any speed3 owners out there?

I was just curious if there are any speed 3 owners on here besides me? If so that would be great.

I was just curious if there are any speed 3 owners on here besides me? If so that would be great.

how do you like it? Ive been thinking about getting one for my girl by next year after the jetta is paid for. It wont be as fast as my jetta but I'm sure it's alot of fun

I am willing to bet you that it will be faster than your jetta. Its not the fastest production FWD for nothing.

YES I love mine it is an awesome car. Everything about this car is perfect. You gotta love the 263 HP and 280ft/lbs of TQ

I am willing to bet you that it will be faster than your jetta. Its not the fastest production FWD for nothing.

YES I love mine it is an awesome car. Everything about this car is perfect. You gotta love the 263 HP and 280ft/lbs of TQ

I said it wont be as fast because when I'm ready to buy a ms3 the jetta will be done. Also it isnt the fastest production FWD, I will tell you why, the gearing. It falls short in the fact that it has to shift to 4th to finish the 1/4 making it very hard to get past 14.3. and because of that, my jetta is already faster. My RX-8 can run close times to a ms3 because it can hold the gear longer. That extra shift is a problem. Another problem is the turbo set up, if you have ever redlined the ms3 you will see that the turbo feels like it shuts off at around 5k and you feel a big drop in power. Thats because the turbo is very small and runs out of steam around that area and mazda designed it to not have a higher redline to protect the motor. My jetta can also use the same turbo you have, actually the turbo that is in the ms3 is the upgrade to my jetta (if I wanted to go that route), it is the Ko4 wagner, mine is the Ko3s. If i slapped your turbo onto mine with the set up for it the jetta would be faster than the ms3 because they way my jetta is designed is that it doesnt give out too much at the top end like your car. Bet you didnt know that? Here is some advise for your car, get the gearing stretched out so you can hold the gear a bit longer so you make more use of the power that the MS3 has, after you do that add a 3" turboback exhaust and then a lightweight flywheel and you will have one hell of a fast hatch.

i think you need to take a look around a bit more about the speed3. though as you said, the turbo is a bit small (for a tuner) and runs out of juice about 5500, it's not slow by any means. you can find vids of MS3's running mid 13's in stock form within 1/10ths of previous runs.

don't get me wrong, i'm sure your Jetta is great, but any reviewer that has driven the car has been completely please with it's power. learning to use the awkward powerband can take some finesse though i'm sure.

i can post up some slips if needed, maybe we can compare them to the Jetta's slips and see how they differ? launch, 1/8th, mph....?

i think you need to take a look around a bit more about the speed3. though as you said, the turbo is a bit small (for a tuner) and runs out of juice about 5500, it's not slow by any means. you can find vids of MS3's running mid 13's in stock form within 1/10ths of previous runs.

don't get me wrong, i'm sure your Jetta is great, but any reviewer that has driven the car has been completely please with it's power. learning to use the awkward powerband can take some finesse though i'm sure.

i can post up some slips if needed, maybe we can compare them to the Jetta's slips and see how they differ? launch, 1/8th, mph....?


I'm not complaining about the speed 3, I love the car, which is why I am thinking about getting one when the jetta is paid off. Also I never said it was slow, what i did say was that it's 2 major flaws were the gearing and the fact the turbo runs out of steam, not at 5500 like you said but 5k. (i have driven it) Why that is I dont understand because as I said before, I have the smaller version of your turbo and my jettas redline goes to 7k and even at 7k i am boosting about 14 pounds, where the ms3 is boosting about 11. If I were to swap to your turbo I could easily tune the car to get close to 400whp. My point is that the revs are way to short to make use of the full potential the engine has, thats all im saying.

Ok !! I sell cars at the MAZDASPEED dealer that I work at. The turbo does not run out of steam at 5k!!! I dont know whos car you may have driven or how you drove it but here on the lot our cars are real mazdaspeed cars. Also the Mazdaspeed3 does to boost at 15.6 psi.

I am sure that without the mods that you have you wouldnt be boosting anywhere near that high? 15.6 with no mods?? I think that is pretty impressive.

Also I do plan on getting the mazdaspeed CAI and Cat-back system and that is rumored to put me over 300HP and god knows that will be sweet!!!

Ok !! I sell cars at the MAZDASPEED dealer that I work at. The turbo does not run out of steam at 5k!!! I dont know whos car you may have driven or how you drove it but here on the lot our cars are real mazdaspeed cars. Also the Mazdaspeed3 does to boost at 15.6 psi.

I am sure that without the mods that you have you wouldnt be boosting anywhere near that high? 15.6 with no mods?? I think that is pretty impressive.

Also I do plan on getting the mazdaspeed CAI and Cat-back system and that is rumored to put me over 300HP and god knows that will be sweet!!!


Yes it is boosting 15.6 BUT NOT AT REDLINE, the turbo isnt designed that way, I dont care if you do sell the cars, but i'm sure you dont research the parts too well. That turbo has been used for over 8 years now. It was used as a twin turbo in the Audi S4's it's used to upgrade the Audi A4's, Passats 1.8t's, The jetta 1.8t, the GTI 1.8t and they all boost 15.6 with the programming but at redline it tapers off to around 11-12 because thats they way it was designed, its a quick spooling turbo meant to reduce lag and deliver the torque as soon as you press on the gas. It's very small, a bit bigger than the size of my fist and isnt good for those long distance races like the Evo or STI.

