fray- they had to run the most recent flash past the epa and carb

dembo- no that is not an accurate assement. they know what is causing this issue and why. they know the results if you have this issue. they have the parts coming to fix the folks that have the issue and to prevent it happening to those that have no symptoms yet. they have aflash that will help make sure they circumstances that bring about the consequences dont happen in the future. or the short version- they know exactly what they are fixing and why.

Yeah, you're right, I'm an idiot. I had to go back and re-read it....closely this time. Oops.

Read the PDFs. It's mentioned in the second one.
________
1 4 in steel shot

From looking at the diagrams in the releases I am wondering if those of us who have installed catbacks with dual mufflers have not accidently helped this situation? Seems that by rerouting that heat could have helped. Or, is the heat coming more from the pipe before the mufflers?
I wonder also what the flash has to do with this?
olddragger

i should be able to answer that last question next week olddragger

It may mean our fuel economy will get even worse :( ?

Run too lean and you run hot, right? Best economy mixture can result in peak exhaust gas temps. So if they reprogram for richer than current settings then economy will go (farther) down but temps in the motor and exhaust will as well. Right?

Of course, they could make it complex where it just enriches if the car is not moving or moving below a certain speed. Then only when sitting (with no cooling airflow) it richens it up to keep from melting stuff. This would have no effect on most folk's MPG - only for those that sit a lot.

Remember when Caddy (I think it was) got into trouble when they were caught programming the computer to be clean at the EPA tail pipe test RPMs, but when you actually DROVE the car it was polluting like a big dog. Behold the power of the computer :)

Right?

Dennis

no thats not it. lets not play 20 questions with it. just wait a few days until i can confirm one thing.

If the gas tank needs replacement, it looks like the drive shaft will need to be disconnected/removed. The tank straddles the shaft from above but comes out of the car from the bottom. Have to take a look and see if the exhaust will need to be dropped too.

Per the service note for Group 2, I just crawled under my car to take a look at those rear body grommets. They look fine to me, no heat deformation or damage that I can see. Hopefully this is a good sign that my gas tank would be fine as well.

I know my car falls into Group 1 and will have different instructions, but that rear grommet inspection seems to be one of the key things to look at.

That's one of my concerns. I'm considering an aftermarket exhaust (RB probably) and I wonder if an aftermarket exhaust would be different than the stock exhaust, as far as heat generation. Does anyone know yet whether this is more or less of a problem with other (non-stock) exhausts?

If anything builds up the heat, it would be the cats not the mufflers.

But the area of concern for heat damage is above the muffler, not the cat. If an aftermarket system is closer to the fuel tank than stock, then there would likely be more potential for damage.

The attached photo is of my Greddy SP2 with 18,000 miles on it. You can see the pipes have turned gold do to the heat but the muffler has not turned color do to heat. In fact I can see some of the blue plastic still on one of them. Here is a link to what the SP2 looked like new LINK

Yeah, the grommets over the rear muffler are obviously being used as an indication of excessive underbody temperature. Those of us with aftermarket mufflers should find these in fairly good nick as it's my experience that aftermarket exhausts run a bit cooler. The trunk floor on my car is definitely cooler since I fitted my Hymee exhaust.

zoom, the file name for the reflash has "E" or "F" as the identifier. That's where I got the info re the flash ID. The latest WDS release level is 38.3, and came out on July 1. The "R" flash came out on release level 38.1. Have I missed something there?

Gomez.

No, no. As I indicated above, the grommets are used as an identifier of underbody overtemp. The damage Mazda are inspecting for is well forward of that.

Gomez.

Oh - I assumed that the potental damage was in the area of the grommets. Is the actual damage (if any) really located near the cat, and not the muffler or pipe? If so, then a cat back system, even if a little hotter, would not be a big concern. And if most aftermarket systems run cooler anyway, then the point is moot. Thanks.

Yippie

this thread is like a bad train wreck ...

cho choo

I hope not. I ride the train everyday.

The way I understand the flash situation is this......

Mazda are using the bungs/grommets located above the rear muffler on the frame rails as an indicator of excessive underbody heat. If those bungs have melted, then the whole exhaust has gotten mighty hot. This will have occurred because of excessively high rpm for a indeterminate period while the car was at standstill, or possibly........because the car had flooded at some stage. If it had flooded, then gas could have been in excess inside the cat and lit off when the car started. This would have created very high cat/exhaust temps and may have caused damage to the components listed in the first post of this thread.

It is this flood theory that they are checking the Group 2 cars for, IMO. These cars are (by and large) still in dealer inventory. As they are new cars, they wouldn't have been thrashed while stationary, but may have been flooded.

We have seen many cat failures in US/Canadian RX-8's. Bugger all in the rest of the world. It is the considered opinion of a few learned people I have spoken to that these failures are caused by flooded cats. They overheat, then the substrate fails. A number of dealers have changed cats after repairing flooded cars, so this theory does hold up. Flooding has not been a large problem in other countries because they do not have your flashes. Your flashes were designed for local conditions/laws. Mazda have obviously had trouble getting it spot-on for your driving styles/weather conditions/environmental laws etc. This latest flash (which I believe is the "E" flash) will be installed in Group 2 cars to lower exhaust temps by modifying fuel delivery when the car is stationary at high rpm. IMO, it will also be installed into Group 1 cars, come the recall in August. The "M" flash pretty much stopped the avalanche of flooding in the US, minor tweaks since then have improved flashes further. The bigger battery also helped...along with the new starter. This latest flash will tweak further to address the recently discovered issue described in this recall.

olddragger, your aftermarket catback may cloud the diagnosis somewhat. It's my experience that aftermarket exhausts reduce the temps above the muffler assy where the bungs are located. So..... it's possible that your car may have experienced a high underbody temp and not melted the bungs. We haven't seen what they plan to do regarding inspection of Group 1 cars, this is something Mazda will have to take into consideration....(IMO!).

Cheers,
Gomez.

thanks for keeping us informed!

I love to see folks dumping their cars at the first sign of a problem...makes buying one that much ea$ier. :) It's a great car, and making it more affordable is always nicer. And as far as resale value...who cares, I just keeps 'em 'til they're worn out.

Maybe we should be able to reroute the a/c into the exhaust system when idleing and doing burnouts :)

Thanks for that info man. I guess we will just have to wait and see. My gromlets look ok and I noticed that I already have some heat shields around my tanks. Maybe they just need a better ones AND the shield around the pipe. ANyway thanks for keeping us updated and we will see how all of this turns out. I am in group one for sure (bought in Dec 2003)
olddragger

:confused: would you rather they go back to carburators instead of injection, and miles of vacuum hoses and valves instead of electric relays? This car, for all of its so-called complexity, is *still* a lot simpler than the '84 I had. That 7 had so much crap on it for emissions you couldn't see the engine.

They've gotten it to the point where a simple ECU flash will accomplish what would've taken parts-swapping in the older injection cars, and hours upon hours with a screwdriver and a length of hose with a carb'd car.

You can thank the gub'mint for all this emissions-control. Trust me. It's a lot better today than it was 20 years ago. Let's not even discuss cars from 30 years ago. Stuff of nightmares.