RX8 oil gauge
 

I have recently read an article about the oil gauge sending unit on the RX8, It stated that the unit is not reading specific pressure but only that there is a pressure switch that closes when you have .5kg/cm2 so your gauge never changes. I understand rotaries rarely have oil pressure problems but this is a little bit misleading. Does anyone know if you can get a real sensing unit for the RX8?

thanks,
4play

Are you talking about an aftermarket oil pressure gauge, such as an Autometer, HKS, etc.?

Well I didn't know if there has been a sending unit that you could hook up to your existing pressure gauge to make it actually be a working gauge or not...? I would rather not put an aftermarket gauge in my car...

The stock oil gauge on the car is just a dummy gauge. If your oil pressure drops, 15 seconds later it will just start to fall off to zero. If, at any time during that 15 seconds you regain pressure, you'll never see it move.

Racing beat showed us this at their headquarters yesterday afternoon.

Isn't that kind of bad for car companies to have dummy gauges? How much would it cost Mazda, or any company, to have gauges that are fully-functional, as in give real results, or would the concept be to intimidating for novice car enthusiasts?

(moving to tech forum)

Strangely then, when I topped off the oil with 1qt. of 10W40 midchange, the gauge did go up half interval (makes sense, higher visc, higher pressure) and after the dealer changed to 5W20 again, came back down. So to me it looked like it did sense the pressure somehow.... Car is 05/'04 build.