I am thinking about buying an rx-8 but i have some questions for you high mileage owners. I want a car that is very reliable because I will be using it as a daily driver, 50+miles per day. i have heard that the engine burns a lot of oil and i have to keep on checking it. i have also heard that a rotory engine costs a lot to maintain. I am still in collage and cant really afford to pay excessive amounts to maintain the car. so my questions are:
1)do i really have to check the oil every 500 miles?
2)how many miles before changing the oil?
3)what are your dealer service costs like?
4)what are your other maintenance costs like?
5)are rotory engines costly in the long run?
please help me out, your answers will help me out a lot in my decision. any other issues that might help are welcomed. Thank you.
-Aaron

[<- I dont know who wrote this but I (account Hink) have not. At least my account wasnt used for writing something rude
(I changed my pwd)]

 

1) No. check it about every 250-300 miles, or every other fill up. For me its add oil every sunday.
2) 7,500 according to Mazda. 3000 according to any sane individual
3) bend over
4) its under warranty, after it expires, bend over.
5) read 3 and 4

but yea I think its gonna be a reliable car. Oh and yea BTW..any dealership whether NISSAN or MAZDA or whatever will charge a fortune for service.

 

Well, honestly your biggest shock and expense will be fuel. I commute 50+ per day also, and by far the biggest cost of ownership has been fueling it. I wouldn't trade it for anything else, though. I've had no problems with it. I haven't been able to get the dealer to change the oil yet, as it is always longer than 1-hour wait (I'm usually too busy). So, I've been doing my own oil changes. The only reason I try is to make use of my free service card...

 

If you're in college, why do you spell it "collage"?

 

haha... good one. that's not the only one though.
"welcomed"??

 

I have not had to add any oil yet! Check every 700-1000 miles and not added a drop and I have 2400 miles on it so far!! So oil is no big deal to me!!!

 

The engine, in itself, should not be costly aside from what fuel and oil it uses. (a lot, as you've already heard.) Aside from that, the other costs are the same or better than a 4 piston engine. The thing that the 8 has going for it is normal aspiration ... no turbo to heat things up and stress out components. Spark plugs, 4 of them, are slightly more expensive if they still use the 4-prong design. They wear out just about as fast as normal ones in piston engines.

advantages:
no timing belt to wear out/replace
no valves to adjust
no rods to throw through your block

 

I will always wonder about all the focus on fuel costs. If you drive the car 3,000 miles per month and only get 15 mpg, at $1.80 per gallon for gas that's $360 per month. A fair amount but only $0.12 per mile. If the darn thing got 25 mpg and I think anyone would be thrilled if it did; at 3,000 miles per month and $1.80 per gallon for gas, that's a monthly fuel cost of $216 per month. I know money is money but is that $144 gap worth all the fret?

I know the numbers above are arbitrary but they are illustrative of costs when comparing a low-mileage 8 vs. a theoretical 25 mpg sportscar. Given that most people don't drive 3,000 miles per month and most get closer to 18 than 15 mpg; coupled with the fact that nobody bought this car expecting to get 25 mpg (I hope); and the above is indeed a worst-case scenario. Even at that, it's not really that bad.....

 

I put over 100 miles/day on my Rx-8... so far so good, but I just got it before Christmas and only have around 2000 miles so far.

The oil consumption is hardly a concern... I haven't had to add any oil yet, and even if I did, a quart of 5-20 costs approximately $2. Assuming you add 1 quart every 2000 miles, the car will cost you an extra $100 per 100,000 miles.

Figure you'll need oil changes every 3000 miles or so, but you should do that for any car you plan on taking good care of. Spark plugs are pricey, but many of the other items that must be maintained on piston engines don't exist on rotaries, so that's a bit of a wash.

Gas mileage is subpar, but not unlivable. If you plan on using the car primarily for long highway commutes, it's reasonable to expect 19+ MPG. That's not great, but it's probably only a few less MPG than you'd get from a similar car like a G35 or Z350.

Your biggest expense will be tires. If you're going to roll 225/45/18s, you're going to be replacing your tires every 20,000 miles unless you either drive like a grandma, are willing to drive around on bald tires, or are willing to compromise on a very hard composition tire. Plus if you plan on EVER driving an Rx-8 in snowy/icy conditions, snow tires are an absolute must.

The only other Rx-8 specific issue is the risk of flooding the engine, but that seems to be almost wholly within the control of the driver. Don't shut the car down when the engine is cold and it will probably never happen to you. If it does, you may be looking at a tow and some work on the part of the dealer.

In short, other than the flooding and perhaps the mileage, there are virtually no substantive RX-8 specific issues that affect maintenance costs. Adding oil costs virtually nothing, and the tire replacement is something you'd face with any car in the Rx-8's class.

A final caveat... the RX-8 is a first year model, so naturally nobody really KNOWS just yet how well it'll hold up to extended mileage. They might all crumble into dust the minute they hit 50k... people uncomfortable with the unknown may feel better waiting a year to buy.