrow. The Mazda techs had a difficult time with my racing beat sway bar and end links. They had to order new oem end links(on their dime)...which is taking at least another day.
Just FYI - Mazda includes an alignment after completing this recall
Getting the lower control arm recall done at the moment. Quite frustrating....as it's been 3 days. Hopefully to be completed by tomorrow. The Mazda techs had a difficult time with my racing beat sway bar and end links. They had to order new oem end links(on their dime)...which is taking at least another day.
Considering the Racing Beat links are a different diameter than the stock ones....what are their plans for the sway bar end diameter miss match?
They have several different versions now; thicker with larger studs (unnecessary waste of money), OE size, and adjustable OE size. Not sure what the situation is now, but I got one of the first pair of adjustable quite a few years ago and then sent them right back because the center adjuster wasn’t a LH/RH thread turnbuckle style. It had the same std thread both sides. They also seemed rather low grade compared to the adjustable Powerlink endlinks I have now.
