Text and Updates Page:

5/23/08: Bought the car today!

5/23/08: Had the car tinted and visor strip installed ASAP!

5/28/08: Had the muffler modded, per advise from people on the forums. Had the back resonator removed and the muffler removed and straight pipe welded in place. Makes a nice deep/growl sound now!

5/30/08: Installed auxmod ipod car connector/controller with a ground loop isolator and the stereo kicks ass now! Much better sound quality then the fm transmitter that was installed before.

6/2/08: Installed 8000K hid headlight kit. Makes a world of difference over stock halogen lights and looks beautiful! Very bluish in color which I like, tho 6000K would probably have looked nicer being brighter and more white.

6/4/08: Installed my A-pillar pod with 3 guages in it: Boost/Vacuum, Voltmeter, and Air/Fueld Ratio guages. Took a while to get the right wiring for this in there!

6/4/08: Installed my ATP adapter flange and fake ebay Greddy Type-S BOV. Still needs some adjusting to get the right sound out of it.

6/8/08: Installed the silver JDM eyelids. Looks pretty sweet with eyelids on the car!

6/10/08: Installed Mazdaspeed Satin Silver Performance fuel door cover. Looks a little more sporty with that on there.

6/11/08: Installed TWM Performance shifter bushings, makes a great difference in shifting, not as playful, mushy, or sloppy as the stock rubber bushings. Makes shifting feel more precise and firm.

6/11/08: After last week's turbo timer being sent as the wrong one, ordered another one and got the right one. Installed it in the cubby hole by the ecu hookup and it works quite nicely!

6/13/08: Changed my dome, map, glovebox, trunk, license plate and rear turn signal bulbs to LEDs. White for the interior and license plate and clear for the rear turn signals but light up amber when activated.

6/15/08: Installed my Corksport Motor Mount Inserts. Makes the car fell awesome and smooth when shifting, the engine doesn't rock or move around as much, and you can feel the torque hitting the ground much better. And wheel hop is reduced a lot! Anyone with this car needs to get this mod!

6/25/08: My fiberglass front lip arrived in the mail today. It was cracked in 7 placed and one of the sides broke off completely! Now I have to deal with the shipping company on being compensated for the price of the item and will have to have someone fix it and refiberglass everything before I can even get it painted and mounted. PISSES me off!

6/25/08: Went back to the muffler shop to get the 2nd cat and the front resonator removed. They said it is illegal to remove any cats despite that it is behind the o2 sensors so it would not effect smog... So i just got the last resonator removed. Now it sounds pretty grumbly and pretty nice! Much sweeter than it did with only 2 things removed!

7/8/08: Received a new front lower lip in the mail. I had the company reship me a new one since the first one arrived shattered in the mail. I'll send it in for painting them post pics when it's done and fitted.

7/9/08: Received my rearend and rear side smoked led reflectors. The stock ones are all red and just reflect they do not light up. I did not want all 4 lighting up at night it looks like too much is going on, so I tapped the sides into the driving lights and the rear are tapped onto the brake signal so they only light up when the brakes are applied.

7/10/08: Installed my GV front lip after having it painted. Pretty expensive for the lip and the paintjob on it. Fits ok, not the greatest, but they don't make much for this car so there isn't many options on lips to buy! But it looks much nicer! Wish they made a rear lip but I can't seem to find any.

7/12/08: Received a note from my lip supplier that they are now carrying side skirt extensions for the MS3, so I paid for a set and they are getting shipped out. When they arrive I will get them painted silver and post pics of them installed on the car. I asked, but still no rear lip or extensions for the rears as of yet for the MS3

7/23/08: Installed my side skirts today, got them the other day and dropped them off for painting. Installed them with double sides tape. They look pretty nice, stick out like side lips. I am satisfied with them. I just need some rear lips/add ons now! I told the supplier to let me know as soon as they have them available or created and then I will order them. Once I have those I will post pics of the complete kit!

8/10/08: Installed my Protege Garage midpipe/racepipe today. Phil came over and we installed his Turbo XS midpipe as well. It took a lot longer than we thought and we had to get new screws for the back of the racepipe to catback portion. But once installed it worked great, I can feel the difference. I liked how my exhaust sounded clean and bassy before, but now with this pipe the exhaust sounds louder and very gargly, and you can hear that inside the car. So the sound is ok, not as clean as before, but it sounds powerful still.

8/20/08: Got a Garmin Nuvi 260W navigation system for the car. I did not want to fork over $1850 for the stock nav for this car and I barely need it, but my wife gets lost all the time so I got it for her. It looks very ncie and works awesome! It's nice for finding gas stations and bowling alleys n stuff like that when you are searching and want to find places like that. Plus being portable makes it much better for swapping quickly to another car.

