I took my car in yesterday and complained of low power, rough idle and rattling noises from the cat/exhaust, all of which are completely legit. The car has been down on power for about 2 months now and I've installed a K&N filter and new spark plugs to try to resolve it but hadn't licked it. When I heard about the recall I was pretty sure that I'd be one of the people getting a new engine.

Day 2 and my dealer is planning on flashing the ECU, chaning the plugs again and replacing the cat which they claim is the reason for the drop in power and the rattling, which sounds accurate.

On the other hand, I want to make absolutely sure that if my engine has been affected that I get what I need to make it right. Should I ask them if they performed a vaccum test and how hard should I push to ensure they did what they needed to do in order to make sure that the engine was fine?

BTW, as a former insurance guy (many years ago) Enterprise charging you for your full deductible for damage that doesn't warrant it is completely illegal. If, heaven forbid, something happens to the rental while you have it, request a receipt for the repairs, pay the amount of the receipt only after you have a copy of it, and tell them if they want more they can sue you for the rest. I guarantee they'll drop it.

 

When I spoke to the Enterprise Area Manager, she told me that in the vent of damaged, they will automatically charge your credit card the full amount of your deductible. If the repair costs are less than your deductible, once the repairs are completed their insurance company will cut you a check for the difference. She then went on to tell me that it is still a good idea to buy the insurance as it covers anything that can happen to the car, where as some auto insurance companies do not, but I tuned her out at that point (this was after she agreed to refund my money). I've been with State Farm for over 15 years, and I've never had a problem with them paying out on a vehicle.

On a side note, believe it or not they still make the Ford Taurus (sp), the one they gave me had ruined interior, and it drove horribly.


But, how nice it is to have my 8 back!

 

Except that keeping it under 3000 will wear out parts faster than "normal."
--R.

 

I'd like to hear more about your logic on this. 3k is 1/3rd 9k. You're going to get less wear and tear at a lower rpm. This is completely different than the topic of carbon buildup.

 

That makes a little more sense, except they are earning interest off your money basically. My mom has a $50/$100 deductible, the lowest our insurance company offers, so it may just have been more trouble than it was worth to bother with the work in charging her since anything would cost more than her deductible?

 

It's symantics, but I would consider carbon buildup leading to engine failure to fall under the catagory of "wear." There's also the fact that pre-recall Rx8's get insufficient lubrication at low rpms.

Suffice it to say, that whether or not you call it "wear," an Rx8 driven at 2000rpm will die sooner than one driven at 4000rpm all other things being equal.
--R.

 

Who gives a rip about wear & tear...I bought this car to have fun with it, and revving is part of the fun. It would be excruciating to shift at 3k, especially where I live, where its hilly & you need the ompfh revs provide to get up the hills without bogging.

 

I got my recall done on my 8 ('04, 63k miles) at Jeff Haas in Houston. They said there is no problem with the engine. They reflashed PCM, changed spark plugs, and changed engine mounts. Mine was shaking pretty bad especially with AC on in idle. Now it is a lot smother. I guess the rattle was caused by bad engine mounts. They cleaned outside of my car but didn't fill up the gas. I asked what happened to my free gas and they told me if I fill it up and bring the receipt then they will pay me back. I told them I will do that when I come back for next oil change. Oh, they gave me mazda3 for rental. I asked if they could get cx7 but they said no. I also had to fill up the gas as it was for the rental since Mazda is only paying for the rental not gas for the rental. Well..I am happier with my 8 now since it is lot more smoth at idle

 

Hows this for an AFR graph??? Mazda just replaced my spark plugs and reflashed my PCM and sent me on my way. They said that during the WOT test there was no loss of power. My butt there is no loss of power. I am experiencing AFR's in the 10.0 range now.

Check out this graph.

My canscan will not even go that low but I do have a gauge that is indicating 10.0 under WOT.

 

Small update. Just drove the car back from my parents house and it's experiencing major lack of power and AFR's in the low to mid 9's!!!! Yes 9.. I am amazed that I saw that figure too. It sounds like the engine is working very hard but the acceleration just isnt there. The tachomoter goes up veryyy sloowly.......

I am going to take in my car later this week and hopefully take the mechanic for a test drive. In the procedure it states that if there is loss of power to replace the engine. This will be the outcome hopefully..

 

Wow, your airway blocked somehow or something?

 

sounds to me like you cat is bad and running hot and the ecu is dumping fuel to cool it down..


beers

 

Mazda ran tests against the cat and determined that it was fine. In fact, they thought that my entire car was fine. Something is obviously wrong though. I'll take some measurments of the cat temp to see what it is.

This issue happens all the time though. Even after I have just driven the car for a few minutes.

 

Is this something that would come and go and the car seem fine for awhile and then act up again? Like your car does it, then it runs fine for weeks, then does it again for a trip or two, and then is fine again?

Just curious since people report occasional problems and then the car acts normally again and then acts up again.

 

it can, but the comes and goes problem is apex seals drying up from lack of oil....

the s flash addressed this, but for some the damage has been done.

beers

 

It happens every time I drive the car now and has been getting progressively worse over the past month. It's really getting to the point where any load that is put on the engine, this issue will arise (Above 5,500 that is).

I have a print out of what my cat temp was about 8 months ago and it was 1684. I'll hook up my canscan and take a measurement today.

 

1684 at what speed and rpm????? that is getting high.. it really sounds like cat failing..

good news, recall on it.. ever had a flood?

beers

 

No I never had a flood yet. I did have trouble with my idle a few weeks back and so I towed it into mazda only to have them tell me that nothing was wrong with it.

I took some stats with the canscan tool tonight and it looks like my cat gets as high as 1700 and falls back down to 1550 when I am off the gas. Somewhere in this range is the temp of my cat.

The 1684 temp was taken at 6400 rpm at 90 mph.

 

hard call...

if you find that the problem is not bad when you start driving it and it gets worse the more time you put on it on one drive cycle. i would say drying apex seals and loss of compression... which heats the cat and the fuel dump to save the cat...

but... if you were able to get to 90 mph at 1684 with the problem i am confused...

here is a test for you...

lock cruise on 72 mph.... note afr.... and cat temp......afr should be at stoich.... ~ 14.7. cat temp should be in the ~ 1600 range..

raise the speed on cruise to 77 mph... what should happen is afr will drop to ~14.4 and cat temp will drop....

my guess is with the idle problem... you have lost compression... new motor is in your future..

beers

 

Aren't the temps the scan devices show are high by about 100-200 degrees due to the accuracy of the 02 sensor?

 

I still didn't get my letter, but Stamford Mazda (my dealer near where I work) said I could just bring it in

 

No bet. I did my "spewing" 2 posts before your response.

The powerband for this engine starts around 3k. You can't cruise at highway speeds below 3k. I think it's not a stretch to say the engine was designed be run well above 3k. There are certainly parts which will wear more slowly at lower rpms (the whole transmission is an obvious example) but will the whole package really last longer when run outside of the operating envelope anticipated by the engineers? The entire point of this thread is related to the fact that the engineers over at Mazda messed up the low-rpm behaviour the Renesis. Are you sure that the low-rpm MOP profile is right now? I personally believe they got it right this time, but we won't really know for a while yet. I don't think it's foolish to agree with the recommendation of Mazda as well as countless others to give this engine regular trips to the beep.

--R.

 

yes,
but i think we are compareing apples to apples here.

beers