Hello guys,

Took my 8 in for 30,000km service at GR. CEL came on after I collected the car. Told me it's ignition coil fault when they put through the computer diagnostics. Any bro had this fault before? Costs over $1000 to replace incl labour. I am going to sit on this for now. Your feedback please, especially the oldbies like Neon, Fab8, Eugene, 2F2F, Genesis, etc. 2 1/2 year old time to change ignition coil?? Find it hard to accept.

-Ringer-

 

Scary man!

30k is just after warranty. But still seems quite premature a failure.

If this "suay" problem hits me, maybe i will get a aftermarket one.

 

but how come 'CEL came on after I collected the car'......? strange leh.

thot if you go to workshop with it 100% error free.....and then when you leave the workshop with error....you can ask them 'so heng the ignition coil spoil at your workshop?'

 

try reseting the ecu to see if it comes on again

 

If it's a real ignition coil fault, I don't think you can even start the engine. Most likely a glitch, so try to get it reset. If GR won't do it, then maybe they ARE really trying to milk you.

 

There are a few threads about this going on. You are not the first one trust me. One person saw flames and hot white metal shavings coming out the exhaust to which he thought was a dead cat. It turned out to be his coil had burnt out.

There are a few ideas floating around about how this happened. One is that heat from the engine cause the coil to fail prematurely.I do admit that coils mounts on the engine block it's self is not that good. Seeing how Rotary engine run hotter than most. like the engine mounts that fail due to heat from the exhaust. Second would be the coils itself has a design fault/bad batch within them since there are only a couple of guys that are experiencing these problems.

A thousand bucks is a little steep for a coil replacement. Why not just order the part and change it yourself. I am sure it would sure cost less than a damn grand.

You can read up about one of the guys on here is trying to DIY/Fab up a coil relocation/upgrade for his 8 in the Aftermarket Performance and MazdaSpeed subforum.

 

I have one scenario. the CEL happened at GR but they resetted the ECU so it would not show up right away. So that after you picked up the car and drive it for a while, the CEL would pop up again.

Haha... that is only one of many possiblities.

 

Thanks guys for your response.

I will ask for reset and monitor for a while. BTW my car is smooooooth.

-Ringer-

 

Ringer - do you massage your 8 with baby oil thats why it is so smooth ..hehe.. If your car is running well, i doubt that it is your coil that is acting up. You would feel mis-firing or ignition break up. Anyways , hope all goings well .

 

Thats extreme and too dramatic.

I think only the engine will either fail to start or just stall.

Afterall, a ignition coils job is to step up voltage, why would it cause any dramatic effects?

 

My ignition coil was changed a couple of months ago... the CEL came on after I had my whitelines swaybars installed at the tyreshop in MacPherson. The mechanic took the car out for a test on the swaybar install (I was not with him) and 5 minutes later, he drove back with burning clutch smell and a CEL. moral of story - don't let others drive your 8!

Anyway, brought it to GR, they diagnosed it to be coil fault, had it reset initially. Came back on a couple of days later. Brought back again - reset, and came back on 5 minutes after that. Gave up, changed coil, and no problems since.

Interestingly, the car had no starting problems, and ran smoothly all the while the CEL was on.

 

BTW, how about some MM brudders here calling up the MM servicing dept to check how much it cost to replace the coil packs? That way, we will know how much these things cost.

 

Emperor - https://www.rx8club.com/series-i-tech-garage-22/catalytic-converter-went-out-blaze-glory-84356/

Fab 8 - you should have made him pay for the replacement cause it happened when he was "test driving" your 8. What was the name of the place? So the rest can avoid it.

 

Ignition coils are $47 US each and you can replace yourself quit easily

 

I read the whole thread and nothing conclusively points to a coil causing the damage. Even the ice cold rx8 also did not said it was because of the coil and he added that the dealer also could not explain why his tail end flamed.

Seriously, i would not say a coil cause all this damage. Jumping to conclusions only alarm people for nothing and start another urban myth.

And recently we had a recall on some heat insulation so that may have been a cause for his cat flaming.

No offence but we all owe due care to each other not to pass false infomation or opinions.

I do make mistakes at time but i try my best to give accurate info. I studied some automotive engineering as a hobby even though my trade is in businesses.

 

I did not say that what he saw was due to the coil. But you must admit it was strange that it happened. There are a whole range of possibilities. May be it was the fuel igniting in the header causing part of the cat to burn off and out the exhaust. It could have been the muffler packing burning off greddy exhaust he had. Weird how the mazda guys did not tell him if his cat was ok. But they did do a full diagnostic so it might be ok. I would have want them to do a visual check just to be on the safe side.

True. As with everything you see on the internet, you must take it with a pinch of salt. Do your own research to make up your own mind

 

Yup. There are alot of fallacies, myths and lies out there. Especially when it concerns making money.

Sometimes i read in misbelief in some claims by advertisers in SG motoring magazines. But you will hardly see this sort of false claims in overseas magazines.

 

we.... this is spore for u.....

some may even claim a voltage stabiliser will give u horsepower..... imagine connecting some wires to ur battery, there u have it - horsepower gain.

Some engine oil oso claim to give u additional horsepower.

oh well..... thats also singapore for u..... juz have to do more research, tink with some logic, answers will come up to u automatically....

 

ya and it makes our motor industry seem backward.

Technically engine oils cannot give power but may free some of it.

I believe voltage stabilisers to a certain extent. There are flunctuations in the energy that car batteries discharge; it being a chemical reaction. Theorectically it may benefit in some small but noticable way.

And grounding really does works; mazda even endorses it by having quite a few good grounding points rather than the usual 2 in most cars.

 

Guys...the issues I WAS facing last decmeber was that I got a mysterious CEL. According to my PI workshop and GR is that dunno why got CEL. They just reset the ECU and ask me to monitor. But the CEL came back usually around a few days later.

How it all started was, when I turned the ignition...the car started to splurter and when ignited, went into limp mode and CEL came on. This happen twice, but after the third re-start, eveything was normal but CEL still lighted up. Went to PI workshop, their analyser could not pull any fault code. Reset the ECU and send me off. After 1 week, the CEL came back, but car was reacting normally. Went to GR, same answer and same remedy.

Thus my PI workshop recommended me to flash the ECU to the latest software. Therefore, for 3 weeks, my car was sitting in the workshop and my ECU travel back to Japan to be flashed. After fixing back the new ECU, no more fault code till now.

Anyway, I invested in a scan tool (sCANalyser) thus if anyone wants to check their CEL can contact me.

 

So in your case, it sounds like it was not the coil packs, but rather something to do with the ECU.

 

Ecu can be fustrating sometimes like all computers. You can check hardware physically but when its software, it can drive you mad.

 

Hahah might not be. As after the last reset (3rd time), the light did not come on . But wanted to get the newset flash to be safe, thus send the ecu back to Japan.

So if you ask me, whether the flash solve my problem...the answer is no. As I am not sure :p

 

I have never done an ECU reflash. Is it essential? What's the downside? Can GR or any Sg shop do it locally (w/o taking it out and fly to Japan please!).

-Ringer-

 

Not sure if its true but i heard old flashes made more power but were less emissions friendly.

To me, i rather have power than be emissions friendly. If i wanted to be a tree hugger, i would have bought a prius.