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Cleaned the MAF on my R3, man was it dirty. IAT sensor was black on one side and the plastic leading up to the MAF sensor had some build up on it. Not sure if it made too much of a difference though. Flow at idle is still reading a bit low at 4.7g/s. I might have a vacuum leak to find now.
Took her to get plugs, wires and coils done. (Hate doing the plugs myself because of tool access problems) Found out I need an engine rebuild because it's leaking coolant into rear rotor housing. 34k on the Mazda re-man. Getting that "free" re-man was my worst automotive decision ever.
Just relocated my brand new Optima Red Top to the trunk. The lack of a battery plus the lack of my air pump/air pump regulator clears up SO much space. I have a full view of one or two fuel injectors, the OMP and the OMP lines on the front side of the engine, it's great. I have yet to take the car to a windy road, but from just driving it around town, it feels awesome! Unfortunately, I wanted to put the battery right on top of the rear axle for balancing purposes, but I also wanted to bolt the tray to the car. I couldn't have both, so I decided to go with the safer route and bolted the tray down on the back side of the rear axle. So we'll see what effect that has on the steering of the car, I'm thinking it'll be a positive one...
Just relocated my brand new Optima Red Top to the trunk. The lack of a battery plus the lack of my air pump/air pump regulator clears up SO much space. I have a full view of one or two fuel injectors, the OMP and the OMP lines on the front side of the engine, it's great. I have yet to take the car to a windy road, but from just driving it around town, it feels awesome! Unfortunately, I wanted to put the battery right on top of the rear axle for balancing purposes, but I also wanted to bolt the tray to the car. I couldn't have both, so I decided to go with the safer route and bolted the tray down on the back side of the rear axle. So we'll see what effect that has on the steering of the car, I'm thinking it'll be a positive one...
this is super bad *** can't wait to do this to mine!! :D
Took her to get plugs, wires and coils done. (Hate doing the plugs myself because of tool access problems) Found out I need an engine rebuild because it's leaking coolant into rear rotor housing. 34k on the Mazda re-man. Getting that "free" re-man was my worst automotive decision ever.
How is it the worst decision ever? Sounds like you got 34K "free" miles out of it, and now you are in the same place as you were before. That's 3 years of normal driving at 12K per year, courtesy of Mazda. Now get an engine from one of the good builders and prepare to enjoy the car for another ??K miles.
How is it the worst decision ever? Sounds like you got 34K "free" miles out of it, and now you are in the same place as you were before. That's 3 years of normal driving at 12K per year, courtesy of Mazda. Now get an engine from one of the good builders and prepare to enjoy the car for another ??K miles.
The reason I regret getting the re-man is that this engine never really ran right, most likely due to a botched install. (Hopefully will know for sure once the engine is pulled). Dealership that did the work sandbagged and deflected, trying to make me pay for a lower intake manifold not subject to the core warranty. (Long story, I've gone over this before). This reman engine had good compression, but had vacuum leak, detonation and heat problems that resulted in driveability issues my original engine never came close to having. In hindsight, I think that I should have just held on to my original engine - it failed compression on one rotor face at 99k miles on the ODO, but otherwise ran better than the reman ever did. My decision caused me a bunch of stress, time & money trying to diagnose the reman's issue, during which time I wasn't able to fully enjoy the car.
You're right though- I should have a more positive outlook on this. I did learn more about my car in the process, and all the parts I replaced were things that probably would have needed to be changed out eventually. And who knows if the original engine would have lasted this long. Now it's time to spec out the rebuild!
Oh. Right. I think I remember reading about your saga now. It's that time of year to have mine compression tested again. If it fails, I have no idea what I'm going to do.
It's that time of year to have mine compression tested again. If it fails, I have no idea what I'm going to do.
Just drive it.
My 8 has had sub-70 PSI compression for years. Doesn't matter so long as it starts and doesn't leak coolant. When I see smoke (blue or white) or it won't start, then I'll rebuild it.
My 8 has had sub-70 PSI compression for years. Doesn't matter so long as it starts and doesn't leak coolant. When I see smoke (blue or white) or it won't start, then I'll rebuild it.
exactly.
My original motor was low on compression for about 2 years and still put down more HP on the dyno than any other NA RX8 in SoCal, started up just fine, and ran great.
Only reason I bothered to get it replaced is because the warranty was coming up on it and I preferred to let Mazda do it for free than on my dime.
Completely refined my garage on Wheelwell.com and I'm now the top modded RX-8 on the website! In reality, that's most definitely not true, but I've still done an incredible amount of work to get this car where it stands currently, so I'll enjoy sitting on my high horse for the time being.
Check it out and drop a like! https://wheelwell.com/patrick-coico/...004-mazda-rx-8
I'm not advertising Wheelwell, but it's a fun website for any car guy or girl...
exactly.
My original motor was low on compression for about 2 years and still put down more HP on the dyno than any other NA RX8 in SoCal, started up just fine, and ran great.
Only reason I bothered to get it replaced is because the warranty was coming up on it and I preferred to let Mazda do it for free than on my dime.
Enjoy the car, stop sweating the little things.
I was going to say...
That's just it. I have about 1 year left on my engine warranty, so I need to start thinking about what decision to make before it expires. Roll the dice on a Mazda reman and see how long it lasts, or bite the bullet and pay one of our top quality rebuilders to hopefully take care of it for the long haul? The thought of letting someone else wrench on my car gives me the skeevies, so I'm inclined to pull it myself and ship it to one of those guys. "Free," OTOH, is awfully attractive right now, considering my precarious employment situation.
But, I just verified my warranty with Mazda NA, and it actually doesn't expire until 6/22/2019, so I have plenty of time.
Who the hell wants to drive a sports car that is low on power that didn't have much power to begin with?
It's not much power loss at high RPM. It doesn't really matter:
Originally Posted by Jedi54
My original motor was low on compression for about 2 years and still put down more HP on the dyno than any other NA RX8 in SoCal, started up just fine, and ran great.
I'm turning the fastest lap times I've ever turned with the lowest compression motor I've ever owned. It just doesn't seem to matter. Steve is retiring his RX-8 from track duty so now it's more of a touring car anyway.
When I get the new suspension sorted and opportunity arises (or catastrophe occurs), I'll get a motor built the way I want it and swap it in. Until then, I'm going to keep flogging it like a rented mule.
Finally made some more progress with getting the series II wiring sorted out and dashbar finally reinstalled. Things do work, but there's still a **** ton of work left to do. I'm hoping that I can have the dash at least reassembled this weekend, but we'll see how it plays out
Took the front coilovers off, disassembled, and put them back on. Took them off again, diassembled, put them back slightly differently. Took them of a 3rd time...yeah you get the idea, took about 6 tries to get them right.
Originally Posted by Nisaja
Niceeee! I just hit 4000 miles! Catching up!
4000? Holy ****. I honestly didn't think there was an RX8 in existence that still had that low of mileage.
I got a jump on detailing the interior of my 8 in preparation for the rally. Probably around 4 days worth of detailing mine before I can just do a "quick " wipe down routine.
03-23-2017, 09:15 PM
