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Oh snap! Fresh set of credit card keys! All I had was one blade and was for sure going to loose it. These were the coolest keys in theory, but absolutely not practical and sadly rather fragile too, but oh well. lol! Thanks to my local mazda dealer (McDonald Mazda) for programing them for me.
Not practical? Give it time. I love mine! Goes in my front pocket with my wallet, and is immediately forgotten until I take it out to return it to its home in the key caddy by the door when I get home along with my wallet and sunglass case. I love it so much, I've made it a must have option on the car I'm currently hunting (E61). My wife keeps hers in a pocket deep in her purse, and never thinks about it. You can't get any more practical than that! I have a silicone case to keep mine pretty. My car came with one in good condition, and I got another new OEM from UAE/Japan (card and blade or the other way around, I forget which came from where) for relatively inexpensive, and had a local locksmith program it, also inexpensively. When I was looking for my car, I didn't care too much one way or the other about the key situation, but now I'm very glad I ended up with the card. Most modern car features end up being liabilities that like to break on you. This is one of the few that removes some wear points. You have a few extra computer modules with no moving parts that don't give up easily or often, and then the ignition barrel doesn't have the wear from keys going in and out. Also, no scratches from missing the slots. If you've ever had ignition cylinder tumblers wear down to the point that the key doesn't work any more, you understand why this is a positive.
Not practical? Give it time. I love mine! Goes in my front pocket with my wallet, and is immediately forgotten until I take it out to return it to its home in the key caddy by the door when I get home along with my wallet and sunglass case. I love it so much, I've made it a must have option on the car I'm currently hunting (E61). My wife keeps hers in a pocket deep in her purse, and never thinks about it. You can't get any more practical than that! I have a silicone case to keep mine pretty. My car came with one in good condition, and I got another new OEM from UAE/Japan (card and blade or the other way around, I forget which came from where) for relatively inexpensive, and had a local locksmith program it, also inexpensively. When I was looking for my car, I didn't care too much one way or the other about the key situation, but now I'm very glad I ended up with the card. Most modern car features end up being liabilities that like to break on you. This is one of the few that removes some wear points. You have a few extra computer modules with no moving parts that don't give up easily or often, and then the ignition barrel doesn't have the wear from keys going in and out. Also, no scratches from missing the slots. If you've ever had ignition cylinder tumblers wear down to the point that the key doesn't work any more, you understand why this is a positive.
I don't use a wallet big enough for it and in my experience, they get broken in wallets. I love the look/idea behind them, but they are a bit fragile and there is a reason you can't hardly find a car with one in tact anymore. Maybe impractical was the wrong word though.
Really impressed with your build, car looks great!
Thank you! I'm hoping to get it on the dyno next week to get the first part of this project wrapped up. Just gotta get the break in miles finished this weekend.
I don't use a wallet big enough for it and in my experience, they get broken in wallets. I love the look/idea behind them, but they are a bit fragile and there is a reason you can't hardly find a car with one in tact anymore. Maybe impractical was the wrong word though.
Not wallet-in, wallet adjacent. Same pocket, but not inside. 100% agree; too big to go in a wallet like a credit card. The wallet sharing the pocket acts as a cushion keeping it safe and from damage (assuming I have my wallet on me at all). I mentioned I'm looking for an E61; BMW's keyless setup uses a key fob. The card is lower profile than a fob, and while I don't yet have the BMW or enough miles under it to say for sure what my preference will be with full experience of each, I think I'd prefer the card. Personal preferences are what they are.
Not wallet-in, wallet adjacent. Same pocket, but not inside. 100% agree; too big to go in a wallet like a credit card. The wallet sharing the pocket acts as a cushion keeping it safe and from damage (assuming I have my wallet on me at all). I mentioned I'm looking for an E61; BMW's keyless setup uses a key fob. The card is lower profile than a fob, and while I don't yet have the BMW or enough miles under it to say for sure what my preference will be with full experience of each, I think I'd prefer the card. Personal preferences are what they are.
