nickyg190

So, back story.
My 2005 rx8 (which I've had for about 6 years, manual of course) started having some start up issues. It would be fine when it was cold but it wouldn't start once it warmed up, so if it stalled out i would need to push start it. After awhile I couldn't even let it idle with the a/c on otherwise it would stall out, and again, would have to push start. Finally had the money to get a new starter, did the swap, and then it just refused to idle. Anything below 1k rpms would just kill the engine. After arguing with it and revving it at 3 k, hearing a LOT of pops and backfires it started to run normal if it wasnt idling. Decided to just get it home, and it was running fine until about halfway home when it just gave up. no power, barely able to keep highway speeds. wouldnt start (i would let it coast and try to start it w/ starter and it cranked like it did with the old starter warm). barely made it home when it finally got low enough and died. Anyways, fast forward, all of my sparkplugs look good. no damage from what i can see, as well as wires and coils. All of my ignition systems are fine, in fact i even cleaned the plugs today but nothing.

So, ideas? i want to keep this as cheap as possible but im at a total loss.
recap- fuel delivery is fine, air hoses are good, fuses are good, ignition looks good, i dont have a cat, and plugs were just cleaned, and theres a new starter.

Love_Hounds

Does it have decent compression, determined by a rotary specific compression tester?

Also, what's the mileage and do you have another modifications on the car, besides the removed catalytic converter?

ECS

How do you know your plugs, wires and coils are fine? Have you recently changed them? If not how many miles on them?

nickyg190

I replaced all plugs, wires, and coils last year, and the coils and wires looked how they did when I put them in, nothings burnt out. Plugs were dirty but fine other than that, but they have about 15k miles on them if that. Engine has about 40k, and chassis has 140k. Haven't done a compression test yet, was thinking about checking that next, but the only other modification I've done was put in a k&n typhoon air intake. Rest is stock.

BigCajun

iTrader: (1)

A good starting point would be to
ditch the K&N intake and put the stock intake back on.
They're known to cause problems.

nickyg190

Only problem with that is I've had it on for 4 years now and the stock is long gone

BigCajun

iTrader: (1)

OK, well, looks like the compression test is next.

nickyg190

Sooo assuming it is bad compression, simply because I'm broke and trying to plan ahead and such. Is there a fix for the rotary engine with bad compression OTHER than replacing the engine?

Love_Hounds

HAHA, no.

You can make sure everything else is in tip top shape and make sure you have the upgraded starter to help with starting, but really your just making the issue worse.

Love_Hounds

Just a thought, did you oil the intake filter recently?

Some of the oil could be on the MAF sensor, causing stuff to go haywire. Easy and cheap to go get some MAF cleaner at an auto parts store and rule that out.

Afterwards trying to find a used stock airbox at a junkyard may not be a bad idea.

Loki

iTrader: (1)

Is the check engine light on? You're saying it gave pops and backfires while you were trying to get it to idle, that's an indication of way too much fuel in the exhaust, which shouldn't be there. Coils have been known to fail early, especially if they're cheap ones. They won't appear burned, that's not how that works, but the electronics inside don't work like they used to. You said the plugs were dirty, dirty with brown deposits? Dirty with oily deposits? Wet? Were they all the same kind of dirty?

The warm start problems still point to compression, but the sudden increase in symptoms points to something else. Even if you don't think it's the K&N intake, it's the K&N intake. There's a thread on here almost weekly about someone having idle problems only to discover it works fine after removing the K&N.

Vaibhav

Guys yesterday I was driving my car on a highway, and engine suddenly stopped, it was my luck that it stopped at near a shoulder. So I pushed it there. There was smoke from the hood, from the coolant container. I waited for some time for it to cool down and then I poured some coolant, and also it had very small amount of engine oil, so I poured around 5 quarts of it as well. Then I tried to start it, it was not starting as the battery was also dead, then toll road assistance came there and the guy gave my car a jump start, it was cranking but the engine was not starting, and as I pressed the gas after a while of charging my battery, it started but the silencer was smoking really bad as I was pressing gas. And it turned of, every time to start it I had to charge the battery for a while and again same things happened. Can someone help me in guessing the problem.

Loki

iTrader: (1)

Well..
1) your battery sounds dead
2) you might have WAY overfilled the oil which explains its inability to start and smoke from the exhaut. It takes 8 quarts. Unless you had less than half of the necessary oil in the car, 5 quarts is WAY WAY WAY too much and now everything is choked with oil. What does the dipstick read? If this has indeed happened, you'll need to take out the spark plugs, clean them off, take apart the intake tract from the filter to the throttle body and clean it out (ONLY use circuit cleaner or special MAF cleaner on the MAF sensor)
3) your coolant container may have ruptured and you need a new one. Check around the neck especially.
4) what are you doing driving a car with low oil level?

BigCajun

iTrader: (1)

It's considered rude to post in a thread when the OP has unresolved issues.
The next time you have a problem, find a thread where the OP found a solution, or find a dormant thread.