My pilot bearing went out and when I tried to look up a write up on how to drop the transmission I couldn't find anything that was very complete, so I decided to make my own. This is my first write up, so be easy on it :P.

First off, read this. It did wonders for me: http://www.rotaryheads.com/PDF/RX8/5Transmissions.pdf

It has everything you need to know to do it and much, much more. Including torque number, etc.

Anyway, to start off you want to disconnect the negative battery terminal and jack your car up, obviously haha. Jack up all four corners as high as you can and make sure you use jackstands!!

Now, get inside the car and work on disconnecting your shifter so you don't have to worry about it later when you're all dirty and stuff :P.

BEFORE YOU START, MAKE SURE YOU ARE PREPARED AND HAVE ALL THE RIGHT TOOLS TO REMOVE THE FLYWHEEL, PILOT BEARING, ETC. YOU CAN FIND ALL OF THESE TOOLS AT WWW.MAZDATRIX.COM

1. Unscrew your shift knob
2. Gently pry up the middle part of the center console and remove it (disconnect whatever wires are under there. heated seats, etc.)
3. Remove the rubber shroud around your shifter
4. You'll see 2 clips holding wires onto studs with nuts on them, remove them to get to the nuts
5. Remove the ashtray, it makes life easier :bowdown:
6. Unbolt the 4 nuts and lift up that cover, then remove the second rubber shroud.
7. Now, you'll see three bolts holding your shifter on, undo those and lift the shifter out. Put a rag or something in the hole to stop things from falling in there if you're paranoid like me :D.
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Now, time to get under the car.

First off, you wanna remove the exhaust.

1. Take off the cross-members first, there are 2 of them.
2. Disconnect the O2 sensor that plugs into the catalytic converter
3. Unbolt the 3 bolts on the flange right before the cat
4. Undo the exhaust hangers and disconnect the exhaust from the muffler as well
5. Set it aside and take a peek inside your cat just to make sure your honeycomb is intact :D

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Just a random picture of the shifter, cross-members, and starter (Which we’re about to take off!) Also, make sure you label all your bolts, nuts, and everything you take off and note where it goes. It saves a lot of headache, I promise.

1. The starter is easy, first unbolt the negative and positive wires.
2. One of them is under the white plastic cover, which pops off
3. It’s held on by two 14mm bolts, the bottom one is just a bolt
4. The top bolt is a long stud with a nut, so after you take the nut off take the bolt out as well
5. Carefully remove the starter and set it aside
6. Now is also a good time to replace your starter if you have the weak one from the factory

Time to drain the transmission!

Here is a write-up to save time, it also includes how to do it on the differential: http://www.5cats.org/rx8/trans_diff_refill/

Now, unbolt the slave cylinder

1. The clutch slave cylinder is located on top of the transmission bellhousing
2. It has two bolts on the same side, I think they’re either 12mm or 14mm
3. Undo these bolts and then gently pull the slave cylinder out
4. Be careful with the clutch lines, they’re solid, but flexible.
5. Now, follow the clutch line to the bellhousing and you’ll see where it’s held on by a bracket
6. It’s held on by one 12mm bolt, take it off, and let the slave hang

Next, disconnect the 4 wires on top of the transmission, there are 2 black and 2 white ones, so make sure you label them.

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Time to unbolt the power-plant frame (PPF). It’s heavy, and I recommend having a second person there to help you manhandle it. Also, either get a transmission jack or fabricate one to support your transmission. I used a regular car jack with a piece of 2x4.

1. The PPF is held on by 9 21mm nuts at over 100 ft/lbs, so a breaker bar comes in very handy.
2. There are 4 nuts on the transmission end and 5 on the differential end.
3. Remove all 5 rear nuts and loosen all 4 front nuts, but leave one on there for support
4. Stick a piece of wood behind the diff to stop it from swiveling forward
5. Undo the last bolt on the front end
6. BE VERY CAREFUL! I highly recommend getting a second person there to support it while you take the last nut off. If it falls on you, it could seriously injure you.
7. Once you safely drop it, remove it from under the car.

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The fifth rear bolt is the one you see sideways going into the diff, this is a bolt, not a nut.

Removing the drive shaft

1. First off, be VERY careful with the drive shaft, if you as much as
scratch it you may want to consider a new one. They’re carbon fiber and balanced almost to perfection
2. Now, get into the car and make sure your e-brake is up
3. Get back under the car and remove the 2 bottom bolts on the drive shaft on the diff side.
4. Let the e-brake off, rotate the drive shaft to get the other 2 bolts showing, then pull the e-brake back up and remove the last 2 bolts.
5. Very gently tilt the drive shaft down and pull it out of the end of the transmission
6. I recommend wrapping it in towels and zip-ties to protect it
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And now the fun starts! Time to start removing the transmission bolts. Make sure everything is disconnected and out of the way. Basically, just double check everything.

1. There are 5 14mm bolts holding the transmission in.
2. There is also a bracket on the lower passenger side that is easily overlooked, remove it
3. There is one in each corner, except the top right has 2 bolts that you will most likely need a swivel and extensions to get to, unless you have baby arms :P.
4. Make sure your transmission is supported, and start undoing the bolts
5. Once the bolts are out, at least 2 people should hold the transmission and gently wiggle it side to side while sliding it backwards to slide the input shaft out.
6. Once you get it out, slowly and gently set it down and slide it out from under the car. I put it on a big piece of cardboard and slid It out from under the car.