Yep, to each their own.. I think the card looks the coolest. It does feel like it was ahead of its time too when they first started using it. But, having had other keyless entry vehicles with fobs, I feel like the card just never held up as well. The buttons wearing off, the key blade lock getting worn and no staying in the card anymore.. either way, I wanted the full experience of the RX8 so I had to bring it back to life with this build and get two new blades/fobs and have them programmed. I am curious how much longer these will be available for replacement as a lot of other things about the RX8 are getting really difficult to come by.
I have moved from Denver to Texas and getting settled so still haven't completed the break in, but doing the first oil change this week and then will be able to start revving it a bit more to finish out the break in. For the most part, the car has behaved well, but as I have completed the move and haven't had much time to drive, it seems to punish me by misbehaving after it sits for long periods of time. It does still have a small oil leak from one of the RRP oil lines. And now I'm getting low voltage/circuit codes for the control solenoids behind the intake manifold. P0661 and P0076. Luckily, I have a spare intake manifold with these solenoids attached so I'm going to switch them out and see if that takes care of the issue.
Dude, I hope to have mine built this well someday. The car looks amazing and probably drives just as well. I'm a huge fan of those wheels, they look much better than the stock ones from the older model rx8s. Also, I was chasing down the same p0661 code for a long time and it ended up being the solenoid for the SSV. My car felt like it doubled in high-end power after I replaced that.
Dude, I hope to have mine built this well someday. The car looks amazing and probably drives just as well. I'm a huge fan of those wheels, they look much better than the stock ones from the older model rx8s. Also, I was chasing down the same p0661 code for a long time and it ended up being the solenoid for the SSV. My car felt like it doubled in high-end power after I replaced that.
Mine has been somewhat intermittent. It seems to pop up when I haven't driven the car for a long time. After I drive a bit, it goes away and the car feels normal. I am almost done with the break in process and then will start working on the tune and possibly replace all the solenoids on the back of the intake manifold as I have spares. I also have a spare lower intake manifold I'm going to port and ceracoat, but can't stomach the idea of pulling the motor out again after having just gotten it in not that long ago.. lol!
I thought for so long about what to do on the wheels. They are such a good looking oem wheel and that is why I decided to have them recoated in the oe color and just use a spacer to get the fitment a bit better.
not much progress on the car has been made as I have had to travel for work and personal stuff all kind of at the same time so it has just been sitting there waiting on an oil change to get through the final stage of break in. This break in oil change has become quite costly though as I've gone a bit overboard with getting my garage ready to accommodate it.
Currently installing this MaxJax lift as this is the first garage I've ever had that has room for it. And I have also never lived so far away from a garage which gave me access to tools and lifts, so I'm having to add to my collection now. Hope to build a shop at some point, but this will get me by a few years till I'm ready for that.
Got the lift all setup and working. I have one bolt that didn't quite work out so I'm going to have to see about punching it through and trying a different anchor and some epoxy, but otherwise, I'm happy with the results. Finally got my first break in oil change out of the way and I also went ahead and swapped the trans fluid from the AT4 (for cleaning purposes) to Redline MT90. I did find a pretty significant oil leak coming from the RRP oil line that goes from front of the block to the driver side oil cooler. This is the same line where the oil leak was before, but before it was the fitting itself. This time, it is leaking from the braked line and sweating through the rubber sheath. I may have tweaked it when reinstalling after fixing the fitting so I'm going to try and buy a new one from RRP, or I may just make my own. I have been thinking about doing a full custom oil cooler setup with remote thermostat, but need to get the garage setup more before I can tackle that project. And my my current priority is to just get the car running with out oil leaks so I can finish break in and enjoy it.
I gotta say, I have really enjoyed dealing with RRP. They are extremely helpful and friendly/easy to work with regardless of being in a different country/half way around the world.
They have an updated line kit so I'm going to be ordering the block to cooler lines (both sides) to fix my oil leak and configure my lines per the new version of their kit. This should allow for cleaner routing and less chance of having issues with the lines leaking in the future. I'll be installing these new lines once I get them along with the pulley kit I got from them and then I should be able to finish the break in and start revving this thing out.
Been a long time since I've posted, but the car is still running good. Finally got through the break in process and have been getting to drive it more. Also, working on the tune some.
06-23-2023, 09:53 PM
Car looks great.
