I have a 2004 automatic rx8 with 47k miles on it. I bought it 10k miles ago. So far have absolutely loved having her. A few months ago I noticed after driving for awhile and she's good and hot there was a noise when i first pull out from a stop that sounded like a pinging noise. Now last week she started losing power. Really struggeling to get going once she's in second gear it's not as noticeable. Stalled at a red light once for me and she started right away but was really shuttering. Took it in and they replaced the spark plugs. Took it home and it still didn't have the power I've learned to love. The next day going up a fairly large hill she really had a hard time getting up. Went all the way down to 2nd gear to get up this hill. The check engine light came on for just a few seconds and then went off when i got to the top of the hill. When I had her in the shop last week they couldn't get any codes on her at all. In fact they didn't think there was anything wrong with her until they decided to take her home for the night and she stalled on him and he couldn't get her restarted. I've only had the car for 9 months and have had the oil changed every 3 thousand miles and only use premium gas on her. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

where in pa are you? if you are close ill take a look

 

Could be bad coils or plug wires.

 

I'm in the Allentown area. I called the garage that replaced the spark plugs last week. Told them it still isn't fixed. They said since it didn't show any codes they don't know what else they can do for me and suggest i take it to a dealer. I spent $398 at this place last week. I don't have the kind of money dealers charge.

 

im about an hour from you. if you want ill see if i can help you out. im between the poconos and scranton. i have an old set of coils and wires in my garage, they have a bit of miles on them but i didnt get any misfires. we could swap yours and see if it clears up the issue. lmk

 

bad fuel pump housing.

it's been a growing problem as the 8's gather mileage, i've seen 2 8's with a crack in the fuel pump housings in just a several month period, both had around only 60k miles on them as well.

a quick check would be to look under the driver's side of the car, look at the bottom of the fuel tank for any snail trails where it looks like fuel has been leaking in the past and dried up leaving trails on the plastic tank.

even if there is no evidence it only takes a phillip head screwdriver and 5 minutes to verify.

open the driver's door and passenger third door, pull up sharply on the front of the seat behind the driver's to remove the cushion. now you will see a plate with 4 screws and a clip on it, remove the screws and pop the clip out to remove the shield completely.

look at the top of the tank and see if you notice that it is wet with fuel, if not you may be lucky. if it is, grab a small mirror and look under the boss where the fuel line attaches to the pump by the quick connect, if you see a line running down the middle, it's likely a crack in the old plastic housing which is causing a drop in fuel pressure and subsequent detonation which is what is causing the pinging noise.

this is going to be a much more common problem soon, only fix for it is replacing the complete pump assembly.

so if your 8 exhibits some of these symptoms just take a few minutes to pop that cover off and inspect the fuel pump module.

was also thinking of looking into a modification to the module to save them but don't have time at the moment. OEM new are ~$400, best alternate is Airtex at rockauto for $180.