Faults:

Brought the car back to the dealer several times for a stubborn engine light issue that started at 60k, then again at 70k, and then again at 80k. After numerous trips, finally they got a memo from Mazda Japan about some throttle body work, which was fixed under warranty to fix a very weird diagnostic code. The engine light hasn't come on since.

Burnt out headlight replaced at 80K under warranty.

Brakes and rotors seem to be weak; although the wife commutes on the highway every day to work, it seems this car needs front pads and rotors every 40k! Is this normal? Just did a complete brake job at 80k, and at 90k there is a creaking noise from the rear brakes; a slight irritant at the moment.

My car suffers from that irritating squealing noise when the car is in Drive and the brake is applied. This unfortunately is a common problem stemming from a poorly designed exhaust connector, and many people comment you can't get rid of the noise permanently. You can't hear the noise driving about with the windows up, but when you stop at a drive through and roll down the window, the squealing reverberates off the walls and into the interior. It's so bad that you have to put the car in neutral just so you can be heard as you try to order a coffee at Tim Horton's! I'm really torn on this issue; the car looks great, but sounds like it has a loose belt when idling in Drive!

General Comments:

I was fed up with my Mazdaspeed 3 and I had an eye on the Mazda 6 for a while. I knew the brand new 2014 Mazda 6 was arriving, and so I took advantage of the dealer's desperation to get rid of their slow selling 2013 Mazda 6s. First off I love the car; it's big, quiet, stylish, comfortable and very fuel efficient. Even with its sloping roofline, interior space is huge and there is tons of back seat room. The trunk is massive and there are no "goose necks" that eat up precious cargo space. For reference I can fit 4 tires on 17" rims in the trunk without any drama.

The strong 2.5L I4 is exceptionally smooth and quiet, and it is mated to a flawless 5 speed automatic returning a combined 26 MPG.

Mazda's Bluetooth technology is near flawless; I turn on the car, my iPhone automatically pairs to the car and my music/podcasts start to play through the car speakers without me having to do anything (there is a 3 second audio delay). Sometimes the car will only play audio and not recognize the mobile phone functions; this can fixed by reconnecting the Bluetooth connection on the iPhone. I haven't bothered to teach the car to recognize my voice for the voice activation system; seems like an tiresome gimmick. The base sound system has very poor audio quality.

The interior is very well laid out with lots of cup holders, a big glove box and a big storage bin under the centre arm rest. There is lots of space under and around the front seats, so the car is easy to clean.

Automatic lights, wipers and climate control work perfectly!

Although the car says "Zoom Zoom" on start up, thankfully the car is very soft and supple; an excellent highway cruiser.

Looking forward to driving this car for the next 15 years!