You're Completely WRONG About Rotary Cars..

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome back to the MartiniWorks podcast. We are so excited to have you.

Morning.

You get a bonus discount code. If you can count the amount of times I adjust my microphone in this episode.

Some people hate that.

I can't help it.

I see a guy that commented. He said, just weld the damn thing.

Honestly, I might. I might.

It's insane how, like, that is, it is cranked.

I won't touch it. And watch. You just, you're gonna hear me get quieter and quieter.

Welcome back to MartiniWorks podcast.

We hope you guys and gals are ready for a fun filled day because I think today's topic is all about rotaries and things about rotaries.

So if you're looking for car parts, be sure to mod your car with your friends over at martiniworks.com.

We appreciate and love all the support we've gotten so far and the continued support over there has been incredible.

Seeing what you guys and gals are putting on your cars is always super special for us because we love to see that you're buying the right car parts.

Honestly, it's so cool to see different wheel and tire packages going out with, like, Konsei, Konsei's and Continental's.

Seeing works and Toyo's.

Seeing, we saw Koenig forged with RT615K pluses.

Like, seeing some really cool fun setups.

And then seeing, like, BC racing DS coilovers and ERs and things like that have been absolutely awesome.

So we really appreciate all the love.

Continuing to add new products on every single day.

And the last thing I'll say before they tell me to shut up so we can talk about rotaries is the build threads has been redone.

Yeah, brand new.

It is brand new.

There's new filters on it.

There's new ways to add your vehicle.

And we'd really love it if you guys and gals haven't had a chance to go out there and check it out recently to go out there and do so.

There's a lot of really great information.

We've made things way more accessible in terms of what information we have on the car so that you can help build your car.

Maybe you really enjoy the way that one looks.

You can kind of figure out if that's how you want your car to look.

And it would mean the world for you guys and gals to go check it out.

So if you haven't yet, add your car to the build threads.

It'll take you five minutes.

Add some really cool photos.

And it might be featured in a future build thread carousel post that we're doing out on Instagram.

So that being said, Gels, I'm sorry. Rotaries.

Yeah, what you want to know?

They say that one in three dentists end up owning a rotary.

Is that true?

Yeah, because looking at us, one out of us ended up getting a rotary.

And I can't begin to fathom what kind of demented little kid grew up saying, I want an RX 8.

So I need to know how this car came to be one that like you're like, I got to own it.

Honestly, it's I know we always like relate back to like movies and video games and stuff.

But it was it was 100% video game influence.

And it was specifically need for speed underground to it.

I don't know why it is like a frickin like core memory.

It was like, I don't know if it was like the car that you started.

It was like either a car you started with.

It was like one of the first cars you could unlock.

And I remember like buying it from like the dealership in the game and it like loaded in and frickin the one like the Black Betty,

but not the original song, the like the the remake one that they did that was in the game like was on.

And I just remember like loading into the car that song was playing and I started driving and it sounded so different from all of the other cars in the game.

And I was like, whoa, this car is sick.

And then I was like, I'm going to go on an RX 8 one day and I did.

So for educate me, why does rotary sound like it do?

It's just a completely different style engine.

How does it work?

It's just instead of pistons, obviously you got little triangles in there spinning around and like it's just it's so weird.

I feel like you're trying to explain to me Santa Claus.

But like, is it just the fact that the rotating assembly is different that causes that to sound that way?

I mean, yeah, it's all it's really exhaust notes.

They all come down to frequency and resonance.

So like when you talk about like Hertz and megahertz and things like that, it's really all it comes down to is like frequency and resonance.

So it's like we talked about who did a video a while back and like why VQ sound the way that they do.

And it's because of the way that their exhaust manifolds are the firing order, the V sixes specifically and things like that.

It's like it's why V sixes sound like V sixes in line or like five pot sound that the way that they do.

It's why three rotor sounds completely different from a two rotor.

It's it's all frequency in sound waves of like how they're how they're produced.

So do they spin pretty fast in comparison to like a naturally aspirated like V eight or something.

They rev up quick, they rev up high.

OK, what's the what's like the average leader size of like an equivalent like Arc State?

What is it?

So 13 B quite literally stands for like one point three liter.

So tiny little really tiny displacement.

My Mountain Dew's two liter.

Exactly.

So yeah, one point three liter, the twenty one B, which would be a three rotor.

I believe it would be a two point one liter engine and then so on and so forth.

Do you remember just real quick, you just said that and it triggered like a like a terror of my childhood.

Sorry.

Back when people said that non ironically, like unironically, they would say that they'd be like Mark Merrill.

Oh, that's a two of my soda pops got more more displacement than your engine.

I've literally been told that by a guy.

Yeah, I've been like that was a that's not a joke.

That's real.

Those are real words.

Those are real people from somebody who's dead now.

There's a weird phenomena with rotary engines though.

OK, old guys fucking love them.

Interesting.

Like it because I've had that too.

It's like oh, you got freaking two liter old soda pop engine in there, you know, four cylinder.

But it's like rotaries that they fucking love them.

I like I I got more compliments from old like dudes at gas stations than anything else and any other car that ever owned

because like that's got that winkle in it, doesn't it?

They always call them winkles.

They didn't recall them rotaries.

I don't got the winkle in it.

They're like, oh, I had a funny snowmobile that had one of them in it.

Oh, shit.

You know, it's like they're thrown.

They were thrown in like motorcycles and stuff like the 70s and like 80s.

I think they're throwing like motorcycles, snowmobiles, all sorts of shit.

There are some like even some like RC engines that were like little rotary engines and stuff too.

So that's insane.

I don't know that they have like a respect for them almost, even though it is a really tiny engine.

It is kind of cool.

Since you got one, obviously inherently, I kind of learned more about them and it was so interesting to see that how much stuff actually did use rotary engines and how much like more common it was than what I originally thought.

I always thought of like the RX-7, RX-8, cars with a rosette.

That's about it.

And there's really like a world of rotaries.

They're not necessarily efficient or reliable or make a ton of power, but they are an engine.

That's the one thing I've always had such a tough time trying to love about them is just when I look at the amount of work it takes to own a rotary engine.

I think there was a period of time where it was very much like it's hard.

It's unreliable.

They're boring.

They're slow.

They're stinky.

Don't buy one.

But now, you know, people are going out of their way to buy them and they enjoy the craft of keeping them alive.

Why do you think that is?

It's because I think people are realizing like where they belong essentially.

It's like, it's really easy to look at something like the FDR-7, right?

It's a 90s JDM legend icon of a car.

They're reaching well over 50 grand for a really, really nice one.

They're becoming that like iconic car.

And obviously, I always wanted one of those two and it's like people talk about like rotaries.

It's like, oh, RX-7.

FDR-7 is like always the first thing that comes to mind.

And it's like, yes, it's a fantastic car.

And when the RX-8 came out, obviously it got a lot of shit at first and still does today obviously because of out of the gate from the factory, it was not the most reliable thing.

The S1s had a lot of issues with them, oiling issues, obviously the Apex seals, that kind of stuff because of the oiling issues, some cooling issues.

