First Launch
 

Today I got bored and decided to go find a location to practice this heal/toe thing you guys talk about. After watching a quick movie someone posted, it was more than I could handle. Well, it's harder than the little movie makes it look, especially with walking shoes on. I finally got tired of this and decided to to try a launch. One of those things you get in your mind you shouldn't do but you know if you don't do it at this opportune moment your life will just not be the same. This is a new neighborhood with the roads just put in and no houses yet so I knew I could do a first gear burn, hit second and stop before the end of the 100 yards +/-. (Don't worry, this is not about a wreck!). I had driven through the roads and could see in all directions so I could tell it was just me.

I stopped the car, took her to 6000 RPM and dropped the clutch and WOT. I was surprised to see that she actually burned out briefly and then puttered off... dum bass, I forgot to turn off the DSC. OK, so I go back and start over but this time with the DSC turned off, hit 6500 RPM and dropped the clutch and WOT again. :p

Let me first say, I'm not sure where some of you get the notion that this car is underpowered! I was extremely surprised at the extended burn and how she really wanted to keep going. What an absolute pleasure. I expected wheel hop, choke down, sputtering, farting and such and what I got was raw power and she hummed like a sewing machine. :D

Second, I have had an issue with my clutch since I bought the car that I had brought up to my Mazda service department and was told that nothing was wrong with it. It was a kind of fluttering feeling when I would first push the clutch in and it would do this all the way to the floor. After doing the launch it seemed to have disappeared. Does anyone have any idea what might have happened. Sorry, I really don't have a better description of the "fluttering" except that it's kind of like the feeling you get if you put your hand on a unbalanced fan and it wobbles a little.

Third, I haven't driven a car with this much power since I had a 1968 Pontiac LeMans 350, 3 speed. So, some of you can talk about the lack of power if you like but I think if you put it into perspective, this little 1.3 liter is one hell of a machine. :D

Where is the heel and toe vid? I hear people talk about this but I don't know what they are talking about.

Also, I agree...I think the 8 pulls pretty hard and I have no complaints about performance.

i dunno you have an apple logo in your avator can't trust much of anything you say..

^^^haha it's not just an apple...it's a macintosh apple :D

can't apples and pcs just get along? :p

Look, this thread has nothing to do with mac's & PC's. I've been through this argument since 1984 and frankly it's not worth the discussion. Can we keep it on topic? I especially would like to know about the clutch issue.

There may have been a bit of unevenness on the ablative material on the clutch which was not getting worn down evenly with normal usage. When you 'dropped' it there may have momentarily been enough slippage to ablate the material and even out the engagement all the way around. Sorry if I'm not explaining it clearly, but I've seen this with other clutches. It's almost the inverse of the problem where a 'hotspot' on the flywheel results in uneven heat dissipation, uneven friction, and chattering.

So hitting it hard is probably just what it needed. I guess if I can use an analogy; on a lathe, if you don't have enough speed then you will not cut into the material but when you add speed and apply the tool it begins to cut. Is that similar?

The word you used "chattering" is what the service department used when I tried to explain it to them. The only reason I noticed it was because my previous 8 had a very smooth clutch.

Thanks JM1FE.

You got it. By extension, you can see how consistantly dropping the clutch at high RPM can cause excessive clutch wear, in addition to heat-damaging the flywheel and slamming other parts (driveshaft, differential, U-joints...) Moderation in all things. :D

I had amazingly bad chatter on a Peugeot clutch due to a burned flywheel (the Dreaded Previous Owner syndrome) and a shop tried to tell me "...they all do that..." after putting in a new pressure plate and throwout bearing. Dude, I don't think so. Dropped the transmission, replaced the flywheel, and had the smoothest clutch in the world. If you have chatter, there's about 4 or 5 things it could be, and there's no one-size-fits-all answer for it. In your case, you seem to have gotten lucky and should have no further problem.

But, what do I know... I guess they can't trust much of anything I say...

Why would you launch at 6000 RPM? Isn't the point to launch with as much force as possitlbe and not have too much wheel slip? I've always launched at around 4000 RPM.

FS

a little sensitive are we? i think those guys were just playing around with you so i think you should loosen up a bit :D

and have you ever launched any other car before?? if u havent how can you say the rx8 isn't underpowered because when launching an m3, sti, or g35 coupe you can really tell the torque difference between the rx8 and those other cars

fullsmoke, you are probably right on the 4000 RPMs. This is not something I'm experienced at and since I was not racing and had only about 100 yards to work with I wasn't really concerned about maximum traction. This was only a burn out trial and my curiosity was satisfied.

Mikelikes2drive, I've never launched anything other than a 68 Lemans and a 72 Toyota Celica back in my young days. Nothing since then. That's a hell of a long dry spell. I've never owned anything in the sport class since then other then a 200SX a/t and several a/t Maximas. So this was a new experience for me.

Not only was the 4th post in this thread not at all related to the topic, it was rude and pretty much a personal attack. The next two were simply adding fuel to the fire.

Look at it like this - there's another forum member who has 'vbprogrammer' as his user name. If he posted a question, should I ignore his question and respond with personal ridicule? I mean, come on.... Visual Basic... :rolleyes: I could have a field day with that...but I choose not to. Picking on someone in such a childish way really does make you a pr!ck.

As for being sensitive, apparently somebody was sensitive enough to react to SilverEIGHT's freakin' avatar with a personal attack, so back off of him for deflecting the crap and focusing on the topic.

Everyone chill out, and not take everything so personal. back to topic, i launched my car for the first time the other day as well. i dont drive many manual cars, but I've launched my friends NSX and i can say that even tho the rx-8 is powerful, most torquey cars would blow it out the water. i sat in my cousin's M3 and he almost tore my eyeballs out...i love that car. but its a moot point anyways, i own an 8 and i knew that the torque tooling around town was a little low, but that's not what i bought it for. im happy with the performance, knowing if i wanted to i could drop the clutch at 7000 rpm. if i wanted to.

Whats a WOT ?? :o

Wide Open Throttle

WOT = Wide Open Throttle = accelerator to the floor.

So where do most of you guys take off from? 4K or 6K, or 7K+? I've read that anything under 8K saw significant drops (or should I say increase) in acceleration times. I personally have taken off in the 6K range myself (no wheel hop at that rpm) but what do you all do normally?

Note: What does BTW mean? I forgot and it's driving me crazy... :p

BTW = By The Way

Check this out too :) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_slang

^ That site is wrong. IMHO = In My Honest Opinion.

i always thought IMHO = in my humble opinion

No, it's In My Humble Opinion, to be deferential when stating an opinion in a heated discussion. As opposed to IMNSHO, which is In My Not-So-Humble Opinion - a more arrogant "I know I'm right" statement.

So, IMNSHO we should quit threadjacking and get back to the discussion of launching at what RPM. :D

yup. always used it as humble...although i don't thing that honest would be a wrong interpretation.