ok so i am pretty new to the forum, i have been reading a lot for months now but just joined. I have searched the forum but cant find anyone else with this problem. My car idles at 200, the idle is not rough or jerky its just extremely low idle. I took my car to Mazda a couple of times but they cannot figure out what it is, i have changed wires, and plugs. Any one got any ideas???

It should idle around 800 once up to operational temp. I'm at a loss why it would idle that low, but my experience is that when it idles that low, it becomes unnervingly rough. Someone more knowledgeable than myself will chime in soon.

if this is really happening the cause would have to be in the throttle body or control of it. i doubt i tho since there are many ways to verify throttle control or throttle body issues with their equipment. so then its either a reporting issue or a gauge issue. which they should also be able to see when its hooked up.

yea exactly you would think that if it idle that low that it would be extremely rough but its not, it is smooth and drives just fine

damn, I would figure the car would stall out before it got down to 200 RPM

Heck it would die out if it's under 600rpm...

never stalled once on me, and i have had the car for over a year now

let me ask you a question actually. have they verified it is idling at 200? by that i mean they plugged it in to their comp and said " yep it is idling at that speed thats weird lets take a look at it" or have they merely taken it into the back then returned it to you and said "well we cant find anything wrong"?

hmmm not really sure actually, i presented the problem and then they have looked at it 4 times now but i just assumed that they would actually verify that it was in fact idling at 200, i didnt think that they would actually just take my word for it

yeah you need to get that straight with them first....

good thought, like i said i just assumed that they would verify that first thing. Ill mention that to them, i think im gonna take it back again.

Its gotta be a gauge not functioning properly. 200 RPM idle? No way..

i'm guessing high resistance in the sending wire to the cluster. if not the cluster itself.

PCM would be going nuts if it was seeing 200rpms tho so im thinking a cluster problem.

kevin.

im going to say its a gauge problem. no way will the engine stay on at that rpm.

so i just got back from the dealership and they said that the cluster was fine no problems

so i just got back from the dealership and they said that the cluster was fine no problems


okay so they verified idle at 200 with their machine and said there were no problems?

Thats what they told me, but im taking it back tuesday and they are supposed to keep it for a couple of days or until they find the problem. im just stumped about what it could be

wow they are giving you a huge brushoff.

kevin.

yea tell me about it. If they dont find out what the problem is next week then im gonna start being pretty straight forward and demand that something be done about it, because i mean it is a problem with my car and its not like an invisible problem and that is how they are treating it. they are acting like its nothing when in fact the car should not even be running at that low idle

yea tell me about it. If they dont find out what the problem is next week then im gonna start being pretty straight forward and demand that something be done about it, because i mean it is a problem with my car and its not like an invisible problem and that is how they are treating it. they are acting like its nothing when in fact the car should not even be running at that low idle

words to live by: no results, escalate.

there's tons of people above the people at the dealer, and part of there job description is to make sure your car is 100% diagnosed and repaired.

kevin.

exactly. so if nothing gets done on tuesday or wednesday then im going up a notch

just out of curiosity, i saw that your avatar says mazda tech, so i was wondering how do i go about talking to people above the dealership if it comes to that??

Thats what they told me, but im taking it back tuesday and they are supposed to keep it for a couple of days or until they find the problem. im just stumped about what it could be

they are lying if they had actually hooked it up they would have found whatever the problem is. so that means they didnt even hook it up. they got busy and didnt do anything and are covering their asses.

you ask to speak to the head of the department.

just out of curiosity, i saw that your avatar says mazda tech, so i was wondering how do i go about talking to people above the dealership if it comes to that??

just ask, you could specifically ask for the contact info of the regional rep/ regional service manager or called MNAO corporate.

kevin.

wow i would be terrified if mine idled that low.....usually it just stalls out on me around 600 rpm :(

hmmm i dont know, thanks for the help and info guys. Im gonna take it back on tuesday and its either going to get fixed or im gonna go higher up on the ladder.

just out of curiosity what RPM does the fuel cut happen at the other end of the scale ?

The engine only cranks at 200-250 rpm. Your gauge has got to be off or something.

not sure what you mean by fuel cut? when cold it will idle slightly above 1000 then when warm it drops down to about 200-300

/\ when you floor it and keep your foot down till the fuel cut kicks in - it should read about 9500 rpm on the guage (which in reality is 9000 rpm).....

not sure what you mean by fuel cut? when cold it will idle slightly above 1000 then when warm it drops down to about 200-300

when cold my car will idle at 2000 then eventually drop to 1000-900.

:eyetwitch

i think my car is the normal one. this dealership is fucked up, i would be screaming bloody murder if they released my car back to me with nothing wrong. in fact, i know my dealership wouldnt ever do that to me, because they know me and know they'd have to take a bite out of such a large shit sandwich everyone would stare and gasp. :rant:

not sure ill test that sometime tonight and let you know

does you car shake really bad when idle? My car shakes if idle is any were nere 600. I couldnt imagine 200. Something must be wrong with your Tech

just out of curiosity what RPM does the fuel cut happen at the other end of the scale ?

