Mazda Motor Corp has a creepy problem — a common spider species seems to have developed a hankering for making nests and weaving webs inside the engines of its sporty Mazda 6 sedan.
The Japanese automaker said on Thursday it would be recalling 65,000 vehicles in the US, Canada and Mexico to outfit them with special screens to keep the spiders out.
“There doesn’t seem to be any particular reason why he’s chosen the Mazda 6,” spokesman Jeremy Barnes said.
Photo: EPA
“It apparently likes to go zoom-zoom from the best we can tell,” he said with a laugh, in reference to Mazda’s advertising tag-line.
While the spider problem sounds silly, Barnes said it could be dangerous. The webs and nests can block air flow in the fuel tank’s vent and this could cause the tank to leak or even catch fire. So far there have been no accidents or fires, but Madza isn’t taking any chances.
Since the problem wasn’t restricted to a particular geographic region, Mazda thought it best to recall all its affected vehicles in areas where the yellow sac spider lives, Barnes said.
The problem was first discovered in October 2009 when a dealer found a spider web in a canister vent line when a customer brought their Mazda 6 in for repairs after it started leaking fuel.
The dealer investigated further and it was determined that the web blocked up the vent and caused “excessive vacuum” in the fuel tank, which “eventually resulted in a crack in the fuel tank through repetitive negative pressure stress,” Mazda said in filings with safety regulators.
Nineteen other spider nests have been discovered in Mazda 6 vehicles across the US, but only in the four-cylinder versions, so maybe it isn’t that sporty after all. Dealers will inspect all the vehicles for cracks, clean out the vents, install a “spring to prohibit spider intrusion” and reprogram the powertrain control module to avoid a build up of pressure in the tank.
In the latest defect recall to hit Japanese automakers, Honda Motor Co Ltd said on Thursday it was recalling almost 37,000 Civic Hybrids in the US.
Honda said a faulty converter in the hybrid control system could lead to the engine stalling and malfunction of the headlights.
No injuries or accidents have been reported in relation to the problem, which affects 2006 and 2007 models.
Chrysler Group is also recall nearly 250,000 vehicles in the US to fix an ignition key unit defect that can cause the engine to stall or shut off while driving, safety regulators reported on Thursday.
The defect affects last year’s models of the Chrysler Town & Country and Dodge Grand Caravan minivans, and Dodge Journey sport utility vehicles.
SEMICONDUCTORS: The German laser and plasma generator company will expand its local services as its specialized offerings support Taiwan’s semiconductor industries Trumpf SE + Co KG, a global leader in supplying laser technology and plasma generators used in chip production, is expanding its investments in Taiwan in an effort to deeply integrate into the global semiconductor supply chain in the pursuit of growth. The company, headquartered in Ditzingen, Germany, has invested significantly in a newly inaugurated regional technical center for plasma generators in Taoyuan, its latest expansion in Taiwan after being engaged in various industries for more than 25 years. The center, the first of its kind Trumpf built outside Germany, aims to serve customers from Taiwan, Japan, Southeast Asia and South Korea,
Gasoline and diesel prices at domestic fuel stations are to fall NT$0.2 per liter this week, down for a second consecutive week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to drop to NT$26.4, NT$27.9 and NT$29.9 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to fall to NT$24.8 per liter at CPC stations and NT$24.6 at Formosa pumps, they said. The price adjustments came even as international crude oil prices rose last week, as traders
SIZE MATTERS: TSMC started phasing out 8-inch wafer production last year, while Samsung is more aggressively retiring 8-inch capacity, TrendForce said Chipmakers are expected to raise prices of 8-inch wafers by up to 20 percent this year on concern over supply constraints as major contract chipmakers Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and Samsung Electronics Co gradually retire less advanced wafer capacity, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday. It is the first significant across-the-board price hike since a global semiconductor correction in 2023, the Taipei-based market researcher said in a report. Global 8-inch wafer capacity slid 0.3 percent year-on-year last year, although 8-inch wafer prices still hovered at relatively stable levels throughout the year, TrendForce said. The downward trend is expected to continue this year,
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which supplies advanced chips to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday reported NT$1.046 trillion (US$33.1 billion) in revenue for last quarter, driven by constantly strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips, falling in the upper end of its forecast. Based on TSMC’s financial guidance, revenue would expand about 22 percent sequentially to the range from US$32.2 billion to US$33.4 billion during the final quarter of 2024, it told investors in October last year. Last year in total, revenue jumped 31.61 percent to NT$3.81 trillion, compared with NT$2.89 trillion generated in the year before, according to
RSS