MSP-16 Reflash done
 

Ok, I have an 07 with 3600 miles on it. I added roughly 1 quart of oil between 280 and 2800 miles. At 2800 miles I had its first oil change done and the MSP16 reflash.

The car now has 3600 miles on it and appears to be using little to no oil. While I'm sure it's not related, I've been adding about 5 oz of Lucas UCL each fillup of 12.5 gallons.

This lack of consumption has me concerned (I don't trust dealers).

My driving is mostly highway. About 70 miles a day, mostly at 70mph.

Any comments/suggestions would be appreciated.

Do you rev it much? This engine will not ask for much oil unless you keep it near the red line. So if thats not happening much, start enjoying the 9K more. Here is the place where people are discussing this new Flash. How does it feel power wise?

https://www.rx8club.com/rx-8-discussion-3/newly-revised-rx-8-service-bulletins-140702/

Hello Old Rotor,

Well, I try to rev it to near redline a couple times a week. I did this probably less often in the first 2800 miles. I may just be paranoid here, allowing all the discussions here about replaced engines bias me.

I have noted very little carbon in the exhaust tips. There was more accumulation when it had fewer miles but I cannot say that's because of the reflash. Perhaps it accumulated faster when it had fewer miles.

I noted that there are problem codes for the OMP, and I don't think I have any of those (no CEL of course).

Power seems fine to me, runs great.

800 miles is not long enough to get a good read - also dealer may have slightly over-filled it at the oil change, leaving the impression of less oil use than is really going on.

In general , it is very hard to get a good oil usage read out of the sump as the dipsitck is not exactly an accurate measuring device when you have about 1 inch denoting 1.6 quarts of oil level and we only use about 1 qt every 2500-3500 miles on average. Also, some (but propbably not in your case with many highway miles) will have the appearance of less oil use from the condensation buildup that can happen in the oil when you do lots of short trips that do not get the oil good and hot often enough to burn off the moisture.

Old Rotor/Jax,

Thanks for the input and pardon my ignorance on this subject. This type of engine is definately new to me (I can't believe I'm asking it to burn more oil, lol). I'm a bit paranoid, no doubt. But I'm learning here. This site will prove to be quite valueable.

On another note, I'm wanting to do all my oil changes. I'm considering purchasing an oil change system as I'd like to find a way to get all the oil out while making it easier (I understand quite a bit is left after an oil change, as much as 3 quarts or so).

Here is one I'm considering: http://www.anchorexpress.com/product...l.cfm?pid=9418

Note, it simply evacuates oil from the oil pan throught the dipstick, so I'm doubting it'd do any better, and perhaps worse than a simple drain at the drain plug.
I'll continue to research this but if anyone has any ideas or comments, let me know.

Good Idea, but the one you are looking at is expensive and overly complicated. I also use an oil extractor and can get about 5 quarts (of the 7) out very consistently (more than most which are getting 4-4.5 quarts out) - with the added benefit of not having to jack up or crawl under the car since the filter is on top as well (at least through the 2008 models).

I use a Pela Oil extractor and it can be had here:

http://www.overtons.com/modperl/prod...ID=1008&r=view

Kinda curious where do u stick the tube to ?

Cuz it sounds like a great product.

Right down the dipstick hole until you hear it hit the bottom of the oil pan. It has a long, thin tube specifically designed to do this.

I use it on two other cars as well - works great unless you have a car with one of the very twisted dipstick tubes - fortunately not the case with our 8's.

Ooooo ... sweet ....

hmm ... let me think about it ... :) Thx man :)

5 quarts, fantastic. I'm getting one. Thanks a lot Jax...you're a wealth of information here. In time, hopefully I'll catch up and be able to provide some myself.

I'm really considering this right now, thanks!

Jax, you're saying you can get the full 5 qts out without even removing the drain plug? If so, I'm all over this thing!

Yes I get 5 quarts out, but remember that capacity is 7 quarts, so I still don't get it all.

Cool, thanks! Yes, I know it's not the full capacity, but it's better than you get with just the drain plug plus you don't have to jack the car up. Very convenient. :biggthump

you could still jack one side of the car up (then the other side) while using the pump to get even more oil out.

OK, I ordered the Pela oil extractor. I can see where jacking the car will help, so I'll keep that in mind. Jacking the car is not that bad, just having to crawl under to drain that's a pain.

