RE: Shed of the Week: Mazda RX-8
Discussion
GranCab said:
Their customer reviews also seem to contain some shocking grammatical glitches?! Keep well away would seem to be the basic messageR8Steve said:
re33 said:
R8Steve said:
Some people say they have great handling, i can't comment as it wasn't fast enough to find out. That was the higher BHP model as well. Rubbish.
LMAO. "Wasn't fast enough to find out." It's hard not to attack you personally for a comment like this, maybe you were trying to exaggerate for effect, but what on earth does amount of power got to do with a cars handling? What do you think of the handling in a Yaris? Wow.Edited by R8Steve on Friday 5th January 10:41
I've only driven a yaris a fairly short distance so didn't really test the handling, it felt well balanced though. HTH
In the hum drum "A" road traffic and occasional clear bit the RX8 I had was as good as any car. On track even my basic 192 was as quick as most (quicker than the 231's that were there that day).
If I had the opportunity to I wouldn't hesitate to get another RX8 192
I would take the engine and gearbox out and drop it into an MX5
I'm tempted by one of these as a track car, there was a pack of them at the Circuit Days event at The Ring in October and they seemed to go well.
In many ways, a broken one for £500 and an engine rebuild with warranty for £1000 looks like the best option. A bit of hassle and spannering, but you'd hopefully have more confidence in it than a used car that hasn't yet given up.
In many ways, a broken one for £500 and an engine rebuild with warranty for £1000 looks like the best option. A bit of hassle and spannering, but you'd hopefully have more confidence in it than a used car that hasn't yet given up.
Wait Here Until Green Light Shows said:
If it had a traditional V6 (like the 2.0 V6 from the the Xedos for example) it would have been a absolute winner. Beautiful looking car ruined by the engine and terrible MPG.
It wouldn't have looked the same (because the bonnet line would have had to be higher) and it wouldn't have handled as well (there's nothing special about the suspension, it just has a very favourable distribution of mass). If they'd put a 2.0 V6 in it, I'd have bought a BMW 3-series instead.I had an R3 for 5 years, driven like it should be driven, with zero faults. I had the down link bars replaced as the connectors were plastic to stop the shocks being transmitted into the car, cost about £50, coils changed at 30K as a precaution and thats it. One of the best handling cars I've driven and there is also a knack to getting the best out of it.
shed said:
You'll still be pouring oil in at a fair old rate of knots, even without an oil leak, as these engines are major-league guzzlers. They demand the good stuff too, none of your Costco gloop
Actually, the correct oil is dirt cheap compared to the fully synthetic long life stuff many cars use today. You will get carbon build up problems if you use more expensive fully synthetic oils which are designed for cars which don't deliberately burn oil.
No regrets. Great to own but wasn't too sad to see the back of it.
Owned a 2007 231 version. covered 88k miles in a little over 3 years. Bought it new for a fraction over £20k (£26k mrp) and px'd it for £6k back in 2010.. its probably dead now!
Never drank more than a litre of oil every two months (which I'm told was very good) but had to get rid of it in the end because the <20mpg and poor tank range was killing me.
Great car for flowing roads and felt nicely balanced, but a lack of low down grunt was frustrating in slow bends and the front end could go a bit too light for my liking in the really fast stuff (especially if you had anything more than a laptop bag in the boot. )
An engineering friends theory is the reason it never skipped a beat was probably because it was bullied on a regular basis. Don't know if that makes any difference or if I was just lucky to have a good one.
Wish they still did it as I might be tempted for something similar, but only if it was factory fresh and had a few more horses.
Owned a 2007 231 version. covered 88k miles in a little over 3 years. Bought it new for a fraction over £20k (£26k mrp) and px'd it for £6k back in 2010.. its probably dead now!
Never drank more than a litre of oil every two months (which I'm told was very good) but had to get rid of it in the end because the <20mpg and poor tank range was killing me.
Great car for flowing roads and felt nicely balanced, but a lack of low down grunt was frustrating in slow bends and the front end could go a bit too light for my liking in the really fast stuff (especially if you had anything more than a laptop bag in the boot. )
An engineering friends theory is the reason it never skipped a beat was probably because it was bullied on a regular basis. Don't know if that makes any difference or if I was just lucky to have a good one.
Wish they still did it as I might be tempted for something similar, but only if it was factory fresh and had a few more horses.
I also have an R3 as a weekend car, having had a couple of 231s prior to it. The fact that it polarizes opinion so much is, for me, a bonus of having one, on top of the pretty unique noise, handling and design - I love it.
I have never needed one on any of mine but the consensus from those who know seems to be that to get a quality and lasting rebuild you need to spend £2k upwards with one of the more trusted builders.