They basically took like what worked because like the FDR-7 had the 13B turbocharged.

They took still a 13B, but they're like, we need to make it into like the 21st century.

So it has to, you know, abide by like more emissions stuff.

It has to be more efficient and has to do all these other things.

So they didn't use a turbocharger.

They didn't do all this other stuff.

They tried to like make it more, have more technology and in turn it caused a lot more issues, which is why like the renaissance in the series ones got so much shit.

Also along with that, the tuning potential of the RX-8s out of the factory was next to nothing.

Like Mazda was doing this thing in like the early 2000s where it was just the cars that were coming out like were built to like their full potential like right out of the gate.

Like they didn't leave much room for like improvement, which was cool.

Yeah.

But you know, as like people who are into modifying cars and stuff, it's like, oh, well, look at how good of a car you get base.

What can we do with it?

And Mazda's like, now we already, we already pushed it.

So unless you're adding boost or like fixing a lot of like dumping a ton of money into that car, power wise, you're not really looking to get much.

Which is why the RX-8 never really hit with a lot of people.

Because I didn't know that it was just compared to everything else out there.

The potential just wasn't there.

But where the potential lies now and why I think people are really coming back around to it is because they realize that the chassis that the RX-8 is is a fucking phenomenal chassis.

It's super fricking rigid.

It's you can throw a ton of speed at it.

Like you can like really rip on it on the track, which I think why you see a lot more of them showing up at the track, whether it's got a rotary in it or not.

People are choosing the chassis because it's so good.

It's really balanced the suspension and like the way that that car handles is insane.

And you know, outside of the engine itself and everything that that brought with it, like the car itself is super good.

So if you were to go back in time knowing what we know about the RX-8, what would you change about the engine?

About the engine?

Yeah, because it sounds like everything else with the car is fantastic.

And I would argue, I think when you clean up like the headlights, the tails, keep it like nice OE plus.

I still think the RX-8 is the closest looking production car that kind of looks like a prototype car out of anything that Mazda's like really released.

It has this like little, it has like a little aura to it.

You know, when you see like a clean, well put together, like Japanese wheels, lower just a little bit nice and it looks super good.

I know what you mean.

It's so good.

Like the angles on it were on like.

Oh my God, yeah.

Like it was like really rounded and accentuated.

Kind of quirky, but it's good.

It works.

The whole thing works together.

I will say like the R3, like the latest, the ones that went up to like 2011 or whatever, like the last ones that came out like the R3 editions, like those are by far my favorite.

They really figured out like the actual like facelift and like arrow on it.

I think like they really nailed it.

The series one, like I had, it's very soft.

It's very round, especially like the front bumper and things like that.

And it gets a little bit of that kind of like frog look to it, essentially.

I don't like it just has like that kind of like look to it, especially in the front.

Yeah, I know what you mean.

Yeah.

It's just a, it's a cool looking car.

And I remember it's like the RX 8 sits in these world of cars that came out.

They're kind of not well received.

And now they're kind of like coming back into the limelight.

But then that also makes me think that FDs are $50,000 and that's a lot of money.

But like FCs and FBs, especially FBs, personal opinion, they're so good to look at.

Yeah.

They're so gorgeous.

They really are.

But are they actually any good like from what you know about like the rotary engine and

like the FCs and stuff like, are they the same as the FDs?

Are they different than the FDs?

Yeah.

So they're, when you get into like the FBs and stuff specific, like the first gens and

stuff, they're carbureted.

So there are 12 A's.

So there are 1.2 liter two rotor and they are carbureted.

Not only are they slow as balls, but now they're carbureted too.

So that throws another, you know, it's a two rotor.

Yeah, two rotor.

I'm convinced they just took the engine out of some small random plane in like Germany.

We're like, let's just throw this in the car.

And then they just threw it in the Mazda.

The FD RX 7 is a two rotor.

Two rotor.

So why did they make the RX 8 one rotor?

They didn't.

It's two.

Oh, it is two.

Okay.

Yeah.

All right.

So it's all, it's all like essentially like the same, the growth of it.

So it's like, you have the 12 A's, which is 1.2 liter carbureted.

We got into like some of the later years of the RX 7, they switched to like the 13B, which

was still a two liter, a little more displacement, 1.3 liter, two rotor, 1.3 liter.

Sorry.

And then they went to obviously like electronic fuel injection, things like that, turbo charging,

all that sort of stuff.

It took the essentially like the, the rotors themselves and like that, like they're not,

as far as I know from like the FD, which is like the 13B REW to the renaissance 13B,

which was in the RX 8, not a lot of the parts were interchangeable.

Like the rotors and like the housings and stuff, I believe were different or like the

irons or something were different, which is why like, you know, kind of coming back to

the question of what would you change different about like the engine or something like that.

I would honestly just have taken the REW out of the RX 7 and just threw it into the car,

made it up with the six speed instead of the five speed that came with the FD and just

threw it in the RX 8.

So you have the turbo charged REW, which is what a lot of people do.

Perfect.

Do you think it would have sold a lot more and been a lot more popular in one of those

like iconic cars, if it would have came turbo charged from the factory?

I think so.

I really do.

Why the hell did they remove that?

Why were they like, Oh turbo, this is cool.

FD is now iconic crazy.

They're like, let's release the RX 8, the new number, the new model.

And they're like, but let's just take that turbo out of it.

That was too much fun.

It was kind of, I mean, not to take it away from the rotary stuff, but that kind of happened

with a couple of different brands because Toyota did that with their MR2.

When Toyota went into releasing their third generation, which was like the MRS, it was

by like all technicalities, slower, heavier, wider, and nobody really liked it.

It wasn't until probably the last five years or so where people like, Oh my God, the MRS

is like the greatest platform of all time.

It's like, yeah, but for 15 years, it wasn't.

Everybody hated it.

And now it seems like that kind of happens to like the RX 8 and thing.

I don't know if there's just like, maybe it was emissions, maybe it was like America saying

no.

Yeah.

I knew you guys were asking questions.

I know, listen, I owned RX 8 for like five years.

I'm not a rotary God, but I do know my way around, but I just kind of, I kind of looked.

Yeah.

Right.

I did look just to kind of see like, why did the RX 8 not come turbo charge?

One of them definitely was emissions coming into the 2000s.

They did see a lot higher like emissions restrictions and things like that.

Also, the porting of the engine, specifically like the exhaust porting.

They used side port exhaust and the renaissance.

So the RX 8's engine, which is why I was saying like those parts don't interchange.

And that caused a lot higher exhaust temps and a lot of other issues like more back pressure

and things like that, that just wouldn't be able to run a turbo effectively, which is

why like you do see people turbo like renaissance and stuff, but not much very often.

Yeah.

And they usually have to do a lot of other stuff to it.

So you usually see it like, okay, well then they ported it out different or something like that.

Okay.

Explain to me like I'm five.

I hear it all the time.

Bridge port.

Yeah.

Street port.

Port.

Yeah.

All these ports.

Yeah.

No boats.

Only wankles.

Yeah.

What is that process?

Do you know what that is?

