This applies for all the rx8 models/years.......Cars inspected about 10 different 8's between 2004 and 2005......only after two winters of driving u get this ......




btw this is not my car its up for sale at Erin Mills MAZDA i feel sorry fot the dude that gets this .......anyways you can prevent this from happening .......


watch out for the new thread coming soon on how to install ur own personal rock guard kit ......cost about 15 bucks

 

wow this is bad for such a new car. Maybe this is a problem for cars that are out east where they use a lot of salt on the road? Anyone have the same problem in Calgary? My 5 yr old RSX has a lot of road chips but thankfully has never develop rust on it yet. I am planning to drive the 8 in winter and definitely don't want this happening to my 8.

 

No matter what type of rust protection you get, you'll never cover everything.
Our winters are absolutely brutal on cars!

The only way to prevent this is to not drive in the winter.

Which means you need a 2nd vehicle. One you won't care too much for. But enough to get you around.

Otherwise, suffer the consequences...

 

What you could do though... is take a warm bucket of water, each weekend, just wipe the wheel well and lower areas, and rinse off and dry. It's not too much work really, I plan to do that, because in the winter, my condo washbay closes, so I can't wash the car at all. Clean the critical areas, and sspray underneath the car once every 2 weeks if possible.

 

Thats why i store my 8 for the winter

 

I have this on mine right now... not nearly as bad as in the pics, but you can tell its happening.

The good things is its fixable and wont look horrible due to the spot its in after you sand/paint.

The last pic u have there, how is the plastic bumper rusting :O

 

That's why I live in Arizona.
It was a miserable 73 degrees when I went to bed last night at 11:00pm.
I feel for you.

 

Do you work at a salt mine? Do you wash your car often? How did it happen, just normal driving over ?? many miles?

 

well pretty much anywhere in canada its salt on the roads to melt the ice... and many other places on the coast with the ocean mist sucks too.

It doesnt take long for salt to eat away at anything once its on your car. the smallest chip or scratch the salt water gets in there and starts creating pits, and those pits get more pits etc etc, until something visable to the human eye shows up.

 

Cloud7 --> I don't think that we will have this problem since they use sand and gravel for our roads (no salt). However more rock chips will happen here in Calgary.

 

Yep...extra dirty, and extra rock chips here...No salt though.

I wash my car every 2 weeks or so anyways, even in the winter time.

 

for all those of you who think that by washing ur car will stop rock chips ur wrong ....anyways i came up with a ROCK Guard Kit for our wheel wells so just give me some time to take the pics step by step on how to...... coming soon i promise just before the snow you will never have a rock chip again in ur wheel wells

 

another reason why I wash my car twice a week in the winter.

 

wow, that's dedication. Aren't you the fella that has all the problems with your 8?

 

Calgary doesn't use much salt but we do use some around this time of the year when it is not too cold yet. As many of you know salt doesn't work (melt ice/snow) once you get below -10 or so.

As for rock chips, I already have half a dozen chips on my paint and it's not the winter yet. I need touch up paint as the chips shows up as black on my white car and are very noticeable.

 

it's the liquid salt - brine that is more damaging! like water, they get into places where normal salt pebbles would just bounce off.

 

This is totally normal, happens to all RX-8. Get Mazda to repaint your rear wheel lips if you see any rust. The inside of the lip needs to be protected with tar.

 

I have some early signs or rust showing on my 04......is this something covered under warrenty?

 

i'm not sure if this type of rust is covered... although i heard of rust being covered by mazda if it was shown to be developing under the paint?

who knows.

 

good luck with that.....you will hear the line "Rock chip caused it"

 

I hate a dirty car.

 

yea, i have these little yellow(rust) dots all over my paint on my mazda3...it's white....

i don't know if this is normal...but i m pretty pissed off..

My rx8 dosen't have this problem.,,,but then its VR...so dose sit hide it?

 

Mazda has a history of premature rusting at the wheel wells...and not doing anything about it. If you search some of the Protege forums you will find all sorts of threads about this.

 

it looks like the person who owned that car basically let it get to that point and didn't do anything to slow or stop the rusting when they could have.......[I] would place that pretty much under neglect of your car... just my opinion. And, mazda doesn't do **** about a lot of things......but I had some rust on the inside of my door sills between where the doors close and they took care of it asap......its hit and miss with mazda.

 

If you're still under the 3 years bumper to bumper warranty, then they are more likely to pick up the full tab. Otherwise, it's going to be a crap shoot.

Random rust like this does not inspire confidence at all.