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That is where your throwout bearing is located ^^. I highly recommend replacing it.

Now we’re ready to unbolt the pressure plate

1. The pressure plate is held on by 6 14mm screws with washers. I recommend using an impact gun as it will spin on the flywheel.
2. Loosen each bolt, but don’t take them off until they are all loose.
3. Remove pressure plate and clutch

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Now it’s time to unbolt the flywheel, but I’m doing that tomorrow so that’s when I’ll finish this write up! :D

Hope this helps out, it’ll be finished tomorrow night!

Nice!!

Thank you sir. Very nice for a first DIY and a solid contribution to the forum.

I completely forgot I never finished this write up!

I will now attempt to do so! Oh and sorry I forgot to take pictures of this part :[.

Unbolting the flywheel:
The flywheel is held on by a huge 54mm nut. There are 2 ways to get this off: Get a flywheel stopper and a 54mm socket with a GIANT breaker and a way to secure your motor, OR use an impact gun. The latter of the two is MUCH easier, but you will need access to a pretty large compressor (I have a 50gal and that seemed to barely get it off). The nut is held on with 300+ ft/lbs of torque.

1. Unbolt the flywheel nut.
2. If you plan to reuse the flywheel, you will need to GENTLY hammer on the outer edge in between the teeth and the friction surface until it comes lose. Be very careful not to damage your flywheel!!!
3. Resurface your flywheel if you reuse it!

Now you must remove your pilot bearing and pilot bearing seal.
Make sure you're prepared for this, because the RX-8 pilot bearing is much smaller than most pilot bearings and regular pullers from autozone are too big. I would recommend ordering the pilot bearing puller for the RX-8 from Mazdatrix.com. It makes the job happen in about 30 seconds. There are other methods, but none worked for me and they're a pain in the a$$.

1. Use pilot bearing puller to remove the bearing
2. I used a deep socket with an OD slightly bigger than that of the pilot bearing and seal. (The seal goes in after the bearing)
3. Gently tap the bearing and seal in until it sits flush with the output shaft, be careful not to push it in too far!
4. Don't forget to lightly apply heavy duty grease to the bearing!!

Installing new throwout bearing

1. The easier way I found was to remove the fork by taking out the metal spring thingy.
2. Grease the new T/O bearing and install! This is pretty straight-forward!

Now you're pretty much ready to put everything back on in reverse order.

Here are a couple tips:

Use BLUE threadlocker on the big 54mm flywheel nut and make sure you torque it down sufficiently.

Also use blue threadlocker on the pressure plate bolts. And be careful with these when you torque them because the snap easily.

Fill back up with tranny fluid and reinstall everything and pray it all works out! I was slightly amazed I didn't mess anything up as it was my very first clutch job ever :P.

Good luck and I hope this helped! Happy DIY-ing

Just a quick question for the OP, about how far did you jack up the car?

I had it up about 1". I was like 4-5 notches up on the jackstands.

Cool man. Thanks for responding! Im going to be doing my clutch soon so i am planning this stuff out.

A couple of things I would add from when I did mine.

The exhaust should have an earthing strap on the drivers side if you forget to take it off you exhaust will fall sideways, then you have to man handle it whilst reaching for a spanner to undo the wire.

I was told to mark the drive shaft on the rear diff and replace in the exactly the same position

When your nearly done Jack up the transmission and make sure the gear stick is the same height as before. Mine sat a little low, so I jacked up the car loosened the ppf and jacked it up then tightened it again.

Bleed the clutch line, mine had a little air bubble leaving the bite point really low on the clutch

Like the OP says be careful with the PPF when I was reinstalling mine I dropped it on my face, worst thing is you have to work through the pain and lift it up to secure whilst bleeding from your cheek.

Great write up OP mine took about 9 hours to do on my drive.

Thanks for the input! Mine took longer cause I didnt have all the tools before hand, which was a giant PITA.

And good luck Mongo! Just make sure you're fully prepared before you start.

Mine took longer cause I didnt have all the tools before hand, which was a giant PITA.

Yeah I forgot to mention riding to the Harbor freight and autozone on my bicycle to get socket attachments to get the nut on the top of the bell housing off.

Alos spraying all the bolts with WD-40 before you start will help get them all off.

Yeah I forgot to mention riding to the Harbor freight and autozone on my bicycle to get socket attachments to get the nut on the top of the bell housing off.

Alos spraying all the bolts with WD-40 before you start will help get them all off.

I had to wait for mazdatrix to send me the pilot bearing puller. I don't even have a bike :(.

thanks for the write up,I'll be doing this soon or biting the bullet and paying for it. sure isn't like an old american car haha

thanks for the write up,I'll be doing this soon or biting the bullet and paying for it. sure isn't like an old american car haha

It really isn't hard at all. This was my first clutch job ever.

Hardest part for me was taking out my old pilot bearing, until I caved and bought the tool for it and had it out in 30 seconds. Haha