mx5cartalk.com

Mazda just quoted me $114.00 for a rocker gasket for a NB which seems exorbitant to me, the ones on ebay are under half the price or more, has anyone used an ebay gasket from the US or UK with out issue?

mx5parts.co.uk

Emailed.

I ended up going to MX5Mania for a few things today and picked one up there, thanks for your offer though.

Certainly seems a lot of money for a cut-out piece of cork!

The press knife to cut it would cost around $500 to have made, and you could cut thousands of them from it, and all you would need then would be a nice, hydraulic cutting press, of which I happen to have one, and the cork material of course.

Mazda prices are clearly outrageous. However be careful. You can buy products from Bursons Repco etc and what they supply may not fit because the cross reference data is wrong- I know from recent experience ( NB VVT) . When you buy from Mazda they ask for VIN and you will get the right level of design.

The whole business of getting the right part(s) is a minefield- buy from O/S at your peril- the cross ref listings are often not correct. Bloody nuisance if is wrong. A Repco or Burson item is about $30 and if it was not correct you get your money back.

The subject part is an injection or compression moulded item not a cut gasket but the mark up is astronomical- the OE part would be moulded less than $10.

The gasket I got is probably good quality ( ACL branding) but simply did not fit.

Recently bought an NA rocker cover gasket from Garrmax (Brisbane) for $15, funny when I see there is someone on ebay trying to flog them for $30.

No cork Benny, looks like its a rubber/plastic compound of some sort, the problem with non OEM ones is there is a higher chance they will leak oil from what others have told me, which given im trying to fix that i just sucked it up and went OEM.

If this still leaks then im not going to be happy!

the gaskets are epdm. I returned an ACL gasket this afternoon to Repco which I bought more than 12 months ago and they refunded without any problem. As stated earlier I think the ACL product - was probably good quality but it did not fit - my car is a VVT and bolt config is clearly not the same level as non VVT. The OE gasket was daylight robbery at $105. Incidentally ACL were a supplier at one stage to OE in Au mainly for cut gaskets and provided they still apply the right standards even something they do not make is probably from a good and trusted source- but who knows. Virtually all OEM gasket production is now off shore.

yeah, OEM parts are often very expensive. I tend to try and buy directly from the OEM suppliers.

for example, with my old 626 I needed a brake master cylinder.

Price to kit and hone the old one - $150
Price of brand new one from Mazda - $400
Price of one from PBR brakes - $180

I went for the PBR, especially since guess who supplied Mazda at that stage? yep, PBR.

Quite often you cannot buy direct from the OEM. The reason is that the car companies often pay for the tooling and the component maker is not allowed to sell the parts except to the car co. This is particularly true for custom made items - like the gasket.

$22 - ebay...