Pulled into my driveway Fri night after going out to dinner. Nothing unusual...went out the next morning & the 8 wouldn't start! Couldnt understand it. I flooded last summer & the car was towed in, upgraded with the better plugs, battery, reflashes, etc...how could this happen again?!
The service manager, whom I do like and has always been great with my car & me, said maybe the car was slow to crank & I "unconsciuosly" pulled the key back & that did it. I dont remember doing anything like that, but it's as good a reason as any at this point in time.
You Philly-NJ guys whom Ive met know how much I love this car, but this second flooding has made me very nervous, I admit. I sure dont want my Duke/RX8 love affair to be coming to an end!
Anyone else ever get flooded twice, or is it just me...or karma?

 

nope. no floods in almost 4 years.

 

My car just flooded a again. This is the second time in a year. It is in the shop right now. Last time I got new spark plugs and an upgraded starter. This is very annoying

 

My 04 has flooded 4 times - once a year since I bought it. It is a little annoying, but I still love the car.
There are a LOT of threads about this, but the general consensus seems to be that being sure to rev the engine high every day to burn off carbon deposits will keep it from happening.
BTW - if the car is out of warranty, call Mazda USA. They paid for the tow and repair when mine flooded last time w/62K miles. ( I asked them nicely - no threats to sue).

 

Make them give you the new upgraded starter.

They were suppose to do that the first time. Especially since you live in a cold climate.

 

Sorry to hear that. Good luck.

 

no new starter. never followed the cold shutdown rules..

65kmiles flood free.

no floods. karma.

beers

 

I flooded my 05 two or three times, but luckily using the technique in the tips brochure I never had to have it towed - do you drive it regularly? That was one of the issues with me...

 

Flooded my '04 twice in over 60,000mi. Once before the starter/plug upgrade and once since. Both times, was able to use the flooding procedure to get the car started without requiring a tow.

 

In 14 months and nearly 10K miles, I've never flooded my '05. I only drive weekends (for the most part), and I've never done the "cold shutdown" procedure, but only because I've never shut her down cold. (I believe that's the only time you need to "rev it before you turn it off".)

 

After 5 floodings with associated tows to the delaership, Mazda replaced my engine. No floods since.

Bob

 

No floods on my 04 in 53K miles. I follow the shutdown procedure if the temp gauge needle isn't around halfway.

 

I wonder if the car is really "Flooded" ? When I had my '87 RX 7 near 120,000 I had an incident where the radiator hose broke, it overheated in traffic . After that I had trouble starting hot or cold....Some said it was an "injector" but that seemed like a dealer rip. Later I was told by the radiator guys that it seems the seals were warped just a bit from the overheat incident...this in turn leads to bad starts. When my mechanic checked the compression, he told me I was in for future trouble because the compression was down. Do you think(this is from a non-mechanic type) that the problem is often a compression problem and that the engine will not turn over when that happens? It is what I was told. That was when I traded....the car was 12 years old.....A new motor was needed apparently. NOW the whole deal could be different with a REnesis so I'm wondering if each car has it's little individual problems after time.
As a doctor , I have realized that treating each person as an individual and not grouping them in disease categories is more often successful than saying something like ..."all diabetics oor all Cancer patients or all people with Mono, get that same problem...when sometimes it is just a thing that happened to that one person.
We all know that RX8's do this sort of thing sometimes but maybe each one has a specific reason that each driver or geographic area has precipitated. Mean temperatures, dust, pollutants, types of fuel...there could be many variables. I would like to see the locale of people that get these "flooding" problems , maybe driving habits, starting techniques, types of fuel, grades of oil? Then see if there is some common factor among all. That would be interesting.

 

Thanks, Guys, for all your comments. I do drive the 8 regularly, summer & winter and I do follow the shut down procedure ( I wait til the temp needle is up past "C" before I turn the car off. If it does happen again, (beside my blowing a socket-you'll hear me up in Bucks County, Doc) I'll try the flooding/restart procedure. Hopefully, it wont be necessary.