[Pyrium]

I have a little story. It all began in 2007 when I had a 2002 Mustang GT. I was telling my mom (who is the one that got me into performance cars) that the power on the Mustang was cool, but I wanted something light and responsive. She said "oh like an RX-8" and I was like "yes." I then responded with "but that is a toy car, a second car, you can't live with it." Later that day we were at a Volvo dealership that was attached to a Mazda dealership. She was looking at a Volvo S60R and I was walking the used lot. They had a black 2004 RX-8 and it was under what I could afford. I played the dumb game with them and got them to come down on the price a bit and they said they would give me the 10k I owed on the Mustang for the trade. I really owed less than 8k, but I believe most dealerships are trying to screw you on the trade, so I started high and they didn't even argue. I loved the RX-8, it was my favorite car in the world. Well I moved to Fairbanks, AK from Houston, TX and let's just say rotary engines hate the cold. I traded my RX-8 in for a 2011 Mustang GT 5.0. I didn't like the handling and the Nissan Dealership would not let me test drive a Z and still wanted over 41k for one. I got a base GT and had it for two days, I decided I wanted my RX-8 back and went to the dealership. I had only put 10 miles on the GT and I said I just want my 8 back and they said they had already shipped it to a dealership in Portland, but they said they would still take the Mustang back.

I decided that I would keep her, but I was not happy with it at all. Well I went in a few months later because someone had bought a Focus and it had a way better interior than that GT had. My salesman said they would do an even trade on the Grabber Blue GT that I had because it had less than a thousand miles on it and a Customer thought it was new and wanted it really bad. They tried to talk me into the Shelby GT 500, but I said I didn't want those payments and insurance premiums, so I went with a 2011 GT Premium with the Track Pack and 3.75 gears. It was a world of difference than the base model. I drove that around for two years (2011-2013), but I still wanted an RX-8 really bad. Summer of 2012 came around and I got married. She wanted another car, but she loved the Mustang. She also liked the fact that it was a manual with auto start, which is great in -40 degree weather. She knew I hated it and said that we could get something fun and the Scion dealership in Fairbanks received an FR-S, so we test drove it. I was in love. I said I wanted it but I hated the color. They said they would get some more in other than the Grey color. They asked what color and I said either black, white, or red. She said red so it would match the Mustang. They wouldn't take a deposit because they had no idea when they would get some more in. We were still looking because the Saturn Ion she had would turn off while you were driving and this was before the big GM ignition recall. The GM dealership had no idea why it kept doing that and it happened once at 55 mph. She found a MazdaSpeed3 and really liked it. So I had to say goodbye to my chance of getting an FR-S. I never wanted the BRZ due to it not having the 86 badge on the fender. I know it is silly, but I love that badge.

She ended up getting the MazdaSpeed3 and liking it at first. Then once winter hit, she quit driving it and drove the Mustang with winter tires and auto start. I was stuck with the MazdaSpeed3 and still hated it and the Mustang. Well she spun out the Mustang a few times, but she never hit anything and was ok afterwards. She told me that she was scared of driving the Mustang and the Mazda due to spinning out and torque steer on the Mazda. We ended up getting rid of the Mustang for a white FJ Cruiser with a 6-speed manual. It was great for Alaska. I loved it, and I could tow stuff. This was 2013 and we ended up moving from Alaska to Texas again a year later in 2014. She ended up wanting to drive the FJ and handed me the keys to the Mazda because I was driving over 50 miles roundtrip. I really didn't like that car and now that I was in TX I knew I could find a decent priced RX-8.

I found the RX-8 in the color I always wanted. It was a 2005 Winning Blue. I was so happy and I got it for 10k, which at the time was a little under what KBB and NADA valued it at. I got out of the MazdaSpeed3 and got the RX-8, all was right to me. I had it checked over by a Rotary Specialist who showed me the compression was still good and everything else was well maintained. Well I had no idea that I was going to put over 25k miles on it in a year. Things started to go wrong with it. Electrical issues, window issues, I had to replace the coils, plugs, wires, tires, clutch, slave cylinder, and then the bad news was coming. After putting 4k into a 10k car I was starting to question if my favorite car was worth it. Well my wife started to work again after having a kid and she was driving a lot more. The FJ was only getting 15 mpg so she traded it for a Prius. I was walking around and noticed that they still had some 2016 FR-S' on the lot. One of them was black with a 6-speed, but I was like it won't happen. We got the Prius and loved the gas mileage. Well then I got some bad news. I was starting to lose MPG's like crazy. My RX-8 was getting worse mileage than the FJ. I was getting 22 when we bought it, but now it was 14. That is a telltale sign of the apex seals going. I had them look at it and they said they weren't completely bad and it would only cost about $3.5k to fix. Then they realized I would need new rotary housings. The total cost was going to be around $7k. My $10k RX-8 was now going to cost me over $20k. I decided it wasn't worth it. We realized we still had the owner's manual to the FJ and decided to take it to the dealership and get the Prius washed. We talked to our salesman to give us a call if an FR-S came in. Funny thing happened, his manager overheard us and told us they just took one in on trade the night before. She wasn't even on the lot. I took a look at it. It was Red, a color I never wanted again and someone had lowered it. We still looked at it, previous owner was a smoker and did a horrible job dynamatting it. They said they would take care of it, but I couldn't make it back for another week due to work. Well I set up an appointment and told them if it was there I would strongly consider it.

The day before my appointment the car had sold. My wife had told me that I should go look at a new one, especially since the Toyota 86 was about to replace the FR-S and they still had the exact one I wanted on the lot. We then went over how much we were saving on payment for the Prius and the gas. It was over $500 a month we were saving from gas and the fact that it was so much cheaper than our FJ was. We then totaled how much I had spent on the RX-8 and divided it by 12 added that to my payment and it had come up to around $690 a month. We didn't even factor in Oil and Oil filters (I went through 10 filters and about $50 a month in oil). I was still paying on the RX-8 and knew that the value had taken a big hit due to the miles I had put on it. So I said it wouldn't work. She said go in anyways. She showed me that she still had the video from our 2012 test drive. I had a smile on my face, I knew I loved how the car handled and I forgot how much fun I had driving it. Our salesman Ralph had called me the morning of the appointment to let me know that they had sold the other FR-S but he said he talked to his manager and they told him they would work a deal with me. I didn't have much confidence because of the RX-8. I was honest with them when I got there and they looked at it. I told them the driver side window motor had just gone out and I was going to fix it and that she was getting closer to the ever expensive rebuild. The car was only worth around $7k to sell and trade in on NADA and KBB was around $2K. So I had no hopes of a deal being made. The General Manager at Grapevine Texas Toyota came and sat down with me. He said that he was overriding the trade and giving me $3.5k trade in and decreasing the price of the 2016 Raven FR-S from $31,000 (it has the BeSpoke premium audio/nav, premium protection package, spoiler, LED Accent and 7 year 100,000 mile Toyota Warranty) down to $25k due to the fact we had just bought the Prius 2 weeks earlier and he was going to offset my negative equity. I was very surprised. Of course my payments are higher, but my insurance was cut in half, and I am no longer spending close to $80 a week in gas. I save $14 every fill up and get 100 miles more each tank. Oh boy this was long winded. The FR-S is my favorite car that I have ever driven. I know cool story bro, but I have wanted this car for a long time. I don't even miss the money pit, I mean RX-8. She has been replaced by my lovely Raven FR-S. I don't think I ever want another car ever again.