Blitzkrieg

Ok, just thought i'd start out and say hello to everyone. I just picked up my black 5-speed '94 FD and i've noticed a couple things about it, i wanted your input on possible problems.


1) Door handles: car won't unlock from the key. i took apart the door handle, and it unlocks fine until i put it back in the car, and tighten it down. the bar attatched to the lock isn't being pushed down far enough, i think. when i reach in and push the bar up/down, it locks/unlocks fine.

2) No power between 4K and 5K rpm. The car pulls hard until 4K rpm, then the power seems to die, and then kick back in really hard at 5K rpm. Almost feels like the first turbo is shutting off too soon.

3) small oil leak. when i'm on the highway, the oil gets blown back onto my exhaust. when i just sit and idle the car, it doesn't happen. After a while it starts to smoke. It only lost about a quart over the first 1500 miles.

4) Burned CD's: The POS bose cd player won't play any burned cd. anyone know if one brand of cd-r's works better than the others?

5) exhaust sound. I've heard people say that the rotary's have a unique exh sound. what should it sound like? Mine sounds almost like its sputtering, or backfiring.

6) high idle. it idles around 1500 rpm, sometimes drops to 1000rpm, but not for long. the throttle also feels extremely touchy. could the throttle cable have been tightened too far? where is the screw to adjust it otherwise?

Beyond that, the car runs great, pulls hard, shifts fine, and corners like nothing else. not to mention the looks people give me (especially chicks).

xstacy7

i can give you a couple tips, #5 - should have a "BLIP" sound to it

Ohseyun

First, welcome to the forum. You'll find a lot of information and a lot of help from many great and experienced FD owners.

The rotary engine does sound different from regular engine. I would describe it as more of deep, spluttering sound.

Looks like there is a leak somewhere in your vaccum lines. your second turbo should kick in at about 4500rpm and if it doest then i'll suggest checking your CRV hoses, or the CRV itself.

Nathan

rotorbrain

2) you need to check all the vacuum lines. this is probably the reason you are having such a hesitation. that is around the area of the turbo transition. you could also have some worn turbos. check the shaft play and get a boost gauge. check your boost pattern. it should go like this (cruising out of boost in 3rd or 4th gear hammer it and watch the boost gauge) 10-8-10. that is stock form i believe. i havent done that in a while as i no longer have sequential. while you are doing a silicone vac. hose change you should take your injectors out, send them to rc engineering for a cleaning, replace the rubber seals that seat the primary injectors into their sockets, replace (or eliminate at your on disgression) the fpd, eliminate the double throttle plates, and get a block-off plate set (if you have the ***** or your state/county doesnt care that much)

4) the oil in your exhaust could be one or both of two things. 1) your turbos are leaking oil (more than likely they are) or 2) you have a bad rotor oil seal (hehe, rebuild time). my 86 gxl has a bad rotor oil seal and it has similar characteristics. if it sits at idle for a long time the oil starts to burn through. does it start smoking when you are at higher rpms in a lower gear? like for instance, you are merging onto the interstate and you are in 3rd gear + light throttle + high rpms? if it does that then you are probably having some rotor oil o-ring problems.

5 & 6) could be due to the vacuum stuff. fix all that and see if it works. itll probably fix that. all of that sounds vacuum related.


remember that everything stated in the section labeled "2)" after the words "replace the fpd" is only a suggestion. hehe. . . damn lawyers .

thats about all i can put my input on right now. i hope all of this helps and welcome to the community. your gonna love it. . . maybe too much. hehe.

paul

Blitzkrieg

thanks for the replies everyone, i really appreciate it.

exhaust: it does sound like its spluttering, i don't know what "blip" sounds like, but it has a low purr, and periodically a louder pop, almost like a small backfire.

whats fpd stand for? and what is a block-off plate? sorry i'm new. oh, and whats rc engineerings contact info?

the oil leaks all the time. if i let it sit overnight, it has a very small amount of oil on the ground (one inch). when i'm on the highway for extended periods of time, it gets blown back onto the cat, and starts to smoke. it doesn't do it no matter how hard or high i drive it. only if i get up to high speeds.

i'm getting a boost gauge this week, and it looks like i'll be replacing all the vacuum lines. where can i get a replacement hose kit?

what symptoms should i look for to know if i need new spark plugs? I'm probably going to do them regardless, but i'd like to know.

thanks a bunch everyone, if it weren't for you all i'd be a lot more paranoid about my car.

p.s. i got my first race in tonight. raced a modded 5.0 mustang, he got me off the line because i wasn't paying attention, but it was a pretty even race, although i only took it to the top of second.