Yeah.

So essentially like, because the engine doesn't have valves in it, right?

Like you don't have intake value on the exhaust valve.

It's just so you have ports.

And essentially when the engine or the rotor rotates, it allows and pulls in the air through

the intake port and then it pushes it out through the exhaust port.

And those ports are on like the plates between the housings.

So when it swoops back around essentially, it'll force it out that exhaust port.

It's typically when you port and a rotary engineer either making that port larger or

kind of like mooning it out a little bit to like, you know, kind of like how you would

like port like a head to like have better flow.

Bridge porting is essentially what it sounds like because you're creating an additional

port for the exhaust, leaving just a little bit of gap between.

Now you have two exhaust ports and leaving a little gap between it.

So it's like a little bridge between them.

And that's where you get like the rap, rap, rap, rap, like really like the sound in the

world.

It sounds sick.

It does sound sick.

I'm not I'm not disagreeing.

It sounds amazing, but like other than sound, it's it's a it's a power thing.

So it just be like opening up like an exhaust.

Yeah, you're getting you're getting more air.

You're getting less restriction.

Yeah.

So if you make it big, big, you get big, big power.

So wait, what's the point of the bridge then in it?

Why do they make like a separate one versus just making that hole that much bigger for

the exhaust port?

I'm not entirely sure.

It should probably just for its own.

Honestly, that doesn't surprise me because I know when you go to like port something,

I've and I might get slander in the comments, but like it's actually a relatively basic

thing to do.

It's if you can if you can do it right, like if you know how to do it and you can take

your time, like you literally take a little cutout and like draw what you're going to

shave off of this thing.

And then you just you go in, you do it, you clean it up, you throw it back in and it's

done.

It's like something you can literally do with like any sort of yeah, I know.

I'll pull back and the block on the S2K.

I've seen you ported the side of that.

Yeah, I did port it.

Unfortunately, did not use the diagram that was supplied.

And I got to clarify too that it is the intake port that gets bridged.

It's not the exhaust intake port.

Yeah.

So it's like the port that brings in the air into the housing and everything.

That is what gets ported.

I'm wondering if the same question though.

I don't get the bridge.

I'm wondering if like maybe there's something to do with like wububo weight of the intake

sound.

Wububo weight.

Sorry, I had to.

I can't see it running right.

Cannot call that out.

But they are cool.

I think that kind of goes into, you look at some of what Mazda did in their motorsports

history with the rotary engine.

But we'll talk about that in the next segment.

We do want to give a huge shout out to our partner in the Martini Works podcast, Continental

Tire, for sponsoring this.

Continental Tire is doing an incredible job at getting ready for fall time, ladies and

gentlemen, because guess what happens after fall?

Winter.

Depression.

And the way to fix that is the Viking Contact 8.

If you haven't had a chance to sneak up and pick up your winter tires, I hate to say it.

Now's the time, especially before the snow comes.

Nobody wants to get stuck on all seasons when the first 8-inch blizzard, which is a lot,

comes to Wisconsin.

So if you're looking for some tires, Continental has the Viking Contact 8.

We also have the DWS06 plus and the ECS02, some fantastic tires.

And of course, if you're looking to get something for your SUV, we also have stuff for that as

well.

We know a lot of you guys and gals have a second car that you drive on Mondays through Fridays.

We actually do support that stuff as well.

So if you ever need tires, we highly recommend Continental Tire.

And we want to thank Continental for sponsoring the Martini Works podcast.

All right, you sent me on a wild goose hunt chase, whatever you want to call it.

I had to figure this out.

And it actually 100% makes sense why they keep that piece of metal there.

So for the Bridgeport, for the Bridgeport.

What does a Bridgeport do, Gels?

Bridgeport allows for a lot more air intake into the rotor housing.

The problem is when you make bigger hole, you have this triangle that's spinning in there.

On the edges of the triangle, you have these things called apex seals and side seals.

Very, very important.

Really talked about a lot.

Yes.

You don't want those going over an open area in the plate, right?

So if you expand that port, it gets too big.

That apex seal or side seal is going to go over that.

And it could shift in, shear off, that kind of stuff.

It's not against like a flat plate.

So they keep that bridge there, essentially.

So it keeps pressure and doesn't allow that seal to move.

And then they go on the outside of it, mill out an additional spot to let more air in.

That way it's still keeping the seal where it needs to be, providing what it needs to do.

But allowing more air in.

So essentially in the path of where it rotates, they want to keep material there.

So it doesn't affect anything.

My brain is putting together the information.

I have a picture if you'd like to see.

I love pictures.

I just don't understand how the bridge reinforces.

Oh, so essentially this guy right here, this little eyebrow that they typically call it.

That's not there.

This is the normal port and that seal travels along the outside of that.

You want to expand this, make it bigger, but you still want the seal to ride along the flat plate.

So this is basically the path where that goes.

And then they just cut on the other side.

Oh, that's really smart.

So bridge porting must have come after street porting.

They must have realized at some point they were like, this is, we are going through APEC seals bad.

We need to figure this out.

Yeah, because you can see we're like in that where they cut the normal port as well.

So that's typically like your street port, right?

Just making the border.

Which everybody should do at least once in their life.

If you own a rotary.

I really want to do that.

I really do want to just build a rotary engine at some point.

It would be so much fun.

They put rotaries in just about everything.

You could start by putting it in something else.

Start small, like an RC plane.

And then start leveling up.

Motorcycle.

Then a car.

I've been trying to.

Rotary bike.

Rotary bike would be sick.

Rotary bikes were a thing, I think.

They put rotaries in just about anything, didn't they?

Anything and everything.

Yeah, like I said, my dad, like I talked about like, oh, buddy had a snowmobile or whatever.

It's like, yeah, they had snowmobiles with rotaries in them.

They were pretty neat.

They thought it was the next big one.

Well, fun fact about the Mazda, or at least sorry, the rotary engine or the Wankl engine,

is that its success had a lot to do with their ability to license the engine and the engineering of it.

So when it was the 50s and 60s, the Wankl engine was licensed out to different vehicle manufacturers for them to use.

Mercedes, I think, was actually one of the first vehicle manufacturers to purchase the ability to use the Wankl engine.

And then they tried to use it and ever went to production, and then they just slated the product.

The Mazda's like, fuck it, we'll ball.

Mazda ball, then I think they got it right.

Because what they were trying to do is there's so many companies trying to make it huge.

Trying to make it a big quote-on, quote-like motor.

And Mazda kept their stuff really relatively compact and lightweight,

because I think, I don't know if it was the Eunus or something like that,

but it was one of the early, early Mazdas had a rotary engine.

And it was inherently massively successful because the whole car was so light,

because it made a lot of Japanese restrictions really easy for that to pass.

It was a low leader size, which meant the actual vehicle emission tax from Japan was super, super small.

And so it was a very like easy vehicle to own in Japan from a financial standpoint,

because it was everything about it was tiny.

So there's actually like quite a few notable like rotary motorcycles.

Yamaha had the RZ201, which was a twin rotor, 660cc,

making about 66 pounds of, or sorry, 66 horsepower, 56 pound feet of torque.

