New cat time

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New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

I had to leave my R3 idling for a bit today whilst I was sorting some stuff out in my garage. I took it out for a 10-15min spirited spin after that to blow out the carbon and started to notice a pinging sound from the back of the car when moving – a bit like stones bouncing off metal.

I pulled over and had a look under my car, to find my cat glowing at the oxygen sensor (hard to see in pic due to the flash) and around the join where the cat meets the mid pipein the direction of the rear of the car. The cat also looks very black, as if it’s burned. No idea if the sound was related.
B800B9C4-FB30-4459-9EE4-264F637954F2.jpeg
I had been paranoid of a blocked cat when I picked up the car a couple of weeks ago and first experienced the RX-8 level of heat in the cabin, but I’d checked the cat a couple of times and it hadn’t glowed previously. This is the first tank I’ve premixed since buying the car (150ml of Idemitsu), if that might have made a difference.

I’m assuming my cat now needs swapping and I shouldn’t drive the car until I get it done if I don’t want to risk damage to the engine. I expect the cause is poor ignition coils as there are no records of these being changed in the 54k miles on the clock. I have a back order for a set of RRP coils and leads, but stock is now not expected until the end of the month.

A couple of specific Q’s about cats which I haven’t been able to find from searching. I’m looking for a decent high flow cat over OEM for performance and price reasons:

- How much more high flow is a high flow cat? If it has 200 cells, how does this compare to the number of cells in an OEM cat?

- I’ve read a lot about cheap cats not being able to take the heat of the Renesis. My first port of call is Racing Beat as I will ultimately buy their cat-back exhaust and possibly their header too if I can bring myself to terms with spending north of £2k :shock:.
I’m thinking that buying everything from RB should mean it slots together more easily DIY. However, it looks like the high flow cat from RB is just a straight through midpipe with a £90 Magnaflow cat welded in. That doesn’t seem good quality value for £560 – am I wrong?

https://www.racingbeateurope.com/mazda- ... 2288-p.asp

- Lastly, will a high flow cat be louder than OEM and will this be in a good or irritating way? I read that you get bad resonance from decatting if you don’t use a decent resonator like BHR‘s. I’m assuming a high flow cat still restricts some of the noise. But, it looks like most also do away with an OEM mid pipe resonator (if that’s what it is?) circled red in the below photograph:
E67005E9-D8AF-486D-8D3C-DCD391332E44.jpeg
E67005E9-D8AF-486D-8D3C-DCD391332E44.jpeg (89.73 KiB) Viewed 1886 times
Thanks in advance for any help :).
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Re: New cat time

Post by Paul_13 »

Use some cataclean first. Have a search on here about it.
OE Cats are worth £500 scrap value
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Re: New cat time

Post by warpc0il »

If the engine is revving okay then that suggests that the cat may be flowing fine and isn't damaged - yet

The cat does run extremely hot, which is why cheap aftermarket cats can die in a few months on a rotary.

You first need to check that everything is okay with your ignition system, as anything that results in any unburnt fuel getting to the cat, e.g. a loose HT lead on a trailing plug, could cause the cat to run much hotter still, causing it to fail over time.
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

Ah, OK. So it might not be dead yet. I was assuming the cat was already clogged or damaged inside if it was glowing. Thanks :thumleft:. I’ll wait for my new RRP coils/leads to arrive and fit them first to see if that stops the cat glowing, then.

The engine revs fine when not under load. It’s good at the top end, but (I think) hesitates very slightly in the midrange which I’m putting down to the old coils. That, and it just doesn’t feel as spritely yet as the other R3 I drove some time back.
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

Paul_13 wrote:
Sat Mar 21, 2020 11:25 pm
Use some cataclean first. Have a search on here about it.
OE Cats are worth £500 scrap value
I’d seen Cataclean mentioned in a couple of other posts, but thought the jury was out on wether it was a good idea vs a traditional Italian tune up (which I’ve been doing plenty of!).

Just read another positive thread on here about Cataclean. May give it a go, although presumably no point until I’ve installed my new ignition.
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Re: New cat time

Post by New Duke »

Yeah the cat will often glow if you drive the car as intended. Is normal and not a problem in itself. Be sure to leave it hours to cool down if you ever remove it yourself.

Good move getting the coils and leads replaced before you fiddle with anything. Make sure you're on new spark plugs since you've had the car too. Ignition is usually the first port of call with low power gripes, followed by air intake and sticking brakes if you have no error codes.

