OK. I got my stage1 back from canzoomer a couple days ago and I put it back in. Today I ran the HPDE at Miami Homestead, and guess what? my leading coils are toast AGAIN!. Looks like my car does not like the stage1. I am pretty sure it was teh stage1 sinc there was another 3 8's on the track today, and ALL the other drivers are more experienced than me and where pushing the car harder, yet they had no problems whatsoever (well, Alex ran outta gas, but thats another issue).

Guess I'll have to find extra HP elsewhere. *sigh*

 

That's nasty. A DNF from an ECU upgrade? Has anyone else tried to use this mod in competition and had similar results?

 

you can still drive the car without leading plugs...albeit with a 25 second 0-60 time

 

what does it feel like to not have the leading plugs working?

 

Genom - if I were you I'd be pissed as hell - which I'm sure you are. You buy what's supposed to be commercially viable product - commercial strength, so to speak - and it [a $300 part or so] - causes you to not finish, (I'm assuming a DNF), a race in which you've probably invested many hours in planning, prepping, getting friends to help, maybe buying tires, other parts, entry fees, etc. And based on your post it appears this was a known problem. I know this site is mostly about looking good and sounding good, but at some point people have to start getting a little pissed off.

 

Actually, the car does run with only the trailing coils firing. I was able to race as planned and had a good time. But I figure the second time the coils fry, the mod aint gonna work for me. I am not pissed because I view this is a experiment. I am fully aware of all the issues that stage1's have had with some cars. Just the variation in mpg reported alone shows that they are all behaving differently in certain ranges, and I knew there was a chance it wouldnt work properly. Ran great for the time I had it before the ignition upgrade was done, and it ran great for a long time after, but the 2 times the car has been really stressed they have failed.

I cant get bothered by this failing because of this knowledge. This however, is the same reason I AM pissed with Racing beat, since buying their front sway bar I had an anoying clank from the front of the car. I got 1 email from RB (saying there was a problem) and that was it. Eventually, I completely dismounted the bar for the third time and put it back in and it finally went away. For a established parts company, that was pretty bad I thought.

 

Hmmmm. Interesting that a clank is more irritating than fried coil wires from an ECU mod. I rest my case. Whatever. I'm movin' on.

 

anyone that buys a stage 1 without knowing the risk associated with it deserves to lose their $600

if I'm still having problems after I get flashed, im gonna sit on mine for awhile and not install it. i have one of those cars that idle's like **** and performs poorly above 7000rpm with it in, but I dont know what is to blame for that. if in a few months, the problems arent resolved, then I'll go with one of the other options that will hopefully be availible by then.

....I'm still waiting for the day someone convinces a dealer to flash jdm or preproduction usdm maps to our ecu's...then I'd die a happy man.

 

Well put. At what point will we be notified this is no longer an experiment?

 

Does anybody have the nology (or similar) plug wires installed with the CZ1? This may be something that could help with the burnt coils, or it may agrevate the situation. In one sense it would allow the power to transfer easier from the coils making them do less work, but on the other hand it may cause the coils to transfer more power, or potentialy more power, making them fail prematurely. (Anybody follow me on that thought?) I have neither plug wires, CZ1 nor burnt coils at this time so I am just throwing out ideas.

 

I expressed my personal opinion on the product and the way I look at my car. You are free to take whatever view you want. I looked at how the stage1 was born and know it's 1 car fans attempt at something. Hardly everybody gets their very first product right immediately without a lot of testing.

I fully understood that installing something like this, while not likely to cause any damage, could! Anybody putting in a stage1 runs risks and they either know it by reading the disclaimers, or multiple posts here. I, not canzoomer, am playing with the cars warranty, so I accept what happens. RB is a different story, they have done this for years, and I expected from them at least more than 1 email and nothing else. Maurice has been attentive, has taken the unit back a couple times already, shipping at his cost last time, to try to resolve my problem. He has answered phone calls, emails, etc. While a couple times there have been miscomunications, at the end of the day he has done everything I've asked, and more. I am sad that I aparently cant run the unit, as it DOES work for me under normal conditions, only failing in high heat situations, but I am not angry at anybody.

