Nadrealista

Update on my cold start misfires:

I checked the coolant level again this morning and it was significantly lower with car cold. I drove the car for 5-6 miles and when I pulled into parking lot I left it running and took a look at the coolant reservoir again. it was above full mark and I could notice bubbles coming up from the bottom portion of the reservoir. If I am not mistaken that definitely confirms that combustion gasses are leaking pass the coolant seal into cooling system and coming up in the overflow reservoir :-(

I took oil sample and sent it for analysis, this will come in handy when I go to visit Mazda dealer and ask for a new engine. There are several of them in the DC metro area, any recommendations which are more rotor crowd friendly?

Grace_Excel

iTrader: (5)

Just my thought, when you observed this overflow was your heater turned on? You will definitely see a rise of fluid and bubbles in the reservoir. Anyway, I have this issue of initial rough start(CEL) and misfire(blinking to solid CEL) but without engine hesitation during hard drives. This have been an issue for almost a month now.

Brief History:
Original Engine just passed 157,000 miles
OEM Cat has close to 80,000 miles
NGK Plugs have about 17,000 miles
OEM Coils have about 5-6,000 miles
NGK wires have about 2,000 miles
First two weeks, I checked the plugs which were pretty clean then I flipped the coils from T1 to T2 and L1 to L2 and that made the CEL disappear, the initial starts are smooth. But the problem slowly came back. This week, I'll change the spark plugs, gonna have the CEL read then flip the coils again, and do this DIY TeamRX8 posted of "Testing (GM LS2/Yukon) coils and sparkplug wires".

Grace_Excel

iTrader: (5)

Videos: Initial rough start with misfire(blinking to solid CEL), Misfire at start-up, but no hesitation after warm-up.

Nadrealista

There should be no air/bubbles coming up from the bottom of the overflow reservoir. Coolant system is a closed system so if air is getting in you most likely have bad seal and combustion gases are getting by the seal and introducing air into coolant system - bubbling from the bottom of the over flow tank...

try putting bottle of aulmaseal in your coolant..

Grace_Excel

iTrader: (5)

Then, you should see fluid dripping under your car and white smoke out of your exhaust. Refer to 9krpmrx8, that's what caused his third engine to fail. Burp the air out and add fluid to see if you're really leaking, anyway, change plugs and coils then see how the car start.

Nadrealista

white smoke might or might not show when you have bad coolant seal, it depends where the seal went bad if it is in the exhaust or intake portion of the stroke there will be white smoke, however if it is in the compression part you will not get white smoke with engine running since combustion pressure > coolant system pressure, hence only misfires in the mornings. when the car is off coolant system pressure > engine pressure so coolant gets in overnight.

my car starts fine from the first crank but it has misfire in one of the rotor housing due to the coolant leak which pools overnight and fouls the plugs in the morning. I just got my oil analysis back and there is antifreeze in the oil which conforms that that I have bad coolant seal on one rotor.

that leaves me with 2 options: AlumaSeal is the first one - cheap but might not be permanent, new engine is obviously permanent solution but very costly. 2K for Mazda reman engine and 1k for the install does that sound right?

Anyone knows what is the dealer cost for Mazda reman and how many hours they should charge to replace engine?

Grace_Excel

iTrader: (5)

Nadrealista, were you getting the white-condensation-gunk in the oil dip stick? I've never had it before and I know a small amount of it is fairly common, but mine seems to coat around most of the stick itself. I'm gonna try a cheap fix as well, looked into some coolant seals at Pep Boys last night; some inexpensive Prestone and a few expensive ones like K-Seal. So, my question is; besides the reman-engine, did you have some luck with AlumaSeal?

DeViLbOi

iTrader: (1)

Before you go damaging your engine by trying to pass the powder around your engine and clogging things up...have you verified you have had the TSB performed that removes the white gunk?

Grace_Excel

iTrader: (5)

I've the TSB, however, I've forgotten about it; thus, why I haven't performed the change.

DeViLbOi

iTrader: (1)

Do that change and don't worry about dumping random metally bits into your engine.

rockin

I have an 04 with 95000 miles with the same mis fire after start discribed in this thread. After tne engine starts it misifires for 5-10 second, then runs fine.

Over the past 3 weeks I have been dry motoring the engine for a few seconds ( holding accelorator to the floor while holding the starter, then releasing the accelerator) during the start.

This has prevented check engine lights for a mis fire for over 3 weeks and eliminates any noticable misfire after start.

While this is a stort term band aid it is not a solution.

Has anyone had any luck resolving the misfire during engine start?

Grace_Excel

iTrader: (5)

When did you have the Spark plugs, Ignition coils, and wires replaced?

Bladecutter

Yes, by actually fixing the problem.

BC.

hdgoddess

I have an '04 with 159K miles. She started having problems when my son took her to a car wash (I told him to hand wash her!!), came back, shut her off and wouldn't restart (don't let your kids drive your RX-8s!). Even though she was up to temp, she acted like she was flooded, so we went through the deflooding process, which took MANY tries, but finally got her started. She smoked white smoke (the usual) like crazy, but wouldn't stop smoking.

Over time she got harder and harder to start, still smoked some and there was lots of water on the dipstick. Now I can't get her started at all.

I am assuming from this thread, it's the coolant seal(s). I don't want to go pouring just anything in my car's systems. Is there any way to replace the seal(s)...or is that just a bandaid? Or is buying a new/used/rebuild engine the only way to go? And if I have to go with a different motor, what's the best option to go with - rebuild or used?

I love my 8 and I want to get her back on the road! I miss her! So any help you can provide, will be MUCH appreciated!

Brian LeetGod Slemp

um no replacing the seals is way better then a bandaid it just means rebuilding the engine and you may as well do the apex and side seals on rotors while in there