Cataclean doesn't seem to do any harm. So may help, may not. There's no real data either way so it may be worth a try for the low cost. I've used it before but don't anymore. Regular trackdays and living at the redline ensure there's no soot in mine. Whether or not your own italian tune up is as effective who knows.
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Re: New cat time

Post by 350matt »

If you are reasonably proficient with the spanners then I'd say to undo the 3 bolts that hold the cat to the manifold and take a peek inside at the front face of the cat - alternatively buy one of those tiddly USB cameras form amazon for about £10 and remove the O2 sensors so you can poke the camera inside to view the faces of the cat brick

if its all melted its time for it to come off
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

New Duke wrote:
Sun Mar 22, 2020 12:48 am
Make sure you're on new spark plugs since you've had the car too. Ignition is usually the first port of call with low power gripes, followed by air intake and sticking brakes if you have no error codes.

Cataclean doesn't seem to do any harm. So may help, may not. There's no real data either way so it may be worth a try for the low cost.
Yep, the garage I bought the car off replaced the sparks. Don’t know which brand they used, but they were re-assuringly expensive!
F3826B63-956B-4D69-98AB-7F08AFDEB692.jpeg
I’ll pop into Halfords and pick-up up a bottle of Cataclean if they have it in stock. Sounds like it’s worth a shot at £15 if it’s not going to do any damage.
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

350matt wrote:
Sun Mar 22, 2020 9:05 am
If you are reasonably proficient with the spanners then I'd say to undo the 3 bolts that hold the cat to the manifold and take a peek inside at the front face of the cat
They only thing that’s stopping me currently is my crappy drive. I replaced the gearbox and differential oil last weekend and really struggled using a trolley jack on the RX-8‘s low and tricky to get to 2x central jacking points to get the car high enough to prop up on axel stands on the side sill points.

I drove the car up on a couple of planks so I could get the jack underneath it. But the combination of my drive surface being uneven, gravelly/stones and soft was a pain. I used 18mm hardened ply under the axel stands, but the trolley jack wheels just cut through this and dug in putting a load of potentially dangerous strain on the jack as the wheels stopped rolling under the car as it raised up.

I need to come up with a solution (or a new drive) as I’ll ultimately need to get under the car if I need to change the cat + do other future work. I might try a big piece of chipboard to see if that’s stronger than ply.
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Re: New cat time

Post by 350matt »

I feel your pain as for a few years all i had to work on was a gravel drive and doing anything major on it was a literal pain in the backside
I'd suggest the use of some MDF sheet as in 15mm or thicker its quite tough or some metal sheet of some kind
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

350matt wrote:
Sun Mar 22, 2020 2:31 pm
I feel your pain as for a few years all i had to work on was a gravel drive and doing anything major on it was a literal pain in the backside
I'd suggest the use of some MDF sheet as in 15mm or thicker its quite tough or some metal sheet of some kind
The thought of sheet metal crossed my mind, but I wondered whether it might be too slippery for the trolley jack wheels :-k.

I’ll pick up some thick mdf and give that a go :thumleft:. I want to get the car up to inspect the engine mounts sooner rather than later too, so need to find a way of doing this and potentially looking at the cat safely.
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Re: New cat time

Post by Ollie »

Maybe get some MDF/Wood of some description and some metal to top it with. Thats what I've been considering as we don't really have any level ground due to everything being hardcore stone/gravel on our parking area. Whenever I've used Jackstands in the past I'll say finding somewhere level enough to use them was tricky.
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Re: New cat time

Post by warpc0il »

The jacking and axle stand pads, as sold in the club shop, also help prevent damage to the underside of the car
https://shop.rx8oc.co.uk/RX-8_Parts/cat ... 27080.aspx
More information here viewtopic.php?f=144&t=79503
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

Yorindesarin wrote:
Sun Mar 22, 2020 3:16 pm
Maybe get some MDF/Wood of some description and some metal to top it with. Thats what I've been considering as we don't really have any level ground due to everything being hardcore stone/gravel on our parking area. Whenever I've used Jackstands in the past I'll say finding somewhere level enough to use them was tricky.
Not a bad idea. Looks like I’ll be heading down to B&Q again next weekend to give it another go!
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

warpc0il wrote:
Sun Mar 22, 2020 4:07 pm
The jacking and axle stand pads, as sold in the club shop, also help prevent damage to the underside of the car
https://shop.rx8oc.co.uk/RX-8_Parts/cat ... 27080.aspx
More information here viewtopic.php?f=144&t=79503
Excellent. Thanks for the link :thumright:. I‘ve been jacking from the front and back jack points in the middle of the car as I didn’t think the ridged lifting plate on my trolley jack would clear the side skirts. I’ll check what size my jack is during the week and order a pad for this.

I’ll most probably get the 4 axel stand pads too as I wasn’t a huge fan of resting the car on axel stands using its thin sill jack points, even if they seemed strong enough.
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

To help with jacking up my car, I went and bought a sheet of 18mm MDF. When I noticed that my trolley jack wheels were gong through that too, I combined it with an upturned metal garage storage shelf, which helped.

I’ve also ordered a jack pad and 4x axel stand pads from the club shop. I’m hoping that these will let me jack the car up from the side vs the harder to get to central jacking points.

