Hi Guys!,

I'm new to this club and looking forward to sharing stuff about the rx7! Have recently purchased a Series 4 Australian Import 1988 FC RX and want to set about to look after it, maintian it and take care of it as best I can cuz such a wicked car deserves it! It has 60k since the engine rebuild, racing tailshaft, rx8 rims, dual exhaust, titanium spark plugs and a whole lot of other stuff. The engine did look good up to the leak, it has been serviced 2 weeks ago so there shouldnt be anything wrong...

I posted a thread earlier about an oil leak on the delivery trip, guess I shood've posted this one up first but anyway, if you guys could give me some hints on:

-Any reliability Mods
-What to do after buying an RX7
-Regualarly Maintaining It (Oil, Fuel, coolant, tune-ups etc)
-Driving it, what not to do, what to do
-What not to worry about ( For example, smoke, oil consumption, etc)
-And what to be careful about ( What kills it)

I'd really appreciate any help! I've had a bit of a hiccup about the car on delivery with an overheat ( I stopped the car and let it cool down before I drove it again) coming up a mountain and losing almost all oil on the 450 mile delievery trip. I've put in a liter of oil and it hasn't leaked at all the past 2 days but not driving it anywhere till I get it fully checked this week.

What I want to do with this car is to maintain it so it won't cost me a bomb in engine repairs! But first I want to make it reliable and fix a potential oil leak and have the engine serviced. From then on it'l be sweet if I can get some info on how to own and care for it.

Thanks guys!

 

Go here. http://www.aaroncake.net/RX-7/

 

Specifically, http://www.aaroncake.net/rx-7/newowner.htm will probably help.

Other then that, read the FAQ.

 

definitely that site.

 

#1 most important thing of all, always listen to Aaron, ALWAYS....do you get it?

good

 

Buy a haynes, or similar service manual!!!!

 

Whoa-ho-ho. Where is it leaking from?

 

well. overheating is the #1 instant killer of a rotary.

you should have compression checked it before sale. if not, check it now. so you know what you are working with.

 

dont scare the kid now, a leak isnt always bad, and its in no way any worse than any other engine leaking, my car was leaking oil from the oil pressure suending unit for like a month before i got it fixed, and nothing happened to my car...i just had to add more oil every once and a while

 

"Titanium spark plugs"?

 

That's not true....Everyone makes mistakes and if you blindly follow them, you're going to get screwed.

As for the oil leak, they are very common on old rotary cars. Common areas are the oil pan gasket (if it's even there...), metering oil pump and lines, oil cooler lines and the oil filter pedestal.

 

Thanks guys!! thats alot of really really good info there. I'm getting it looked at this week and I'l get the guy to check the entire oil system ( pump, filter, lines etc) and coolant system just in case, actually I might get the whole thing looked at while I'm at it, maybe make it more reliable and replace a few things here and there and change the fluids and what not. ( Il use that site as a guide only)

Mite look into getting a compression test done as well. I don't think there is a massive problem with it, its had a rebuild 60k km's ago and has been maintained and serviced (got all the receipts) but yer, have to be sure, possibly a bump on the delivery drive may have knocked something out of place (Had to go through a rough gravel road coming up unfortunately, bloody road works) or the service it had 3 weeks ago may have missed sometihng or didnt tighten something... Actually it overheated coming up a mountain on the way up, I figured high rpm's and lower speed may have resulted in overheating so I didn't panic too much about it, just stopped the car, let the heat dissipate and continued on as smoothly as possible, maybe that had soemthing to do with the leak?

Started it up yesterday morning for about 8 to 10 mins idling, no leakage, no abnormalities. Ive got the good old flattened cardboard box under it as a guide anyway.

Oh and this guy I'm taking it to does all kinds of engines, turbo charged, supercharged etc and has been recommended by a few friends but none of em have a rotary so am wondering, is it best to find a rotary specialist instead? Or will it be right with a general specialist? I guess it depends on how good the guy is but yer, who do you guys use when you have to take it in for service and maintenance that you cant do yourself? Im definately not going anywhere near the local Mazda dealer cuz we had an alfa romeo there that got totally screwed up, I've heard they aren't that great on rotarys either.

Ive got that haynes service manual on disk and will look through it and check out the auto shop for any simple repairs I can do, for example I gotta fix a sunroof, the hatch (so it holds up like it should), a left power window switch, simple but tedious stuff like that.

Oh yer, question, sorry about the many questions! Um, is the series 5 rx7's (1988 model for mine) on a 12v electrical system?? Cuz im looking into installing interior neon lighting which requires 12volts from the cigarete lighter.

 

actually don worry about the 12v question, Ive found the specifications on the site and am now reading that and the FAQ's, sorry!

 

yeah I wouldn't of wanted that kind of pressure no matter if I as you or Icemark.