Cheap RX8 - good idea?

[SD1992]

As some of you may have noticed, the early 2004 ones are getting seriously cheap now, and I was wondering if they are a potential money pit or not?

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/2011...

This for example looks nice, so does anyone on here have any experience of the cheap ones?

My mate swears blind that there are hardly any moving parts so there is not much to go wrong, but I am not so sure. Too good to be true?

[frosted]

There are no moving parts if the car is not moving . I like them but my friend had a dog and everything broke including the engine

It's a bargaing if you get a proper compression test , dont think a warranty would cover the engine on rx8

[J4CKO]

SD1992 said:

As some of you may have noticed, the early 2004 ones are getting seriously cheap now, and I was wondering if they are a potential money pit or not?

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/2011...

This for example looks nice, so does anyone on here have any experience of the cheap ones?

My mate swears blind that there are hardly any moving parts so there is not much to go wrong, but I am not so sure. Too good to be true?

There are less moving parts but the movement they do tends to mean they dont last as long, I was speaking to a chap last night who bought one at the start of the year for 3k and has spent a lot on it on coil packs, plugs, diagnostics etc, he gets 15 to 18 mpg, 300 miles per litre of oil and it has had hot start problems, he says it is gutless unless you are ragging it and desperately wants to get rid. 33,000 miles and it is knackered.

Tempting isn't it !

[hornetrider]

SD1992 said:

My mate swears blind that there are hardly any moving parts so there is not much to go wrong, but I am not so sure. Too good to be true?

Buy it, what's the worst that could happen?

Or, you know, search for previous RX-8 threads and find out what you could be letting yourself in for!

[Chrisw666]

Do your research and buy with your eyes open to the potential pitfalls and buy one that has been enthusiast owned and you could be getting one of the best performance car bargains around.

Not a car that appeals to me on many levels but I can't see why they deserve to be as unloved as they are.

[frosted]

Chrisw666 said:

Not a car that appeals to me on many levels but I can't see why they deserve to be as unloved as they are.

I guess partly because they have been sold as an everyday car when clearly it's not

Get the compression test done, the rest is not really worth worrying about

[tucks]

spend an extra 1k and get a 231. those cars are hard enough to sell without buying a pov spec one. even the "hi-power" ones (mazdas words, not mine) are cheap-ish to insure for a sudo-sports car.
i used to own one. didnt miss a heart beat, but joining the owners club is a must. if you treat it like a normal car, it wont work. it you treat it like the wankle it is, it will be fine everyday all day.
i sold it due to the appaling MPG for a car with relatively little power. my current car(monaro) does more. other than that it was a bit of a gem in my opinion.

[STW2010]

SD1992 said:

My mate swears blind that there are hardly any moving parts so there is not much to go wrong, but I am not so sure. Too good to be true?

Moving parts, such as pistons and stuff- yeah, they do have less of them (or none in the case of pistons!). However for each chamber (there are two) there is a rotor with three tips. Each of these tips has springs and seals (apex seals). It is these springs and seals that fail, causing a loss in compression and eventually engine failure.

If you get a good one, then they are great cars. The best way to be sure is to find one with <40k miles, full service history (specialist or Mazda) and evidence that the owner has looked after it- questions on flooding and oil type will normally tell you whether or not the owner has a clue. Then the warm start, take it for a long drive, shut the engine down and then 5 minutes later try to start it up again. If there's any hesitation (>5 seconds) then walk away.

Another thing to consider is the coil packs (over £200), which are not service items and should be changed every 30k miles. If they have never been done on a car with over 50k on the clock, then that is a warning sign. Major services are every 3 years (or 36k miles) and include new spark plugs, which are £100 a set.

With these cars, I would tend to advise people to stay away from the bottom end of the market. They are very specialist cars, and need to be carefully looked after.

[tucks]

STW2010 said:

With these cars, I would tend to advise people to stay away from the bottom end of the market. They are very specialist cars, and need to be carefully looked after.

i whole heartdly agree with this.
The rx8 range has a whole has been torn apart with people having a poor understanding of how to treat the car. this is partly ,imo, Madas fault by aiming at almost a family market with it beng a 4door. it wasnt made clear my dealers that at its heart lay a great lump which you had to train your bran into treating in a differnt way than the generic family 4pot.
it wasnt bad...just different. now the market and internet are flooded with horror storys and low priced "coupes", that i dont believe was the cars fault.
misunderstood.

[J4CKO]

frosted said:

I guess partly because they have been sold as an everyday car when clearly it's not

Get the compression test done, the rest is not really worth worrying about

Not an everyday car ?

4 doors, fixed roof, creature comforts, pretty much in the mould of any affordable coupe, eith some added doors and a strange engine.

[300bhp/ton]

frosted said:

There are no moving parts if the car is not moving . I like them but my friend had a dog and everything broke including the engine

It's a bargaing if you get a proper compression test , dont think a warranty would cover the engine on rx8

Curious, but what else broke on it?

[tucks]

J4CKO said:

Not an everyday car ?

4 doors, fixed roof, creature comforts, pretty much in the mould of any affordable coupe, eith some added doors and a strange engine.

bad in heavy traffic.
appaling MPG hidden by small engine and average power.
Lots of garages have zero knowledge of them..which means expensive main dealer visit.
try swapping one round in your driveway as you other half wants to get her car out, see what happens when you go to restart it. even poping to the shops if its 5mins away can be risky
making notes of when oil was used and how much. always keeping oil in boot.

i had one, i like cars so got round these issue. for an example, my dad owning one....he would hate it. its not a mass market car but got sold as one.