The fuel tables only go down to 500.
The idle control starts at 250.
You could effectively keep the car from even starting by just setting the rev limit to 250.
So, I think there is something else going on here.

no, car does not shake or vibrate at all really, i cant really tell its running when its warmed up and at idle

/\ i was thinking the whole scale was out
ie if reading 200 when it should be 800
at fuel cut it may only read 9000 instead of 9500 .

im not real knowledgeable about this type thing but that makes since to me, but why wouldnt the tech catch it

also is the scale stored in the ECU? is that what controls it because they reflashed it last week

/\ and the problem started after they reflashed it ?

ok the fuel cut is at 9000, and no the flash was a step to try and fix the problem. The problem was there before the flash

ok - it should be at 9500 . So it seems your whole guage is reading 5-600 low across the board .

i think the needle may just need adjusting..

/\ yes give it a tweak to the right - LOL

really?? something that simple?

im not real knowledgeable about this type thing but that makes since to me, but why wouldnt the tech catch it

because they are lying to you.

because they are lying to you.

BINGO! Bad dealerships FTL.

kevin.

ok so an update on my car situation in case someone wants to know. The dealership had it all day today and they have narrowed it down and they believe the problem is the PCM. They are doing some more tests tomorrow to make sure. They quoted me 1200 for a re-manufactured PCM from mazda

year and miles? they have ruled out the CAN controller for the dashboard?

it is an 04 with about 87000. They said that they had ruled it out and they also call the higher up tech guys at mazda and they also confirmed the situation and that it has happened in about 15, of the 04 RX8's. They got 3 codes, random misfire, throttle position sensor, and a throttle control position sensor i believe. ( not 100% sure on that last one but it was something with the throttle pedal).

That's dumb. They shouldn't charge you for something like this, go to another dealer and ask them about the price.

getting PCM replaced on Tusday

huh... if you do the diagnostic for the cluster, what happens for the tach test? #13

http://www.rx8club.com/showpost.php?p=2632200&postcount=1

i'd be surprised if it was your pcm

--

edit: i just did it and on my unit, before the test kicks off it is at zero rpms, then past 10k rpm to the 3 o'clock position, then holds steady on 3k rpms, does yours park at these values?

hmm interesting, i went and did the test and mine settles at about 26-2700. im gonna mention that to the dealer tomorrow because im not paying for a pcm if it will not fix the problem.

lol, your cluster is reading 300-400 lower and they dont have a clue how to test it. Bring in that forum topic with the output test and hand it to them and ask them to do the tach test.

Fuck it get a pcm, then when it doesnt fix it get a refund and a free cluster.

kevin.

thats what im thinking, since they putting me through all of this crap let them put in a pcm and then not pay for it cause it did not fix the problem and get a new cluster.

ok so i went to the dealership today to get the PCM installed and well it seems that the new PCM will not communicate with my car at all. They said that they installed it but it would not communicate with anything in the car and that the PCM that is currently in my car is not the one that should be in there. No clue how my car is running at all if it is not the right PCM nor do i understand why the new PCM that is supposed to be in there wont work. Mazda has no clue what is going on, the tech called mazda and they have no idea either. So this question should keep some of you guys busy thinking for a bit.

if your car is still running (did they put back your old pcm?)
run away as fast as you can~

yea they put the old one back in, but whats goin on with my car haha

did they properly transfer data from the old PCM to the new one? (PMI/Programmable Module Installation) if not they will need to get the As-Built info from Mazda and force the PCM into programming mode with that.

If you are 1st owner of car and never swapped ECU's, then im guessing they're full of shit.

bad dealer FTL.

kevin.

well i was there for 3 hours and they said they tried it a couple of times but they could never get the PCM to communicate with anything else in the car. I am not the original owner of the car i am the third. i bought it from an individual that had it for about 2 weeks then broke his foot so he couldnt drive it so he sold it and he bought it from the original owner. I have been trying to find out who the original owner is so i can talk to them and ask about it but i cant find out who it is. Mazda looked it up in their files but wouldnt tell me

did they do the tach test and see that the cluster is bad yet? show them that then you can skip the whole PCM fiasco.

kevin.

will do, ill go by there tomorrow and get them to do it. But what do you make of the PCM not being the right one?? i mean the car is running overall right and good but if the PCM is not what is supposed to be in there then the car should not be running right at all, right?? Man i wish your dealership was close by and id just drive the thing to you.

You should really just print out that post on diagnosing the tachometer. Then go buy a stapler. Now here is the tricky part, staple the diagnostic info to the techs head.

I say that is the tricky part because you'll have a hard time finding his head as it is deep within his ass.


In all seriousness though. Your car wouldn't run if the PCM wasn't right. There are alot of things that tie into it, including the immobilizer. If the PCM isn't correctly programmed, then your car wouldn't start. I also believe that the PCM for all the manual transmission cars from 2004-2008 are the same, the differences are the programming.

Since they replaced your PCM with a new one, and the car won't start, it sounds like it is incorrectly programmed. They are just giving you some BS about your PCM being wrong because they are too stubborn to admit to you, or maybe even themselves, that they have no idea what they are doing.

I also believe that the PCM for all the manual transmission cars from 2004-2008 are the same, the differences are the programming.

~don't think that is true. (3 types for MT in US [2004, 2005, 2006-8] if i remember correctly, see elsewhere on the forum)

pics of pcm