Help! (Engine failed 8 days past warranty)
 

Hey everyone,

This is my first time on this forum. I own a 2004 RX-8, about 70k on the engine. I was recently notified that my engine needs replacement and I am 42 days over my 8 year warranty. The mazda dealership requested and was denied the replacement, I contacted the 800 number for mazda and within less than 24 hours once again I was denied. I purchased the vehicle in 2009, not knowing much about the vehicle, which was a mistake. After recently viewing the vehicle maitenance records of the car it became quite clear that the flooding issues I was having prior to the engine replacement diagnosis was happening to the vehicle years before i purchased it. The engine has never been repaced.

In short I love this car, but is there any other recourse I can take to get mazda to replace this engine???

You took the only options. If they refuse, they have no legal requirement or even legal pressure to voluntarily cover an engine replacement for you outside of an already voluntarily extended engine warranty.

Your options are pretty much limited to selling the car, parting it out for cash, or replacing the engine. Replacing the engine options include a built engine upwards of $10,000k, all the way down to buying a used engine from a part out for as low as ~$1,000. Mazda remans can be purchased for around $1,800-$2,300 depending on the dealer, but there is poor quality control on them and you have a decent chance of a DOA engine that they won't take back and give you a refund, and even if it isn't DOA, it could be dead within 10,000 miles. Or it could last 50-100k. Like I said, poor quality control. If you are buying a rebuilt engine, the cheapest option that I'm aware of and you should be able to trust is Mazmart, for around $3,000 plus shipping and core charge. Other engine rebuilds exist, but pretty much anything cheaper than that would make me really suspicious about their quality, and I wouldn't trust it.



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they are denying them for people who are still in warranty, good luck

As I've said to other people:

You've had a good long time to learn about the car, find this forum, and get your engine checked and covered under warranty, but you chose not to until after your car was outside of the warranty period. A warranty period that Mazda voluntarily extended on their own, to 8 years/100k miles.

Exactly how long does a car need to be covered under warranty until everyone's satisfied?

BC.

This year is the last year on the 8 year warranty on my car. It has 37k+ miles and i'm glad the engine is still running good. I might have to do a compression test before my warrant expires, to check the condition of the engine, just in case.

time for a 13B-REW-TT swap!!!

You're entitled to your opinion, but it's disheartening to me that this poor attitude and misinformation still exists after all this time I've spent in the rotary community working to prove otherwise. But hey, its your money, spend twice as much as you have to if you really feel like that's what you need to do when the time comes.

To the thread starter: there are other options available to you than a $3000 (plus remove/install) engine block build, you just have to be smart enough to look for them.

Can you elaborate on this? I'm looking to buy one with 2 years/45k miles left on the 8 year/100k mile warranty.

Yeah, many builders are blindly promoted by people who really have no clue what those builders rebuild process is, or what they are capable of. It really does a disservice to the community actually as I know several people who were led to believe certain builders were capable and reputable when they were not.

But I also acknowledge that it is the customers responsibility to educate themselves and do proper research before deciding on a builder and level of build.

It would be nice to have a thread dedicated to build experiences but I realize that would probably get out of hand quickly.

You have to read the warranty documentation, there are certain stipulations and if they find a reason to deny you, they likely will. However, I did get a warranty engine installed at 96,000 miles. But my dealer is pretty cool and at that point I had a pretty good relationship with them.

You will have an uphill battle if your point was about the remans.

I honestly have never seen a price from you, so I am unable to comment. I don't question your quality, but I can't make an assumption on your rough price.

I don't mean any offense by the omission. I'd think you would agree that there are some rebuilders out there that are really cheap and indeed complete crap.

My comment was definitely not re: mazda remans. I just took one apart last night that represents ignorance at it's finest. Pictures!

From everything I can tell, it's the higher priced builders who seem to do the most questionable work. I just gone done re-rebuilding a 4000 mile old custom build from a big name shop in FL that charges 4 grand-plus for their blocks and I saw a lot of QUESTIONABLE stuff in it. I have the pics hosted on my server if you'd like to see. Pictures! . The owner was NOT happy with what I showed him. He wound up wanting to replace both rotors and both rotor housings (1 housing was damaged due to a cracked apex seal, the others were in questionable condition when built).

I have to say that I agree with Kevin in that you don't have to be roped into paying $3k+ for a rebuild unless you're talking full service pull and replace, and several hard parts damaged. I've NEVER paid $3000 for a rebuild, ever. Even with buying a short block renesis and the bridge porting, I think it came out to around $2500 tops including shipping, complete rebuild, and everything.

Kevin is a stand up guy that does good work at a very reasonable price. I can't say that I've ever heard a negative comment from any of his customers that I know of.

His prices are right on the Rotary Resurrection website under whatever specific generation car you're looking for if you're ever curious...

Yeah there is a difference between a professional re-builder that runs a reputable business than some hack (like BDC) that works out his garage and has no real skills. If it's one thing I have learned over the years, it is to educate yourself so that you can ask the right questions and do your research, talk to people who have had similar work done, ask for references, etc. After all it is a decent amount of money for most.

There is nothing I hate more than to see some poor guy get ripped off.

What members CAN do is make a whole thread for their rebuild experience in the Good Guy/Bad Guy section. That would be huge for those of us hoping our Mazda re-mans will last forever. :fingersx:

I have a good guy thread about my builder Rob @ Pineapple :)


But people need to venture outside of this site as well to research. There are a few reputable stand up guys that will build you an extremely solid engine (if you allow them to do so). And opinions vary but IMO, how a guy handles a bad situation tells me a lot about them even if they have managed to make a few customers happy.

If money is no object then you can hire very special builders that will build you something pretty amazing but that is not an option for most.

Problem is, people are too lazy to do that. I have done tens of successful rx8 builds so far and I can't get a single one of them to overcome their laziness and post about it publicly. You know the old saying, and it really does work that way: you make a mistake that one time out of 50 and the customer will whine to 1000 people because of it; you do a perfect job the other 49 times and no one will know about it.

I've even gone so far as emailing previous customers months or years after the build and asking them if they are satisfied and if they'd be willing to post a review here. I've been ignored. :tear:

You know it's bad when I offer them a $50 rebate for their online review after 6 months of ownership (positive or negative) and $100 for a referral, and out of tens of rebuild customers in the past 3-4 years ZERO of them have bothered to complete any of it. The bottom line is, people are selfish and the only like to bitch, but not praise in most cases.

Or it could just be that I'm that much of a dick. :rofl:

I just cannot comprehend that. That is crazy.

there are many reasons an engine may live beyond or die before it's time and it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the builder

there are some builders who consider installing certain used parts as being questionable too,

it's not the price that counts, but the builders experience and reputation, which generally the best of the best who provide the best using the best command a higher than typical price

Thanks for the input. Could you recomend some resourses I could start to look at to learn more about re-builds from reputable sources.

Why don't you tell us what part of the country (or world) you're located in?

I still have to set up my profile but I am located in central IL around the Peoria IL area.

You have banzai racing and a-spec nearest to you although I do not know if they deal with rx8s yet. Not all builders have embraced the platform or have much experience with the engines. There is also rx7store in ohio and I am in east Tn. There are tens of rotary shops in the eastern US, some more "high end" than others, so it's up to you to do your own research. The reason locality can play into your decision is because of shipping or vehicle transportation costs.