f4pilot

I bought a new RX8 this week. I did do quite a bit of searching first to try and answer this question but could not find a thread directly addressing it.

As you might expect with the stock summer tires fitted, I had a lot of slipping in some snow that fell recently. In fact, the minute I backed out of my garage I started getting stuck in about 1-2 inches of new snow that had some ice underneath it. Almost immediately when I had slipping of the rear tires, both under reverse and in 1st and 2nd gear (6spd equipped car with DSC) there was a distinct clunking sound coming from underneath the car, hard to tell exactly where it was from but I would say it was NOT the very back of the car where one would expect to hear a problem with the diff, more in the middle. Fairly loud and it was, for me at least, a concerning sound. I read the threads about the ABS brake check happening when first pulling off and h0itting a minimal speed -- this was different as it happened when I was getting tire slippage.

The sound continued to surface on the drive to work many times when I was slipping and the DSC and the limited slip diff were doing their respective jobs to try and help me get traction.

Has anyone else experienced this? Do you know the source of the sound? Is it normal or something about which to be concerned?

I just bought the car the night before, it was delivered from a dealer in another city so it does have about 320 miles on it.

Thanks in advance for any replies.

staticlag

how much experience do you have with manual transmission?

f4pilot

Lots, almost every car I have ever owned but I have never heard them make this sound.

The other cars were mostly hondas with front wheel drive and they were not equipped with Torsen diffs or a brak based traction control/stability control system.

Please tell me what I am missing ? Enlighten my apparent ignorance, I would like to know the source of this sound I was hearing.

staticlag

I don't know hard to tell what it is unless I'm hearing it myself.

Since your car is working overtime to give you traction, I'm going to have to say its the stability control. It has the ability to pump your brakes for you even if you don't touch the pedal and can sound like ABS.

So hard to tell since you aren't driving it on a smooth dry road.

I mean, cruising down the highway at 60 and getting this noise is one thing but slipping everywhere in the snow is another.

I'm going to have to call it a normal noise at this point.

staticlag

well, there is one more thing that sounds like what you describe,

and it is when the catalytic converter tube comes out of its rubber suspension mount underneath the middle of the car and bangs against the cross-supports down the center column. Unlikely, but i imagine it would sound a lot like what you were hearing.

nycgps

iTrader: (1)

if you have lots of exp, you should know that if you continue to drive with those summer tires in snow, we might see you on the headlines 1 day.

Change them soon.

f4pilot

Yes I know. Dunlop Wintersport M3s are being spooned on Monday. I just picked the car up on Wednesday and the snow tires were ordered from TireRack on Thursday. I had to get to work for a meeting and braved the snow in summer tires...it was ill-advised and I almost didn't make it as a result of several hills.

Anyway, I have not heard the noise since, have been driving on salt-dried roads since and the car is a joy to drive.

I worried that the noise was maybe the driveshaft binding when the wheels slipped and the rear diff locked and DSC applied brakes at same time. I didn't know if the carbon fiber shaft might have been prone to binding or twisting under those conditions or what the heck the sound was. I still don't know but the car seems to drive great on dry roads.

StealthTL

iTrader: (1)

It's just the traction control - you'll notice a slight power loss when it happens too, the computer closes the throttle a bit and applies rear brakes with a 'grrunk' sound.

Snow/ice + stock tires = rapid death.

S

Nick79

This is what I got when I mixed snow and stock Potenza's, cracked rim plus two bent links. But I was soooo lucky!!, the curb that fucked up my rim stopped me from nailing a hydrant that was less than a foot away.
Anyways, I immediately bought a set of Goodyear Eagle F1's. I'm in Chicago, rarely drive to the 'burbs, so All-Season tires are good enough.
These Goodyears are amazing compared to the Bridgestones. I'll see how they handle in the summer, but so far so good.

daisuke

I ended up doing a bit of a clutch dump the first few miles after picking up my car because I wasn't used to the clutch yet, and yeah that's what I got, vibration, noise and the traction control light coming on. It's normal, especially since the engine is so quiet, you hear everything else the rest of the driveline does. Hell the tranny is louder than the engine at 10 mph

f4pilot

Yeah, at slow speed the thing is eerily quiet, pretty cool. You'll have to let me know how the FI all seasons do in summer, if its not too much of a compromise I may go with those as well. So do they get the job done in snow? If make the '8 serviceable in snow and handle and stick well in summer they may just be too good to be true.

Gish

Yeah, I get this when driving gets a little too spirited on roads with some sand on them...

Nick79

Haven't had a chance to test them in any real snow, it's been a freezer in the Chi all this last week...-4 F last night.
But I have noticed a big improvement in traction over the stock's in this extreme cold. I

f4pilot

Dunlop Winter Sport M3s installed today by dealer. I must say, they are a dramatic improvement, as expected of course. Spent a little while driving around in neighborhood streets that have not been plowed at all and it steers and corners on snow well and does not kick in the ABS very easily at all. I can climb a grade in snow great. And the driving on fry roads is not bad at all either. I can recommend these tires subject only to my limited experience with them, I do think they will burn up quickly on dry pavement.

daisuke

how is the road noise with those new ones? the potenzas are damn loud, I'm looking for newer tires but not sure what I want to go with yet. I don't really need all season tires because we don't get snow in this part of california.

f4pilot

The Dunlop WinterSports are surprisingly quiet on the highway, I would recommend them as great snow tires. The car behaves great in the snow, can stop, turn, accelerate all with minimal DSC intervention. But since you are in Cali I would stick with summer tires like you are thinking.

If you'r etrying to decide which tires to buy next I recommend that you look on TireRack.com at the summer tires for our size. Read their test reviews, they will tell you about everything from out and out grip on dry and wet surfaces to road noise and ride comfort and rate the tires accordingly. I know that they have comparisaon tests comparing several different high performance summer tires that are available in RX-8 stock sizing.