Any reasonably priced extractors that get more of the old slimy stuff out? Or is that just not realistic?

https://www.rx8club.com/series-i-do-yourself-forum-73/diy-max-oil-out-oil-change-90879/

if you really want to get the most out here you go.. this method gets most of the oil out of the coolers.

as to oil usage, the 1.75 qts between full and low. i do not hit that in 5 k miles of 98% highway driving..

i am on the t flash..

beers :beer:

5 Quarts is pretty sweet already, consider that you dont have to jack ur car to do it !

Hmm, Im about to order it, but my next oil change is due like next month, I can wait :)

I had the recall done and had the same thing happen to me. Little or no oil consumption, but the did overfill my oil but it doesn't seem to be going down. I used to have to fill after every other gas fill-up. I have started to premix with Idemitsu thanks to Dominion and Phil's 8. This gives me a piece of mind knowing soome oil is getting in there.

Well, I drove it a bit harder on this tank:ylsuper: and what do you know...it used about 1/4 quart in 240 miles.

It was over filled just a tad.

I have been premixing with about 5 oz of Lucas UCL, but that's temporary till I get that Sohn device on this car....afterwhich I'll use the following:

Amsoil Saber Pro 2cycle through the Sohn system
0w20 Amsoil or M1. Leaning toward the M1 because it's additive package includes some moly, some boron and a reduced ZDDP level (SM classification I suppose). I have a hunch, but I think these engines like boron and moly.

Sources inside Mazda seem to indicate that the reason Mazda does not recommend synthetic is because of some additive(s) present in some synthetics and Mobile 1 is specifically mentioned as one of the culprits. This from rg.

I am getting the Re-Flash done on Thursday 4/17/08.

I'm going to run it hard the rest of this tank and see if there is any change.

I'm pretty sure the Sohn oil adapter will allow for the use of any synthetic in the oil pan (I almost said crankcase)....the oil injected into the combustion chamber will come from the bottle under the hood (2 cycle stuff, made to be burned, not as much carbon formation in theory).

Ah ... I kinda missed your mention of the Sohn adapter. (I want to do that to my car too but probably when it's out of warranty.) I don't really know, but I suppose you're right that Mazda's only objection to whatever additive comes from it being burned inside the the combustion chamber.

I Used More Than 1 Qt In 1000 Miles!

What type of driving did you do, lots of short trips, hard with lots of RPM's?

About 25 Miles Each Way To And From Work 18 Miles Highway Driving At About 75-80.

So because you used a "!" I take it you are using more oil now and thats what the "TSB" says. Are you using 5W20 or 5W30 and premix too?

Just 5-20 Got Into An Arguement With The Dealership Yesterday They Said My Car Required Motocraft 5-20 Synthetic Blended Oil. I Told Them No! They Fought Me Then They Said Well 5-20 Isn't Made In Conventional Oil. I Said You Better Call Castrol And Letr Them Know Because I Just Bought Some Gtx Yesterday! Then They Looked In Their Service Manual And Saw That The Motocraft Was Completely Different Api Standard Than What The 8 Calls For They Just Looked Shocked. They Have Been Puttig The Wrong Oil In The 8's They Have Been Servicing. Whats Even More Scary Is They Are The Only Certified Mazdaspeed Dealer In Maine. So They Say!

^^^^Scary!:Kill2:

Disappointing and Scary too....

just to share--it has been decided by independent study that the renasis needs 300cc of oil per 1 hr of driving for proper lubrication of the seals. Thats a lot more than we are using!
OD

That's a lot (assuming we went 70 miles in that hour). Assuming a more realistic speed averaging 35mph...that's a ton. At 35 mph for an hour we'd use 1.5 gallons of gasoline and 1/3 a litre of oil. That's close to 20 parts gasoline to 1 part oil. Crazy.

i have one good guess where that info came from.. ;)

beers :beer:

Please give us all you know about this study.....

The housing surface is not a hard chrome finish---the more shiny chrome you see the more wear. It is a micro channeled pinpoint pourous chrome. All designed to increase lubrication properties. Think about it--how hard is it to keep lubrication on a hard chrome surface?
This engine is a good engine with betterment capability.
Pre mix, a 3nd injector or sohn adaptors are a step in the right direction--but they are not the complete answewr. IMHO it is seal design, housing coating problems, engine hot spots, exhaust port problems and under addressed carbon build up that is "the problem".
This is not doom and gloom however--we are only evolving just like the earier models did.
rotor on
olddragger

tell sealbonekanobi we said hi!

beers :beer:

Who is sealbone? Wish I had that name!
olddragger

The chrome plated inner surfaces bothers me a bit. Why would chrome be used instead of a cast iron lining similar to the cylinder sleeves uses in the aluminum block of a conventional engine? I'm no materials expert but I do recall that cast iron has some major advantages to other materials when it's used in a lubricated, high heat/friction application. In fact, I think cast iron actually absorbs, for lack of a better term, the liquid lubricants applied to them.

