The Yuasa is an excellent battery I’ve had one fitted for at least 5 years.
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Thanks for the battery recommendation (this is the YBX5053, is it?).
Update on jump start. The local garage owner and his mate came down with their jump start pack. Put positive and negative leads on my battery: nothing doing. Took the negative lead off my battery: engine sprang into life immediately. From this they concluded that the battery was totally knackered. I don’t have the electrical knowledge to follow any of that, but they seemed sure of the diagnosis.
I was able to start the engine myself a couple of times in succession, a few minutes after they left. But when I tried it half an hour later, I was back to the same old pattern: button goes to flashing amber, then straight to OFF. (They predicted this would happen.)
So my next move is to get a new battery (though since my dead Varta may have come with a 3-year warranty in August 2022, it’s worth an e-mail to follow up on that, too). Garage owner wanted to sell me an Avon battery for £85 + VAT, and dismissed my mention of the Yuasa battery on the grounds that it was a cheap battery. The message was that battery manufacturers market cheap, consumer ranges - and then superior professional ranges. I don’t buy that. While I can get the Yuasa delivered for £66, other retailers are charging £114 for the same product, so I don’t consider it a “budget option”. What does anyone else think? And importantly: is it OK to fit a battery that is significantly more powerful than the Varta? A good thing, I would have thought: but then, what do I know?
And as I have already had the Varta disconnected from my car while on charge, I assume it can’t be any different, or worse, if I install a new battery myself by disconnecting the positive and negative cables (as I did for recharging), switching the batteries over, and then reconnecting the +/- cables. The power to my car has already been interrupted once: it surely can’t matter if I do so a second time. Can it?
No problem swapping batteries, taken mine out for recharging many times. Yes YBX5053.
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I think I would have started with a new battery TBH for the sake of £50.
I put a new Varta Blue on mine at 6 years as a preventive measure, ahead of a European tour. The old one is fine and sits in the garage , it’s been used for a couple on jump starts (not on the MX-5).
If I were you I’d definitely invest in a cheap meter now, e.g. this at £13.50
A voltage reading is not an infallible guide to battery health but very useful when something like this happens. Modern cars really don’t like low voltage and seem to do all sorts of unfathomable things.
Well, things have gone from bad to worse. I fitted a new Yuasa 5053 battery this afternoon, which probably meant that the car was disconnected from any battery for half an hour or so (possibly a fatal error: but I haven’t seen any discussion on here of the importance of battery power continuity, and so assumed it was OK just to take one out and put a new one in without worrying about the intervening power loss).
The engine fired up OK, though I noticed that the ignition sequence did not go through the green phase on the push start button. It cycled through successive stages of orange - but flashing orange, which I didn’t like - before firing. I also didn’t like to see the security indicator light flashing after ignition (is that normal? I can no longer remember.)
When I switched to OFF, I noticed that the infotainment display was still ON, and I couldn’t see a way to shut it down. I also found that the central locking no longer worked, and that the boot would not open. Worried about the infotainment display draining my new battery if left on permanently, I disconnected the battery again. I can’t now recall, in the ensuing mayhem, if that did the trick - I think it probably did. But now the next thing was the alarm going off. It kept on sounding, stopping briefly, then starting up again.
Thinking that the only way I was going to stop the alarm (and get a night’s sleep tonight) was to start the engine again, I reconnected the battery. But now the engine wouldn’t fire, I was back to where I was with the old battery: cycling through orange lights back to OFF, and unable to start the engine at any stage.
Meanwhile the alarm was still going off, and in fact it had now moved into continuous mode - on and on and bloody on. I went back indoors to call up my breakdown insurance in desperation, but before I called them I stepped outside again to listen for the alarm - and by now it had stopped. Which, under the circumstances, was good news, and quite possibly a miracle. At least I don’t have to spend the evening outside, in the freezing cold, with a torch, trying to locate the right fuse to pull to silence the alarm. ( And how does it keep going anyway, with the battery completely disconnected?)
So there I am. New battery fitted - more power, and a welcome return of the magic eye indicator light - but car totally immobile and useless. All I can do now is reconnect the battery in the morning and see what happens. Nothing much, I expect. Does anyone have any suggestions? They will be gladly received.
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Mixed-news update:
Just tried the car this morning (reconnected the battery). Alarm went off a couple of times, but has now stopped (with battery still connected). Central locking now working again (though: indicators flashing as they should on UNLOCK, but not flashing at all on LOCK). Boot now unlocks and opens. Infotainment screen shuts down when ignition is OFF.
So that’s quite a bit of progress since last night – for no apparent reason.
But the engine still won’t fire. It’s back to the old scenario with previous battery: start button goes from flashing amber straight to OFF.
I feel like this might require a trip to Mazda dealer for them to confirm the keys are talking to the car properly. As mentioned previously, thee is this line in the manual:
If the engine does not start with the correct key, and the security indicator light keeps illuminating or flashing, the system may have a malfunction.
That very much sounds like your scenario unfortunately
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Well, when my old battery was put on the jump start pack, the engine started - presumably because the key was working - and I was able to start it few more times in the immediate aftermath of that jump start procedure. And when I fitted the new battery last week, the engine again fired a few times after that, again presumably because the key was working.
I spoke to another local mechanic this morning who suggested the battery earth connection might be dodgy - broken cable, corrosion at the body anchorage point? It sounds like a bit of a long shot, but I don’t have any better ideas. The same mechanic assured me he could reprogram my keys if necessary - so I don’t have to go and shovel bank notes into the pockets of main dealer Vosper in Plymouth. Not that I ever would.
