Picked up the car, blew off work and went driving for the day.
More Pics from the day I got it
Got the car on the SCCA corner scales. The gas guage was two
ticks above the 1/2 mark. My best estimate, taking into account the
amount of reserve fuel still in the tank after hitting the empty mark
(2.5 gallons) is that I had about 10.3 gallons of gas in the tank. (it's
a 15.9 gallon tank). I took everything out of the car, including the
floormats, but left in the factory-supplied air compressor (the corner
of the car where the air compressor sits was still the lightest!)
| Without Driver | With Driver | ||||||
| left | front | right | left | front | right | ||
| 780 | 1563 | 783 | 843 | 1642 | 799 | ||
| Total: | 2969 | Total: | 3131 | ||||
| 720 | 1407 | 687 | 776 | 1489 | 713 | ||
| left | rear | right | left | rear | right | ||
Re-wired the foglights so they can be turned on as long as the accessory is on and wired in the Valentine 1
Got to the gas station within a few miles of the low fuel light coming on. The gas guage was not quite to the empty mark. 13.519 gallons were required to fill up. That means when the low fuel light comes on, there is about 2.4 gallons left in the tank.
Pavillions Car Show with RCCAZ
This picture shows how the stock tire seems to be too narrow for the stock
wheels. The stock tires are Bridgestone Potenza A030 at P225/45ZR18. Once
they are worn out, I plan to go to P245/40R18
040725: Drove up to canyon lake, took a few pictures.
040814: washed the car, had to take a few more pics and drive up to the lake overlook
I just changed my oil myself. this was my 8's third oil change. the first two were performed by dealerships (1st by the dealership I bought it from, second by a highly recommended dealership). I didn't jack the car up at all.
the crush washer I removed from the oil drain plug had been painted black! it must have been the factory crush washer. so two different dealerships must not have bothered to replace it. I did. (crush washer cost a buck, the filter was $8.something, for a total of $9.95 with tax for both)
the oil filter was only hand tightened. a pleasant surprise, in that it was easy to get the old oil filter off.
the car had been driven about 4 hours previously. I wrapped the oil filter with a diaper first; fortunately, because some oil came out with the old filter.
breaking the drain plug loose could have been a problem, but I have a 2-foot long socket driver (non-ratchet) that I use for taking off wheels, with that it wasn't too hard.
the hardest part was putting the drain plug and new crush washer back on. since I didn't jack the car up, there wasn't much room between my oil collection pan and the place where the drain plug went. the crush washer slipped off and fell in the old oil! that sucked. after that I moved the pan away and just put some newspaper under the hole to catch the odd drip or two while I put the plug back in. I don't have a torque wrench, so I just tightened the drain plug some random amount.
new tires installed! There are pictures there
comparing the new tires to the old tires.
replaced all four spark plugs myself. got a 12" ratchet extension for this job, as well as a 5/8" spark plug socket and some anti-sieze.
Simplest way to do it is take off the driver's side front wheel.
Best known price for the RX-8 spark plugs
Thread about changing the spark plugs
My car passed the dreaded engine recall check; just got a PCM flash and the leading spark plugs replaced. since I had just replaced them recently, I complained, and they gave me two brand-new leadking spark plugs for free!
had a persistent leak of some sort. Turns out it was the transmission input seal (took two trips to the dealer to diagnose it though). seal replaced under warranty.
Got some Michelin Pilot tires installed for autocross
Replaced the gas cap. the seal wears out after a while and starts causing the check engine light to come on.
It was only $16 online from the sponsors of rx8club.com
bought an extra set of wheels with factory bridgestone potenza RE040s. can't decide if I just got some tires for cheap for the street, want to put race tires on the extra wheels, or if I should re-sell them and just get some nice tires to use for both street and autocross.
I ended up selling the wheels and tires individually on ebay for a tidy profit, and using the proceeds to buy some Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 tires. These tires rock, they are by far the best tires I have ever had on any car I have ever owned. I bought them from Carrol Shelby, who is a sponsor of my local SCCA club.
Last Thursday I was getting on the highway, accelerating gently up the onramp, when I heard a loud "Pop!". Then the car had no power and the tach started slowly sliding lower and lower.
The battery light flashed once.
Then the check engine light came on and stayed on.
By this time I had coasted to the shoulder.
Turns out I had lost at least one apex seal in rotor #2.
Fortunately, I was at about 90,500 miles and the powertrain warranty had been extended by Mazda to 100,000 miles.
So I'm getting a Mazda-remanufactured engine installed at Berge Mazda.
Took a few pictures in the middle of the swap; click on the thumbnail to see a full-size
The grisly tableau greeting me this morning, with engines and a transmission up on spikes! (or barrels anyway)
Awful empty in there!
spiffy new clutch I just got in August
Rear and Driver's side of the old engine, with everything still waiting to be moved to the new engine.
Front and Driver's side of the old engine.
Passenger's side of the old engine; you can see the intake tract and the exhaust.
New engine! yep, it's a 13B
Front and Driver's side of the new engine. You can see the spark plugs sticking out the side.
Rear and passenger's side of the new engine. You can see the flywheel, the intake ports at the top of the side, and the exhaust ports along the bottom. Also, along the top you can see the oil injection ports.
Close up of the intake ports (upper row), and exhaust ports (lower row) on the new engine.
Why does my transmission remind me of the doomsday machine from the old Star Trek so much?
Bought a wheel on ebay to replace the wheel I hit with a curb. I also ordered some new Dunlop Direzza Sport Z1 tires yesterday. The current wheel looks bad but is still functional, so I intend to keep it, with the tire on it, as a spare. hopefully I can get a large wheel bag to put it in and keep it in the utility room, out of the heat, so it won't get dry-rotted.
Hopefully the wheel will arrive before the tires!