I was at our local "rotary car club" meet and talking with the guys and their general consensus was that the rx-8 was doomed to only last about 70-80k miles before starting to crap the bed... mainly due to poor designing on Mazda's part...true or false?

 

Duuuuddddeeeeeeee. This has been discussed many times and no that is not correct. There are 8s that are well above 100,000 and there are 8s who never saw it to 20,000. It depends on how well you treat the engine and if you keep up with the maintenance. I am out about 76k and my 8 still feels strong. Just take of her and she'll take care of you!

 

Sorry if it's been discussed before... I can't help but worry/wonder.... I'm not the first owner of my car and who knows what went on before I had it. I do know the previous owner took good care of it but did autocross and drive it pretty hard. I autocross and drive it pretty hard and experienced quite a bit of engine trouble last year so I'm a bit freaked out. I love the car and probably shouldn't obsess but it hits home when people who already own these cars are talking this way.

 

It isn't simply maintenance. There are several failure points that you have no real control over, like side seal spring failure. You can certainly kill our engine through negligence, but it's also possible for it to decide to die on it's own. It's the nature of an engine that is still really in the developmental stage. Call it a "Beta Test". There are known flaws.

Anyone who isn't mentally prepared for engine failure shouldn't drive a rotary.

Not bashing or flaming, just simply stating a fact. If it bothers you, freaks you out, worries you, etc... then trade to something else. If you accept it, then keep on it!


And no, there isn't a single failure method that has any real connection to the odometer. You can take a good engine 140,000 miles, hand it to someone that lets it carbon up, and it could be dead within 10,000. It's more an issue of "how many miles with <this> problem." My engine lasted 40,000 miles AFTER my cat failure that I believe slightly warped a housing, causing a slow coolant leak. If not for that, I'd likely still be on the original engine.


Also, it seems that you may not have read my new owner's thread, since the 2nd post's first point is discussing the engine failure story: https://www.rx8club.com/new-member-forum-197/new-potential-owners-start-here-202454/

There may be additional information in the thread of value to you.

 

Hopefully, you did your homework first, and bought a car with comprehensive maintenance records to qualify the 100,000 mile / 8 year engine core warranty, and also confirmed that your car had the TSBs done to remedy flooding and lubrication issues (upgraded starter, battery, programming reflash). Then, you would have little to worry about.

If in doubt, you might want to get a compression check at some point before the engine warranty runs out. It's a mixed bag with the series-1 motors, and the 2004/2005 motors had more issues prior to some of the upgrades.

 

All i could say is...its true to some, and false to some, and it really depends on how you take care of it.

 

^ more so the luck of the draw.

Fact : Mazda has a 100k warranty on the engine.

Question: why put a warranty out longer than the average failure? Seems like a great way to lose money.

Question: how many 06+ have had engine replacements?

 

Drive the car, take care of it properly.

Don't worry about it.

 

which rotary club u went?

ur location said rochester.

and if ur local rotary car club are mostly rx7 guys and never had rx8 before, they can go suck it since they dont know ****

just like anything in life, some dies sooner than others, some went over 200k on original engine, so just dont worry about it

 

At about 74,724 miles, the Renesis begins weeping what appear to be, by all outward appearances, tears of blood.

Upon close inspection for investigative purposes whilst in front of the car, with the hood propped open, the owner will find that the RX-8 has started itself, revving to a full on 9000rpm+ clutch dump, thence running down the owner, tossing hand grenades, lawn jarts & improvised pieces of its now self-immolating jagged, twisted, razor sharp shrapnel from its various couplings and apex seals at said owner's backside, before running him or her down in cold blood, proceeding to initiate a self destruct mode whilst parked over the owner's body, spontaneously bursting into an epic and inferno-rific ball of flames, thus destroying all forensic evidence, and denying David Caruso from CSI Miami or Mark Harmon from NCIS the ability to solve what was really a murder-suicide, forever to be unproven by them or anyone else for all of the ages.

