Mazda5 2.0 Sport review
by David Finlay (21 December 2010)
With such a profusion of compact MPVs on the market, it would be all too easy to be distracted by the other offerings and forget the existence of the Mazda5. In its latest form, as introduced to the UK in October 2010, the 5 deserves better than this, not just because it's quite a good car in several ways but because it has one particular feature which remains unique in the class.
I refer to the sliding rear doors, which were a good idea when they were introduced back in 2006. In the new version they are longer, giving an even more impressive opening to the centre row of seats, and if you choose the top-line Sport trim level, as tested here, they work electronically, opening or closing fully with a single pull of either the exterior or the interior handle.
The best thing about these doors, of course, is that they don't swing outwards in the way that conventional doors do, so each one adds only 160mm, or about six inches, to the width of the car once it has been opened. There's therefore no chance that they will be damaged against a wall, or another car, if you park the 5 in a confined space.
Officially, the 5 is a seven-seater, and yes, it does have seven seats, though the one in the middle of the centre row is so small that it's hardly worth talking about, while the two in the extreme rear are, as is usually the case with compact MPVs, suitably only for small children. Each of the back five seats can be folded away, so you can turn the 5 into a four-seater with 426 litres of luggage space (if loaded up to the level of the seatbelts) or a two-seater with 1566 litres (if loaded to the roof).
Apart from the powered doors, the Sport specification also includes 17" alloy wheels, leather upholstery, heated front seats (much appreciated during the recent cold weather, let me tell you), front foglights, a tyre pressure monitoring system and various exterior styling tweaks. You don't get any of this on the £1300 cheaper TS2, which does however come with privacy glass, rear parking sensors, climate control air-conditioning, automatic wipers, a trip computer and Bluetooth connectivity. All that is standard on the Sport too, of course.
There's also a more basic trim level called TS, but that's available only with the 113bhp 1.8 petrol engine and not the 147bhp two-litre version tested here.
This engine (the 147bhp one) is a bit of a puzzle. Its power output seems healthy enough, and in certain circumstances it gives the 5 very decent straightline performance. However, those circumstances involve revving it pretty hard - maximum torque isn't produced until 4500rpm, maximum power not before 6200rpm - and it's unlikely that many people will venture that far round the revcounter.
At more modest engine speeds, say up to about 2500rpm depending on whether or not you're climbing a gradient, the 2.0 is positively feeble - or, to be more precise about this, it doesn't have enough grunt to cope with the 5's weight. On one hilly piece of road near where I live I had to select sometimes one, sometimes two gears lower than I would normally, and even then I frequently found that I was on full throttle simply to maintain speeds which other cars could easily have managed with much less fuss.
On the combined fuel economy cycle, the two-litre 5 achieves 40.9mpg, which is actually better than the 1.8 can do, though this is partly because the 2.0 has a start/stop system for urban driving and the 1.8 doesn't. In real life I suspect it would be very difficult to get anywhere near 40mpg simply because you have to work the engine so hard (though this does depend on the shape of the part of the country you live in - it's going to be more achievable in Norfolk, for example, than in Cumbria).
For tax purposes, the 2.0 nevertheless has the advantage, as its 159g/km, compared with the 168g/km of the 1.8, means lower annual VED payments. On the other hand, the 1.8 is much cheaper to buy in the first place (partly because it's less well-equipped, as mentioned previously).
Mazda keeps insisting that its cars are splendid to drive, which isn't always the case, but in this respect the new 5 seems a lot better than the previous one. The last 5 I drove - another 2.0 Sport, as it happens - was noisy and didn't ride well, but this one is a great deal better. For me, the steering is too light, and that caused a few worrisome moments when I wasn't sure if the lack of information through the steering wheel was being caused by black ice under the tyres or was just the way the 5 naturally behaves. Apart from that, the handling is secure, if nothing like as sporty as this particular car's trim level name suggested.
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