How difficult is it to change the starter motor yourself?
 

Does anyone have any instructions or advice about how difficult it is to change the starter motor? Mazda wants $595 to do it....screw that.

I have the "old"/crappy/weak starter motor from my 2004 car. It was never changed, but now at 64,000 miles I am out of warranty. I called Mazda North America and they said if the service center deems it too weak or out of spec, they could probably cover replacement costs; I just spent $100 to have them tell me it is "fine", even though it cranks for 4-5 seconds and it flooded last year. I thought they would have inspected/changed it when it was in to be de-flooded/serviced.

Anyone have any experience doing it? I hear that "it is only one bolt" but I looked at it under the car and it's gotta be a little trickier than that, and frankly I don't want to screw anything up. Thanks....

do you have a copy of the Service Manual? There's a link on here somewhere for it, let me see if I can find it...

found it! http://foxed.ca/foxed/index.php?page=rx7manual#rx8
Download the Workshop Manual, should be instructions in there on how to remove the starter

the 595 includes the starter?

yeah 595 included everything....but i'm pretty sure I found a new starter motor online for $120. So I'm trying ot figure out how to do it.

I looked at the workshop manual, and it is just one picture (attached)

It "seems" simple enough, but these things always get complicated.... No one's ever done this before?

very easy. 3 bolts and its off.

It's dirt simple to change the starter. If you can change your oil, you can do this.

It'll be easier then taking out the stupid Alternator...

yea its really one long bolt, one short bolt, and one nut and a ground clamp. Then it just falls off. real easy. there are no troubles alligning or anything.

Ive got a whole starter for 125 if you need one. or need pics or anything lmk

thanks g3tr3ddy I'll PM you

like said above. it should usually be 1 or 2 bolts holding it together to the tranny mating to the flywheel gear.

just make sure all your power source are off and the battery disconnected before doing so. there should be a positive lead and ground connected to it either by a connector or strapped on. easily removed. the starter itself is located on the lower left hand side of the trans, driver side.

it should be no difficult than an oil change, provided you've got proper tools and patience.

whats the worst that can happen? you gotta get someone to push start your car and drive it to a small shop if you can't install the starter?

GL =)

BUMP. Thanks for this guys. I was looking to install the starter myself in the near future and was looking at the service manual. They make it look so easy (ie the dreaded silver bolt when removing the stereo). Any special tools needed --> I assume a good jack and standard socket set should be sufficient?

elysium19 --> did you get it done ok?

Wowwww, I seriously thought there was much more to that. Maybe I should consider this. My car has a crappy start in winter, but I have a downsized battery, which is probably somewhat to blame. I figured, the car still starts, so to hell with a big project, but its so simple.

How long do people wait before changing the starter usually? I have an 04, supposedly had all the TSB's done, brought it in for floods twice in its life time. I assumed I received the updated starter, but if I didn't its nice to know I can do it myself.

Hi guys, I just finished replacing the old starter with the n3z1 18 400 starter. It's so freaking awesome.

I don't know about you guys, but I had a heck of a time removing that upper bolt/nut. I ended up needing to buy a deep socket 9/16 to get at the nut. Other than that, it's super easy to do and I encourage anybody that's still on the old starter (with extra money to burn) to change it. My old starter caused my engine to flood this winter and caused me a big headache deflooding it.

hmm, could you give some more info about that starter you upgraded to? Cost, where you bought from, etc? Sounds like a grand idea.

1) I haven't done it yet. Although it really pains me to hear it cranking away some mornings for 4,5,6 seconds, the mazda tech did have a point: it hasn't NOT started yet.* So, I may be being a little too anal about it, and it's not really worth my money to change it unless there's a problem, although I understand that it's more likely to flood or fail to start if cranking speed is slow.

2) Yes, Bluefrenzy, please let us know where you got the new starter from, and how much it cost you. If I do decide to change it, this would be helpful.

3) Very good to know about the need for a deep 9/16th's socket, thanks.

* I did have one flooding experience, but that was when my dad moved it and shut it down w/o warming it up. Not really the starter motor's fault.

Pretty sure that's the upgraded Mazda OEM 1st gen starter.

Here's ASH8's post on starter part numbers:

https://www.rx8club.com/showpost.php...27&postcount=5

If you go to onlinemazdaparts.com and put the first one in OMP returns back this message:

It's crap that they aren't replacing the starters. It was included in the TSB on starting which got replacement batteries for 04s but you had to ask for it.

I didn't the last two years I went in to get them to replace my battery. But I didn't realize what the problem was. This Winter it takes two sets of cranks most of the time to start so I'm replacing the starter now. Very annoying.

Exactly - my car's previous owner had the TSB done and I assumed the starter was changed as well; it wasn't. When I brought it to mazda last month, they said they won't do it retroactively.
Despite cranking slowly, it is starting, so I sort of understand, but I just wish they would have replaced it initially.

Thanks for that link Jedi.:)

Hi guys

To answer your questions:
I got the starter from my local Mazda dealership here in Canada (Kramer). I asked around online for the n3z1 and most people wanted about 250-400 USD with shipping to Canada (with crappy exchange it's like 3million Cdn). At the dealership, I got it for about 275Cdn!!! Go figure ... for once us Canadians don't get screwed. Get this though ... the old N3H1-18-400A version was 600Cdn!!! The tech guy scratched his head and was puzzled as well.

Elysium --> I too was a bit stubborn about changing the starter thinking it would be alright and that I can live with 4-6 second starts. Then the deep freeze came. I could hear the weak ass starter wanting to turn (in slow motion) and the engine wanting to catch ... then nothing. Ended up leaving my car in the parking lot for 2 days before I could get a tow truck to my house. Then spent xmas eve and part of xmas rolling around on the garage floor trying to deflood it. Once I got it started I was lazy to change it until recently I had another close call where the engine would catch and I ended up draining the battery. Left it over night again and got a boost the next day when it was warmer. In hindsight, if I had replaced the starter earlier, I would have avoided the cost of the tow truck, new sparks and time lost in the garage. So the lesson is that prevention is the best policy.

This was posted a while back, but did you replace the starter motor, and did it solve the problem?

I have a similar problem. I have an '04 RX8 Auto and it starts almost immediately on a COLD start, but once the engine warms up (after a bit of driving) it usually takes 4 secs to re-start after turning the engine off for a few mins. And just yesterday it didn't start at all (for the first time) after driving around for a bit. Engine cranked, but no start. On the 3rd try and 6 secs later, it finally started. Seems to be ok today, starts up after 4 secs when warmed up, but I'm beginning to wonder what was the problem yesterday and if it's a sign of a failing starter motor or battery.

Update: I just checked, and I do have the newer starter motor installed (N3Z2-18-400), so it can't be that.

That can be the first inkling that the compression is failing....

Poor warm re-starts...:(

Might be time to get the compression checked :)

How much would it cost to do that at the dealership? And if compression is low, would that be covered under the extended powertrain warranty?

Likely 1 hour would be enough...so about $100...

Problem is that a lot of the dealers don't have the compression tester...

Last time I checked Freeway and Wolfe couldn't do it...but that may have changed

Technically, yes it would be covered under the 8 Year / 100,00 mile extended warranty, they should replace replace the engine under warranty. You could do a search for low compression and see what other people have done.