8/22/08: Although I really enjoy my EBAY immitation fake Greddy Type-S bov, I wanted the real thing so I got one and installed it today. The fake one was loud and made a very nice "koosh" sound when it went off. But I had always wanted the very distinctive and loud "pssssst" from the real one. I found one in absolute mint condition with one minor knick on it otherwise its perfect! I installed it and love the PSSSST sound now! Don't be affraid to buy the fake ebay one tho, as it is a VERY nice unit as well, they both work just as good, just make different sounds. If I get annoyed with the real one I'll sell it and put the fake one back on.

8/24/08: Installed my Pioneer touch screen deck, dash kit, and amp wiring kit for the subwoofers and amp when they get in. So I'm rolling with the wiring but the sub box/combo will arrive this week I'll already have it wired and ready, just need to plug it in.

8/27/08: Installed my Visonik sub/amp box today. It is a preloaded 12-inch 500watt Visonik sub that comes in a box with the amp already installed and wired up to it. Since i had my wiring laying out waiting for this arrival i just hooked it right up. Its nothing crazy loud or extremely bassy. But I got over the LOUD stereos a while ago, I just needed some more bass to even things out. It sounds decent enough for the cheap price of only $40 shipped!

9/28/08: Installed my Street Unit silicone boost tubes. Haven't really got on it to test them out, but thus far appears much more responsive to pressive the throttle, since they don't expand the boost spikes appear to be eliminated and it seems to have a more noticeable power after install.

10/19/08: With the help of a forum member, we installed Demon Eyes into the headlight housing. Required taking off the bumper and baking the headlights to get them apart and then putting them back together after using silicone to attatch the rings. The process took about 8 hours as there were some issues with one of the lights that had to be re-done 4 times. But overall the look of the headlights is amazing! Very bright and look great at night!

10/22/08: Painted the front emblem semi-gloss black and also the upper grill on the front bumper. Looks pretty cool, sets it apart from other speed3 out there. I was about to pull the back emblem off and do them also, but never got around to it.

11/1/08: Installed my Dropzone lowering springs. 1.4 front and 1.4 rear drop. The install went well except for some issues with removeabl of the strut from the spindle and re-install into he spindle on the driver's side front, but the passanger side went in smoothly and easily. Other than that issue which attatched more install time, it was a 5 hour install. Rotated the tires while I was at it and also installed 1/4 inch spacers for wider wheel stance. Springs feel great, slightly more bouncy than stock, perhaps that will change a bit after settling and alignment.

11/12/08: Installed my Street Unit full motor mount. I enjoyed having the Corksport Inserts as they stiffened up the stock mount very well, however there was still too much rocking around of the motor in the engine bay even under light shifting or traffic driving so I wanted something stiffer without the vibes of the TRZ or other race stiffness mounts. The Street Unit is absolutely perfect! The same amount of feel/vibes as the Corksport Inserts but stiffer mount provides absolutely no rocking of the motor around in the engine bay. A MUST BUY!

11/12/08: Installed LED hyperwhite reverse bulbs to match everything else I have already swapped out to LED from stock bulbs.

11/19/08: Swapped my stock tmic for an ETS 3.25 upgraded TMIC with a local person. Initial size is almost twice as thick as the stock one is and the flow is much better. It initially made my Greddy type-S bov a bit louder than it was previously when installed with the stock low-flow tmic, which I liked as I love the type-s whistle and the louder the better for that. Initial drive the car definately pulls much harder in the upper rpm ranges above 3000 rpm, and the torque after that is also more noticeable as well. In the low end the car struggles slightly more to get to the boost, probably due to a larger core so the air has to get in and then probably takes longer to build the initial pressure to push it out the other side, but once it hits it feels like a different engine in the car. I would like to get the car dynoed eventually and I am sure this mod probably gives it a nice bit of hp/tq gain.

12/7/08: Replaced my stock recirculation hose with blue silicone hose to match the rest of my blue silicone in my engine bay.

12/7/08: Installed a custom 2.5 inch turbo inlet with blue silicone tubing to the turbo itself. Took about 2 hours to take everything apart and then install and put back together. Initial driving the car does spool faster, the turbo is much louder (as in the intake sound is twice as loud as it was before) and you can hear a very loud jet0like sucking when flooring it. There is a minor tq/hp increase that can also be felt. Overall this makes the car sound great and perform better as well!