That's pretty neat.

A bridge ported motorcycle go crazy.

That would be pretty good.

So Yamaha had one Kawasaki had the X99, which is kind of sick.

That's a sick name.

That's so crazy.

That's like a 900cc twin rotor.

This Norton, a leader rotary.

Norton had a bunch of them, including some like sport bikes that looked absolutely insane.

Suzuki had the RE5.

This is the one that I was thinking of.

That's a single rotor, 500cc or 498 single rotor, 62 horsepower out of a single rotor.

Whenever I think of Rotaries, I only think of Mazda.

I don't think of anyone else.

So it's like everyone kind of, not everyone, but a lot of brands did dabble.

Yeah.

But like the the 588cc Norton F1 making 90 horsepower.

Look at that thing.

That thing's fucking sick.

It looks really good.

I could see Tom Cruise driving that.

Honestly, yeah, that does look like a James Bond or like Mission Impossible.

80s and 90s motorcycles were some of the best looking motorcycles in my opinion

for all the nostalgia reasons.

Just the massive bubble, like single headlight with like the shroud that was way too long.

Crazy color, liveries, purple, lime green, yellow and purple together.

Like they went buck wild.

Dude, the 90s were a wild type.

Not saying it because I was born during the 90s, but like legit, like the best cars,

the best bikes, everything was doing cool shit.

Everybody remembers.

McDonald's toys.

McDonald's was going hard in the 90s.

Especially the toys.

Yeah.

The people, everybody always talks about the cars of the 90s being so incredible, especially.

But all those same companies were doing motorcycles at the same time and some of the

Had a heart in it.

Yeah.

Some of the coolest bikes came from the 90s as well.

I just think it's interesting.

I just want to say that I'm really upset that McDonald's doesn't have like play places

anymore.

Yeah.

But I get it.

They were really gross.

They're nasty.

Everything's really gross.

That's true.

I'm fine.

I played at play places.

I made it out.

So help me understand this for just a quick second.

Yeah.

Let's get back to Rotaries because we just talked about Rotaries in all the ways that

they should probably be enjoyed.

Yeah.

Small, compact, lightweight vehicles, small chassis, small motorcycles, blah, blah, blah,

blah.

Then they said, well, what if we just put this in an endurance race car, like the 787B

and the 767B?

How the hell do you even make that jump?

Like, why did Mazda?

Do you even know why Mazda would do such a thing like that?

It makes no sense to me.

Yeah.

I don't think they thought like they really thought that they had something with it.

And honestly, they in a way did.

Right.

Like those cars got down and like they broke a lot of records and did a lot of cool shit

and they sounded fucking incredible.

And it was just very, very unique, different.

And honestly, it's like, what other brand was really doing something?

They're like, we don't want to use the normal internal combustion engine.

We want to do something to like basically changing the entire premise of everything

that we knew about how cars worked and how engines worked.

And we're like, yeah, we want to go with the new thing.

We should do that again.

That was really cool.

We need a square spinning around or something.

We did circles, triangles.

I think it's the squares time.

Pentagon's, I don't know.

Hexagons.

Do you think the Rotaries have like a future in something like realistically?

I know like they just are plagued with emission issues.

Like that's their big thing.

They're just not emission friendly.

Reliability issues.

Yeah.

So they say.

Yeah.

I think they do have their place in something.

And I think that's like, you look at Mazda now, it's like they still are putting a lot

of research and money in like Rotary development and stuff.

But if you look at like was like this, the new CX 30, I think it was that they announced.

It was like the big deal was like a first car with a rotary engine in it.

And it's, you know, RxA.

And it's like, it's a range extender for essentially it's like a little generator

or their EV.

So it's like a little one rotor, I think, or is it a two rotor?

It's a little rotary engine that they have in there specifically just to power the motor.

To power the power.

Yeah.

To power the power, which is, which is unique.

And I think they've put a lot of time and stuff into that.

And I mean, as much as I'd say, I'd love to see a new full rotary powered sports car

from Mazda.

I don't think it's ever going to happen.

It still boggles my mind that Mazda invented or at least coined the sky active technology.

And when I was a kid, I thought that was just like the coolest thing in the entire world.

The regenerative, regenerative braking system is that that's what it was, right?

The sky active.

Yeah.

Because like Mazda has always kind of been at the forefront of doing these funky little

things with their cars to make them like slightly more optimized, even though they're working

on the basis of something that might traditionally just not be as well accepted.

I know like the rotary they kept, they keep trying to work on the sky active technology

that they did.

Sky active R is the rotary one now.

Sky active R.

Sky active in general is just like their basically line of technology.

So probably could include like the regenerative braking.

But it's the whole suite of things to make things more efficient.

Yeah, it's super cool.

I think Mazda is one of those fun little crazy uncles that is in the car manufacturing space

that I just feel is always just one thing is way off in left field that they're working

on just for shits and giggles.

Gels, after owning a rotary for five years, what would you say is like one of the biggest

myths about having a rotary?

One of the biggest myths about it?

Man, the reliability aspect of it, honestly.

I mean, yes, they're completely different.

Yes, they're, I would say more prone to having an issue long term, right?

Like that's just just how they are.

But it's been kind of looked upon as like, oh, you buy a rotary engine.

It's going to blow up on you every weekend.

And it's like, one, they don't necessarily blow up.

They just lose their compression.

Like you never like blow a hole in the side of the rotary.

Like it just does not a thing.

I have.

And it's really not, like I said, I own the car for five years.

Granted, I did get a pretty clean example of one and had, you know, lower miles had

right around 50,000 miles, still stock everything, no rebuild, anything like that.

I don't know what the previous life of it before was as far as like pre mixing

and things like that.

But I would say I took really good care of that engine.

I researched everything that I needed to do to make sure I could get the most out of it,

talked with a bunch of people that like reached out to me to like help out with things,

did a lot of preventative stuff for it specifically for like the S one year

like I had that had like some of the oiling issues and things like that.

And I never had any issue with it whatsoever.

And I drove that car a lot.

You drove it to Gatlinburg.

I drove it to.

See him back and back would drive it pretty much every day all summer.

Did a lot of road trips with it.

It was basically like my summer daily ticket to work every day.

And never once thought twice about it.

Never like, oh, they flood on you.

It's like they don't flood on you.

Explain that.

What is flooding with that?

So like with the older rotaries and stuff like that, just like any car that you have,

that has like a warm up cycle on it.

When you start it up, it wants to like dump a lot of fuel in it.

You know, the RPM like runs higher, things like that.

So it's pumping a lot more fuel in because it just started.

It's cold with rotaries.

It's like in the past and there's this thing where sometimes and even the RX eights,

like they have, they do flood.

It's like, oh, you started up, but then you shut it off right away.

It's like you get a lot of fuel sitting in that essentially like the combustion chamber,

like the engine.

Yeah.

And then it gets really hard to turn over or won't start.

It's flooded.

So it has too much gas in it.

What do you do once it's flooded?

So there's a deflooding procedure that the RX eights had where I never had to do it.