Called my breakdown insurance, so-called, but because I have fitted a new battery they scuttled off to check out their little clauses and told me they would only attend at my own cost, starting at £125 (and counting, obviously). So they are useless: a total waste of time and space, as I rather suspected they would be. Waste of money, too: lesson learned.
Electrics now seem dead. Nothing but flashing amber on start button, and a strange thing (which has happened before in previous no-start crises) whereby the needles on the speedo and rev counter spin smartly to the max point and then immediately drop back down to zero. I can also hear a strained whirring noise from the boot area when trying to lock or unlock the car (central locking doesn’t work anyway, or flash). Infotainment screen doesn’t even fire up - never mind the engine. Magic eye on new battery is still showing green, so seemingly not discharged.
So I am looking at having the car recovered to a local garage - maybe the mechanic I spoke to this morning, who is only 2 miles away.
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I think he might be onto something with the earth. The flicking instrument needles I have seen before when battery voltage has been iffy. Not just the battery earth, there’ll be an engine/starter earth too.
Where there is a loose connection, you can get resistance. Where there’s resistance, you get heat. Where there’s heat, surface oxidation, and more resistance. And the higher the current, the faster this progresses.
Good luck. Are you sure there’s no new water ingress?
Today it seems that the new battery I fitted only 72 hours ago is completely discharged. Absolutely nothing electrical is working on the car. The start push button shows no indicator light at all, nothing lights up on the dash, none of the lights work. The electrics are just dead.
I assume the new battery - supplied online as fully charged, which I have no reason to doubt - was OK when fitted. It enabled me to start the engine for the first time since the old battery was jump-started a week previously.
I am a complete layman when it comes to electrical systems - which is ironic, considering that my late father was an electrical engineer: I should have paid more attention. But it seems to me that the car’s electrical systems are somehow draining all battery power in a matter of hours, at most.
Does anyone have any idea what kind of fault accounts for that profile??
Put the battery on charge now and it (the battery) should be OK.
The battery going flat implies something more than a bad earth unfortunately.
Thanks for the tip - I already had the old battery on charge, since it was already in my workshop, and so was quicker and easier to set up. But on the strength of your tip, I went and extracted the new battery from the engine bay, brought it into my workshop and transferred the CTEK charger to the new battery.
Interestingly, the old battery was still showing only 3 amber lights lit on the CTEK after a good six hours on charge. When I transferred the charger to the new battery, it was up to four amber lights within a minute. With four lights lit, there is apparently enough power to start the engine (under normal circumstances, that is). So it looks as if my new battery was not as totally drained as I assumed it was, given that the car is showing no signs at all of any electrical life.
All I can do for now is get the new battery up to full charge again, reinstall it, and see what happens.
Not sure if you have seen this thread but it could be of interest:
That’s my post above ^. Interesting, when my battery went dead a few weeks ago, I also had the EXACT same Issue with the keys not working, flashing dash, only organe on the ignition etc.
A full overnight battery charge sorted the issue. However replaced the battery just in case.
I am disconnecting the BOSE amp today (do you have bose or not?) To see if the battery drain is reduced. After much research, if these go bad, they can drain the battery significantly. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Please let us know if you get it resolved and how - i’ll do the same!
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Thanks for your post and your message - very interesting! I’m still recharging my new battery now, and will reinstall it and see what happens. Did you find that fuse 17 was blown? Obviously I can pull it and check it, but I’m not equipped to test further.
Removing fuse 17 reduced the draw signifigantly ~60%. The fuse isnt broken. Basically you test by putting a meter between the - terminal and the battery, then remove fuses to isolate the problem.
Just checked the bose amp by disconnecting and no change. FYI for anyone out there, its behind the drivers seat under the hood!
Just refitted my brand new, fully charged battery - still no ignition. Still can’t get beyond first-stage flashing amber - it goes straight from that to OFF. No dash lights other than the flashing red Security Indicator Light. Indicators flash twice on UNLOCK (correct), but fail to flash once on LOCK.
When I lock the car, the passenger window closes up that last half-inch to seal with the hood (so normal behaviour); by total contrast, the driver window DROPS an inch or so every time the car is unlocked. Consequently the driver window is now halfway down, and I’ve had to swathe the hood in plastic sheeting to keep any rain out, as I have no way of closing the driver window. (I think the windows only operate when you get to second-stage amber on the ignition button - and I can’t get that far.)
It’s insane - and it’s driving me crazy. I’ve left the new battery in place, but disconnected both battery leads to avoid any further drain.
You’ve been at this nearly 3 weeks, time for an auto electrician?
I’m sure you are right, and I have already arrived at the same conclusion. But the outfit (DNA in Bodmin) first recommended to me by the mechanic who does my MOTs and servicing won’t take it on. Apparently their diagnostic equipment doesn’t like Mazdas (and I can see its point).
So now I am looking at two garages fairly close to us who have agreed to look at it - but I am struggling to assess their expertise in this kind of work. It was one of them - and the nearest, which is unquestionably convenient - who suggested it might be a bad earth connection. I like a garage that will talk technical when you contact them - rather than just taking bookings. In other words, I’d rather talk to an engineer than a receptionist, but you don’t get to choose.
When you say auto electrician, are you talking about a whole different class of experts? Do you mean, in effect, the people who market themselves as mobile mechanics? But it’s knowing which ones are any good - that’s the problem.
I think you may need to take it,to a genuine Mazda franchisee garage that has a good reputation,yes will be more expensive,but you may have no choice as it all sounds that you may of got a very complicated problem.