RX-7 Renesis Gasket Modification

(RX7 to RX8 Renesis Front Cover Gasket Mod)

We’ve all seen the leaky front cover gaskets in the past rotary RX7s.  So has Mazda, apparently, as they have redesigned the RX7 gasket for the new Renesis RX8 engine.  The new RX8 renesis gasket is now made of metal and has a crush ring around it; far superior to the old RX7 paper gasket. The purpose of this is to help you take advantage of the newer RX8 gasket style and use it on the older RX7 engines.

*This modification works for all 2nd gen 13B, 13BT RX7 engines and all 3rd gen 13B RX7 engines.

Here’s the gasket on a REW (93-95 3rd gen RX7) engine. The first thing you might notice is that most of the bolt holes line up. Cool! The next thing you might notice is that not all of them do.

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Here’s a close-up of the 2 bolt holes that are different:

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To make this gasket work, we’ll need to do some cutting. It is metal, but some sturdy scissors or tin snips will work just fine. I’ve marked the cut points in red.

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OK, let’s cut it!  Just remember to stay on the outside of the crush ring when cutting for the bolt hole!!

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You’ll notice part of the gasket is now free-floating on the water pump stud.  You can attack this in a few different ways:  either add just a touch of super glue or RTV spread very thinly to glue it onto the front side housing so it doesn’t fall off. You can leave it off entirely, use a washer/spacer from an s4, or you can cut the other “spacer” section of the gasket off and use the original spacer from the REW motor.  Any of these ways are fine.

The last thing you need to think about is the front housing-to-front cover o-ring and nylon washer.  I simply laid the o-ring and washer down with the gasket on top of it…piece of cake.

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Here’s what it looks like when we are all done:

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Now wasn't that FUN?! =)

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