So I never had to worry about it.

But I think it was like, if you like held the, you're the break in, but also like held

the gas to the floor and then like cranked it over for a certain amount of times at it.

Like it shut like the coil pack off or whatever.

Like it didn't try to fire.

It just got all the fuel out of it.

Otherwise you go in there, take the spark plugs out and just turn it over and just shoot all the fuel out.

Interesting.

Yeah, that's so quirky.

Yeah.

I mean, they got to be fairly reliable.

I don't know if you guys seen the story.

It was somewhat recent of a, there's an older lady that bought a Mazda RX seven and owned

it to like give it back to Mazda and she's done with it because she had such a good time.

She enjoyed the car so much that like as her thank you was returning and it was in pristine

condition.

Perfect.

But she said the car was amazing.

She always loved driving.

It was always good.

You think a little old lady, you know, would have issues or something like that would be

willing to give the car back because she enjoyed it so much and wanted to say thank you.

No, it was a phenomenal car.

And I think they do get a bad rep because people don't know about them and they do things.

And then they run into weird quirks and they don't know how to solve those real, you know,

quirks that pop up and then they sit in yards and turn into rust buckets.

And then that's where that bad rep comes from.

It's just, you got to take the time to appreciate and learn what you're getting into.

And I think some people just aren't willing to do that.

100%.

And it had to be fair.

It's like the RX8 specifically, like when it first came out, put a lot of that bad taste

in people's mouth because of the issues that the Series 1 had.

So like the oil porting issues that they had, the oil metering pump issues that they had.

Essentially it's like-

OMP.

I remember this.

Yep.

Because somebody got mad at me.

He's like, it doesn't have issues.

The OMP does not have issues technically.

It's something else.

I'm like, oh my God.

I don't know.

Well, it does because they go out and there's no real way to tell that they go out until

your car blows up.

And it's like, oh, it started itself oil.

So it's like-

It's things like that.

It's like to keep a rotary engine happy.

You got to keep it well lubricated and you got to keep it cool.

You do those two things.

Same, brother.

Yeah.

You do those two things.

You're pretty much set.

Isn't it a thing to beat on them a little bit too?

You want to like rub them out?

There's a thing with like the carbon buildup and things like that because the exhaust is

so freaking hot and it's like they are so technically inefficient that you are putting

a ton of fuel into like the exhaust and things like that.

And obviously with like the emissions stuff, like that's why I say it's like the best thing

you can do for a Mazda RX-8 is to take the catalytic converter out of it because if that

catalytic converter clogs, which they do, it will also cause a lot of issues.

Okay.

Is there, I've heard this recently on TikTok, so the credibility is obviously questionable

at best, but there's been a bunch of people that have started to say premixing isn't good

on rotaries.

Where did that come from?

I have no fucking idea.

I don't know why or where that came from.

My thing was I premixed the RX-8 ever since I had it.

And along with that too, I did, I know we've talked about it, but I did what was called

a zone adapter.

So specifically the series one, like I said, had some issues with the oil metering pump.

So basically what the oil metering pump is, is a pump that was powered by like the rest

of the engine.

And that was what was responsible for lubricating the, like the seals in the engine.

So the apex seals everything.

That, it was the pump that basically went to the oil port, squirted the oil into the

engine, pulled from the oil pan.

That's why it's like, oh, RX-8's burn oil.

It's like, yes, they do their design.

I'm perfect.

That's just, you know, like a two stroke style thing where, you know, I know people hate

when I say that, but you know, it's like two strokes.

You like, you know, have oil and you premix.

Yeah.

So essentially what I did is because the oil that you have in the car is, is like a really

thin oil, essentially, because it had to be injected and burned.

When you put the zone adapter in, it basically blocked off the oil pickup for the metering

pump and allowed you to have a separate reservoir of premix oil.

So it routed to a new reservoir.

I had it filled up with like a quart and a half or like two quarts of premix oil and

instead of pulling, used oil from the oil pan to lubricate everything, it was constantly

pulling fresh oil to inject and burn.

So it's a lot cleaner.

You didn't have to worry about any contaminants in it, anything like that, but it also allowed

me to swap out the oil in the oil pan for a much heavier weight oil, which was a lot

better for like the bearings and things like that because it was a lot thinner oil and

stuff in there before.

Yeah, the heat gets to it.

Yeah, the heat gets to it a lot easier.

It's you know, not great for the bearings and stuff like that.

So when I could, I switched to like a 1040 or like 1540 oil that I put in the car, much

healthier for the bearings.

I was pulling fresh oil the whole time and then I could always see if like if the oil

metering pump were to shit out, I could see that, hey, I'm not pulling any oil out of

here.

What's going on?

Because that'd be something I'd check every time I fill up.

But on top of that, I would also do about half because I was doing the that with the

son adapter, I was doing about half the recommendation of the race amount of premix that you're supposed

to put in per tank.

So I think it was recommended you put it like eight ounces of premix in per tank.

I was doing like four.

So I don't know where where that all came from.

Maybe a coping mechanism because they don't want to spend money on premix and like, oh,

I'm fine.

I don't know what it is.

I like, oh, it's not necessary.

Not necessary.

It's like, no, it's not, but it definitely doesn't hurt.

Yeah.

Interesting.

What would you attune or what would you relate owning a rotary to be like in like some other

hobby?

Oh, it's a good question.

This is a question for the table.

I feel like it's like having one of those weird gaming consoles that doesn't get all

the main titles.

Like Sega's, Jenna's Sega's.

Yeah.

Like it was cool.

It was fun.

Your friend had one, but you just always had then 64 or something.

I think it's like that.

Remember that was it?

Is it the GameCube?

What's wrong with the GameCube?

No.

I was always so jealous because my friend had one and I had the little mini disk.

I thought it was sick.

It was so weird.

I was, I remember the first time because I didn't have a GameCube as a, when they first

came out and my friend got one and seeing that little disk.

I was so confused.

Yeah, that's a good one because that little disk is kind of like the rotary.

What the fuck is that?

You still got to pay 50 bucks for that?

Yeah.

You don't get a deal in half a game?

That's about right.

For me, it's like I would almost relate it to like film photography where it's like,

it's a little bit more work.

Is there an easier way to do it all?

Sure.

But you're doing it because you love the art of the thing that you get to do.

And you have, you have to really practice it.

Beautiful.

Thank you.

Like woodworking.

It's like, I'll just do it myself.

I really like what that is.

Yeah.

I'm going to do the hard way.

I can do that.

Woodwork enthusiasts are just nothing more than like reincarnated like beavers in my

opinion.

And just constantly, we have one because they're working on the booth for Gatlinburg.

We have a really special booth that we're doing.

And I swear to God, every single time I talk to him, he's like, we can make that out of

wood.

And I'm like, brother, I don't want the entire booth to be made out of wood.

He's like, it's just so versatile.

You can do it.

It won't even look like wood.

We'll paint it black.

It's like, it's so black.

Anyway, sorry.

We do have to take a small break, but now for talking about our next partner, the Martini

Works podcast, Dakota, take it away.

Fortune Auto.