Garrett

Welcome to the beginning of an obsession, either by choice or necessity you will be very in touch with your FD in no time.

First and foremost you need to do some ample reading. The site I like the most is www.iluvmyrx7.com. They have many informative links. Go to a site such as Rob Robinette's for the vacuum hose job. It is quite an undertaking, although many novice RX-7 owners do it.

The Bose sound system sucks, to remove it you will have to gut out the acoustic wave **** in the back.

Boost problems are very common with the extensive vacuum lines accompanying the sequential setup. It could be you pre-control solenoid causing that problem, don't quote me but you might want to check it out as a place to start.

Go to this site

http://home.istar.ca/~dvandit/TurboT...shooting.shtml

Make sure you do as many reliability mods as you can (i.e., radiator, intercooler and eliminate or replace your air seperation tank) don't want to lose those coolant seals or detonate. Also, be weary of you fuel when modding, make sure you have upgraded your fuel system with larger injectors and a fuel computer after the boost has increased. Just make sure you stay within factory levels. Get an accurate temp gauge and don't rely on the non-linear stock temp gauge, it is grossy inaccurate.

Last but not least, find a capable RX-7 mechanic in your area. The best way to do this is to go to your region of the forum and ask them. You will usually find objective view points, but sometimes that kind of information can be misleading so be through in your research finding a mechanic.

Good luck!

Garrett

rotorbrain

fpd => fuel pulsation damper

block-off plates => blocks off all of your emissions (if you get a power fc its easier as that ems doesnt use the emissions crapola anyways)

rc engineering contact info => www.rceng.com

have fun man, and garretts right. read as much as you can and research everyone's answer to you. be safe. . . and just wait. . . youre gonna go mod-crazy!!!

paul

rynberg

It sounds like the first thing you need to do is perform the 60k mile service. This replaces all the fluids, filters, coolant, etc. This will let you know where you stand.

The rotary is supposed to burn oil by the way. You should be going through a quart every 1200-1500 miles, depending on your driving style. If you are not burning this much, there is probably something wrong. BTW, the difference between L and F on the oil dipstick is NOT 1 quart (like every other car on earth) but is 1.7 quarts.

Get a compression test done. This really should have been done before purchasing. You likely do need to do a hose job. How many miles are on the car?

The exhaust should sound like a purr with small occasional pops and "blurts".

Very important: post in your regional forum to find a good mechanic in your area. You can't trust the Mazda dealer to diagnose any problems. The Mazda dealer is really only good for basic things like oil changes, brakes, tranny -- pretty much anything other than the engine or turbos.

Welcome to the club.

rotorbrain

uuuummmmmmmmmm. . . if your rotary engine doesnt burn that much oil dont worry about it. i never lost that much oil unless i had something wrong with it. the rotary engine doesnt ingest that much. thats why people premix.

paul

rynberg

I disagree. Even though the 13B-REW uses less oil than previous versions, you should still be using up a quart every 1500 miles anyway.

FWIW, I had a brand new oil metering pump installed in January. I have stock oil pressures of 30 psi at idle, 60 psi at 3k rpm, and about 120 psi near redline. I used Castrol GTX but now use Mobil 1 10w30.

Mahjik

iTrader: (1)

Hmmm, mine definitely doesn't burn anywhere near that amount. I'll admit that I'm sure I don't drive my car like most members here on the forum, but I do get on it.

I'm using 10w30 right now as well...

The only time I was seing that much oil disappear was last year when I had oil leaks.

dubulup

Mine doesn't drink that much either...I heard some gremlins might though???

James Paventi

iTrader: (34)

I just bought a red 94 a month back ... so I'm no expert on the engine ... ... yet.