Piston rings can be made compatible with cast iron cylinders, why can't apex seals? Or is it perhaps the fact the trochoidial the rotor moves in a bit too difficult to apply the equivalent of a cast iron cylinder wall sleeve?

cast iron ---to heavy and doesnt dispense heat as well. Each rotary engine (i think) has had a slightly different housing coating. Seals are not ran at the same tolerances as piston rings---much looser . The coating is actually placed on top of another bonded plate of metal--not aluminum.
olddragger

not sure about the weight, we're talking about a sleeve, not an entire housing. Seems the heat could be managed as it is in piston engines made from the stuff.

I'd be willing to bet they looked into it, we can only specuaate why they didn't use it. Could be weight but I'm thinking the difference might be just a few pounds.

piston engines do not have to deal with a 270 degress flame front. I thought you were speaking of the entire housing--my bad there:)
i am sure Mazda looked at a lot of different configs. Seems to me they need more field testing. Looks to me as if they designed a 75K engine---at the best.
olddragger

270, I assume that's 270C (518F). Honestly, that doesn't sound that hot. A internal combustion chamber using gasoline as the combustible has temperature averages about 1300C ( 2370F). Cast iron pistons and cylinder would get pretty hot I'd imagine in that environment. Cools by water jackets and by squirting cool (relatively) under the piston keep it down from that fur sure. But I'd bet these cast iron surfaces get to 500F or higher.

Housing is straight aluminium, the liner bonded to it is steel (composition unknown) with a micro-porous chromium coating (Mazdas patent).

The micro holes are designed to hold lubricant......

S

the 270 degrees refers to the amount of time the combustion surface is exposed to the combustion heat---recips have 90 degrees. so the rotory engine combustion surface is exposed to the c. heat 3 x's the lenght of time a recip is. result ---much hotter surfaces and therefore much more difficult to cool.
OD

ahh...now that makes sense. Sorry for my confusion.

So essentially, the thermal conductivity of the porouse chrome plated steel are greater than the the thermal conductivities of a cast iron lining.
But....the following may be of interest to you...

Thermal conductivity pretty much follows electrical conductivity (not perfectly, but similar). In other words a good conductor of electricity generally is a good conductor of heat. Both conductivities are affected by temperature (generally less conductive with increased heat).

Since Stealth indicates the steel is an unknown variety, the following table may not indicate much, but notice the thermal conductivity of pure iron is 42 at 68F, 1/2 that at 1832F, and of carbon steel it's 21-31 depending on carbon content at 68F, and stainless is 7-26 at 68F.

Yes, probably more than you wanted to know about these metal properties, and the engine has what it has...but the question does remain...why no iron lining in the rotor combustion chamber. Maybe marketing doesn't want their "high tech" engines to have any iron in them, LOL.


Metal Temperature - t - (oF) | Thermal Conductivity - k - (Btu/(hr oF ft2/ft))

Admiralty Brass 68 64
Aluminum, pure 68 118
200 124
400 144
Aluminum Bronze 68 44
Antimony - 120
Beryllium Copper 68 38
Carbon Steel, max 0.5% C 68 31
Carbon Steel, max 1.5% C 68 21
752 19
2192 17
Cast Iron, gray 70 27 - 46
Copper, pure 68 223
572 213
1112 204
Copper bronze (75% Cu, 25% Zi) 68 15
Copper brass (70% Cu, 30% Zi) 68 64
Cupronickel 68 17
Hastelloy C 5 70
Inconel 70 - 212 9
Incoloy 32 - 212 7
Iron, nodular pearlitic 212 18
Iron, pure 68 42
572 32
1832 20
Iron, wrought 68 34
Gold - 183
Lead 68 20
Lead 572 17.2
Manganese Bronze 68 61
Monel 32 - 212 15
Nickel Wrought 32 - 212 35 - 52
Platinum - 41
Red Brass 68 92
Silver, pure 68 235
Stainless Steel 68 7-26
Tantalium 68 31
Tin 32 36 - 39
Titanium 68 11 - 13
Tungsten 68 94 - 100
Wrought Carbon Steel 32 34
Yellow Brass 68 67
Zink - 67
Zirconium - 145