Serious Engine Trouble

[nfpgasmask]

Cool man! Thanks for all your effort!

Bart

I borrowed a camera and will post pics as soon as I can. Keep in mind it is 29 degrees out and is supposed to get colder. shawn

[MoonRaker]

Ive been dreading the rebuild and putting it off. Ive been reading alot on the history of problems with this peticuler engine. Im a very reputable engine builder so ive got alot of experiance from my 15 years of building. I work at Email address pettitracing,com and have been there since 04, the yellow RX-8 belongs to me. From the info ive seen it lookes like the main problem stems from sticking oil seals on the pistons. It causes excessive blow-by and from what ive seen breakes down the oil very fast causing lots of problems before you figure out whats wrong. Ive herd of crank bearings going out causing crank failure and also rod bearings. Im lucky to the fact of catching the problem early. It seems to happen from 50,000 to 80,000 miles. Im not shure if its from going to long between oil changes or carbon biuldup but im thinking that its the main cause. Even though a former owner sludged the oil and I have gotten 30,000 miles since perchase. Maintnence or lack of tends to hurt the VX. As good as it still runs im willing to bet that oil rings are the only thing thats wrong with my engine so far. Bearings and seals are getting replaced for shure though. I replaced the PCV valve and found that cleaning it or replacing it helps for about 2000 miles. As for pluging the hose, bad idea unless you dont mind blowing seals like the ones on your valve cover. That PCV valve is there to vent and if its getting clogged its from blow-by. Thats what im talking about. Id like to ask for some help and ill return the favor if anyone is local to WPB. Im disabled to the point of not being able [ 2 shattered vertabre] to pull the motor out of my VX. If you need a rebuild on your motor or tranny I can do everything except lift heavy stuff. I need help pulling it and reinstalling. If you fix this problem early im shure it wont be as bad as you think. I dont play when it comes to the details.

[MoonRaker]

Wow, new set of ring, only $50. Oil pump seems the most expensive thing, $250. Gaskets are cheap to. At the price of what a new engine is going for, im thinking of doing rebuilds for $1500 plus parts and machinind. Its looking like its going to be around $800 in parts sofar. Not bad.

[psychos2]

From the info ive seen it lookes like the main problem stems from sticking oil seals on the pistons. It causes excessive blow-by and from what ive seen breakes down the oil very fast causing lots of problems before you figure out whats wrong. Ive herd of crank bearings going out causing crank failure and also rod bearings. I replaced the PCV valve and found that cleaning it or replacing it helps for about 2000 miles. As for pluging the hose, bad idea unless you dont mind blowing seals like the ones on your valve cover. That PCV valve is there to vent and if its getting clogged its from blow-by.

First of all WHAT OIL SEALS ON THE PISTON ??? Second excessive blow-by is not caused from bad oil rings. Third the hose that gets plugged goes to the intake not the valve cover. You put a breather on the valve cover. Forth it is not getting clogged it is sticking open so when there is vacuum it is sucking oil.
I am willing to bet that most of the problems stem from lack of oil not broken down oil. For example, my low oil light came on ,so I added oil now my engine is making a noise.
I have seen motors with so much fuel in the oil that it has the consistency of fuel not oil. The motors are still running with no spun bearings.
I have seen my motor suck down 2 qts of oil in less than 500 miles. Once the problem of the sticking pcv valve was fixed it would use approx 1/2 of a quart of oil in 3000 miles.
The biggest cause for spun bearings would have to be lack of oil.Metal on metal is a bad thing. shawn

[MoonRaker]

Sorry, oil rings, I like working with cars not reading dictionarys. It shouldnt use oil at all. If your getting fuel in your oil its from a leaky injector and if you have one it makes oil you dont loss it so thats out. Your lossing oil so thats from bad, stuck, worn out oil rings or an external leak. Yes it does get worse if your PCV valve is sticking. If you look through your oil fill, its probly brown, thats a sure sign of blowby. If your oil smells like fuel and breaks down fast, like in 500 to 1500 miles thats another sign. Remeber that its not a rotary engine wich is supposed to use oil. If its leaving your engine, somthings wrong and it isnt anything that you mentioned above is going to fix or stop completly. If your having these problems rember it just gets worse till it gets fixed or breaks completly. If you push it its going to cost you more to fix. My truck still has good power that meens a good chance of a easy inexpensive fix, for me atleast. Dont come at me like that psyco, im here to answer questions and ask them, not to start cyber fights. You can either be a friend and I can answer your questions if you have any for me or not. Pettitracing.com is were I work as the chief of R&D and master machinest. If you look on the sight youl see a yellow rx-8, like I said its mine, that supercharger kit you see there was designed by me also. I have fun doing things like that and ill put my mechanical engineering abilitys up against 95% of MIT grads and the other 5% are pretty impressed. Trust me, I work with alot of them. Ive built V-12s V6s, 4 bangers, rotorys and any 2-strokes you can think of automatic trannys are a little of a challenge, manuals are cake for me. At this time ive got an inline 4 jetski motor apart in my living room, its practicly the same motor as an R-1 less the tranny. I have never had a motor blowup that ive built and havent found a problem I couldnt figure out. I dont cut corners even if it saves money, do it rite the first time is my goal, not rigging it to get some more miles out of it.

