Wow No flaming for once

Yeah i get this once in awhile too. But it's there and i can clearly see how much oil i have after the 3rd try

 

sorry for the crappy cellphone pic. This is day 3 first pull with the blocked oil cooler. There is oil on the dip stick it's just clean and doesn't show up well

 

Froth is water vapor.....hot oil boils it off........

Short trips = cool oil and more condensation = more froth

Long trips = warmer oil and less condensation = less froth

Drive the **** out of it = no problem

The 04-05's were the worst till they fixed the breather...now they aren't bad

Oil and coolant temp control are important....hard to keep them cool in the summer stock...and hard to keep them warm in the winter...

 

At least you had the decency to put socks on!

 

I have a catch can .... alot less goop

 

socks hell! Those are my super comfy double thick custom memory foam slippers

 

Before mazda fixed the breather, they had an oil dipstick tube insert that kept the dipstick clean.

 

Here is what driving it took to get rid of froth on a 21 degree F day: I drove 2 three hour drives yesterday at 70 mph. It wasn't all gone when I got home.

Today I had a friend with an Ipod measure the Gs thru 2nd and 3rd. To slow things down, I found a huge hill and did 4 pulls to redline in 2nd and 3rd. The froth was gone.

Sadly i can't do the second every day. How hard is it to upgrade the breather? I have read one TSB that involves unbolting parts underneath the oil filler and adding vacuum lines. Is adding a catch can just as good?

 

Thought they might be sumtin like that, but had to take a chance and went with socks!

 

its temps--i have a catch can to vacuum and i still will get it if i dont get my temps up
OD

 

Update

Yesterday I checked the oil and it was clean excpet around the rubber top of the dip stick there was a very minor bit of froth. Today I checked again and basically had the same results. I still have vaccum from the intake to the oil filler neck. I will be removing the driver oil cooler block and leaving the hose connected to the intake today*did it already*. If the froth doesn't go too crazy then I'll remove the filler hose and replace it with a cheap 2" breather and see how that goes. Ither way i'll try both just depends on how fast the froth builds as to which route I take.

 

people may be surprised how much of this stuff is in the oil pan---not just on the dipstick.
OD

 

Ya know this makes me wonder a few things. If my oil pan is full of this smutz what problems might that cause considering engine life. The froth is basically created from *water* right? So what kind of corresion might that be causing over extened time periods. How about the OMP is it possible it might be picking up some of this foam and injecting a bit less oil due to the mass/volume/weight difference of the frothy oil vs. pure oil. Also how about the oil filter could some of this froth block it's ability to filter in any way?

 

There is a huge amount in the oil pan. I just replaced my stock oil pan with a GReddy replacement and there were gobs of the white gunk in the OEM pan when I removed it.

 

thats exactly the thoughts i was having concerning the 04 oil filter bypass pressure being too low.
if the oil cannot get through the oil filter and the by pass opens--then this stuff has a full run through the system.
on cold mornings i am thinking the oil filter by pass is being activated. to much pressure difference with the cold oil. cold oil does not flow well.
thats why i switched to the 09 oil filter with the higher bypass pressure.
mazda has a reason they switch things around.
BW---when i removed my pan --about 1/3 of it was covered with this stuff. that and my uoa caused me to change things around some.

 

OD what exactly do you mean you switched to the 09 filter? Is it just the filter itself that's different or is there something different in the filter mount. I rember some saying were using a larger miata spec filter but it was to big when running the RB oil plate.

 

The '09 filter is a bit taller than the one for our cars, but the difference is a higher bypass pressure. That is, if the oil is cold and viscous, it won't bypass the filtering potion of the oil filter as easily.

 

Car has had 6 startups with approx 15-20 min of inital idle time. Ambient temps have been 32 or less since monday and that's the first time I have driven since removing the oil cooler blocking plate. I haven't seen the water temp over 176 and oil will not go over 170 in normal driving conditions. I have also noticed that with the mazmart t-stat installed as soon as the radiator gets to 176 the t-stat will open and temps fall to approx 168 before rising again to 176. This all takes place in about 1 minute for a complete open to open cycle. Temps fall fast and recover in about 45 sec. I didn't really expect to see this much froth back in the oil pan after just 6 drive cycles but my car is also struggling to get near operating range unlike most rx-8's. It is looking to me as if the BHR rad and Mazmart t-stat are a bad combination for a NA winter driven rx-8. I'm going to install the block again and see how long it take to go away then i'll remove it again and also remove the oil filler neck hose as well adding a filter to atmosphere and see what results that may yield.

sorry crappy cell phone pics again

 

If you want to get your oil temps up, drive the car in 1st gear at 3k RPM for 15-20 min. Watch your oil temp gauge because you can hit 230+ in no time.

 

Where in the hell am I supposed to drive around in 1st gear for 15 min any how no that will not work for me.

 

I was being facetious.
I drive LA stop and go traffic 34 miles one way and have trouble keeping the oil temp below 230.

 

Ahh well in that case you SUCK!

 

ok relax folks---the coolant temps are not that important here. mazmarts setup is fine.
Matter of fact a well known company is considering manufactoring a well made oil cooler blocker pop in.
You will get much better results if you block both coolers all the way out to level with the fog lights. Use that thick of foam. Just blocking the cooler with a flexable thin thing doesnt work as well as some airflow will continue to get by when you are at speed.
Even on a 26F morning now i can get mine up to 180 on the interstate and 195-200 in town. Coolant temps will also go up a little maybe 10-15 degrees.
Oil cooler blocks could be made to look really good

 

Thanks Denny, been wondering what to about this as of late. Can you post a pic of the oil cooler blocks you have installed? Just want to see how much I have to block...I don't have fogs installed.

 

you know my rep concerning pics!
No fogs then just level with the opening?
details of what I did:
1- used a small piece of heat shield on the front side of the coolers
2- fairly thick piece of home depo type insulating foam (cut to desired size) on top of that
3- piece of a left over track magnetic number sign I had lying around on top of the foam
4- lock it down with the long plastic through fasteners like you get with a additional cooler kit. you can get these separate at most any auto parts store.

Actually I have only mentioned this to Paul at Mazmart as an item they may want to make for sell and just a "plug int type". If the package was shaped well and have the right type of anchor all you would have to do is to push them in when the weather got cooler. They could be made to look really good and have personnalized message on them like " TOO COOL"
or something.
OD