Gday Guys
I am new to this forum. I am glad i found this website....
I have a 2006 Mazda MPS 6 Speed Manual. Its a totally fantastic car which i bought early 2011.. I havent had one issue ever with the car until last week which i will explain below:
I first noticed when travelling at 70 - 100km that the car seemed to be running a bit rough. I thought nothing of it thinking that it might need a change of oil as it was due foe its next serivce shortly. All of a sudden a few days later, the car was making this loud grinding noise when the car revs were slowing down as i approached a corner or a traffic light. at this stage i know something was seriously wrong
i took it to my mechanic and he had a suspicion it was something to do with the driveline... He opened the transfer case sump plug and sadly found a large chunk of metal which he believed was one of the broken bits of teeth off one of the internal parts inside, and the lubricant was a very very dirty colour
i then took the car to a gearbox and diff specialist here in bayswater melbourne for a second opinion. After 8 hours of labour to pull the bloody transfer case and gearbox out ( Thanks Mazda by the way for such a fantastic accessible design which has cost me 8 hours in labour already ! ) they confirmed that a bearing in the transfer case had blown and the floating chunks of metal from the broken bearing in the transfer case would have most likely caused the chipped teeth off the other internal parts in the case... Luckily the gearbox was ok.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, its going to take another 8 hours to refurb the transfer case either by getting the parts off mazda which is just a rip off mind you !!! The transfer case in the Mazda 6 MPS is totally unique so you can only use Mazda parts in for the refurb. They cannot be sourced from any other car or from other companies that make similar parts etc...And i need a whole new set of bearings to go with the 3 broken parts, so the parts alone will cost me about $2k and then another 8 hours to put the parts back into the car once refurbed. Mazda Ringwood have told me that my car is the first one they have heard of that has a rooted transfer case which is just wonderful news for me !! So the job is going to cost me around $4k total !!!!!!! ARRRRHGH !!!!
What i need to know off you forumers is :
would it take roughly 8 hours to remove the transfer case as i am a bit suspicious that it would take this long?
Can i access a second hand transfer case in good condition and how much would it cost?
Can you access transfer cases in good condition from overseas?
Can you find parts for the transfer case other than buying new ones from Mazda?
Would it take 8 hours to refurb a transfer case if someone with skills in this area had all the parts needed?
Any other advice would be appreciated as its a tricky situation i am in
thanks for your help, and i hope no one else has this happen to their MPS as its been a bloody nightmare !
cheers