[MoonRaker]

First of all WHAT OIL SEALS ON THE PISTON ??? Second excessive blow-by is not caused from bad oil rings


Wana bet ? If the oil rings are stuck, your going to get carbon buildup because the oil isnt getting sraped off the cylender walls properly. That causes the rings to stick also = blowby and oil burning. The acids from blowby breaks the oil down very fast and kills viscosity. Thats why your buddys oil turned to what you explained as almost fuel. That lack of viscosity causes metal to metal. Like I said, overdue oil changes and sludged oil are the main cause. Also if you run out of oil, well that isnt suposed to happen. It didnt do that when it was new did it, and were is it going.

[psychos2]

First of all WHAT OIL SEALS ON THE PISTON ??? Second excessive blow-by is not caused from bad oil rings


Wana bet ? If the oil rings are stuck, your going to get carbon buildup because the oil isnt getting sraped off the cylender walls properly. That causes the rings to stick also = blowby and oil burning. The acids from blowby breaks the oil down very fast and kills viscosity. Thats why your buddys oil turned to what you explained as almost fuel. That lack of viscosity causes metal to metal. Like I said, overdue oil changes and sludged oil are the main cause. Also if you run out of oil, well that isnt suposed to happen. It didnt do that when it was new did it, and were is it going.

I am not here to argue either but ,I purchased my vx with 15,000 miles on it so it was pretty much new. When I bought it the oil consuption was 1/2 quart per 3000 miles. I started noticing a lot more oil consumption , so I changed the pcv valve and it was back to the 1/2 qt per 3000 miles. The pcv valve failed again shortly after. The oil consumption was high again. So I made it so there was no chance for the oil to get sucked into the intake when the pcv valve gets stuck. Problem solved. Back to !/2 qt every 3000 miles . My vx now has 93,000 miles. So it is not a temporary fix to cover a problem with bad oil rings.
The problem with fuel in the motor was not on my vx. It was on a boat with a Procharger on it. They run so rich that the fuel makes it past the rings into the oil pan. They have a bad setup. On boats anyway. But again the oil was broke down and no bearing failure.

If you think about it if the problem was oil contamination, Wouldn't all the bearings fail, not just #1 rod bearing ? I think so . There is a reason it is #1 ,because the vx oil system starts at tha back so #1 get oiled last.

And I am not just joe schmo from Idaho (no offence) I have done some engine building myself.I have done many Supercharger installs. This is a link to the place I work. The motor in the videos is a 1300 hp motor. We just finished a 1000 hp motor,its going in the boat right now.

http://www.perfmar.com/

[VehiGAZ]

Are you two arguing about whether pistons have rings or not?!?

I think we can all agree that in a perfect world, piston rings would form a perfect seal for their entire working life of the engine and not one drop of oil would ever be lost past them, but in the real world, they are not perfect and get worse with age and some oil will get past. If we can all agree on that, then you can argue all you want about how much oil loss is acceptable.

To that, I say that half quart every 3000 miles is fine by me... the engine never gets starved for oil between changes, and that's the most important thing. My old Honda Prelude SH with 145k miles was burning about 2-3 quarts every 3000 miles. That was a problem, but not unexpected for a high-revving engine that old and that beat on (I was anything but gentle on that car from the day I drove it off the lot). Ultimately, the oil was cheaper than a ring job, so I was willing to live with it.

[psychos2]

Cool man! Thanks for all your effort!

Bart

Sorry I have not posted pics yet . I have been busy and it has been very cold. I will try to get them up soon. shawn

[nfpgasmask]

Hey man, that's cool. Whenever you get around to it! Until then, pour in more oil!

