Hello,

My wife recently purchased an RX-8, and she's absolutely thrilled with her purchase. Even though my head hits the roof (I'm not that tall really,) I'm happy knowing that she got what she wanted. I do have one small question that perhaps someone here might be able to answer. Acceleration off the line is sluggish, and I have been told that this is to be expected due to the rotary engine design. Is this true, and can the takeoff performance be improved without expensive engine mods? The wife isn't going to want to do anything that might void the warranty, so my options are probably very limited. Any thoughts?

Von

 

Just take off at a slightly higher RPM and slip the clutch. Takes some practice, but it works wonders. I usually go at about 3k, slip for a second or so, and it takes off nicely.

 

If she has the auto tranny, she has the lower-power engine. If manual, some practice is required of the clutch-accelerator-rpm synchronization to get the most out of the engine. Practice, paractice, practice.

 

Once the engine is broken-in, accelarate until you hear the warning chime at redline. Unlike most piston engines, it's perfectly fine to drive a rotary in its upper rev range.

 

Sadly, I forgot to mention that this is an automatic. Thanks for the input though, I can now tease her about buying the automatic when I told her to get a manual.

 

Yeah the auto is sluggish off of the line--its feels much better once broken in--but at best with brake reving and all you are looking at a low 8 second--maybe maybe high 7 second 0-60 car. The manual tranny feels very different.

 

Is this a software issue or an engine limitation? In other words, are there any chips that could improve this? I know chips are a bit of a gray area in regard to warranties, but I understand some are made to be plug and play, so that they can be removed for warranty work.

Am I beating a dead horse?

Edit: By the way, I just want to tell you all how impressed I am with the quick and friendly responses, it's a refreshing change compared to other forums I have frequented.

 

There's not much you can do...it's actually a different engine in the auto than the manual rx8. Mazda made it underpowered because the transmission couldn't handle it.

You may take a look at the Canzoomer chip (he's a vendor in this forum). Other than that, there's a couple intakes that add some horses and then the next step would be a turbo. Even then, you still might be slower than the MT. I guess you're kicking yourself for letting her get the AT now, eh :D

Hopefully in 2006/2007 they'll have a 5-speed auto tranny that's the same HP as the manual.

 

Thanks khtm, I'll check out the Canzoomer as you suggested.

It's still a great car as far as I'm concerned, but yes, she deserves to be punished for this indiscretion.

 

The cheapest mod ever:

I went on the Atkins diet. Lost 130 lbs. Improved my 0-60 acceleration by 0.33 sec.

:-)

Just kidding, but I think the horse HAS been beaten to death.

 

As khtm says, this is a completely different version of the Renesis engine. A major difference is the porting as can be seen in the attached image. The low-power engine used in the A/T version has 2 ports (housing on the left) and the high-power engine in the M/T has 3 ports (housing on the right). There are a number of other significant differences as well. My advice would be to save your money and let your wife enjoy her car. Instead, you should go out and get your own MT. :D

 

Oooooh, 48, that would be so devious, I like the way you think! :D

Thanks for the detailed explantion.

 

You're wife has one of the sharpest, safest and comfortable sports cars going today. Trying to turn it into a piece of **** Mustang that goes like stink off the line will cost you plenty and at the end of the day, you paid a lot of money for an acceleration boost, violated your warranty and stress your drive train repeadedly all because you want to be quick off the line or burn rubber (which will cost you!). Not worth it my man. Use the car the way it was designed. The car is awesome in handling and brakeing and when you need to kick it down while moving , it responds quite nicely. The 8 provides a substantially better road feel and handling, interior and electronics than anything $5G's more expensive.

I too wanted to be quicker off the line, but I have addapted (mind you, I have the 6 speed!) :D and enjoy the car for what it was designed to do. Its cheaper, more enjoyable and better that way!

 

Looks like pics from the Revolution.Man it was even cold in that tent huh?I had fun anyway though.Did you notice there was a rotor housing there from a normal non-Renesis engine that looked pretty bad.I wish I had done more of the seminars,but I was having way too much fun on the Auto-X courses.

 

Do a lot of reading before you get a Canzoomer, it's not exactly plug and play and the gains are not great. Honestly if she's happy with the car the way it is then leave it be, all the boltons in the world aren't going to help much performamce wise.

 

Yup, is that the one on the left you're referring to? They must have pulled that piece out of some junk yard. One on the right is from a Renesis.

Cold is right. Haven't been that cold in a loooonnnggg time. And before that the Friday-night thunderstorms, hail and tornado warnings. Had to run out of the motel and move the car under cover. That was a prelude to things to come on Sat and Sun I guess. We stayed at IRP 'til early PM Saturday for the Renesis presentation only to realize the video that was the centerpiece of his presentation was the same video I had on my desktop. Since I wasn't planning to do an autocrossing or drag racing, we headed over to IMS and did the Grounds Tour. That's an amazing place.

We got up Sunday morning to predictions of 24-degree wind chills so we headed back to PA driving 9 hours through the snow squalls. Fortunately, the roads were not cold enough to freeze so the car handled the weather just fine. Apparently, they will try to move the event to more suitable weather next year. We shall see. My guess is that the weekends at IRP are pretty much booked up for the good weather.

 

We got up on sunday as well,and figured it was best to just get a full belly of food,and fuel for the car,and head home.We stopped at the motor speedway,and checked things out.What an awesome place.I spent about an hour and a half in the mueseum.We drove 10 hrs through the snow,rain,and such to New Columbia PA,and then finished the trip to MA the next day(7 hrs).I wish I had met more of you guys,but the weather was so bad,and I think we maybe needed name tags or something,which would have helped guys like me who drove half way across the country,and knew nobody there.And oh yeah did I mention it was cold?

 

Not much you can do about the lack of pick up from a dead stop with the automatic. Check the canzoomer forum...there's a handful of automatic owners trying to get more power out of the automatic using the cz unit. Also, keep the automatic out of its dead zones.

 

Try an Racing Beat Exhaust.

You will get about 3.5 RWHP

 

Why is everyone so obsessed about straight line acceleration? Sheeze. In my experience the fastest car off the line is the guy who is the craziest (and it's usually some piece of crap car with parts falling off). Honestly, how many of you have actually put your accelerator ALL THE WAY to the floor within the last few days. If you haven't, then you have enough power.

 

b/c sadly enough, around town this is what you're doing all the time.... and it's hard to resist a little stop light action :D

 

My MT has enough power for me to send the backend roundy round without much effort. I really like the ability to keep my tail just inside the limits of control. Any more power and I'd have to relearn it again.

 

screw that,, u keep that up and u'll end up with broken clutch
Clutch drop is not something you want to do all the time.

 

And be sure to smell that stink of your clutch burning up as well. Be careful slipping off the clutch, done it a couple times myself. It's easy to let the smoke out of it and then you are getting a new clutch. I put my accelerator to the floor and take it to the beep all the time, but I'm always easy when starting off because I've fried my clutch too many times and I would like to keep it. but of course you have an auto so it dosen't really matter. I think a VW bus can beat an auto off the line. ...lol...sorry j/k ...I had too.

 

Yes, and no. Yes, you don't want to drop the clutch often, as that can damage things. But no, that's not what he said. He said to slip (not drop) the clutch. This avoids the damage you are talking about, but adds lots of premature wear on the clutch plate. This is explained in the post right after yours.