 

Genom,
Very well said! By the way I like your address! I live across the swamp in Georgia! Damn bugs!
I have been posting on differant threads about my concerns with the heat factor. Maybe we need to start a new thread about that. I have not had any problems yet and my cz unit works well but electronics +heat eventually will have problems. It seems to me that the front of this car just doesnt have any room to circulate air. ANy ideas all?
olddragger

 

Might be a dumb question but how do you know if you burn your coils? Do you get a CEL? I live in Texas and we get pretty hot down here too so I would also be interested in what could be done to cool off the ECU plus Canzoomer!

 

Well, I know cause it's happened before :D

Basically for me, the process is: I smell a burnt electronics smell in the cabin. After that, the car has no low end power at all. I mean, you have to rev the car to 3000RPM at least to be able to get off a complete stop without stalling it. Power is also very jerky under 4000RPM overall and there is what feels like a power boost at about 5000RPM.

But the easiest way is to look at the coils themselves. The thread from last time it happened had some pics Mazdamaniac posted that clearly show what to look for when the coils go, and it's pretty hard to miss once you know what to look for.

 

Could someone throw up a pic again of what the burnt coils look like? I know I saw one a while back, but cannot find it now.

And the first person who tells me to "do a search" gets banned!

 

Say what? Where the hell did you get this idea? This site is completely independant of ALL of the tuners. The forum is Canzoomer's, but not the site... and most of us who post here have nothing to do with him. We're consumers, and are not trying to "look and sound good."

Sheesh.

 

Pic

 

Yup, a 12 V CPU cooling fan from a PC. The good ones (ball bearing) only cost about $10...

 

Thanks, dannobre. :D

 

Damn, Omicron! Do a search!

Hey, that looks like my hand in that picture up there!

Maybe I'm a glutton for punishment (I guess telling you tosearch might be an indication of that), but I would "cure" your ignition problems by getting an AEM C2DI ignition and a set of DIS coils.
I know that would set you back another $400 or so, but it would run really well with the CZ box and would be impervious to burnt coil packs.

I'll be doing just that in a few more weeks.

 

That's it bucko, you're OUTTA HERE!!!

:D

Ok, maybe not.

Now this is info I can use... an AEM C2DI ignition and a set of DIS coils, huh? Do these coils completely replace the (marginal to crappy) factory coil packs? And what other benefits would this expense net me? Thanks Jeff...

 

It would work in the same fashion as the MSD system I had installed for a while, only without the hassle of building a trigger circuit because the AEM understands the pulses from the RX-8 ECU and/or CZ/E-Manage.
The problem with the MSD was that it fired on the down side of the ignition pulse which caused the spark to be late and also it would miss a cycle every time the E-Manage advanced the ignition timing because the advanced pulse would overlap the trailing end of the proceeding pulse.
The AEM doesn't have this shortcoming.
Additionally, the AEM has two capacitors, so it can run the leading AND trailing plugs - the MSD couldn't do this and was only useful for the leading plugs.

The advantages would be:
1) no possibility of frying the coils
2) considerably more spark energy - potentially more power
3) longer spark at low RPMS - potentially more power and better fuel economy and possibly a better idle

The gains might be fairly small, but since 2 coils from Mazda are $130 or so, it would pay for itself in the medium term and it would allow you to continue to use your CZ box.
Greddy has issued an update for the E-Manage that includes some of the profile information for the RX-8's AFM. I suspect there might be some additional ignition capability there as well, but I wouldn't bet on it being any safer for your coils or that it would allow individual control over the timing split.

Wiring would not be plug-n-play, but it would be fairly basic - you would remove the stock coils and mount DIS coils in their place with little aluminum L-brackets.
Then, the coil plugs would be spliced to a connector that would plug into the AEM harness.
You would also have to make a set of plug wires using one of those universal plug wire kits.
I'm using a custom set of plug wires right now and it took about 30 minutes to make the set. I have another set that matches the DIS coil profile as well once I go back the the AEM myself.

 

Here are some pictures:

MSD DIS coils:



Two of the coils mounted on the OEM bracket in the leading positions with the harness attached:

 

Thats an interesting solution Jeff. Especially since it will probably work! :D

Unfortunetly with my current money situation, what with my wedding getting closer every day, I doubt I'll have the funds for this anytime soon. We shall have to see.

Unless someone here would like to donate a set as a wedding gift?

:D

 

The AEM C2DI is about $297 from most vendors.
The coils are $42 each.

Get a second job.