They make some fantastic coilovers.

You could even put them in an RX8 if you wanted.

So if you guys head on over to Martini Works, you can go check out what we all have Fortune

Auto's for.

They have a pretty wide catalog now at this point.

So they fit a lot of makes and models, which is great news.

And then if you need something custom too, we can work through that.

They're hand-built in Virginia in the United States and assembled in-house there.

You can upgrade them with Suss Springs down the road.

You can have them upgraded, fixed, re-put back together, which is nice.

And also the coilovers can grow with you.

So if you get like a base set and you want to advance them in the future, we'll go ahead

right there and do it.

I've had Fortune Auto's.

I've used them from everything, from slamming my Evo 10 to the ground and making it not

functional.

And it rode fantastic still to doing more of like an aggressive setup on my Supra and

taking it autocrossing into the track.

And it did all of that amazing.

And I would also drive that car across the country.

So it wasn't just like, yeah, it works really good on the track, but daily driving, it breaks

my back complete opposite.

It was phenomenal.

And that digressive piston that they use and how they set those up is the main reason

that they can perform phenomenal on the track and then also do phenomenal daily driving.

So if you guys are interested, check out Fortune Auto 500's over at martiniworks.com.

So after everything, Gels, would you own another rotary again?

A million percent.

Really?

I'd do it in a freaking heartbeat.

What price of an RX-8, in your opinion, does it become not worth it?

Like cost-wise?

Yeah, like what's the best price for an RX-8 and what would you be willing to spend it

knowing how much experience you have on the platform?

I'd say, so if I were to get into another RX-8 specifically, I would be on the lookout

for a low mileage R3.

So like the later year, like facelifted ones.

I would be willing to spend probably about 12, 12.

Yeah, it's a good deal.

I mean, that you can get a car for that much.

Yeah, I bought mine in 2020.

So like in the peak of kind of everything going crazy, like in the bubble bought mine

in 2020, little less than 50,000 miles.

The thing was on it when I got it.

I bought it for six grand.

Damn, that's crazy.

Like they were they were stupid cheap and I think they've gone up a little bit since

then.

But there's this funny thing with RX-8 specifically because of like the flooding thing.

Also the starters and like the series ones are tend to like go really weak.

So like, like they'll turn over, but it's like not strong enough to start the car.

So it's like people think that the like it blew up, you know, these cars blow up.

It's cooked.

It's not starting.

It's blown up.

But they don't compression test it.

And it turns out to be completely fine.

And the exit just says a weak starter.

So that's like, hey, just kind of get this thing off my lawn for 500 bucks.

Dude, there's so many stories of that happening.

It's crazy.

People are like, oh, yeah, I just I saw this on Marketplace for stupid cheap.

I started the engine was blown by when Russian tested it and was good and just needed the

new starter.

So do you think do you think Rob Dom is on to something with all of his builds?

Or do you think he is just insane part of the cult of the insanity that is a rotary

engine?

No, I love what he's doing.

I think it's so sick.

One of the coolest things in my opinion is like how essentially modular these engines

are.

Like you talk about like there's really nothing like you look at a two rotor to a three rotor

four or five or six rotor engine.

It literally just you just add another.

Yeah, you just stack.

The only limitation really is the eccentric shaft that like runs through the whole thing.

So it's like you get up to like a six rotor engine.

That eccentric shaft that is causing all of those rotors to spin is getting really long.

It's getting really expensive and getting really, really damn hard to balance and like

keeping one.

What do you think like a six rotor would get for MPG?

I know that's not the point, but I'm just curious.

It's got to be just yes.

Because yeah, what were you getting in your RSA awful, awful.

It was probably like around like 10 to 12.

You could be driving on my age too, brother.

It was I was keeping recession times.

It was so funny because it wasn't funny.

It sucked.

It cost me like $400 in gas to drive to Tennessee.

Oh my God.

I was I was keeping up.

So Dustin was pulling a trailer with his LBZ.

Yep.

I was stopping just as much as him to fill up and I was like almost making it.

I remember I remember when we got to the cabin when you drove it that year and we had

we finally sat down.

We were like having a beer and we were like just decompressing from the drive.

And I remember you kind of look, he looked very like distant and I'm like, are you okay?

And he goes, yeah, I just did the math.

It would have been cheaper to have somebody trailer my car down and drive it because I

did it that next year and it was about the same price.

Oh my God.

I trailer it the following year as well.

Yeah.

But you can say that you drove your bagged RX-8 from Wisconsin, Tennessee and Beckham had

no rotary issues.

No rotary issues.

Had rotor issues.

But brake rotor.

Different part.

Doesn't count.

Yeah.

Circle, not triangle.

Yeah.

What do you what do you think would be triangle calipers?

Triangle calipers square motor.

What do you think is the best kind of person to buy an RX-8 in 2025?

Like what would you say if you're this kind of person, you'll love this car?

I'd say if you're that kind of person who's, so for me, it was like the RX-8 was like the

car of bursts for me.

It was my first rotary car.

It was the first car I put on air suspension.

It was the first car I did over fenders, like a wide body, quote unquote.

First car I wrapped.

First car I did any of that too.

And I've always liked that kind of stuff.

I've always liked to be just a little bit different in the stuff that I look at.

I thought it was unique.

I was like, no one else is really doing this like right now.

Um, and I've always had a fascination for rotaries.

I just thought it was cool.

I like figuring out how things work.

So it's like, if you're the kind of person that likes that unique shit a little bit is

not afraid to, to go into a deeper understanding of how something works to make sure that it

works well.

Um, and maybe get your hands a little dirty.

If something does need to be done about it, a hundred percent.

What's the worst kind of person that owned a Mazda RX-8?

Someone who just the worst person to own a Mazda RX-8 is someone who uses a vehicle

as a utility and has to drive an hour to work.

Yeah, yeah, you'd be going to work just to pay to take their cars to like a five minute

oil change place.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that don't, don't get an RX-8.

That's fair.

I would like to see someone take an RX-8 to one of them five minute oil change place.

I was like, is it weird at all doing oil change on those?

Or is it still pretty much the same thing?

It's, it's really standard.

Um, it, it's just like you, you would normally would, but yeah, it's, it's one of those things

where it's like, not only if you had like a typical setup with like your RX-8, like

not only is it important to change your oil over so many miles because oil like starts

to, you know, get dirty breakdown, that kind of stuff.

It's like you're also burning it.

Yeah.

Like intentionally.

So yeah, I guess stay up to date on your maintenance.

It's not like one of those things like, I'll run it for, you know, it was, it got so weird

with like, you know, the synthetic oils and stuff like that.

It's like, oh, you can run this oil 20,000 miles.

And it's like, oh, I can't, you better fucking not because it's literally eating it.

Yeah.

Dang, that's crazy.

Was there any issues you did have while you own the car in that timeframe?

Um, like it's kind of talked about it.

I did have a caliper seized up on me when we were down in Tennessee.

That sucked.

Um, car was just old.

Um, you know, it was a 2004.

Like it happened.

I think it's a 20-some year old car.

Uh, I think the boots are like the seals on the pistons of the caliper.