I can take an educated guess about the CD problem. A player (CD) has to know how to read a burned disk. I believe that the frequency of the laser light is changed from pre-burned to home-burned disks. The 1994 CD player in your car was probably not designed to read burned media.

Before you write it off completely:
1) Do a strait dupe (entire disk) of an audio only disk. (No bonus PC or MAC material on it.) Use a CD dupe program for this ... I.E. not one that lets you pick and choose tracks ... you want to make a Xerox copy of the whole disk.
2) Make sure that you are using CD-R media and not CD-RW. It's rare to find an 8 year old player that will play RW media.
3) If this works, back off and try single track burns, etc. until you see what screws it up. If not, the 94 Bose probably doesn't play burned media.

I have to agree with you, the car gets looks big time! The previous comments are correct ... this car is addictive

Blitzkrieg

Thanks again for the comments everyone! Yes, i had the compression checked before i bought it. the oil leak is gone, i had a mazda dealership do it. although i drilled the mechanic before i'd let him touch my car, lol.

ordering a cheap boost gauge, turbo timer, and the hose kit by the end of this week. as soon as i recover financially, i'll put in a high quality boost gauge, egt, oil pressure and water temp gauge, replace the air seperator tank. after that is downpipe, radiator, and an oil cooler.

i've definitely got mixed feelings on the bose system. it has a good range, but not worth losing half my trunk over. the cd player seems to like certain brands/colors of burned cd's. i've found the cheapo compusa disks work the best. weird!!! also tends to work better if i burn it at 1x. some burned cd's work perfectly every time, and others won't play at all! the car is definitely finicky.

can anyone help me figure out how to fix my door handles myself? the driver door won't unlock. the key doesn't push the bar far enough to unlock the car. this only happens if the handle mechanism is attatched to the door. when i unscrewed it, and had it loose, it worked fine. as soon as i put it back in it doesn't work anymore. the only thing

X-factorRX-7

first off never never go more than2000 miles betewen oil changes 1500 is better. the door handle problem is tricky can you unlock it by hand when the cylinder is out with pliers or sompthing? be carefull sometimes it takes a little more effort to unlock it. one thing is to invest in a good alarm and they have keyless entry you dont have to use the key just press a button but try pushing the lock in the caaar up and down with the cylinder out and see if it moves the arm back and forth where the cylinder should be. the arm could be bent in the door you could take off the door pannel inside and check it out. but remember it has a follow me lock system so the passenger door locks too try putting a little more effort in to it to unlock it but dont break the key and make sure u have a spare. with the stereo try memorex cd-r's not cd-rw's but also remember the bose was not designed to play cd-r's so good luck i used memorex ones but now i have all aftermarkett stereo components

ArcWelder

I'll address the oil leak. There are many places for a possible leak, hard to say a definite cause, but car is "old", seals and gaskets wear out. Find the leak replace the seal.

Oil usage. This is a repost of a reply I made in another thread:

"Your car WILL burn oil. Period. That is, if the oil metering system is functioning. Oil is injected into the combustion chamber to lubricate the seals. Search the forum for a more detailed explanation.

Now, how much consumption is normal.

Oil metering system is about 400 parts gas to 1 part oil.

1 gallon = 4 quarts

So, you use 0.01 quarts of oil/gallon of gas. Or another way of looking at it, you use 1 quart of oil/100 gallons of gas.

Assume 17mpg. (100 gallons of gas)*(17mpg)=
1700 miles. "

Mark

rotorbrain

i dont know how you guys pass emissions using that much oil. mine does not use that much oil.

i would like to see documentation from mazda about that. anybody know where that is? it probably differs from climate to climate also. this is interesting.

paul

ArcWelder

The car was designed to pass emissions with the stock OMP(oil metering pump). It really is a small amount of oil compared to the amount of gas burned.

Mark

rynberg

Well, considering I get about 14-15 mpg, I think my statement of burning a quart every 1500 miles or so is pretty much right on. BTW, I did mention I have a brand new OMP. I have no oil leaks. I would think that my oil usage would be considered more "correct", for lack of a better term.