finalturismo

So i just purchased a Mazda RX8, looks like i will be a pretty active member in this club as long as i don't die

BACKGROUND
PERSONAL
Let me first introduce my self, i am 31 years old and this is my 2nd car i have owned as a hobby. I love birds , computers, cars, family, alcohol and fine women. I grew up on a commodore 64 and i am a heavy computer nerd and use my skills to make money. I consider my self an intermediate mechanic with ability to usually get done what i need to do when it comes to car work.

MY 1987 MK3 Supra
I used to have a MK3 Supra and was an active car enthusiast. I picked my old MK3 supra turbo up for about $1100 with a blown head gasket. Now your lucky to find one in that condition for under 8K. I drove it carefully by turning it on and off when she was starting to get hot, i got her back to my friends warehouse and started tearing apart the motor. I didn't know anything about Supras but i always wanted one. Hell i didn't even know how to do a head gasket job. I figured i would learn how as i was tearing apart that Supra, which are VERY easy to work on BTW. I ordered my HKS head gasket/ARP bolts and torqued them down to spec, put the car back together and it wouldn't start. It didn't start for another week until i found out the coil packs were in reverse order. SHE STARTED RIGHT UP, the car n00b had him self a MK3 Supra with HKS Headgasket and ARP Bolts.
I had the time of my life with that car and enjoyed some of attention i got from it. I got her to 16psi with some junk yard injectors and no tune, she was a beauty. I did some minor upgrades to it, ARP bolts, HKS 1.2mm head gasket, upgraded boost, inner cooler kit, new paint job and new rims. I did almost all of the work on that car besides the welding for the inner cooler system and the paint job. I was on a tight budget but i ended up with about a 350-400 HP MK3 Supra that looked GREAT. I let her go when she was constantly being towed out of my apartments with random flat tires till i couldn't afford to get her and i didn't want to ask for any money to get her out. Now i would of raised hell for that car if i knew what they were going to be worth in the future.

The overheating 7MGTE LIVES
One thing everyone should know about the 7MGTE engines is that they are almost indestructible when they over heat. Let me tell you a small story about how i learned to never trust a car temp gauge. When she was in her prime , i drove near 20 miles with NO WATER.
Now when you have a steal head-gasket they might not break in a way so water/oil starts goes into combustion chamber and your car stops when your over heating. Instead the MK3 just kept going and going and going. Eventually i started to smell aluminum burning, i pulled over and opened the hood only to find the worst over heating event of a car i have ever seen in my life. Aluminium and rubber smoking everywhere, the car wouldn't turn on after i turned her off. Waited an hour, added water and drove the MK3 home with near no compression and weird air noises coming from the head gasket area. I didn't have money to resurface the head, i was desperate. So out of desperation and going against what everyone told me i took the head off of the car and saw some pitting on the cylinder walls. I put the head back on and with anger i drove the ARP bolts back down 15 LBS ABOVE ARP TORQUE spec. To my disbelief, it worked and the car started. Compression was mostly still in range and it ran great for the next 2 years. So anyone that tells you that a 7MGTE is not a good engine, think again.