And yes if you did do the CAI and Cat-back it would give you around 300hp but if you did a custom Turbo-back exhaust you would get alot more power and more low end torque. And there is only one way to test the efficiency of the turbo, Install a boost guage, drive the car to 2k rpms and floor it to redline, watch as the turbo hits 15.6 by 3k rpms and from the slowly go down to about 11-12 byt the time you reach 5k it will stay there at 5.5k so there is no point to keep going after 5k.

everything so far that i've seen/felt has been just about 5500 where it starts tapering off. BUT the thing is, it's not the turbo that is doing it, it's the mazda ecu. the turbo's efficiency starts to deminish just over 6k, so you would just be blowing hot air. for this reason, mazda scaled things back after 5500 and by redline you should be seeing roughly 5-7psi. there have been issues with knock on the newer DISI setups, so to make sure everything is golden, mazda keeps things as cool as they possibly can.

there have been several owners that have thrown on an mbc and run 15-16psi all the way up to redline without issue. seems that a/f really isn't the main concern, as it has plenty room to spare, but i would like to see some logs of IAT's when boost is left on that high.

ATP has a few upgrades already for the cars, Xede just released thier stuff.....i'm sure the car will have pleny of aftermarket support to supercede any downfalls out of the box for a tuner.

everything so far that i've seen/felt has been just about 5500 where it starts tapering off. BUT the thing is, it's not the turbo that is doing it, it's the mazda ecu. the turbo's efficiency starts to deminish just over 6k, so you would just be blowing hot air. for this reason, mazda scaled things back after 5500 and by redline you should be seeing roughly 5-7psi. there have been issues with knock on the newer DISI setups, so to make sure everything is golden, mazda keeps things as cool as they possibly can.

there have been several owners that have thrown on an mbc and run 15-16psi all the way up to redline without issue. seems that a/f really isn't the main concern, as it has plenty room to spare, but i would like to see some logs of IAT's when boost is left on that high.

ATP has a few upgrades already for the cars, Xede just released thier stuff.....i'm sure the car will have pleny of aftermarket support to supercede any downfalls out of the box for a tuner.


you're wrong, the turbo starts tapering off much earlier than 6k, it tapers off at 5k, i know this because it is used in many 1.8t's and the 1.8t's redline at 6.5k. Sure you can throw a MBC and make the turbo hold boost till redline, but it would kill the life of the turbo, boost needs to be let out that is why the turbo is designed to do that. it is not the ECU that makes the boost taper off it is the design of the turbo.

no actually, on the mazda, the ecu does it. read up a bit, it closes the tb (electronic tb) no matter what your input is, to reduce the load.

i can post some links to dyno's if you'd like as well. both the speed6 and speed 3 have the same issue.

no actually, on the mazda, the ecu does it. read up a bit, it closes the tb (electronic tb) no matter what your input is, to reduce the load.

i can post some links to dyno's if you'd like as well. both the speed6 and speed 3 have the same issue.


that would definately explain the sudden loss of power, i read up about it too, but the normal tendancies of that turbo is to taper off at 5k, guess mazda figured they didnt need to make the engine go to a higher rpm range cause of that. Wish they would let the turbo do what it's supposed to do and taper off instead of cutting off the boost, makes the car feel like it goes into limp mode.

I was just curious if there are any speed 3 owners on here besides me? If so that would be great.

Don't have a Speed3 but I do have a Speed6. It's basically the same 2.3 Turbo and 6 speed manual tranny, but the Speed3 is lighter and I'm more partial to the Hatch than the Sedan. I do love my Speed6 but if I would have waited a year, I could have got the 3 for a lot cheaper. I also used to own an '03 SRT-4, which was a cool car, but again, I do love the styling of the Speed3. Good choice of car!

my speed 3 tapers off at 55-6000 rpms when turbo cuts out and massive amounts of fuel are pumped into the engine... and about the jetta, stock on stock mazda wins especially if you go with a front mounted intercooler to replace the stock top mount on the speed 3.

my speed 3 tapers off at 55-6000 rpms when turbo cuts out and massive amounts of fuel are pumped into the engine... and about the jetta, stock on stock mazda wins especially if you go with a front mounted intercooler to replace the stock top mount on the speed 3.


of course stock for stock the speed 3 wins, but if you can change to a front mount then i can change something on the jetta that costs relatively the same price to do and then I win again. But im not here to compare the speed 3 with the jetta, they are 2 different vehicles that act differently to mods. What i am saying is that I dont like the fact the turbo is cut off and you cant have as much boost on the higher rpms and the fact the gearing sucks ass.

Hey the guy with the speed 6 there is a reflash at the dealer that actually gives the car more power.I actually felt the power difference after performing that reflash for a customer.

Hey the guy with the speed 6 there is a reflash at the dealer that actually gives the car more power.I actually felt the power difference after performing that reflash for a customer.


What kind of reflash is that? I guess they dont have one for the speed3?

of course stock for stock the speed 3 wins, but if you can change to a front mount then i can change something on the jetta that costs relatively the same price to do and then I win again. But im not here to compare the speed 3 with the jetta, they are 2 different vehicles that act differently to mods. What i am saying is that I dont like the fact the turbo is cut off and you cant have as much boost on the higher rpms and the fact the gearing sucks ass.

Thats funny ! It seems that I have killed more than a few jettas(some stock and some modded) and other various vdubs since I have had my car. And the gearing dosent seem to be a problem as long as you know how to drive the car.

I wonder if it would be possible for us to get together at the track some day? I would love to give you a run.

Thats funny ! It seems that I have killed more than a few jettas(some stock and some modded) and other various vdubs since I have had my car. And the gearing dosent seem to be a problem as long as you know how to drive the car.

I wonder if it would be possible for us to get together at the track some day? I would love to give you a run.


i've already made my point so im done with this thread, go test a car like the SRT-4 and you'll what I mean when I say it holds boost till redline and you'll see the difference.

Yes i own a 2007 speed3 i have had it four months and so far i love it.But i would of liked it to have a boost gauge and it realy eats up the fuel.:grinyes: