The central locking failed on the drivers door about 5 years ago, so I fitted a used actuator.
Ive just been out and its blooming failed again.
It makes no sense why its the drivers side, I mean the passenger side has operated just as many times.
I can buy a genuine new Mazda oem part locally for £120, so I’ll probably go down this route.
However, I’ll not settle until I’ve tried to fix this, eventually parts will be obsolete, and we’re all stuffed.
It seems mine originally failed in 2016, and I recall around that time @mickap posted an image of the actuator opened up.
I don’t suppose you still have the images…. Tall order I know.
I read in the old thread where you said that the case isn’t glued, so I opened mine up before I saw these images, and found exactly what the problem is.
Water ingress.
What gets me, the car only ever gets wet when it’s washed and that might be twice per year. It’s garaged all year round and only comes out when the sun shines.
Although it did spend about 5 days outside last week while I had my garage roof repaired.
But still having said all that, if water was to get in anywhere, how on earth did it get in the central locking module, this is on the inside of the door frame, and secondly, how did it get exactly on the motor terminals.
What I do recall, is back in 2016, when I installed the used actuator, I had a bizarre issue. Where the car would lock/unlock/lock/unlock and I diagnosed this down to the unused wires which operates the internal door locking switch (not fitted in the uk), so maybe the fault has been present for the last 5 years, and a few days outside last week finished it off.
I cleaned up the motor with vinegar and electrical contact cleaner, and got it so it would lock, but couldn’t get it to unlock.
MX5 City are in the village and they have an offer on a brand new oem part, imported from Japan at £120, so I just bought a new one.
When I fitted the new one, I couldn’t get this to lock either, until I’d fully connected all the linkages,
when Id messed with the old one, I didn’t connect ll the linkages, I just tried it on the garage floor, so maybe I actually fixed it, but I’m not taking everything apart again to find out.
It’s in now, and it’s fixed.
Yep that looks to be the cause of your failure.
Anyways glad you got fixed up with one, a reasonable price that.
My SH one cost £25 delivered a few years ago, I think that price on eBay has more than doubled now, if they can be found.
It looks like the same motorised part is used on Mazda 6, 2 and rx8, so if the worst comes to the worst it may be possible to cobble one up from parts of other cars.
For the record, I identified the small internal motor part number to be 1021313.
Available for about £12 on aliexpress, delivered to the uk.
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A bit more info for the record and future search ability.
The plastic motorised part has a part number of A92-SPL-R- (Or L depending on which side).
These show up better in a google search, and are fitted to various Mazda models, not just the mx5
I’m going to tinker with the faulty one once the weather warms up, so I’ll post more info as and when I find anything.
I’m sure that someone will find it handy in the future.
Whilst difficult to read on the image, I’ll make a note on here of the lower number being A8782
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I opened up this motor and its well and truly beyond saving.
But I found some more info.
The Mazda small motor number is 20115, which when googling cross referees to 1021313
The aliexpress link below could expire at any time.
Condensation??
I honestly suspect the actuator was probably faulty when I fitted it 6 years ago, and it’s just finally failed.
I had a bizzare issue where it would randomly lock and then unlock and go through this never ending cycle.
Anyhow, considering that these things are either expensive new, or becoming rare used, I thought that documenting anything I find may eventually come in handy for someone else, or even me should the passenger side fail at some point.
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Hi Keat, would you please be able to confirm which motor is the LHS and which one is the RHS from the aliexpress link you sent (black or white gear tooth)
My drivers side actuator is going out and I have a RHD MX-5 so the drivers side is RHS, I believe you guys are the same in the UK.
looking at MickAp’s disassembly pics it looks like the drivers side actuator has a white gear but would love some confirmation.
I don’t have that info I’m afraid, and looking at those Ali express images, it does look like the gears are in opposite directions, which I’d not noticed.
Looking at my images and comparing with the Ali express one, then without doubt, the rhs is the white one.
mine was also white (drivers side).
Whether or not that means the passenger side is the black one would be an educated wild guess.
Playing with the Ali express advert, if we click on either colour, then add to cart, it does add either the black one or white one, depending on the image we’re looking at.
Thanks Keat, I only need to replace the drivers side at the moment, assuming you guys are also RHD in the UK I’ll go with the white tooth gear option, assuming that’s what you ordered when you replaced yours?
I found an Amazon advert which does show that left and right are different colours, although it was a listing for Suzuki and not Mazda.
Confirming that the uk drivers side is white, I’m going to stick my neck out and suggest that the passenger side is black. Although, I’d suggest anyone reading this in the future confirms this beforehand.
Thanks. I’ll order the white as per your aliexpress link. Since I am replacing the RHS motor same as you it should work since that’s what you also ordered and fitted. If my passenger one dies in the future I guess I’ll have to order the black geared one haha..
I actually fitted a whole new lock from MX-5 city (local to me).
All the info I discovered was after I’d replaced it.
Thanks, ordered the white geared one. Will try just replace the motor alone, not too keen on spending over 300 AUD for a new replacement actuator when I am pretty confident its just the tiny motor going out.
Prefer this over putting in a second hand actuator which may show same problems in short time…
I’ve just done this repair successfully! The difference between the old and new motor was staggering (video attached below).
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