Quick post in case you ever experience this. I drove away from my house early this morning on way to work. Boom; engine light starts blinking and my 8 is hesitating, accelerating, rough. Bad news. So I head straight for the dealership (who I love, by the way; they are top notch). I smell a "burnt" smell as I exit the vehicle. I start thinking .. am I low on oil? Anyway, to make a long story short ... my ignition coil fried; it was mis-firing. I'm riding my Honda VTX 1300R today and tomorrow until the part comes in.

 

yup, whenever the CEL starts blinking, it's usually a sign of misfiring. Bummer you fired the coils though! Covered under warranty I assume?

 

the new version of the coils only cost $25 each. I have a set of 4 sitting in the garage right now...

installing it is a matter of removing a nut and plopping the new coil on. Takes less than 5 mins.

 

btw, did you notice your car exhaust note sounding louder once you burned the coil? I've blown 3 coils in the 2.5 years I've had my car, and the exhaust always seems louder and rougher sounding when that happens.

It's a lot easier to notice leading coil problems since you'll see hesitation when moving from a dead stop.

 

I haven't heard of new coils. Are they replaced due to failures or do they improve performance. Are they Mazda replacement parts at just $25.00 each-that seems cheap compared to what you would expect for stock parts.

 

Yes, covered under warranty. I am assuming that when you say I fired the coils, you got that from my comment about the burnt smell. I'm really hoping that I didn't cause any other damage to the car based on this event. The smell was similar to that you get when a piston-engine runs out of oil. Dealer didn't seem worried. I hav a feeling he's seen this before. The drama of being an 8 owner

 

I didn't notice the exhaust noise but wasn't focused on that.

 

Yes, the previous coils cost $50 each. The new ones are supposed to handle heat better.


Fried mostly just means non functional, though they can burn through the bottom if it's really bad... my coils just had the bottom area with a different colored black, some people see the plate that the coils sit on blackened too.

 

How come you keep frying your ignition coil? Do you track your car a lot?

 

two died slowly over a 2-3 month period. no idea why. the third popped when I floored it with my turbo. no idea what caused it to die in either situation. FL can get pretty warm though.

 

How long do the old coils last and is it covered under warranty? Should I change it or wait till it dies

 

Warranty covered 3 of mine. I had to pay for the 4th because it did not show any visual problems.

 

You had to paid for the 4th? When it was replaced could you see the difference? Warranty should cover even the 4th (if it was during your warranty period....

 

Not according to the service dpt. If it does not show damage, they will not replace under warranty. Said they could not collect from Mazda. They had already replaced just the 3 and I refused to drive it out with one old one, even if I had to pay.

 

Well I'll be damned!

I'm taking my 8 in tomorrow morning to have the dealer check on a "blinking-CEL-that-became-solid-CEL-accompanied-by-slight-power-loss" " and I've been telling my GF for the last two weeks "I'm SURE something's wrong, it's not only an occasionnal misfire, the car sounds lounder and rougher, it's not as it used to be".

My guess at this point was that something in the ignition was probably amiss, probably a coil. You're just adding more weight to this idea of mine.

I'll keep you posted, we'll know tomorrow

 

There is a way to test your coils. I think you just have to check the resistance between two of the pins or something.... There's a DIY on the site somewhere.

 

Ya my ignition coil fried too... i thought i was crazy b/c i was the only one in the car when it was messing up. i thought it was the oil or bad gas at first, but the dealer told me what it was. so now i am carless till tomorrow...hate being too young to get a loaner.

 

Just got my car back from the dealer last night. I'm back up and running. I can't help but think that it must have something to do with my driving. I drive the car "like it wants to be driven" .. I don't baby it. I like running at relatively high RPMs. From now on (until I sell the car) I'm going to be much less aggressive with the car. Shame really ... but as someone recently suggested; it's a somewhat complex car to own.

 

I don't think you're frying the coils by your driving, at least they shouldn't be. Heat apparently can kill them though. What state are you located?

 

Arizona, but the weather is cooler now. The temperature was probably in the 40s that early morning when I went to my garage, started her up, left the garage .. and within 100 yards, the CEL was flashing. Dealer told me that as far as he knew, I was the first in Arizona to experience this. They are pretty open/honest with me about things and they have good visibility to the RX8 experience in the area. Anyway, I don't need to get to a root cause here ... just wondering what the heck the next surprise will be !

 

just keep in mind that the flashing cel doesn't mean you burnt your coil at that point.

When i was running around with burnt coils, it would flash sometimes if i did hard acceleration, otherwise it didn't say anything.

coils can slowly die on you, getting worse and worse over time.

 

Just a quick word to update you guys... my coils are good, seems it was only 2 spark plugs that somehow went bad in the course of 6 000 miles. Got them changed under warranty as I baby the car and didn't flood it, sure wasn't my fault they gave up!

 

Babying your car seems to be the problem. Seems like your plugs have built up some carbon/ash deposit on them. Renesis is meant to be revved out! Low revs = abuse!

 

I beat the **** outa my Renesis everyday ! (9K rpm) and its running strong.

but Im not taking my chances tho, maybe when I change my plugs next time, I should change the new coils too ? I know it doesnt have any problems but I just want to be sure it wont just *die* on me all of the sudden, is it easy to change the coils out ? really 5 minutes job ?

 

Don't worry, I follow the carbon removal procedure everytime I take the car out for a drive :grin:

But I do always make sure oil is at proper level, I let the car warm up before taking it to high revs, I don't slam the gears, I give it the "10 secs at 3000rpm" shutdown procedure...