Bart

Sorry I have not posted pics yet . I have been busy and it has been very cold. I will try to get them up soon. shawn

[psychos2]

I have taken a pic from the vx manual and hope that it will help. where the blue circle is you connect the breather.Just get a short piece of hose and a couple clamps. Or you can get one the same size as the hole for the pcv valve and just remove the pcv valve and install the breather in the valve cover. Second step would be to plug the hose circled in purple.Again I used a short piece of hose and I plugged it with a bolt, again using clamps on the hose.Or you can just plug the stock hose with a bolt and use a clamp. If you use a hose on the pcv valve put the breather pointing toward the front . It will be covered by the plastic cover and you will not see it.The pcv valve is in the drivers side valve cover. Hope this helps. As soon as I can I wil post an actual pic. Right now we are getting hit with a pretty big snow storm. hopefully enough to open the snowmobile trails. shawn

[AndyC]

Snow storm? We'er supposed to be in the middle of one too. The forecaster said yesterday that we'd have 6-9" by morning. Well it's morning and there is maybe 2" of snow/sleet out there covering the ground. Who knows maybe by tomorrow there will be more.
Maybe that one that your getting will hit use later. Might have to start up the sled later.
Ok back to the oil problem -- how about valve seals? bad seals would cause the oil to leak into the cylinders and burn, right? I've been pretty luckly with mine. I use a little oil when I pull my boat but generally it's good.

[nfpgasmask]

Hey Shawn, thanks. But pardon my ignorance, what the heck is a "breather"???

And for hose, what are you using? Just the clear plastic stuff (like the stuff from Home Depot that is used with ice cube makers and cold water lines?)

Bart

I have taken a pic from the vx manual and hope that it will help. where the blue circle is you connect the breather.Just get a short piece of hose and a couple clamps. Or you can get one the same size as the hole for the pcv valve and just remove the pcv valve and install the breather in the valve cover. Second step would be to plug the hose circled in purple.Again I used a short piece of hose and I plugged it with a bolt, again using clamps on the hose.Or you can just plug the stock hose with a bolt and use a clamp. If you use a hose on the pcv valve put the breather pointing toward the front . It will be covered by the plastic cover and you will not see it.The pcv valve is in the drivers side valve cover. Hope this helps. As soon as I can I wil post an actual pic. Right now we are getting hit with a pretty big snow storm. hopefully enough to open the snowmobile trails. shawn

[phant0m-je$ter]

Wow - I thought I was one of few, but it looks like a lot of VX owners are on their way to a blown motor. I never got a chance to post - but in the fall of last year my motor threw a rod in what I believe was also the #1 cylinder and once I heard the rapping\clicking sound - I knew it was all over. I took it to my local dealership and they did indicate that it's happened plenty of times before because of excessive oil consumption. My 2001 Proton VX had right about 78,000 miles on it and was still well within the 120,000 power train warranty. They asked that I provide all of my oil change records illustrating that I have changed the oil in no more than 7500 mile intervals. Upon reviewing all of my records they replaced the motor with a long block under warranty. I now have about 83,000 miles on it and all is well. However I love my VX like no other and would like to hold on to it for a while longer as I am the original owner and have quite an attachment to it. I would be VERY interested in this PCV valve fix if it stops the excessive oil consumption - especially it I am going to just run into the same issue again.

From what others have experienced - has adding the breather and plugging the hose solved the consumption problems? Has it had any negative side effects?

Thanks all,

-Rob

[nfpgasmask]

Hey Rob, yeah, that is what I am afraid of. My VX runs well and I baby it so hopefully I can avoid this tragedy in the future.

With the new engine, do you have the oil burning problem?

Even if I get this oil consumption problem solved, I will still check my oil once a week as I have done since I owned my VX. Nothing is worse than catostrophic engine failure. Trust me, I know from experience.

Bart

Wow - I thought I was one of few, but it looks like a lot of VX owners are on their way to a blown motor. I never got a chance to post - but in the fall of last year my motor threw a rod in what I believe was also the #1 cylinder and once I heard the rapping\clicking sound - I knew it was all over. I took it to my local dealership and they did indicate that it's happened plenty of times before because of excessive oil consumption. My 2001 Proton VX had right about 78,000 miles on it and was still well within the 120,000 power train warranty. They asked that I provide all of my oil change records illustrating that I have changed the oil in no more than 7500 mile intervals. Upon reviewing all of my records they replaced the motor with a long block under warranty. I now have about 83,000 miles on it and all is well. However I love my VX like no other and would like to hold on to it for a while longer as I am the original owner and have quite an attachment to it. I would be VERY interested in this PCV valve fix if it stops the excessive oil consumption - especially it I am going to just run into the same issue again.

From what others have experienced - has adding the breather and plugging the hose solved the consumption problems? Has it had any negative side effects?

Thanks all,

-Rob