[J4CKO]

tucks said:

i whole heartdly agree with this.
The rx8 range has a whole has been torn apart with people having a poor understanding of how to treat the car. this is partly ,imo, Madas fault by aiming at almost a family market with it beng a 4door. it wasnt made clear my dealers that at its heart lay a great lump which you had to train your bran into treating in a differnt way than the generic family 4pot.
it wasnt bad...just different. now the market and internet are flooded with horror storys and low priced "coupes", that i dont believe was the cars fault.
misunderstood.

It isnt some piece of highly strung, tuned to the hilt excotica, it was a mass market coupe from a major manufacturer that should have been more robust and reliable, the horror stories arent some kind of smear campaign, other manufacturers make much more focused stuff that doesnt have this level of problems.

I really like them but would only consider one if it had a different engine fitted, otherwise its a great solution but I couldnt be bothered opening myself up to that kind of agro.

The Rotary engine really needs shelving now, after god knows how long, nobody has ever made it econimcal or reliable enough to compete.

[frosted]

J4CKO said:

Not an everyday car ?

4 doors, fixed roof, creature comforts, pretty much in the mould of any affordable coupe, eith some added doors and a strange engine.

It would be a everyday car if it had a conventional piston engine . It requires a level of competence to take take care of a wankel . I'm buying a wankel next btw not in a rx8 though

[300bhp/ton]

SD1992 said:

As some of you may have noticed, the early 2004 ones are getting seriously cheap now, and I was wondering if they are a potential money pit or not?

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/2011...

This for example looks nice, so does anyone on here have any experience of the cheap ones?

My mate swears blind that there are hardly any moving parts so there is not much to go wrong, but I am not so sure. Too good to be true?

In short yes!

But it's a specialist car so you need to know a bit about them and what you are looking at. Personally I can't see the point in the 192, the only thing it offers over the 231 is less performance.

These things are thirsty, really really thirsty vs the HP output. But they look great, drive great and handle fantastically.

Be warned though, the wankel is fickle. And engine rebuilds or replacements are expensive. So again READ up on what you need to know.

Logically most of the cheaper ones are likely to have issues, but logic would also say only a fool would believe all of them do. So know what you are looking for and go hunt down a bargain!

[frosted]

300bhp/ton said:

Curious, but what else broke on it?

Well the most expensive thing was the interior climate and stereo . If someone sat on the passenger seat it wouldn't work , if someone slammed the door it wouldnt work and in the end just didn't work at all . Mazda told him it needs a whole new unit which was 1800 just to pur hase

[jdw1234]

I sent this thread to my friend who currently owns one. This is his reply...

" Ha ha can you reply?
If so, feel free to say "my mate says…"

The worst that could happen is a new engine – rule of thumb on an rx8 is that they last 60k miles.
Sure, if the owner has religiously looked after it, only ever used mineral oil, kept it perfectly topped up, red-lined at least twice a week and never flooded the engine then it may last longer.
But there is no way of telling if this is the case. A compression test will help, but someone allowing you to take one before you buy it is extremely unlikely as it is a bigger job than it sounds.

A rebuilt engine would be £3-4k with labour, and kills the re-sale value of the car. And that's before you replace all of the oil parts (which will almost certainly be screwed if the engine is. This is what I did.
A new one from Mazda is £5-6k – about as much as a newer RX8.
The worst thing is that a test drive won't reveal a thing – the bust engines take 20-30mins of motorway driving before the power goes down. It broke my heart when it did.
All in the RX8 (or at least the 2004 model thereof) is far and away the worst car I have owned and I warn anyone off them – I wish I'd bought an S2000.
It isn't that quick, it isn't that practical and drinks like a fish."

[300bhp/ton]

frosted said:

Well the most expensive thing was the interior climate and stereo . If someone sat on the passenger seat it wouldn't work , if someone slammed the door it wouldnt work and in the end just didn't work at all . Mazda told him it needs a whole new unit which was 1800 just to pur hase

Is this type of thing common? I've not read or heard much at all that hasn't been cats, coils, oil or hot start issues.

[frosted]

300bhp/ton said:

Is this type of thing common? I've not read or heard much at all that hasn't been cats, coils, oil or hot start issues.

I have no idea but the whole dash is one unit , how I said earlier his was a dog , 2 owners from new, fsh , last owner was a military lady that owned it for 4 years . Had to pick it up from from aldershot

[300bhp/ton]

jdw1234 said:

I sent this thread to my friend who currently owns one. This is his reply...

" Ha ha can you reply?
If so, feel free to say "my mate says…"

The worst that could happen is a new engine – rule of thumb on an rx8 is that they last 60k miles.
Sure, if the owner has religiously looked after it, only ever used mineral oil, kept it perfectly topped up, red-lined at least twice a week and never flooded the engine then it may last longer.
But there is no way of telling if this is the case. A compression test will help, but someone allowing you to take one before you buy it is extremely unlikely as it is a bigger job than it sounds.

A rebuilt engine would be £3-4k with labour, and kills the re-sale value of the car. And that's before you replace all of the oil parts (which will almost certainly be screwed if the engine is. This is what I did.
A new one from Mazda is £5-6k – about as much as a newer RX8.
The worst thing is that a test drive won't reveal a thing – the bust engines take 20-30mins of motorway driving before the power goes down. It broke my heart when it did.
All in the RX8 (or at least the 2004 model thereof) is far and away the worst car I have owned and I warn anyone off them – I wish I'd bought an S2000.
It isn't that quick, it isn't that practical and drinks like a fish."

Sounds like someone who bought and RX-8 for all the wrong reasons to me.