2018 Mazda CX-9
This year drew an ordinary 126 complaints for a Mazda CX-9 — the model's median is 61. What they were about is the unusual part: 38.9% of them mention cylinder head, against 0% across the model's other years.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 126 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 61 |
| Involving a crash | 4 |
| Involving a fire | 1 |
| Recalls | 2 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 5/5 |
| EPA combined | 23.5 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- cylinder head — 38.9% of this year's complaints, against 0% across the model's other years (194.4×).
- coolant — 50% of this year's complaints, against 6.2% across the model's other years (8.1×).
- tsb — 58.7% of this year's complaints, against 23.1% across the model's other years (2.5×). Owners wrote it as: tsb, kids, powertrain, powertrain warranty.
Words owners used for the same problem are counted together, so a fault written four different ways is measured once. Grouped by which complaints they appear in, not by a list anyone wrote in advance.
What owners wrote
While commuting home on 8/19/22 my CX-9 began overheating and coolant temp. warning light illuminated on dash. This was a dangerous situation as I had to stop in the middle of traffic for fear of ruining my car and risk getting rear-ended and also navigate to…
A coolant leak appeared around 62,000 miles. Car started overheating and come to find that I had no more coolant left in the reservoir. I filled it back up and drove it to the mechanic, after almost a week in the shop and have been quoted over $2k for the fix.…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 21V875000 FUEL SYSTEM, GASOLINE Fixed free of charge.
- 19V403000 ELECTRICAL SYSTEM Fixed free of charge.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Mazda CX-9 was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.
This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.
Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.
Own a 2018 Mazda CX-9? What happened to yours?
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