First time rotary owner? Read this before you modify your car.
 

Rotary engine can make a lot of power if it's modified in the right way. There are plenty of people getting 500-600 rwhp out of a 1.3 liter rotary. But if it's modified the wrong way, you are running into the risk of blowing engines.

Rotary engine is extra sensitive to detonation. One detonation can destroy the whole motor. If you blow one apex seal, your engine is gone!

Mild upgrade such as intake, cat-back exhaust, and pulley kit will be ok but any mods that will require you to modify the fuel map and timing map will need extra attention. Anything that will affect the air and exhaust flow drastically needs extra attention. There are mods that you have to do together to run the engine safely. I will suggest the following modification stages.

Stage one: intake, cat-back exhaust, pulley (no ecu tuning necessary)
stage two: add tubular header, (ecu tuning needed)
stage three: add midpipe to replace the catalytic converter (ecu tuning needed)
stage four: forced induction (turbo or supercharger) need to upgrade the fuel system with larger injectors, high flow fuel pump, and ecu tuning, possible radiator upgrade (higher power engine produces more heat)

Engine tuning is the most important part as you can see it's a requirement in every stage except the stage one. When it comes to ECU tuning, you have to let people who have extensive knowledge on rotary engine tuning to modify the ecu for you. The required a/f ratio and igntion timing is totally different from piston engine. If the company has no expereince on tuning rotary engine, run away immediately.

So why am I writing this? I am writing this because I can already predict how improperly tuned rotary engines start to blow up, companies that do know anything about rotary engine start to offer unsafe mods and ecu tuning, rx8 starts to get bad rep because of blown engines. This is what 3rd Gen RX7 went through in the past 10 years.

Please be smart and mod your car carefully and wisely. Choose the people and companies that have extensive knowledge on rotary engine.

Good luck on modifying your rx8 and happy rotoring

Good points. Have you seen this thread? https://www.rx8club.com/showthread.p...threadid=14703

Good to get these words out...

I thought it was past my bedtime there for a sec.....

Question from a New Rotary owner
 

I appreciate the post being a first time rotary owner, I just came from the world of V8 and lots of torque and getting used to the smaller engine. The one thing I do know (after getting smoked by a lexus sports coupe) I would like more power!

I have a few question hopefully someone will have time to answer.

1. Has anyone run a dyno on a stock RX8? If so what type of numbers are you seeing, what about 0-60 and 1/4 mile? *Personally I don't know how to read a dyno report (so seeing one does me little good, if anyone feels like explaining, I will be all eyes!)

2. What mods would you recommend (that will not void warranty), and what type of power do you think I could expect from these mods? I saw the lists above, any price guessing on those, and which are in the market, and which are still pipe dreams?

3. I don't know that I want to change the exhaust note on my car (unless it can't be helped) but I would like a performance boost, what can you recommend?

4. Who should I buy my aftermarket parts from, and who should I trust to do installations? (Any help in the Dallas area)?

Thanks in advance

Tkemory

try Rotary Performance....they are in Garland, TX...don't know how far that would be from Dallas. RP is the home of Ari Yallon and his 9 second RX7. Nice guy too. they just released a midpipe for the 8 on their site.

RX7.com


santino

Garland is a northeast suburb of Dallas about 20 miles or so out. The street exit for Rotary Performance is just north of LBJ on I-75. RP is about 8 miles east of I-75.

Thanks for the replies, based on their website they don't have any info on rx8 yet, guess I will just keep an eye on them.

Keep reading this board, tkemory, and a lot of your questions will be answered.

Thanks Omicron.

If i changed my midpipe to clear my cats, but i left the stock muffler would i have to tune my ecu. This if my first rotor, and am not to sure of it's limitations. I'm also not sure of anybody in my area that has experience with tuning rotary engines, I live in Miami, Fl.

We need to get rotors a good name.
All the shoty wogs give them a bad name becuase they take short cuts and have no idea no offense to most wogs but its true well in sydney anyway they wonder why there engine blew up at 15000rpm when uncle habiby just rebuilt it with a bridge port

Whats a wog? Is that an Aussie term?