12/19/08: Took an idea from a forum member, who has the greddy type-s bov setup as VTA. He shoved a D battery in the recirculation hose to cap it. I decided to try the same thing and the valve was ridiculously loud! The whistle is amazing and loud and I really enjoy it! The car started with stumbles and had rough idling and jerky shifting, but I have gotten used to it and they seem to have gone away now.

1/31/09: Tried putting the second spring back into the greddy type-s the way it comes from the factory to see how well it would work. I put it in and it kept the valve almost all the way closed at idle, making driving much smoother, idling smoother, and easier shifting when running in VTA, but unfortunately it makes the valve not open enough when shifting (blow-off) and you get compressor surge. So everything else is perfect except for the surge, probably from too much spring tension to allow it to open enough, but it's enough to keep it closed like I need it to. So I took the second spring out again and went back to the single spring. This is a hit or miss bov, it's either too soft to stay shut with 1 spring in, or too hard to open with 2 springs. There is no intermediate...

2/25/09: Removed the 1/4-inch wheel spacers for some 25mm (1-inch) wheel spacers. The make the wheels perfectly flush with the fenders in both the rear and front. The fronts are fine without rubbing, but the rears rub when going over bumps so I had to roll the fenders. It took many tried to get them rolled and was a big pain in the ass. Paint also chipped in the under fender area and I hope it doesnt start to chip towards the outside of the fenders.

3/4/09: Installed new Audiobahn component set in the front doors. The stock speakers worked great but they started to crackle and distort even at low volumes but had great bass. I needed to get rid of the crackle since i like to listen to my rock music loud and crackle just won't due. These speakers were only $50 for the 6X8's, tweeters, and the crossover box and sound great.

4/1/09: Bought a used HKS SSQV V2 blow-off valve mounted on the MS3 needed flange. Currently I have it in VTA mode with the stock silver fin inside and my recirc tube plugged with a D battery. The valve has a nice hissy chirpy whoosh sound that sounds great actually. Certainly not as sexy sounding as the greddy type-s whistle, but still very nice. I may try to take out the silver fin to eliminate the chirp and see how the whoosh sounds by itself. I also have the recirc flange adapter as well, but will see how it runs in VTA before trying it in recirc and comparing the loudness. The car actually drives and shifts VERY WELL in vta mode, compared to the greddy in VTA which was terrible to drive with. I believe the pull-type HKS valve is pulled shut during idle while the push-type greddy needs spring tension to stay shut and since it never stayed shut it drove like shit when in vta.

4/4/09: Tried taking out the silver HKS fin insert (stock insert) it eliminated the chirp but only kept a minimal hissy whoosh. It was way too quiet so I put the silver fin back in. I would like to borrow or buy a purple HKS fin insert to see how that sounds and if I would like that or not

4/15/09: Bought a used MSD Dashhawk from a forum member for a great used price. Hooked it up to see what the MPG was for the car and the correct boost/vac as well as the boost gauge I bought wasn't all that accurate, nore was the a/f ratio gauge either. Nifty little item, I enjoy it, tho the screen is pretty small so reading things is a bit tough.

4/21/09: I have been trying to find rear lips or rear add-ons for this car and they don't seem to make anything for the Mazdaspeed3. I bought a set of brand new sunlight silver oem rear fender flares that are made for the 2004-2006 Mazda3 hatchback. I was hoping they would fit as the bumper's look very close. Got them in the mail and tried to get them to fit but they are a tad long in the rear portion where it mates up with the dark gray unpainted portion of the bumper. So they are a no-go. But at least I tried. I may modify them to be the right size by cutting some off the rear and then try installing them anyways. I really want something for the rear to make it look lower as well.

7/2/09: Got into a fender bender a few weeks ago and had to get the front bumper fixed and repainted and a new lower lip. Just got it back from the shop today. Watch out for shit falling from the back of a truck when you're on the freeway!

8/1/09: The car bascically sits underneath a car cover since I commute far to work now, so I bought a commuter car to drive to work that is an automatic and takes regular unleaded and gets 33mpg so the Mazdaspeed3 is my every other week car I drive once in a while just for fun. I've only put 150 miles on it since April 24 when I bought my commuter car. I love the mazdaspeed, but I feel bad putting useless miles on it driving in commuter traffic and havign to ruin the clutch shifting all the time.

8/31/09: Finally bought my wife a Mazda 3 sedan, in Aurora Blue, which is my favorite color, she wanted white so it stays cleaner but they were hard to find at a good used price so we got the blue one. Already done a few things to it so it looks decently customized. Now my wife has joinded in the Mazda family with me.