Is anyone doing any kind of ECU tuning for the car? I recall (vaguely) when the RX8 first hit market that people were having trouble making the claimed power on the dyno. There was speculation that the third set of intake runners weren't opening. Also there was talk of the ECU cutting power when there was low airflow to the cats (like when on a dyno) and who knows maybe even around town. If those were true wonder if they could be fixed with more aggressive (re: less emissions friendly) engine management...

Unfortunately, Mazda went and changed everything between 2008 and 2009. The engine now has only 2 injectors per rotor, super high oil pressure, different ECU, etc... as well as a whole list of changes to the rest of the car, so much of the stuff from the Series I RX-8 (up to 2008) isn't compatible with the Series II (2009+). The Cobb AP which was a favorite doesn't work on a series II, and they cancelled development because so few of these cars are sold (soemthing like 150 a month) and they wouldn't see any return on their investment. They even discontinued the series I accessport. People aren't all too willing to rewire their new series II cars with a standalone, and people seem unwilling to use piggybacks. Tuning is out, for now, and hopefully not forever.

I have heard of people not getting advertized numbers on a dyno. I think the highest I heard from a stock car was 190 whp or so, which was on the high side. Even modified ones hardly break 200 whp without a turbo or nitrous. Basically, for any significant power gains, a turbo is required, which means tuning is required, which means a standalone, which nobody is willing to do at this point. I'm not either. I would love to put a turbo on mine, but not until after the warranty is up.

As for the stuck intake runner valve, I think that would produce a different looking dyno chart. These things usually have 3 main 'humps' in the power curve, and people with power loss usually see the 3rd hump as lower than the other 2, but I think if the 3rd set of intake runner valves didn't open, the 3rd hump wouldn't be there, and it would just taper off from the 2nd. I could be wrong, though.

Failing all of this I'll just do the LSx thing.  No need for a turbo there, and it's a lot cheaper and easier than a 20B or something like that, though i would like to stick with a rotary.  Maybe by then Mazda will have that Sky-G rotory or whatever it is in production.  I have plenty of time to figure this out.

Yeah there was some discussion on the RX8forums about the possibility of the Haltech, but about 90% of the posts there are pure noise, and any useful discussion was eliminated quickly. If any sort of tuning of an SII rx8 was to be available, there would have to be more demand. I personally would love to turbocharge my car, but only after the warranty is up, and i'm not alone in that. In that case, you may have some time to work out the tuning/REW swap details. The series I rx8 crowd could probobly benefit from lower compression rotors, but there are some pretty decent power levels they are achieving with the stock ones (certainly higher than I would be happy with), and the Series II people are completely turbo-less. Someone will most likely come up with a solution that doesn't involve an engine swap once the relatively new SII rx8's start to lose their warranties, but until then I think we're boned. Random question- if the Haltech doesn't support drive by wire, is there any possibility that it could be ditched for an old school set up?

Speaking of engine swaps, my biggest concern with a REW would be passing inspection/smog. Where my car is registered now is a no inspection/no emissions test area, so I could literally get away with anything i could cram under the hood so long as the police don't get angry about the noise, but where I may be living by the time i get around to all of this messing about may be different. I want this to stay a street legal car, preferably without any law-dodging or shady business. The project V8 RX7 on here seems to show a viable solution, but i'd rather not go that route. I'd preffer to keep the MSP or perhaps whatever new rotary Mazda could possibly come out with in the future, but i'd be open the an REW if it matched my criteria.

and also, I've decided not to do anything major with the engine until the warranty is up and they have proven turbo solutions available and/or this engine is toast and needs replacing out of my own pocket.

OK, some things I've learned from some reading- The series I RX8's have problems with fuel pumps, ignition coils, and heat when turbocharged. (this is of course in addition to the whole boosted rotaries blowing up thing) Series II RX8's have different fuel pumps and ignition coils, though the fuel pumps were changed to prevent starvation under cornering, not higher flow under boost, and the coils were changed for better longevity, not power, as the Series I coils only seemed to last about 30,000 miles. These problems are small potatoes (and easy solutions are available) compared to the engine management problem. Assuming the Series II renesis has the same crank trigger wheel as the Series I (refered to as a 36-2-2-2), megasquirt may not be able to read it. At least, this is what a guy at rx8web said while he was trying to piggyback a megasquirt on an RX8 for a turbo application. Replacing this part with a standard 36-2 wheel means the stock ECU can't read it properly and won't know the RPM. He does say the code to read it has been written for megasquirt I, but not for megasquirt II. Mind you, this was a thread from 2006 and it ends before any resolution. I think I'll have to dig around the megasquirt forums and try to find out a bit more.

This would all be a lot easier to figure out if I could only see into the future.  If I knew where I would be living in a couple years, and that place didn't have inspections, I wouldn't have to worry about this.  It would also help if I had more free time!  But that's life as a grad student.

 Why not just make the engine have 2 trigger wheels...one for the OEM ECU and one for the Megasquirt (or Haltech, etc). It might look a little wonky, but it would work. Use the 4 bolts that hold the main pullies to the E-Shaft and make a cylindrical extension with a new trigger wheel in front of the main pulley.

 Here's a quick solidworks rendering I threw together because I figured my description was probably lacking in detail. Image shows a 36-1 trigger wheel.