The purchase of the RX8
Budget - $4000
Purchased price $1,500
Money spent on repairs / tuneup - $600
So i had my heart set on an RX8 because of the rotary motor, i always wanted one since i was about 22 years old. I just finished a decent sale on some computer inventory and decided to go shopping. I checked Facebook Market Place, Offerup, Craigslist and 5 Mile.
I had a price limit of about 4 grand. The first RX8 i came in contact with was blue with a light style body kit for $1,500. It had some dings and more dash lights than i could count fingers on my hand. I decided to stay away from it because it did not have leather seats and the cosmetic condition was a little rough. So i drove down the street in Fort Worth for another RX8 that was black and listed for $2,300. When i arrived at the scene of the crime, the tire was flat and the battery was dead. The car looked like it was in GREAT cosmetic condition. So i wanted it and i wanted it bad. I checked the oil and it looked horrible, but i did not see any water in the oil. I checked the water and it was at about half capacity. A check engine light was on and the steering light was on. There was rust all over the engine bay from water spraying out, almost like it had over heated slightly. We got the car started up and drove it to the nearest Autozone (The tires were run flats and almost new). When i was driving to auto-zone it looked like it was about to over heat. The owner had told me it was just the thermostat, but i knew better. We made it to auto-zone where the car died because of my poor experience with the clutch in reverse. We couldn't get it jumped because of a weak alternator on my friends car and the battery was already toasted. This is when i decided to offer $1400 for the car, it was the perfect opportunity for me to make the offer. I had one big gamble on my hand and that was something equivalent to a blow gasket, as i didn't know much about the rotary engines i had no clue. The owner thought about it for a while and i put another offer of $1500, said lets make it a day. He slowly took the offer, i was happy but i was also questionable. I knew couldn't take the car back in its current condition. So it was tow the car, remove the thermostat and hope for the best or drive it home over the coarse of a few hours very carefully. I didn't have any tools so i decided to buy some at Autozone. (should of brought mine with me -.-) After i got the tools my friend started tearing apart the car to get to the thermostat, hes very helpful and kind. He seemed to know what he was doing so i went back into Autozone to look around for a new battery and other stuff we needed. By the time i got out, he already had the pully off and had the thermostat housing exposed (DAM that was fast). I used some high temp gasket maker and put the original O-ring back in place. We put the car together and spent 30 min trying to air the tire with Fixaflat and a portable air pump. Believe it or not, it eventually worked and sealed the small hole. I was so excited to see if it really was just the thermostat. We jumped in and drove it up the street, the temperature was locked in the middle and i was extremely satisfied with my investment. I knew not to trust the temp gauge from past experiences, so i pulled over and poped the hood. It smelled like antifreeze and the engine bay in certain areas seemed much hotter than normal, but the engine it self seemed cool. I was confused, very confused. I didn't find any major leaks but i did fine some wet spots on the radiator. The leaking was so small i decided i could drive it home, during the ride home i noticed the heater was not blowing hot air. I didn't know what was going on but the radiator seemed to be heating up with the coolant lines,so i was watching the engine carefully. It had a check engine and coolant light on but the coolant was not low at all. We made it to a half way point back to the warehouse and got some food. After we finished eating we started heading back home again. When i was driving i could smell more antifreeze. I ignore it and just drove fast on the high way at low RPM. When we made it to the warehouse i poped the hood and got the same results that confused me. The engine was cooler than most usually are, but there was a lot of heat coming from the engine bay. I went to sleep and got up the next morning and purchase a infrared temperature monitor at Home Depot for about $25 bucks. Around this time i also did the proper sea-foam engine flush and fixed the steering. I drove the car around checking temps, from my memory they were around 160F at the radiator, around 155-165 on the engine block. and around 170F on the oil pan. Everything was cool..... but still no heat from the heater. I thought for sure there was a circulation problem and that because of the small engine and open thermostat it was staying cool. So i ordered a water pump and dual core performance radiator. I quickly swapped the water pump from the one i ordered from Autozone and flushed the radiator and oil a few times prior to installing the water pump. I discovered the old water pump was fine and installed the new one anyway. I took the car for a test drive and it did seemed to help a bit just getting the old liquids out , but something still seemed off. I smelled the burning smell again when city driving, it was a mixtures of smells at one time with antifreeze. I knew why i was smelling the antifreeze because of the wet spots on the radiator, but i did not recognize some of the other smells. I kept pulling over and lasering every part of the car and couldn't figure out what was going on. The next day of driving her i decided to pull engine codes again and saw 2 miss fire codes. I looked at the NGK spark plugs, wires and they looked almost new. I pulled a spark plug out and it looked GREAT. From what i read on the forums it seemed it was pretty common for a coil pack to toss a random misfire code. So i replaced the coil pack on the cylinder, another misfire code was showing as misfire on cylinder 1. The misfire codes vanished, yay!!!!. As i don't have any experience with rotaries i was curious if a misfire could also cause it to get hot. I drove it around again and it was a lot smoother in throttle response, i didn't even feel the first misfire anyway. I stilled smelled burning, just not as bad and it was driving a lot better. I knew i fixed a big problem but not the one i have been worried about. I look under the car at the cat and there it was a glowing red cat. THAT WAS IT, i knew it had to be removed. So i jacked up the car and got under it. Once i saw the size of the pipes i decided i am not going to get an exhaust and just stick with stock. I removed the cat and went to war with its internals for about 30 minutes, blood and guts all over the floor. I put it back on and to my surprise the car still sounded the same. The throttle response had improved and now the burning smells were for the most part all gone.


Problems the RX8 had when purchased
Bad thermostat -FIXED (I didn't know if thermostat was bad or something equivalent to a bad head gasket in a rotary motor when i purchased the car)
Rusted and partly bad radiator - not fixed
Loose steering column - FIXED
Clogged cat (glowing red) - FIXED
1 faulty coil pack - FIXED(causing misfire on cylinder 1 and a random misfire CEL code)
Flat tire - FIXED
Dead battery - FIXED
No ac - Not fixed
No hot air - Not fixed
BAD OIL - FIXED
BAD COOLANT - FIXED

Work done to the RX8

• Decat (Cat was clogged and glowing red, so i banged out the honeycomb)
• Electric steering fixed (Cleaned connector)
• Random misfire and misfire on cylinder #1 (Fixed by replacing first coil pack)
• Dead battery (Replaced battery, duh!)
• Flat tire (Air added, same stuff you breath)
• Loose steering column (Fixed by molding a steal piece around a pipe that was the same size as the steering column, used a few c clamps and it came out better than the stock plastic collar, way better) Credit: Johnathan for the idea
• Replaced water pump (Was not needed, i was convinced it was because of the heat coming out of the engine bay and only small puffs of hot air coming out of the heater core)
• Removed thermostat (Temporary)
• Changed OIL (Absolutely horrible looking)
• Changed Coolant (Absolutely horrible looking)

Goals - To Be Done When Orders Arrive

• A very fast and clean looking stock RX-8
• Learn and play with tuning a bit
• Remove all emissions related items from ECU
• Lower temperature for when the electric fans turn on
• Increase Redline limit to 12,000 RPM
• Redo fuel maps
• Install automatic premix oil kit
• Cold air intake
• Remove EGR Value
• Remove Air Pump
• Install Manifold Block Off Plate
• Remove all remaining emission hardware
• Upgrade ignition system
• Increase Red line limit to 12,000 RPM
• Install coil over suspension kit
• Black tint on windows and lights
• Install a Linux based tablet or computer in dash for tuning and car monitoring (If there are any Linux based tuning apps, but i can do a lot of cool stuff with Linux

Future Goals

• Upgraded Injectors
• Turbo Kit - 350HP
• Female with no clothes on inside car

Questions for the RX8club members

• What is everyone's opinion on the best tuning software to use and or palm style tuner?
• Where can i get the latest ECU flash update for my car? (Downloadable)
• When it comes to tuning where do i start (I can figure it out fast with a few pointers, does anyone has a tuning guide that is reputable and easy to understand?)
• Why is my heater not blowing hot air and only puffs of hot air it once in a while? Is it possible my stock radiator has a blockage?
• Can i get a waiver for the site registration time of 30 days? I am a very experienced forum user and provide easy to read eye content

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