For practicality purposes, and for financial reasons, I traded the old girl in. I know "financial" and "trade in" shouldn't belong in the same sentence, but believe me, long-term I made out better. Leasing is stupid; don't ever do it. Anyway, I did at least stay in the family:






It's an 09 GT... they had two Sport models on the lot in black, but the leather seats and 6-disc changer sold me on the GT (I spent time in both and that's what I preferred). The Bose in the Speed3 sounds leaps and bounds better than the Bose in the 6 ever did, but it's still a little weak in the midrange. But, it's not so bad that I feel I need to replace it right away. That will likely be a fall project.

She handles right damn well, not as tossable as the 8, but she can still be tossed right hard. The 8 is the king of handling; I'd call the Speed 3 a young prince. For what I'm losing in handling, I'm gaining in fuel economy, interior space, and seating comfort. The RX8 (or its successor) really needs telescoping steering. I had the car 2 years and could never ever get a comfortable seating position because of the steering wheel. My arms and legs are really long, so not being able to bring the wheel out was awkward at best. My choices were moving the seat forward and cramping my legs, or moving the seat back and not being able to relax my left arm while driving.

I'll still be here on the forums. This is a great community, and I don't even plan to join a Speed3 board. The personalities here are top notch, and we are allowed to actually speak our minds as long as we remain civil. And hell, who would willingly give up Alfy's MS Paint exhibits, MazdaManiac's daily avatars, and Leesha's... well... Leesha's everything.

I've got to get back to homework, but I just want to say that I will miss her forever. I gave her a nice long hug before driving away forever. I hope the next owner gets a good deal and enjoys her even more than I did.

 

Welcome to the world of torque again....at least ur stayin in the family I like the speed3's powerplant(other than FWD) just not a fan of the wagon look....great cars though I know you'll enjoy it!

 

Very nice. How much did you pay for it? My friend is looking at 09 MS3s. He has a 2003 VW GTI 20th that is starting to cost money due to the 6 year VW fall-apart curse.

 

Nice choice, I considered getting an MS3 instead of my 8 but I just couldn't stomach FWD. The speed 3 is very practical while still being fun, and it's kind of a sleeper What does torque feel like?

 

^it's this amazing feeling that when u accellerate hard the turbo spools up and presses u back against ur seat and can't sit up! it's great!!! haha

 

This.

I was ******* around early this morning on mostly-empty roads (still staying in the speed limit, but getting there as quickly as I could ). I hit the the turbo just right one time, and my gawd, my teeth went into the back of my brain. I started laughing hysterically.

The power isn't there right away from a dead stop, which is good or bad, depending on your perspective. When you want to drive normal and accelerate slow, like in city traffic, it feels like a regular 4-banger. So I have leeway to keep my foot out of it and get decent gas mileage and not make a fool out of myself in a 25MPH zone. But people who want instant gratification all the time will have to clutch dump (not much though) from a dead stop. Now, when the car's in motion, all bets are off, and you can tap into that power whenever the hell you want.

The RX8 was like driving on rails or something. Like the damn light cycles in TRON. You pointed that thing where you wanted it to go, and that's where it went. I hated giving that up, but this really ain't bad at all.

 

Mazda is offering 1000 rebate on it through the end of the month, but you can do better tell your friend to go prepared, and get a Consumer Reports bottom-line report, and use TrueCar to get an idea. Know his bank's interest rates for new cars before he goes in (the scum actually tried to hit me with a 2% higher rate than my credit union offers. I called them on their bullshit and it magically went down). The more info you take to a dealer, the less they will be able to **** you. I had to take a little up the *** because I was going in upside down, and you lose some leverage when you do. But I knew that was coming, and fought with the scumbags over the stuff I could negotiate.

If your friend is getting rid of the GTI and doesn't want to bother with private sale, have him get an appraisal from Carmax, and then get the dealer to appraise it afterwards. Once the dealer tries to lowball him, show him the Carmax report (Carmax will probably always offer more than a dealership, sometimes by thousands). If he won't match it, sell it to Carmax, use the money for a down payment.

I'll just say that car buying is always painful. but the more it hurts, the better your deal will be. A painless car buying transaction usually means you got screwed.

 

That thing was the best grocery getter I ever drove. It was on borrow while I was doing MSP16. You just gotta take those rear seat headrests out though to get any visibility.

 

Thanks for the tips.

I would think that one could get the MS3 under invoice before the rebate. One dealer around here had like 10 of them still.

 

welcome to the land of power & fuel economy.

 

Great car.
Isn't the Mazdaspeed3 dubbed as the best handling FWD car ever?
You sound like you're a tad modest on the handling part.
Sure it's not the same "feel" as the RX-8, but the "grip" should be almost on par with the right set of summer tires I would imagine.
Congratulations on a fine vehicle.