 

To give potential buyers confidence that they're covered even if the engine blows prematurely. Standing behind their product and reputation when there's a problem.

Remember that Mazda instituted the 100k engine core warranty in '06 when there was a lot of publicity over the early engine failures, over their not counting RX-8s in dealer satisfaction surveys, and when they engaged in the 4206f recall to test every engine.

Ken

 

Okay, I can take a hint... I just started to worry because of hearing/reading too much from others. I Love my car and don't want to get rid of it but it but did go through some very expensive repairs last season. I don't know what happened to it before I owned it. I'm not a mechanic nor have any mechanical ability - and not really prepared financially to deal with a major problem. I have done everything I can to take care of it with all the advice I can gather from this site to the best of my ability. With that, I'll keep a positive outlook, keep my fingers crossed and just get in and drive!

 

Most sports cars have some sort of rare fatal flaw, you gotta pay to play. A few examples:

Audi 1.8t - timing belt can break before change interval (head rebuild), engine sludge, suspension bushings before 100k, turbos die at about 100k
BMW - plan on replacing the entire cooling system and all suspension bushings at about 100k
350Z - transmission rebuilds are common, interior bits wear quickly
Porsche 986/996 - rare intermediate shaft bearing failure, typically takes the engine with it ($8-12k)
WRX - transmission rebuilds are common

Your choices are to take care of the car and have fun with it, or sell it and buy a Camry. I'll take #1 please.

 

And I'd bet majority of those "rare" fatal flaws are from people abusing their cars on the street. You never get accurate statistics on any forum because all you hear from are people who've had the said part fail and nothing from those who haven't.

 

Side note to prove the accuracy of internet statistics:

66% of the Toyota Corolla's I've owned have had engines that made it past 90,000 miles. 100% of the RX-8s I've owned have had engines that lasted more than 90,000 miles.

Conclusion:
RX-8s are more reliable than Corollas.

 

You need a bigger RX8 sample.

 

The only reason some cars are hyped to be more reliable or make the highest ratings is because people who buy typical vehicles that aren't performance based don't attempt to drive their wheels off every single day for the most part; those in performance based cars do.

ANY car has a potential "rare" fatal flaw; there just is a more tendency for it to be exploited for those who own sports/muscle/exotic, etc. vehicles.

 

Yeah RX-8's are reliable man, don't worry about the haters. Some of these dumb asses have had four engines so obviously they have no business around a rotary.

 

Amen 9k.

























....wait a minute

 

 

whats a rotary? can i put a piston in it?

 

Honestly, the answer to your question is both true and false, that Mazda's poor design in some areas can lead to the early demise of the engine in an RX-8.

The ignition coils are probably the car's weakest point, and has the greatest potential for leaving you with a dead engine. Mazda is now on their 4th version of the ignition coils.

Of course, with the Series 1 engines like your car has, they decided to give two oil injectors per rotor housing a try. Don't really know why they went that way when the previous engines all had 3 oil injectors per housing for so many years before.

The starter in the first two years was weaker than it needed to be, and contributed to hard starting and flooding issues.

The fuel pump was also a point of design contention.

So, there's quite a few things that Mazda designed wrong in the RX-8, that had the potential to leave an owner with a dead engine, sometime in the future, through no real fault of their own.

But the rest of the car is pretty much solid, and even though the motor might die an early death, the rest of the car is usually good to go for many more miles, hence why so many people have invested the time and money into replacing a weak or dead engine in these cars.

If the car wasn't worth it, then there wouldn't be so many options in order to fix these cars.

BC.

 

Gotta take care of the 8. I just hope it's like my old N/A S4 FC3S which had well over 260k miles on it and the only problem was that I didn't have a powersteering pump in it lol's.

 

Out of curiosity have any of you had an engine replaced? - and even under warranty, how much does that end up costing out of pocket... it can't be totally free....

 

It's only out of pocket to have extras replaced like spark plugs, coils, etc. to pay for the parts.
Engine replacement is free if you have all service history. Some dealers even throw in the compression test for free.