My driver's side power door lock quit working today. It will only lock and unlock manually or with the key. It wont work with teh key fob remote or with the switch. THe passenger side still works though. Is this a common problem or is this going to be an expensive dealer fix?

No, Its not common and should be covered under the warranty.

fuse

+1

warranty went off about 2k miles ago... :-(

Bump!!!!!! Need help!

Take it to a dealer and whine anyway. They may just go ahead and fix it. If they don't, call the Mazda customer service 800 number in your owners manual and politely request that they cover the repair since your mileage is so close to the warranty mileage.

Mine just started doing this (or so I noticed) the other day. Passenger side. I took the panel off the door and found it to be the lock actuator. Has anybody here had to replace the actuator before.. Or know the best place/price to get a new one?

I know that the Honda civics 01-05 had many problems with the lock actuators and the gas tank lid actuator failing, but it doesn't seem to be a common RX-8 problem.

If anyone has any advice I'd appreciate it.

Adam

it is the door lock actuator and you can get it covered if your polite about it. i can get you a price if you need it... where are you from?

lord et is your car out of warranty?

Yeah, the car is out of warranty. I went to the dealership here and they showed me the part on their order list and it's for the entire door setup.. actuator, lock, cables, switch...all of it. $149.76. OH, and I'm in Denton.

how many miles do you have on the car?

52,xxxmiles

Im so Blown! my car has 51000 miles and now i have the same problem with my driver side. the door wont open!

Im having the same problem with my 8. It seems to be like a common issue, does anyone have a solution as to what it could be?

Happens to my passenger side lock. Occasionally unlocks or unlocks with the fob, but driver side works perfectly. I think ill check it out later

My 8 just clicked over 55,000 miles and started doing this today on the driver's side lock. It opens/locks with the key in the door just fine, but the electrical actuation just doesn't have the might to move it.

It was about 90 degrees out all day, not sure if temperature has something to do with it but I have seen that some people have suggested that.

sorry for the huge bump, but I am having this exact same problem on both my driver and passenger door. could it be the actuator motor? I know the actuator motor is a cheap radio shack motor, and I don't really want to spend the money on a whole new actuator, so would it be possible to replace just the motor?

You can try that, but as I recall it's a PITA. A new actuator was about $120. Not great, but saves considerable time. Also you can't buy just the motor from Mazda, so you have to find one that fits. Spending money feels easier than spending time on that problem.

I would just search for a similar motor online... they all probably come from the same factory in China anyways . If I find it is too much of a pain (which I am thinking it may be), then I don't think I can cough up $240 for door lock actuators. I will just live with it...

Cross posting to this thread as well for future searches.

No need to purchase the complete door lock assembly from Mazda for the RX8.

The Mazda 6 door lock actuators are the way to go. My passenger side actuator completely failed and the drivers side was on the way out. Picked up a set from Ebay (Door Lock Actuator For 2003-2008 Mazda 6 Front Left and Right Set of 2) for about $30.

Dropped right in with no issues. Should be good now for another 15 years

Some additional info after about a year after the new lock actuators were installed.

Had a really strange problem that cropped up. Not sure if it was the cheap ebay lock actuators or just bad luck.

The symptoms where the doors would continuously start unlocking when I first put the key in the ignition with the drivers door open. It was a constant 'click, click, click' that only stops when you turn the key to 'on' or close the drivers door. Really strange. Once the cycling stops it does not happen again until you get out of the car and lock the doors and unlock and get back in.

Since the locks were working fine I was thinking it was the security system but then thought maybe there is a short or something in the lock actuator since it was so cheap.

So I swapped the drivers actuator out with a used OEM one from a pick and pull and it worked fine. The unlock cycling stopped.

Hopefully this could help someone down the road. I could not find anything reported like this when I searched the site.

Bought mine from Amazon, haven't had your issue yet. Slight binding of the actuator will cause cycling.