1.6D Sport 5dr People Carrier

Useful and practical

Had this for 6k miles now, and it's liked by all the family. It's extremely practical and flexible, and I'd recommend one to anyone. It's got more toys than previous cars we've had, which pleases the kids. Do worry a bit about how well they'll last, though. Not desperately exciting, but working well for us so far. A couple of comments:
- The power rear doors seem to fool people, especially as they won't open electrically with the engine running till the handbrake is on.
- Managing low 40s with a mix of driving, with a high of 48 on a slowish motorway trip.
- Had a bit of a struggle to get the previous owner's service onto the Mazda DSR system, but sorted after the garage wrote a letter
- Flexible seating a bonus, though the centre armrest/seatback gets in the way of free passage into the rearmost seats
- Centre-row seatbacks easily scratched when folded down - needs some sort of cover to protect them from being marked when carrying longer loads
- First gear's quite low, so you have to change up very quickly if you want to keep the revs down. Good for fully-loaded hill starts, but less so around town
- The engine is gutless below 1750rpm: once above 2k, it's fine. It'll happily sail up motorway hills in sixth gear, but strains if you let the revs drop. This does make it difficult when trying not to thrash the engine when it's cold. It also means I use a gear lower at junctions than in any other car I've driven. Not much of a problem - just different
- Rear parking sensors started playing up and finally failed, playing a set of beeps 5 times every time you started the car - got very wearing! Fixed under warranty - the connections had got dirty. Not sure what will happen if they do it again once the warranty ends next year?

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