1997 Mazda Millenia S Review

I owned a Mazda Millenia S 1997 from 160,000 km to almost 240,000 km. The Mazda Millenia S is a mid-luxury supercharged compact 'sports sedan'. The Millenia S engine (when working properly) was its best feature. Acceleration from 0-60 was about 7 seconds, but you could really feel the raw power of the supercharger when it kicked in. On the downside, inexplicably on some days it seemed to have more kick than on other days. Also, the air conditioning sapped way too much power from the engine, changing the entire driving dynamics. Also a 4 speed auto transmission with no tiptronic was a disappointment. In some situations it was difficult to get the car to kick down a gear.

The comfort of the car was also excellent. Good quality leather seats (if a bit worn by the time the car got to me), and the car did a decent job over rough pavement with its way too soft suspension.

Handling on the other hand was horrible. Go around a corner, and the car tilted like a boat. This was a sports sedan in name only. The brakes, while decent were not terrific for spirited driving. The suspension was tuned for comfort and was too squishy.

Reliability was atrocious. The car broke down routinely with the oddest problems, I especially remember the TCS light blinking, which put the transmission into safe mode, and the supercharger (probably) problems near the end, plus tons of other stuff.

Its a bad idea to own one of these cars with high kilometers. They all die when the supercharger seals weaken and leak oil into the engine. This will eventually kill your catalytic (making passing emissions difficult) then dirty your spark plugs etc, then of course the supercharger itself might die.