Even mazda is stumped!
 

My friend's 2007 has been having some serious issues and, as of right now, the dealership has no idea what's wrong with his car.

He took his car in last week for a coolant leak, found out that he needed to get a new sensor, bottle, radiator hose, and plugs n coils. Got the car back 2 days later, after replacing everything, above, and everything felt fine for about 2 days, then the power problems that he was having, before, started up again.

He says his car has a harsh start up, sounds like it's misfiring, a rough idle and that he has a power lag at lower rpms. No problems at higher rpms as of right now. The only thing that mazda did find, as of yesterday, was a loose ground wire, but they said it didn't appear to have anything to do with the problems listed above.

All of his coils and plugs are brand new and the dealership told him they have to call the higher ups to try and figure out what's going on. We have no idea what's going on. :Wconfused

Tell Mazda to replace the engine. Problem solved :yesnod:

What tests have they ran on the car? Did they at least check the compression?

Other small things to try:

Pull the MAF sensor off, clean it with some MAF spray, NOT electrical connector spray.

Reset the KAM by removing the negative terminal from the battery for 10 minutes, that will reset the fuel trim. If problems persist then try resetting the NVRAM as well: http://www.rx8blog.com/how-to-reset-ecu-on-mazda-rx8/

Other larger issues could be Front O2 sensor and/or CAT is going possibly.

Did a CEL come up?

The ECU will use FRT O2 sensor under closed loop. so thats not his problem. CAT could be going. but it should effect more on the high rpm, not the low.

Have your friend seen white smoke at start up ?

The maf has been cleaned with the proper solution. As for the smoke, there has been a light white smoke, but it didn't seem that out of the ordinary. It wasn't the think nasty smoke that every always talks about before an engine dies. There is a cel, I don't remember the code, but it is "misfire in cylinder 2". P108 or something like that. Also, the first time I started having issues, I cleared all the ram and let it relearn, but it didn't seem to help much.

You cleared the ram aka NVRAM or the KAM? The KAM is done by simply disconnecting the negative term on the barrery; NVRAM is the 20 brake stomp.

The only other thing I can think of is your SSV might be getting stuck like Jon's did but I've seen older Rx-8's that didn't have that issue. I cleaned mine out a month ago ('06 @ 30k miles) and didn't look bad nor was stuck.

Coolant leak onto the ground or just loss of coolant.
One of my engines had a coolant leak into the rotor housing. It would sputter for a few minutes in the morning and run fine the rest of the day. There was no leaking onto the ground.

Well Al, they said the coolant leak was fixed and all was well driving around for a couple of days so I think that was a separate issue unless, there is coolant somehow leaking inside the engine which I find had to believe.

What has Mazda checked/tests they have ran?

The coolant issue was just a bad sensor. I haven't had any problems since they fixed that. As for the ram, I cleared both of them. As far as I know they haven't ran a compression test yet, but I am waiting for them to call me today so I can get some more information.

small amount of white smoke at start up are fine, try to sniff the exhaust with your nose (NOT TOO MUCH! LOL!), if you smell coolant ... well you get the idea.

its pretty easy to tell if the engine has water/coolant in it, just let the engine sit overnight, pull the fuel pump fuse or foot on gas, crank it a couple of seconds, pull the leading plug out, if you see water spot. gg :)

I will keep this updated, Sephy thought it would be a good idea to get some ideas from around the forum. I am in a meeting for work now, but as soon as I get out of here, I will be calling Mazda to see where they stand.

*pats on the back* I know, I know, I AM awesome....

:suspect: okay maybe not too awesome if I have no idea what it is....but I thought I'd help in the way I could...

Thanks for your help guys!

^ dork :icon_no2:


jk :lol:

^ Seconded.

:squint: y'know....this isn't going to turn into a "bashing" sephy thread! we have a problem to solve here!!! :yesnod:

I'd bash dat ass!! :naughty:

This is easy. Its the CAT. The reason they didn't find it is because it didn't throw a cel yet. but the cat can and does go bad often without any cel at all and always well before throwing any cel.

of course you have done things like check the plug wires are connected properly and the battery terminals are clean and the connections tight?

Well got in touch with leshil

He's part of the new cool kids' engine club.

Coolant was indeed leaking into rotor 2. Good job calling that out Al. Still covered under warranty but now he's going to be pretty upset not having his baby for 15 days.

Thanks for your help guys!!

Yeah, when I first had issues with the coolant, I thought it was this, then I guess I just tried to tell myself it wasn't it. The sad thing is I told Mazda I thought it may have been this a week and a half ago, but they chose to to ignore me and have me get new coils and plugs. Go go Mazda dealerships.

Well, at least now it should be okay. Though it kills me, "10 days for the engine to come in and 5 for install".

I hate you. :banghead:

Thanks for all the help guys, I thought for a while there I was gonna have to really get into it with Mazda.