anyone drive a Protege 5?
 

was curious if anyone here drives a mazda protege 5 and or what there thoughts on the car is.

go check out the local protege forums..
I'm on there, as well as many others from RS.

www.bcprotege.net

my gf used to drive one....put 95K km on it. Great commuter.

I think it's piece of shit for no reason. I prefer civic

I have a 2003 protege 5 and I bought it brand new and not one problem *knock on wood* and I do drive it hard. I have the triptronic transmission but haven't had one bad shift even though I should have gone with the 5 speed. It has been way more reliable than my lexus rx 330. It is good on gas and good as a daily commuter. It does have pretty good handling with the strut bar so there is not much body roll. I had looked into buying the civic, matrix, corolla, and protege 5 when I was looking for a good 4 cylinder and the protege 5 just drove way better than all the others and was a lot more sportier. It only has 130hp and I wish it did have more but it is still peppy for 130hp. One common problem was the egr valve clogging up and causing the car to have a rough idle and could cause it to stall. There was a tsb on the egr valve with a new design but I just opened mine up for the hell of it as I love making sure my cars are in perfect condition and mine was clean inside. mazda247.com is a good website to check out for all info on the protege 5.

I've driven my best friend's brother's P5 a few times. It's not bad of a machine. Not quick by any definition but if you throw on some stickier tires then it will handle pretty well. Not as well as many of my other cars, but for a stock family hatchback, it's decent. He's had a couple issues with the 5 speed transmission and bad syncro's but I have a feeling it's more to do with the way he drives than any mechanical defect. Other than that, he's had very little problems with it.

Good commuter car that barely gets any attention from girls / cops (which is good and bad) and can occasionally be driven hard. Low maintenance other than the usual ones.

fast but not that fast
slow but not too slow
nimble but not that nimble
average joe kind of car that dont get noticed...except by other P5 drivers...lol me

jack of all trades, master of none (well maybe the master of not getting cops attention, but thats really up to the driver and how fast the car next to you looks)

2003 / Bought new / tiptronic (avoid it like you avoid standing in line in a grocery store with the person infront of you having 300 items to check out...in other words: slow - patience required) / ~120k km / slightly above average driving style

My parents have a P5, and I used to drive it quite a bit. My parents have 160K on their 02.

When it came out, it seemed like the best choice in the segment. The base civic/corolla were too plain, the Sentra SE-R was about the same price, but the quality didn't seem to be as good.

It's a great handling car, practical (Hatchback!), and has relatively nice interior. The stock bodykit looks okay, even though the gaps between panels seem a bit large. The transmission has longish throws, but it's reasonably smooth. The engine should be bulletproof...it's a destroked version of the B2200 engine I believe.

My two biggest grips are refinement. Driving at freeway speeds (100km+), it's a lot louder than a corolla. Not a problem if you live in Vancouver, but if you commute on Hwy 1 everyday, you might want to consider this. The other thing is that the engine is quite buzzy. You can feel the vibration coming through the shifter, and it gets really buzzy near deadline.

Anyways, those issues are minor; it's a good car, and the price now is quite attractive.

That really doesn't say much. :D

I almost bought one last year as a daily driver. They're pretty decent cars. The exterior and interior are showing their age, but I'd say quality and reliability are above average.

I love my sedan. They are fairly fuel effecient, yet still sporty enough. It is fast enough for me. As much as I want a faster car, I don't really need one at this point in time. Only get me into more trouble :P
They are really good for younger guys for that very reason. Also, easy to work on yourself, and TONS of modifications for them, a lot of which are fairly cheap. Good starter mod car, especially for the price of them now.

I drive one, and I love it:)

it's not a fast car... but it handles very well IMO

you CAN get some attention...if you mod it..(aka rice it out) lol

here's a pic of my p5:

http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/8447/jan09.jpg
(taken from a iphone..sry for the bad quality)

Nice.. I like it.

Dude that's a super nice P5

Looks good! fucking amazingly sleek.

I'm selling mine:

http://www.revscene.net/forums/fs-ft-2002-t567356.html

http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d7...P1030054_1.jpg

It's been a great car, just want something different now.

Had one for a while, it's my sister's now... meh, it gets the job done. No real problems with the car since it was new other than having to change the accessories and PS belt a few times. For some reason, they keep breaking.

My parents had a 2003, I drove it for awhile when I worked in Langley and now it's my sisters. Good car for the money. I replaced both front sway bar endlinks because they went noisy (they make a super annoying clicking/knocking) but that's it. The engine oil and ATF were changed constantly (got it free from work!) so I'm sure it will keep going and going and going and going. I'm a Honda guy too! Timing belt and water pump time is coming up though..

I totally digg the rims... what are they?

They look to be Rota GT3 - 16X7 and +40 I bet. LOL

:clap:

you are the wiener! heh