Mazda 6 Tuning

"Tuning guide to the most effective Mazda 6 modifications."

The large executive fleet target for Mazda was the Mazda 6.

The well thought out and designed car has a good range of engine options and a good chassis design.

But originally the Mazda 6 was never aimed at the performance car market until recently.

The Mazda 6 is a good car tuning project to try. Take your time and research 6 tuning to avoid making the usual common errors we frequently see.

A nice wide torque band and sweet spot of peak power at one third of your RPM range is optimum.

Top end power should be your overall aim on the Mazda 6 with a nice fat peak torque band.
Following our tips for tuning your Mazda 6 you will create a practical but sporty car that will embarrass bigger cars.
Smaller engines do not provide much of a return in terms of power so start with a bigger engine. Engine swaps are a good option if you have a small engine size.

Engine Tuning.

The following uprated parts are usually installed by our members, decide how far you want to go before you get going.

1st Generation engines

• 1.8 L MZR L8 I4 (gasoline)
• 2.0 L MZR LF I4 (gasoline)
• 2.3 L MZR L3 I4 (gasoline)
• 3.0 L Duratec 30 V6 (gasoline)
• 2.0 L MZR-CD I4 (diesel)

2nd Generation engines

• 1.8 L MZR L8 I4 (gasoline)
• 2.0 L MZR LF I4 (gasoline)
• 2.5 L MZR L5 I4 (gasoline)
• 3.7 L Duratec 37 V6 (gasoline)
• 2.0 L MZR-CD I4 (diesel)
• 2.2 L MZR-CD I4 (diesel)

3rd Generation engines

• 2.0 L SkyActiv-G PE-VPS I4 (gasoline)
• 2.5 L SkyActiv-G PY-VPS I4 (gasoline)
• 2.2 L SkyActiv-D SH-VPTS I4 (diesel)

Getting the best performance upgrades for your planned usage of the car is essential. Stage 3 (competition) mods just don't work well on the road making the car difficult to drive.

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Mazda 6 Stages of Tune

Stage 1 mods: Lighter flywheel, Remap, Panel air filter, Alloy wheels, Suspension upgrade (drop 30-40mm), Sports exhaust.

Stage 2 mods: high flow fuel injector, Fast road cam, fuel pump upgrades, Power/Sport clutch, Ported and polished head.

Stage 3 mods: Sports gearbox, Internal engine upgrades (pistons/head/valves), Adding or upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Competition cam, Engine balancing.

Your goal when modding the engine should be a flat and wide torque band. You don't want all the torque to be at the top end of the rev range unless you are creating a motor sport car.The whole point of our tips is to give a brief overview of modifying modifications and point you in the right direction, our forum is the place to go for detailed advice and tips on your car tuning project, the best motorsport parts and all aspects of modding cars.Fast road cams offer one of the biggest performance gains for your money as far as a single mods goes on a NASP engine.

The intake & exhaust flow play a large part in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car impossible to drive in traffic.

You'd need to follow a cam upgrade with other mods and finish with a performance chip to fully release the power gain.

Don't forget to ramp up the fuelling when you are increasing the power - it makes the car more thirsty.

If you find you experience flat spots and surges after your motorsport mods you should check the fuelling and try a higher octane fuel as well. Uprating the injectors is another beneficial modification and will deliver sufficient fuel.

A fuel pump will only deliver a finite amount of fuel, so you may need to uprate this if your injectors are demanding more fuel.

Intake and Exhaust Tuning.

The next area for modification is the intake and exhaust. Contrary to popular belief there is usually a small if any power gain obtained by fitting an induction kit, they only become beneficial and are recommended after you increase the engines power to the point where the standard air intake box cannot cope!

Induction kits can work well on turbo engines and larger engines (if supplied with a suitable cold air feed or air box), generally though we'd just recommend for Mazda 6 engines you should go with a high performance panel air filter preferably made from cotton.

Sports exhausts can help balance the flow of air through the engine. But if your exhaust is too big, ie: over 2.5 inches bore, you will lose a great deal of the flow rate and end up lacking power and torque.

Airflow through the head can be dramatically increased with some professional gas flowing. These should match and be setup to take into account any other engine mods.

Your clutch can fail as you increase the power if it starts to suffer and the standard clutches are only ever good for power gains of up to 43%. Fit a power clutch to avoid power loss through the transmission. The best mods we would do for your Mazda 6 are fast road camshaft, remap, induction and exhaust, suspension.

Turbo engines are just crying out to be Upgraded. You will see large power gains on most modern turbo charged cars including diesels making a remap one of the most cost effective and large modifications for your money.

Adding forced induction will see phenomenal power gains but this is usually too expensive to be cost effective. Superchargers are generally easier to add than a turbo. With a turbo the boost curve is related exponentially to the engine speed making it difficult to map fuelling with.

Superchargers however will give a boost which is directly proportional to engine speed so is simpler. Adding forced induction will usually require a lower compression ratio or water injection.

Handling/Suspension upgrades

Handling modifications are usually your first port of call for the Mazda 6.

Fully adjustable suspension allows you to fine tune the handling of you Mazda 6 often benefitting your drive.

We would go to a maximum drop of 26mm - 35 mm on most models. You risk compromising your handling if you go lower than this.

Alloy wheel upgrades.

Because alloys are less heavy they improve performance and they can help to cool the brake disks.

We can't go into too much detail here about tyres but they are how the car puts the power down on the road so are a critical choice. directional tread pattern tyres work well on Mazda 6, and make a big difference over budget tyres. It is worth noting that although they can look cool on the Mazda 6 large all

oy wheels will actually decrease your performance. The larger you go the lower your acceleration will be - this to the change in your effective final drive ratio.

Although some people have installed larger rims without issues we would stick to a 16 inch rim size as the maximum.

There is a more updated version of this Mazda Mazda 6 Tuning article on TorqueCars.com.
For more information on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss Mazda 6 options in more detail with our Mazda 6 owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Mazda tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

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This article is flagged for an update, so please pass on specific tips below that I can include. All articles, and content was written by me, Waynne Smith TorqueCars founder. Some outlines are just too general so I appreciate your feedback and suggestions. This entry was filed under Mazda. You can leave a response below or join our forum to discuss this article and car modification in detail with our members.

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