We're getting dry rotted or torn.

Yeah.

We drove through a ton of rain on the way down and one of those pistons just

completely seized, uh, like after like second night of the show, we were driving

back and I'm just like, this car is pulling really hard.

I'm like, what the hell is going to get on the road or just glowing?

I'm like, holy fuck.

Um, so that kind of sucked.

Other than that, um, the mid pipe that was on the car, I, I burned through a

lot of O two sensors, which sucked because they're expensive.

You know, they're like a hundred some dollars.

How'd you know no two sensors, Ben?

Uh, well, one, because it kept shooting it out of the mid pipe.

Uh, RxH to this really cool thing where if you take the catalytic converter out

of it and you put it after Marcus Austin, they shoot really big flames out of it.

It's really sick and it makes really cool rotary stuff.

Parks for living in Wisconsin, but it, uh, it also can cause issues.

If you have a cheap mid, but so the pre, the owner that I bought it from put

the mid pipe on it.

It was like the only thing that was done to the car, which like I said, it's

one of the best things you can do for an RxH.

Uh, so he's heard that did that.

I think he bought like a cheap eBay one and, uh, like the threads for the O

two sensor to go in just completely like blew out like, so like the O two

sensors is dangling and for the longest time, I did just have it, those

whole sensor just zip tied to the bottom of the car, um, which is probably why

I was running so rich, but rather rich than lean kind of thing.

I don't think flames, but it's sick flames.

And then I would because the threads were gone.

I took like, uh, like a big oil drain plug that was like the size of that

and put a bunch of like that, like quick steel, like epoxy stuff and just shove

it in there and like just put a bunch of epoxy on it.

And it lasts about a month until it's shot that out.

And then it's sound like a fricking straight pipe Honda Civic for a while.

Oh yeah.

It would sound rough when that was so loud.

That was like the most annoying thing about it.

And I finally had Jackson weld a new bung into the mid pipe in it and it worked

great, um, ran a lot better after that too.

I bet.

But, um, outside of that, no, I didn't have any weird issues or problems

with that car whatsoever.

It was great.

Oh, I lied.

Oh, there was one thing I had to replace kind of when I got it.

And again, this is just another like Wisconsin or like northern salt, you

know, rust belt kind of thing.

They have oil cooler or they have two oil coolers in the front, um, like

right in the front bumper and the oil feed line to the one oil cooler, like

the fitting on it just like rusted and it was pouring oil out.

I was like, God damn, this thing has like a crazy oil.

Like, so I had to replace that line, um, which you can really, they're expensive.

Those lines are so fucking expensive.

Cause they're like a really like long, like braided line.

I got like a Mishimoto one.

And after that, it was great, but, um, that was kind of a bitch to put in.

It was really messy.

Do you feel comfortable confirming that as a, as a rotary enthusiast that you

are in fact part of a cult?

Oh, a hundred percent.

Okay.

Do you reason outside of like I said, do you accept the fact that every

single time a Mazda article comes out about the rotary, it's only the same six

people that are convinced the rotary will come back that are posting these stories.

I don't think anyone is fully convinced.

We just have really high hopes.

Let me, let me just, there's a, there's a piece there that's just hoping.

Let me just spit this out cause there's one guy on our cars.

I went to his profile and anytime he could make a case for the rotary coming back,

he has, and I follow him now just to see what posts, and it's always about the

road.

And so a few months ago, he made one that said Mazda CTO says company is ready

to go on new rotary powered sports car if they can make a good business case.

And the top comment is if they can make a good business case.

So basically it isn't going to happen as everyone with a brain would expect.

Oh man.

That's a good question though.

Um, how was the rotary community and how do you compare it to like, you

know, other car communities that you've been in?

I think it's, it's one of those things where everyone who is really in it

understands like it is kind of like that cult mentality of like, this is our group.

Welcome to our group.

This is what to expect.

These are the rules to abide by.

It's like, don't do these rules.

You're going to have a fucking horrible time.

Kind of like the Marines.

Cause I, it was so funny.

Um, I know I've told this probably on here a bit, but it's like, I bought the

car, I posted about buying the car, posted what we were going to be doing with

the car and I got flooded with messages, like immediate, like make sure you do this.

You have to do this.

And there was this one guy who was like, he sent me like a fucking novel and

like pictures and links to shit to buy.

And it kind of came across of like, at first he was like, please don't fucking

like, like you, you don't really know what you got yourself into kind of thing.

I don't want to see you put the RX eight in a bad light because you don't know

what you're doing.

And it kind of came across a little arrogant at first, but then I like, I

kind of like looked into it and like realized like, he's right.

He's like, these cars do get a lot of fucking bad rap.

And it's like, I couldn't understand why it gets annoying, especially because

like at the time when we were doing with it, it was going to be put in front of a

lot of eyes and it was like, Oh, they're just going to put this fucking platform

on blast and it's just going to cause a lot of shit and all they're going to

say the RX eight's horrible, that kind of stuff.

And he didn't want that.

So he was like trying to help me.

And it actually ended up being like a really awesome guy.

Met up with them at Gatlinburg that one year and, uh, we, uh, went cruising

in the mountains together with his RX eight, which was a beautiful car.

Uh, and honestly, I owe a lot of probably the good success that I had with

car to him and the people that reached out initially, uh, to say, here's

what you're going to want to do, just trust us kind of things.

I'd say the community was freaking awesome.

It's like one of those things where it's like, Hey, we're all in this together.

Let's make sure we all have a good time and help each other out because

there's really nothing else like this out there.

Like where else are you going to go?

So the real hard question before we finish it up is what is the difference

between RX eight enthusiasts, accepting the disposition that they're in and Subaru

WRX enthusiasts, accepting the disposition that you sound like the

same people, but there's a key difference.

The RX eight, you, you follow what you need to do.

You work on me, did the mods you needed.

Good car.

Subaru, you follow what you need to do.

The fucker still blows up and that's the key difference.

I think we need, we need, uh, what's his name?

Is it Schmi?

Do we can get whoever we want on this podcast?

I would love to talk to him.

But super is cause everyone I know in the world,

what was the story you just had?

You had a story, somebody talking about right over here.

There's a, we, in one of the units that's over here, they had a super outside.

I was like, Hey, it looks pretty good.

He's like, yeah, uh, it got like airlift, three P and stuff on it.

And, um, just some wheels and it's on a third motor.

And I'm like, whoa, it's like a 2014 10 year old.

He's like, yeah, driving just blew up and, uh, he's like, you know, you know,

I was like, yeah, I know, I know, but he's like so nonchalant about it.

And then he's like, yeah, the, the white one next to, uh, that's mine too.

That one actually blew up too.

This is what I'm saying.

This is a real life conversation that I had and it's like this every single

time and then people give me so much shit about talking crap.

I will say it's like the amount of you run it and it maybe, maybe it's just

like the pool that we pull from, I don't know.

It's like, I talked to a lot of rotary guys and gals and have met a lot of

people who have had rotaries and it's like, I would say it's, you know,

every now and then it's like, Oh, yep, I'm doing a rebuild.