Anyway, with the car up, I whipped off the cat and was surprised to find no gaskets between the exhaust sections.

Sure enough, the honeycomb was in pieces. Amazing that the car got through an MOT (in Feb) before I bought it with the cat in the state it was. Perhaps the rubble inside it was stopping any omissions coming out #-o:
8FBBD3FA-8840-4BC2-8FCA-18550A5C1FF8.jpeg
With all the talk of the value of the cat’s precious metals, is a bag of this worth anything to a scrap yard :lol:?:
86A79A36-1179-4321-807C-CBC2794E5550.jpeg
Once I cleared out the front section of the cat, I noticed the rear section still looked pretty blocked:
6EA23027-DE5F-4585-9CDD-A9CDBFE4E952.jpeg
Rather than sit on a potentially dangerous fire hazard, for now, I knocked out the rear portion of the cat:
026DA410-8275-4521-8935-E72547AD6B77.jpeg

The 8 drives a lot better now and no CEL codes so far. Less heat coming into the cabin too, although I did notice the resonator was glowing (but not the cat). Perhaps still from unburned fuel ahead of my incoming RRP coils sorting the ignition:
B336B5B9-496B-463D-BF53-F65F32929BB2.jpeg


It’s slightly louder and throatier from outside/behind the car and it backfires a bit, but there’s very little difference in noise when driving inside. Presumably retaining the OEM resonator (vs a straight through) helps, coupled with the overly quite Mazda back box.

So, for my longer term fix, I’m now thinking about the Racing Beat high flow 200 cel cat, which should mate nicely when I eventually buy their cat-back exhaust (unless I decide to go for something louder).

https://www.racingbeateurope.com/mazda- ... 2288-p.asp

Is there anyone with any experience of this Racing Beat part who can advise on performance, durability and sound? My concern still is that it seems to just be a straight through midpipe with no resonator and just a £90 Magnaflow cat welded in. For £560, that does’t seem like good value, I’d be worried that the cheepo cat won’t survive Renesis temps and the lack of resonator will generate annoyingly sounds.

BHR do a version of their resonated mid pipe with a cat, but the fact that it states that it’s not suitable for track use doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence :-k:

https://black-halo-racing.myshopify.com ... ed-midpipe
Last edited by R1DSO on Sat Mar 28, 2020 10:50 am, edited 2 times in total.
2009 R3 in sparkling black
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Re: New cat time

Post by Ryan Rotary Performance »

R1DSO wrote:
Sat Mar 28, 2020 10:42 am
.

So, for my longer term fix, I’m now thinking about the Racing Beat high flow 200 cel cat, which should mate nicely when I eventually buy their cat-back exhaust (unless I decide to go for something louder).

https://www.racingbeateurope.com/mazda- ... 2288-p.asp

Is there anyone with any experience of this Racing Beat part who can advise on performance, durability and sound? My concern still is that it seems to just be a straight through midpipe with no resonator and just a £90 Magnaflow cat welded in. For £560, that does’t seem like good value, I’d be worried that the cheepo cat won’t survive Renesis temps and the lack of resonator will generate annoyingly sounds.

BHR do a version of their resonated mid pipe with a cat, but the fact that it states that it’s not suitable for track use doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence :-k:

https://black-halo-racing.myshopify.com ... ed-midpipe

Another to consider.

https://www.ryanrotaryperformance.com/s ... -converter
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Re: New cat time

Post by New Duke »

Bit of an aside:

Invest in 2 (or even better 4) low profile ramps like the ones below. They raise it enough to get to those central jacking points which will save you so much time in the long run and give those poor sills a rest.

https://www.carbuilder.com/uk/low-rise- ... -oEALw_wcB
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Re: New cat time

Post by warpc0il »

You can buy very similar low-rise ramps from any store that sells stuff for caravans and motorhomes, as these are what they use to level when parking on a slope.

The advantage of the camping versions are that they're designed for use on gravel and soft ground, while being strong and light.

The more expensive ones also come in sections that slot together, this isn't just for easy storage but you can drive up the slope, park with the wheels at the height you want (usually in a secure "cup") and then remove the ramp section(s).

This means that for jobs that don't require the wheels to be removed, the car just needs chocks (e.g. the removed ramp sections) and you don't need to jack at all.
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

Ryan Rotary Performance wrote:
Sat Mar 28, 2020 10:48 am

Another to consider.

https://www.ryanrotaryperformance.com/s ... -converter
I think I’m going to have to set up a monthly RRP direct debit Carl as it looks like I’ll be ordering a set of your motor mounts to join my pre-existing coils order :lol:.

A couple of Q’s about the RRP pipe...

- Will the cat survive spirited road driving and the occasional track day if I were to leave it installed permanently once my ignition system is healthy?