I have never needed one on any of mine but the consensus from those who know seems to be that to get a quality and lasting rebuild you need to spend £2k upwards with one of the more trusted builders.
R8Steve said:
On the contrary, i do hillclimbs/sprints in a Mazda MX-5 and think it is one of the best balanced and enjoyable cars to drive.
It's just the RX8 i thought was rubbish, the values of them would certainly tell me i'm not alone.
the values do not reflect the performance or handling. If that is the case then surely the MX-5 must be crap too since they are similarly cheap...right?It's just the RX8 i thought was rubbish, the values of them would certainly tell me i'm not alone.
Edited by R8Steve on Friday 5th January 12:07
treeroy said:
R8Steve said:
On the contrary, i do hillclimbs/sprints in a Mazda MX-5 and think it is one of the best balanced and enjoyable cars to drive.
It's just the RX8 i thought was rubbish, the values of them would certainly tell me i'm not alone.
the values do not reflect the performance or handling. If that is the case then surely the MX-5 must be crap too since they are similarly cheap...right?It's just the RX8 i thought was rubbish, the values of them would certainly tell me i'm not alone.
Edited by R8Steve on Friday 5th January 12:07
The fact that people are struggling to give them away would indicate that the general perception of the market is that they are rubbish.
My thoughts on the RX8 -
Pros
Looks fairly good
Interior is nice enough
Suicide rear doors are quirky
Gearbox is slick
Cheap to buy
Cons
Underpowered
Fuel consumption
Oil consumption
Noise
Reliability
Build quality
The blue one is my wife's car. She used to have a silver one that we had the engine rebuilt in. The blue one came up with a dead engine for 800 so I put the engine from the silver one in to the blue one as it was in much better condition. Lovely car, she wouldn't change it for anything and I have tried as the body shell is nicer than mine. Car is use for normal every day use, ferrying kids around etc. Surprising amount of space in them.
The red is mine. I bought this with a dead engine for 200 and had a ported 231 engine built for it. It's got racing beat arbs and eibach springs and I'm about to fit tein mono coil overs on it so I can adjust the ride height now I've stripped most of the interior out. The car is the most fun I've had on the road and track for a long time given that it's been totally reliable.
We all like different things.
R8Steve said:
RX8 residuals are significantly worse than MX-5's, in fact, they are worse than most cars.
The fact that people are struggling to give them away would indicate that the general perception of the market is that they are rubbish.
No, it's that people are obsessed by fuel economy, even on a car they'll only do 5-6k a year in.The fact that people are struggling to give them away would indicate that the general perception of the market is that they are rubbish.
Add in the 'rep' that these things have, and that most performance car buyers either want a badge, an image, or 'white goods' style running experience (chuck it at the dealer every 2 years and ignore everything else), and these are harder to shift than an elephant with an attitude problem.
The reality is that they WILL cost more to run (£ and time) than an equivalent 330Ci, Audi TT or 350Z, but will cost MUCH less to buy, so the lack of any meaningful depreciation now SHOULD be an offset. If you're in the minority that think about depreciation, that is.
Plus they handle better than any of the 3 cars mentioned. And if you know the foibles (coil packs as service items, treat like a 2-stroke with a little oil in each fuel tank, don't use just for a trip to the corner shop), there's actually little to worry about...
PhantomPH said:
otolith said:
R8Steve said:
it understeers into fast corners.
I found that a little on track, until the instructor improved my driving. 
R8Steve said:
PhantomPH said:
otolith said:
R8Steve said:
it understeers into fast corners.
I found that a little on track, until the instructor improved my driving. 
In fairness, don't all cars have understeer in fast corners? It means you are going too fast. I don't think that means it's a bad handling car. F1 cars understeer if the lads go piling into a corner too quickly. Just think about the amount of times the top dogs went washing out into the gravel at Tamburello back in the day.
PhantomPH said:
R8Steve said:
PhantomPH said:
otolith said:
R8Steve said:
it understeers into fast corners.
I found that a little on track, until the instructor improved my driving. In fairness, don't all cars have understeer in fast corners? It means you are going too fast. I don't think that means it's a bad handling car. F1 cars understeer if the lads go piling into a corner too quickly. Just think about the amount of times the top dogs went washing out into the gravel at Tamburello back in the day.
They do, yes, some more than others. If you drove something like an Exige round a track then something like an Audi S3 you would see what i mean. One is razor sharp, one is a big understeery mess.
I'm not saying it was terrible and my main complaints are that the engine doesn't live up to the chassis and even at that the chassis is more flawed than a lot of reviews would let on.
Some clearly disagree, some do agree so i'll bow out of the debate at this point, perhaps i had a bit of a pup, who knows.
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