JadedMarxist

Ok i had someone offer me double what I paid for my 05gt. How could I refuse? This guy drove 10 hour one way to pick this car up. Now he gets it home and takes it to the mazda dealer.

Well the service tech tells the buyer there is oil in his coolant! I checked the coolant and oil almost daily always watched my temps drove it 3000km in 2 months and only used maybe 2/3 of a quart of oil from the crankcase.

I asked buddy to get a second opinion but he's so rural that a second opinion from another dealer is to much cost so, I offered him a G back.

Not that I'm thinking the buyer is trying to screw me but I wonder if tech knew what he was doing, when I was checking it was thru the cap hole as I'm sure that's the way they checked too I think I would have noticed it too.

The coolant if I'm remembering correctly was always a orange like gm antifreeze.

Unfortunately I'll never know as the car is gone but I still gotta wonder.

CaymanRotary

I mean, buyer beware. If he lives in the sticks and knows no one with experience with these cars, he's gonna have a bad time. I wouldn't give him any money back to be honest...

Loki

iTrader: (1)

So he drove it back over 10 hours? Who knows what could have happened in that time. He had plenty of time to check the coolant when he picked it up, right?

That said, orange is the wrong coolant for this car. Tell him to change for Mazda FL22. Other coolants can eat the seals over long term. That still wouldn't get him oil in the coolant, but he should look into fixing it anyway.

Are you sure he's not trying to say you have coolant in the oil? The dipstick on these cars gets frothy, especially in winter, from condensation. Many people who don't know better have confused this for a blown head gasket There is even a Mazda TSB his tech can look up

ipena4

Hey guys, so I'm using my dad's 2004 RX8 and I've had it for about 3 months now. I went to check the oil earlier and noticed a creamy "cappuccino'' colored substance on my dipstick. I told my dad about it and he told me it may be coolant getting into the oil which would be caused by a blown head gasket and told me to change the oil and check the oil. I did that and the oil looked completely fine, I let it warm up and took it on the highway. My dad had told me that a blown head gasket may cause loss of power, I think I let that part get into my head because the car did feel a bit sluggish but I didn't think much of it until I was driving down the highway and noticed that I couldn't get the car above 90 mph. I downshifted to 4th, got down to 65 mph and tried again but to no prevail. Is this a blown head gasket? Could it be anything else? Where do I go from here? Anything helps!!

Loki

iTrader: (1)

This engine doesn't have a head gasket. Or a head.
Milky froth on the dipstick is normal in cool weather in a 2004.

ipena4

What about the loss of power?

Loki

iTrader: (1)

What maintenance have you done on the car? Is the check engine light flashing at any point?

Things to check would be:
- catalytic converter
- ignition coils and spark plugs
​​​​​

CaymanRotary

You can always do a block test to confirm. The RX8 doesn't have a head gasket but it does have coolant jacket seals which can fail. A simple block test would confirm if they have failed.

ipena4

I’m not quite sure about maintenance, it was my dads car, I know it has an aftermarket intake and a cat delete. I do have an engine check light for a bad neutral start switch and running rich. I parked the car until I can run a compression test, and 2 other tests (forgot what they were).

Loki

iTrader: (1)

What intake is it? Most perform worse than stock and create problems like this. There's no good reason for it to runn rich and may indicate a deeper issue.

ipena4

I’d have to ask my dad about that or check tomorrow, I’ll let you know once I figure it out. I believe it was that it was running rich, I’d have to scan it again to be 100% sure.

ipena4

I finally got around to checking the intake, it's an "injen technology" intake. I got my compression tester today, it is a piston compression tester. Would anyone happen to know of a good video to use the compression tester on a rotary engine? I've been looking around and it looks like you need to record the cranking rpm somehow? Not sure how to do that accurately.

CaymanRotary

Any intake other than stock can cause issues in this car. I would take the filter off and inspect to see if there is oil in it. It could just be running poorly due to a block in the intake. Here's the video you requested.

ipena4

Could it lose that much power because of a blocked intake though? That amount of power loss seems extremely significant especially I've gotten up to 107 without trying top it off.

CaymanRotary

Absolutely yes it can, especially if the filter is blocked. Those filters should be changed every 12,000 to 15,000 miles and be cleaned every oil change in between. They can fill with gunk and dirt and no longer allow sufficient air to get to the engine. This can cause significant power loss depending on how blocked the filter is.

ipena4

I just took off the intake and it wasnt very dirty as far as I could tell, it was definitely a bit oily and had dirt all over it but it didn't look crazy dirty. I'm trying to find my can of compressed air to clean it and then was thinking I'd clean the MAF sensor while I'm here.

CaymanRotary

If you are cleaning the MAF, make sure to use MAF cleaner and be very careful handling it. The glass is very fragile. Definitely clean the filter too.

ipena4

I did use MAF cleaner that I previously used for my other car. I wanted to update anyone who might be reading this, I just finished running a compression test and as long as I did everything properly the lowest reading is 8.09 bar. This means I have excellent compression. I also ran a block test and there is no gases in my coolant and haven't seen anymore white 'foam' in the oil dipstick. I'm going to be cleaning the air intake next and then probably spark plugs. The last thing I know of that could be causing this much loss of power is a backed up catalytic converter. However, my dad told me he had his catalytic converter bypassed and wasn't sure if there is only one or if there's two. Anyone know about that? I looked it up and couldn't find anything.

Loki

iTrader: (1)

Remove the injen garbage and get a stock intake. See if it works then. Bet it's the issue.

ipena4

I'll see about doing that after I clean it to see if that does anything, thank you for the suggestion. Another question though, I used the compression calculator mentioned in the video above and my cranking rpm was 180 for the front rotor and 192 for the rear, is it supposed to be so low?

Loki

iTrader: (1)

No, nornal starting rpm is 250ish. Early starters perform worse, it's an easy replacement though.

ipena4

Could that cause me to have an innacurate compression test then? Also it wasn't answered so do you know if the RX8 has two catalytic converters?

Loki

iTrader: (1)

1 cat. Low compression will prevent the car from starting but not noticeably affect performance at speed once it's running. The symptoms fit a clogged cat, yes, but if it was removed then it's not that.

If you have an OBD scanner, see what your fuel trims are on a warm idle, and again whem the issue occurs. Report back, that might be a clue.

But again, intake is prime suspect. Did it ever work properly?

ipena4

I haven't had the car that long so I don't really know about the intake but I'll get an OBD scanner and run that.

Xmorbidarx

Did you ever find the problem?