But a lot of times it's like, well, I wanted to, I wanted to port it or I

wanted to REW swap it or I wanted to do something like this.

So it's like, I pulled the engine out and it's like every now and then it's like,

Oh yeah, I had a catastrophic issue with my rotary, but it does seem like every

single Subaru person is like, I've done this 10 times.

I would, if you guys are going to go to, to slam enough Gatlinburg, number one,

please come check out the booth for putting a lot of love into it.

But number two, if you were a Subaru owner and you have modified your WRX and

you have not had issues with it and you're above a hundred thousand miles,

I want to talk to you.

I want to understand this because I've run into a bunch of Subaru people and I

hear the same thing, but I try not to share it all because then I just feel

like people think that we don't like Subarus.

I love Subarus.

I think Subarus are some of the best sounding like sport tuner cars you can

buy like with a nice exhaust.

I think they sound insane.

They look insane.

I think they look really good too, but they just seem to blow up quite a bit.

I would, would you say per capita, WRX blows up more than an RX 8?

I'm not a numbers guy.

I would love to see the analytics of Subarus and their reliability issues of

WRX and STIs and yeah, that would be so interesting to me.

It's got to be a percentage because I was just thinking like, as I was kind of

saying the last thing, it's like, okay, well, talk to way more Subaru people than

I probably talk to the rotary people because it's just fewer far between, you

know, so it's like that percentage is probably a little bit skewed.

But yeah, it'd be kind of interesting.

Oh, so you had a STI?

I did.

You also had RX 7.

I did.

What was the lifespan of that STI?

Um, was there ever an engine swap in it either before or after you owned it?

No, my, my STI experience.

I had a 2008 hatch and I was super simple with it.

I think I did an exhaust, a shift knob and an intake, wheels, tires and coils.

And it was, that was it.

I didn't touch the engine, particularly because when I bought that car, it came

after I sold my Datsun 280Z and I bought that to be like my daily driver going

into the winter time.

So I didn't want to blow it up.

I didn't want to do anything to it, but I will say the one thing I remember was

the car was a couple owners, no accidents, but I remember having this

gosh darn squeak in the front bumper.

And for the longest time, I could not figure out why my front bumper squeaked

so badly.

And it was just loud enough to where I could hear it on the inside of the car,

which should say something about the sound that's annoying, it killed me.

So it was the springtime I remember one day and I had a bad day.

It was a bad day.

And I go and I pull into the driveway of our house and it makes that

gosh darn squeak.

And I'm like, I am going to lose my mind.

So I go outside and I shake the bumper and go inside, go into my office,

grab a piece of paper, rip it in half, fold it into like eighths, right?

Like eights.

And I go and I pull on like where the fender meets the bumper, like the front.

And I pull it down and I put this little piece of paper in there and then I let

it go and it like kind of scrunches back up, fix it, fix it.

So it's just like the bumper rubbing against the fender.

Exactly.

There's no like, there must have been like no gasket or something there had gone

over time, but I remember that being like, and I remember selling the car and

somebody was like, did you enjoy that car?

And I'm like, no, but I said, no, because of that, that was the reason I didn't

like the car.

I have this thing though.

There's like these little things completely outside of Rotary's where it's

like the little tiniest thing can drive me up a wall really fast.

I can handle huge problems just fine.

Like huge issues with things I almost can take better than a door not being able

to completely seal all the way.

And I can see the little like pinch of like the gasket, you know, I'm like,

I'll lose my goddamn shit for that.

I will say I've owned a Rotary in my lifetime and I've owned a Subaru in my

lifetime, one of those lasted me six years, one of those lasted me three months.

I will let you figure out which one of those lasted me three months.

It also, I think lasted longer in the back parking lot of the shop than it did

on the road because I caught so much shit every Monday at the meeting.

Watch that piece of shit Subaru's still doing back there.

I was just hoping someone would just take it.

I think you were.

I think it's at multiple points.

He's right at the whole time.

Yeah.

You said, if somebody just wants to take, because I remember one of the guys,

one of the shop guys was like, I'll take it.

And you're like, please, he's like, I do need like the title.

I was like, I will bring the title tomorrow.

You can just have it with that being said, we hope you guys enjoy this format

of the podcast.

If you like us to talk about a certain subject, please let us know in the

comments below.

Don't forget, if you don't need car parts, but you still want to support,

you can actually do that by checking out the website.

We've got apparel on the website and hopefully by the end of this month,

you'll actually see that limited edition coffee that we've been working really,

really hard on, which we're really, really proud of.

We're really excited for.

If we will see you at Slime of Gatlinburg, save your pennies and nickels.

We got a lot of really cool stuff coming for that and we appreciate all the

support if you're, you're all the way listening at the end.

We have one more partner that we'd like to give a shout out to Gels.

Please go ahead.

Absolutely.

That is of course, Melco.

We've been using Melco products on our vehicles for almost a couple of years

now, uh, and they're the ones that we trusted to put on the website and bring

it on to support the podcast because we do believe in their products and they

work really, really good.

I use a ton of their stuff, uh, on the RX eight, even bringing it to shows,

getting her shined up, getting it, uh, all buffed and polished and things like

that.

And it works really freaking good.

Whether it's from just the quick detailing stuff, uh, to their interior

stuff, honestly, they're like tire cleaner or tire shine.

I guess if you even want to call it that is some of, I'm, I'm not even like

just, you know, building it up to build it up.

Like some of the best stuff that I've ever used for tires.

Like it doesn't make it like slimy.

It doesn't make it super shiny.

It just makes the tires look dark, look like a brand new tire.

Like you would see on like a picture, just got delivered.

They just got delivered.

Um, really fantastic stuff.

We made it easy for you guys.

If you want a quick detailing kit, if you want like the full spa kit, if you're

looking just for stuff for interior, glass, wheels, whatever it might be.

Uh, we put some kits together.

Uh, you can check them out over martiniworks.com a little more on the

higher end side of things, but you get where you pay for a hundred percent.

Um, so we want to go check it out.

Check it out on martiniworks.com.

Of course, thank you so much for Melco for sponsoring the martiniworks podcast.

Thank you guys.

That was fun.

That was a good time.

Thanks for teaching us.

Yeah, I miss my RX eight.

I'm educated now.

I'll buy another one.

Yeah.

Race car time.

I did would make a fun trip.

You did say you wanted to grip like grip drive one.

I think a RX eight time attack car would go crazy.

It would a, uh, a 200 treadwear tire on an RX eight.

You'd never break traction.

I, one of my, I look back at it.

It's like, would I wide body it and put it on air again?

I don't think so.

Glad I did it.

Probably won't do it again.

Yeah, but it is what it is.

Thank you all so much.

Have a fantastic weekend.

Bye.

You're Completely WRONG About Rotary Cars..

About this episode

Mazda Rx7

Mazda Rx8

Toyota MR2

Mazda Cx30

Toyota Supra

Honda Civic

Subaru WRX

Datsun 280Z

Request an Explanation

Want to learn more?

Help improve this episode

More from MartiniWorks Podcast