Gen 2 smoke and power loss

I’ve been in the market for a Gen 2 MS3 for a while now and one just popped up on my local FB. It’s listed for $3k because the owner doesn’t know what’s wrong with it. Description is very vague, but he says “runs and drives” but “smoking out the exhaust really bad and is lacking power a lot.”

I think I read somewhere that MS3s have a common turbo seal issue. Could this MS3 be experiencing that? I’ve never worked on a MS3, but would replacing the turbo be easy or is it in a tight spot? Either way, I feel like $3k is a steal if it’s turbo seals. What are the chances it could be the valve seals?

 

Turbos are a very common issue on these cars and smoking is one of the main symptoms. Power loss may be a number of things including compression.

3K for a gen 2 is a really good deal assuming the body is in decent shape.

Repair difficulty is only relative to your experience with mechanical repairs. Share some experiences you have done and I can give you a gauge of what you are getting into.

 

Yes original turbo is prone to seal failure, that'll cause exhaust smoke. Turbo could just be dead and no you're generally not remanning our turbos. Or ring lands are cracked too, compression numbers would be key here should be 170-180psi

You need to read this thread
https://www.mazdaspeeds.org/index.php?threads/what-to-look-for-when-buying-a-used-mazdaspeed.10009/