Back in 2004 when I bought a brand new RX8..... 3 days after I bought
it it would not start. I tried all sorts of things but no luck.
Called the dealer and he sent a truck to pick it up. Took him a week
to get it started. Mazda then had to re-flashed the EFI program in
all RX8's. That fixed it.

Turns out it is rather easy to flood the rotary engine with fuel.

Recently I had taken the plugs out on the TTC engine and my helper
turned on the Motec and electric boost fuel pump. Then he pressed the
starter button. A lot of fuel vapor came out of the spark plug holes.
NOT GOOD. The Motec was injecting fuel. A lot of the fuel remained in
the engine I am sure.

Then we tried to start it after putting the plugs back in. No way
would it start. We ran the battery down trying.

The apex seals collected all the fuel and oil in the engine and
forced it into the spark plugs holes shorting out the plugs.

The TTC mechanical fuel pump will not supply fuel when the engine is
being turned over by the starter. It is also a good idea to use the
emergency fuel shut off valve and turn off the fuel supply when you
are cleaning moister or fuel out of the engine with the plugs out.

In the past 18 or 19 years we have received many messages where
people found the engine hard to start. I suspect it was the same
problem.

Take the plugs out and make sure you do not have a supply of fuel to
your fuel injection or your carburettor. Turn the engine over and
hold a paper towel in front of the spark plug hole. If there is any
wetness of any kind the engine is not ready to start. Only warm dry
air coming out is acceptable.

Once you have that condition the engine will start after you
reconnect the fuel supply.

Same goes for water of course.

Paul Lamar




This has happened to my RX8 a couple of times after I accidentally
flooded the engine.  Isn't part of the problem that when the excess
fuel washes out the oil, some or all of the compression is lost?

Scott Gettings

That could be Scott. I did not think of that.

Did you get your EFI computer re-flashed? If not take it in and ask
them to update it.

Paul Lamar


   I emailed Tracy if he could re-Flash my EC2, but he is off the grid most of the time.  He did send some basic instructions.  All of my local software buddies felt that compiling the code and implementing  the programmer hardware to flash the unit would be a substantial project with uncertain outcome.  Basically a black box.

   I have been following the CDI / EFI threads here, and am hoping to have a practical solution for both functions instead of using Tracy's unit.  Builders like myself greatly benefit from the most final schematics, hardware specs and CAD files to allow us to build critical components we cannot buy.  For example, it isn't out of our range to have a local CNC shop build a redrive coupling or adjustable CAS if we have the CAD files.

   Scott Gettings

   It is a waste of time rewriting Tracy's code.  Number one it is way too difficult as it
   is written in assembly language. When he wrote it 20 years ago that was probably the only way
   to do it because computers were not fast enough then. With faster computers you write short
   simple programs and it is run directly. No compiling. Have your buddy's take a look at
   the maximite. I plan to use two. One for each rotor and their only job to control
   the fuel injection. Plenty fast to do that. You need to buy a maximite and try it.
   You will be stunned on how easy it is to use.


   The other thing is half of Tracy's code is necessary to use the old fashioned
   coils invented in 1922. Totally unnecessary with capacitor discharge ignitions.
   NO CODE IS NECESSARY :-) The CAS fires the plug directly right now!

   Hang on awhile Joe Berki is making great strides with his cap discharge ignition
   systems. I don't have time to do it now as I am focused on the TTC.

   Paul Lamar


   I was wondering why more of you guys are not using megasquirt. They are super easy, instead of controlling fuel and spark with 2 different controllers and everything you can just have 1 megasquirt. Anyone can tune them, I have done some cool stuff with them there is almost no learning curve it's so simple and explained. 100 times easier than a motec, at least from my experience. I have used them for maybe 10 years and recently tried there new ms3pro and it's awesome but pricey but it has rotary support ready to go.
Jacob Sturges

You used it on a car with an ancient ignition system.
Cars need to accelerate fast. Aircraft engines don't.
It is 20 year old technology.

Aircraft engines have other needs. We would like to have a black box
on engine parameters. The Maximite can do that easily.

We need something that everybody can easily understand and change.
MegaSquirt uses a cryptic programming language called "C"  that is hard
to understand and learn. It takes years to be really competent.

The act of "C" programming itself is more complicated
because the code needs to be compiled and burned into an EPROM.
Then the EPROM chip needs to be pressed into a socket on the computer
board.

In a Maximite you can change a program or rewrite it in seconds. In fact you can
have 100 different programs in the 3" by 4" computer at all times in your aircraft.
You can select any one and run it in seconds. A list of these program can be called
up on the LCD screen on the instrument panel. The same screen can display
all the engine parameters in real time. You have 32 gig to store engine data.

The BASIC program that runs the fuel injectors takes only minutes to write
and can be shared here with 750 people.

Paul Lamar

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