Hey guys, long time lurker and fan of GRM, but I just recently decided to make an account here. I just bought a 2005 Rx-8 back in February (coming from an NB miata that I loved), to track my build progress and hopefully take a few tips from those with some more experience tuning the rx-8!
About the car: I purchased it from the original owner in February 2019. The car had 181,000 Miles on the clock, having had a rebuild done at Brickell Mazda in Miami at 166,000 miles. The owner worked at Mazda and had all service and work done on the car there, I even got pages of records with it!
So the car is great fun. I've replaced the blown front shock, added an oil catch can, a cold air intake, straight piped and de-catted it (because fireballs). But I have some plans in mind as I want to start autocrossing, and tracking the car (I've had it for a few months and haven't taken it out yet). Maybe down the road if I'm not tired of dealing with it, i'll cage it and build it into a full blown time attack car.
My main goals are these:
1.) Reliability. Rotary engines scare me, and I want to make sure I'm protecting and monitoring the lovely rebuilt engine as I take it up to redline and use full throttle frequently.
2.) Lap times and ease of use. Simply put, I want a nice tool to do business with when I'm exiting the pits. I want the car to grip hard, but still have a nice balance and be able to rotate off of the brake pedal, or with throttle. The miata did this GREAT and that's probably what I miss the most about that chassis vs the Rx8. (I'm getting some understeer mid corner right now). I have KONI shocks on order for the car, and I will be pairing them up with springs in a few weeks as the budget allows. But again, my kowledge of this chassis tuning is non existant.
Any suggestions on what I should do, mainly to protect my engine? I will be getting a SOHN adapter soon, and have been meaning to order some Idemitsu premix for a few weeks now. What else do I need? Oil Pressure, Oil temp, and AFR gauges? Also considering my straight pipe and decat, should I get the car tuned?
Thanks you guys, any suggestions are highly welcomed, I'm new to rotary engines. But I love Mazda and I'm looking forward to many florida track events and driving this thing off into the sunset at 9300RPM.
