I have a 2004 RX8 that has 34k miles on it.

About 3 months ago, the dealer changed the oil pump.
Then about 2 months ago, the dealer changed the spark plugs, coils, and spark plug wires.

Driving it last week, when I red lined the car, the check engine light blinked for a few seconds, and then shut off. This seemed to happen randomly when the car was redlined - sometimes the CEL came on, sometimes it did not.

After doing some research on this site, I took the car to the dealer and told them I thought it was misfiring at high RPM's. The dealer said they test drove it for 6 miles, and the check engine light never came on for them. They also said that the computer did not have any CEL codes in it. I was suprised to hear that, since I was under the impression that every check engine code is stored (even it it only comes on for a few secods) and can be pulled later.

I picked the car up from the dealer 2 days ago, and driving it this morning and red lining it (after the engine was warmed up), the check engine light once again blinked for a few seconds and then turned off.

I only have 3 weeks left in my bumper to bumber warranty, so can you please suggest what course of action I should take? What could be causing this, and how do I get the dealer to fix it before my warranty runs out?

Thanks for your help.

 

The dealer can supply you with a logging device.

It plugs into the OBDII port, you drive around for a day or 2, and they can download the data on their WDS.

Check engine codes are not all automatically stored. Some are stored immediately, some require the problem to happen multiple times, and some are mysteriously absent unless the CEL is illuminated at the time of reading.


Your issue, though just sounds like a simple misfire. Have you tried changing brands of Premium fuel?

 

hey the same thing happened a couple times to me -high revs-check engine light blinks..not always though... should I worry????

 

misfire...

You should worry in that rotaries are not comfortable with pre-ignition.

In the case of misfire: Coils, plugs, plug wires, engine cleaning with Seafoam or Mazda Zoom Cleaner. Also, use a good quality premium fuel.

 

You already reported an issue to the dealer, its logged in and if it shows up again you have proof it happend previously to the warranty expiring. Your engine is 8yr/100k mile warranty though and I would lean toward that being the issue. You can usually fight those issues as long as you brought it to the dealer with a issue and it wasn't resolved down the road. I do work for Mazda but those statements dont reflect the way they handle them, this was all a assumption based on working for a dealer in the past and having issues like that arise. You can usually talk to mazda hotline people and they will cover things like that if you attempted to have an issue checked that wasn't found as long as its not rediculous.

 

Check and make sure your plug wires are all on their tight. They just got you some new ones..maybe they didn't plug them up tight enough.

 

Thanks for all the advice. I think I will ask my dealer to hook up the logging device device so they can log the CEL and see what the exact issue is.

For the first 3 1/2 years of using the 8 as a daily driver, I never really had any major issues with it. Only in the past 6 months has the car had all these check engine lights, and I am at the dealer monthly now. I hope that this trend does not continue and that the 8 proves to be a reliable long term car.

 

A lot of problems with this car stem from dealerships not being able to diagnose the problem correctly. They throw something at it, and if it doesn't work, charge you for more work. I think that's your biggest issue right now. I would always follow behind their work and make sure it was done right.