- Will I miss the resonator, either with the OEM back box or when I get a performance cat back? I’ve read that the resonator takes out annoying resonance. I don’t mind an aggressive exhaust note when accelerating, but am trying to avoid intrusive droning at steady cruise speeds.
Last edited by R1DSO on Sat Mar 28, 2020 11:25 am, edited 1 time in total.
2009 R3 in sparkling black
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K&N panel filter
Suffix C Mazda coils
Magnecor leads
Racing Beat header / mid pipe
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Russell speed bleeders
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

New Duke wrote:
Sat Mar 28, 2020 10:50 am
Bit of an aside:

Invest in 2 (or even better 4) low profile ramps like the ones below. They raise it enough to get to those central jacking points which will save you so much time in the long run and give those poor sills a rest.

https://www.carbuilder.com/uk/low-rise- ... -oEALw_wcB
This and the camping ramp intel is brilliant, thanks guys. I have an old set of Halfords ramps, but haven’t been using them as I’m sure the front lip of the car won’t clear.

These (or some similar camping ramps) will make my life a lot easier. I will order a set :thumleft:.
2009 R3 in sparkling black
Racing Beat REVi ram air duct
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Magnecor leads
Racing Beat header / mid pipe
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Russell speed bleeders
Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tyres
R-Magic shift knob
Heel/toe pedal mod

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Re: New cat time

Post by 350matt »

I bought a 200 cell cat and made up my own pipe and in the process also removed the resonator as mine was falling apart

this did make the car louder but with a stock back box was not unpleasant or buzzy in teh cab

however when I later fitted a Toyo rear exhaust it got a 'lot' louder to the point where I'd say its possibly a bit too loud now but you get used to it ( or go deaf)

so I'd say if you plan to change the rear exhaust at some point then keep a resonator in there

and what have you done with the remains of the cat as you may be able to sell the debris
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

New Duke wrote:
Sat Mar 28, 2020 10:50 am
Bit of an aside:

Invest in 2 (or even better 4) low profile ramps like the ones below. They raise it enough to get to those central jacking points which will save you so much time in the long run and give those poor sills a rest.

https://www.carbuilder.com/uk/low-rise- ... -oEALw_wcB
I’ve found the same set on Amazon, with free (and, in these lockdown times, still functioning) delivery.

Debating wether to buy 2 or 4, though. Is it safe to jack the front of the car up if the rear wheels are sitting on these ramps?

Obviously, I’ll put it in gear with the handbrake on, but I thought the rear wheels should always be chocked too.
2009 R3 in sparkling black
Racing Beat REVi ram air duct
K&N panel filter
Suffix C Mazda coils
Magnecor leads
Racing Beat header / mid pipe
RRP engine mounts
Hel braided brake lines
Carbotech XP10 pads / Mintex discs / Motul RBF600
Russell speed bleeders
Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tyres
R-Magic shift knob
Heel/toe pedal mod

1990 Eunos Roadster V-Spec in BRG
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Harrizone
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Re: New cat time

Post by Harrizone »

For years I used some extremely cheap ramps used for caravanning that I then filled with expanding foam, so making them lightweight and extremely durable :thumleft: . Was amusing to watch the overfill of foam extruding out in a sausage from the filling hole :lol: . Simple things please simple minds #-o .
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New Duke (Sat Mar 28, 2020 12:37 pm)
Now a distant memory unfortunately.
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Re: New cat time

Post by R1DSO »

350matt wrote:
Sat Mar 28, 2020 12:19 pm
I bought a 200 cell cat and made up my own pipe and in the process also removed the resonator as mine was falling apart

this did make the car louder but with a stock back box was not unpleasant or buzzy in teh cab

however when I later fitted a Toyo rear exhaust it got a 'lot' louder to the point where I'd say its possibly a bit too loud now but you get used to it ( or go deaf)

so I'd say if you plan to change the rear exhaust at some point then keep a resonator in there

and what have you done with the remains of the cat as you may be able to sell the debris
Interesting. Thanks for the insight. I like the idea of a Racing Beat cat back, but was a bit worried that it might be too muted and I’d be disappointed vs a Borla etc. which sound incredible, but are probably too loud and droney. However, maybe if I’m losing the resonator the RB will be just about right.

The remains of my cat are in a tightly sealed, heavy duty plastic bag. No idea where I’d go to sell something like that... perhaps a scrap heap :-k.
2009 R3 in sparkling black
Racing Beat REVi ram air duct
K&N panel filter
Suffix C Mazda coils
Magnecor leads
Racing Beat header / mid pipe
RRP engine mounts
Hel braided brake lines
Carbotech XP10 pads / Mintex discs / Motul RBF600
Russell speed bleeders
Michelin Pilot Sport 4S tyres
R-Magic shift knob
Heel/toe pedal mod

1990 Eunos Roadster V-Spec in BRG
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