 

but you will only get the good gas mileage in it if you can stay out of boost alot...but if it was me I'd be in boost as much as possible and my gas mileage would suffer but it sure would b fun...no just get a boost controler and crank up the boost then you will love that "teeth into your brain feeling" even better

 

MS3 is on my list of cars to replace my dodge commuter when the time comes.

 

I parked next to a red ms3 the other day and tbh i was impressed they acctually are pretty HAWT

(ps. my 100th post finally )

 

It does handle REALLY well, especially for FWD, but all that power overwhelms the fronts pretty fast. Basically, expect to be wrestling the torque steer any time you want to punch out of a low speed turn and if you ever get into the throttle even a tiny bit too hard, you're understeering. That's the big problem with packing in all that power, otherwise it's surprisingly civilized. I've driven friends all over the place in it and every time I put my foot down, they're amazed by the power it puts out. It's smooth, (relatively) quiet, and comfortable until you ask it to show its teeth.

KVN - welcome, brother! I think you'll enjoy the car, but I definitely miss the 8 since I'm a BIG time handling guy. I will say it's super intoxicating to put your foot down in 2nd or 3rd and hang on once the turbo hits - chews up tires though. That's definitely what sold me on the car - I was totally drunk on power after that test drive. Let me know if you have any questions about it, you can also check mazda3forums.com (club is pretty dead).

When you get a chance try removing the shifter counterweight, it does an amazing job of getting rid of the rubbery feel to the shifting. It definitely feels a lot closer to the feeling of the 8's shifter.

 

okay this might sound noobish, but w/e.. does the MazdaSpeed 3 only come with a M/T?

 

Yeah, only a normal clutch and H-gated shifter - none of those fancy flappy paddles or slushboxes.

 

its a fun car to drive thats for sure! i drive my friends, but i can't do the fwd after the 8 it just doesn't feel the same! but its defintely a great car to drive! nice that you stayed in the family!

 

I've only hit noticeable torque steer once, but I keep it in the front of my mind. I saw one in White Pearl coat the other day and got jealous. That's a pretty damn color! But I gotta remember that I'm lazy and would have never kept it clean. And the rear headrests came out before I even left the dealer lot.

I was going to wait for the new Golf TDI, but the demand for those is going to be ridiculously high, which will make availability and price flexibility worse than I care for. And VW isn't offering leather seats as an option on those, only the GTI.

It does handle very very well! I have a list of curves in the city memorized, that I always enjoyed conquering with the 8, and took time this weekend to hit some of them. I'm satisfied so far!

 

that's good to hear. if i didnt have my 8 i wouldn't mind having a ms3 plus i've met some local MOCC(mazda owners of california club) and other ms3 people and they seem to be a very good people. almost reminds me of the rx8club fam. but nice! +1 for a nice ride! personally true red and clear water pearl are the best colors for the ms3. too bad true red are a dime a dozen for ms3's

btw the ms3 has one of the best stock exhaust notes. it sounds wonderful stock. now you need to upgrade that rear motor mount and you're set.

 

kvndoom, do you plan on driving the MS3 in the winter?
I've been thinking about picking up a MS3 as a daily driver, once the new style floods the market, that way the 1st gen price should go down.
But even with snow tires, I just don't know if it can handle the Wisconsin weather.

 

Winter? Virginia has winter?

I wish I could answer that for you, but Hampton Roads maybe sees 3 inches of snow a year. At least that what it seems like. Maybe check some MS3 boards and see what other owners have to say about it. And yeah, I'll be driving it year round. I see very few used ones on dealer lots, but that may change when the 2010's hit. Although I like the first-gen looks a lot better, personally.

nikkdizzle, I do love the note. When I left the dealership I had the windows down, and didn't realize that sweet hum was ME! I kept looking around to see who had it, and finally it hit me. It is right pleasing, and not "ricey" at all.

It's a hell of a lot of car for 25k or less, that's for sure. I'm not a big fan of red, but if I could do it again I may just have gotten white if I could have found one.

 

no way! the deep exhaust note is just right too! sounds really good! for the price its got a lot of bang for the buck!

 

^yeah good bang for the buck

 

Haha, that reminds me of the first time I let one of my friends drive the car. Before leaving, I said "just keep in mind, if you're going to floor it, make sure you've got both hands on the wheel" he said okay and we hit the road. After driving around in a surprisingly civilized manner for a while, I reminded him that it's okay to put his foot into it, just hang on to the wheel. So finally, we pulled on to a straight road and he said "alright I'm going to punch it up to speed." I said "okay, just remember, both hands on the wheel." He put his foot into it, one hand on the wheel and it immediately spun itself about 45 degrees to the right. He looks and me and goes "holy ****, you weren't kidding!"