65 replies to this topic

[skillionaire]

Hi,

 

Dead right, Chris. Just think it's worth people exploring the option before dropping the coin outright.

 

 

Cheers,

Nik

[alexGT]

That is bad luck mate. However, if it didn't blow on the dyno it would be only a matter of days/weeks before it happened on the road. Damage is already done - providing it wasn't knocking/pinging hard on the dyno while it was being tuned that is.

[krazynayba]

Hi Guys,

 

Thanks heaps for your suggestions and comments!

The main reason I went to S&J is because they seem very reputable, both here and in other places online. I don't really blame them, although at first I kinda felt like punching through a brick wall! He did mention a few other things he found odd with the car, like it was only pulling 92kW with the stock tune and the fuel/air mix was running very rich. He said that after he reset the ECU this jumped up to 101kW but that a stock B4 usually pulls at least 115kW. He tuned the ecutek to even out the fuel mixtures and then started the power runs and tuning. He did get it to 133kW but then I think a power run or two after that the power started to drop, the power curve readouts looked strange, and he heard the noise then switched the engine off. He said it was almost as if someone had tried to have a crack at tuning it previously, and had down tuned it and made the fuel mix richer. Also, the previous owner had a thicker oil in it (I think 10w40 or 10w45) whereas they put something thinner in with the service they did (5w30?) Do you think it was possible that a previous owner had done this (de-tuned and thick oil) to limit the power and perhaps mask other problems?

 

Sean reckons that it wouldn't be covered under S&J's insurance but I might still look into this a bit further if I can. My personal car insurance is with Justcar so I'll give their T&C's a suss to see if there's anything there. As for the replacement bearing vs new engine (or long block) I'll investigate both thoroughly to see which is the more viable in terms of cost. The replacement bearing might be made from a stronger material or something so could be worth getting done, but who knows what else they'll find wrong under there (rods, crank, etc.) At least with a new engine or long block I can be relatively certain that everything's going to run well (and heck, might get a bit more power out of it compared to my engine )

 

Thank you everyone for your help, It's really good to have some support in a horrible situation like this!

[Delete This Account]

Wow. How didn't you know something was wrong when it was only running 90kw's at the wheels? Haha

 

Mine did 130ish kw standard, and 180kw after the Ecutek tune.

[Tim.]

Ditto, Sean got the same results as Walts on mine.

It does sound like there were some underlying issues prior to this whole saga.

[TSG]

$3k for the rebuild is pretty good - I mean its a clusterfuck in there, I wouldn't want to pull the motor and do it! lol. Forking sucks about it going pop though. That's why I shit myself when I heard mine pinging last week but it turned out to be airflow related rather than needing a tune. 90kw would have felt pretty terrible in 1.5 tonne of car... I run 10w40 year round to help protect mine.

[krazynayba]

Hmm yeah there must have been some underlying issue the whole time. As I'd never driven a B4 before I just took the way it drove as being normal. Wonder if in that case it'd be worth just going with a new long block? Or is it possible that dodgey bearings could account for that much power loss? =/

[allpaw4]

The dodgy bearing will likely be the underlying cause of the lack of power, but not the direct reason. The ECU will limit itself to buggery when it thinks something is wrong, and it was obviously seeing something wrong. When Sean reset the ECU, he will have also reset all the learnings. So thats why the power went back up immediately, and then started to drop on subsequent runs (as the ECU re-adjusts to the bad conditions). Nothing that can really be done there, reseting the ECU prior to a tune is normal, otherwise you would need to do 3 times as many power runs to get the same result. Sean has done nothing wrong by the sounds of it, bar the lack of investigation of a really low initial power figure, which could be impossible to find in the real world. With no error codes or strange noises, a low power figure to start with is not really reason to go looking into it.

 

The problem with these TTs is the fact that while swiss cheese syndrome applies to all motors, the holes are so much bigger with these engines. Anything can go, and they are literally renound for doing big ends.

 

New block isnt really required here, as long as the existing one isnt damaged, but Sean and the boys will be able to tell if theres something wrong when they remove everything. Will be up for a new set of bearings, and likely a new set of rods (unless sean has a spare one out of another block, although I have no idea if rods can be re-used). Depends how bad the damage is really. Pistons/rings should be fine. Bores should be ok also.

 

The majority of that 3k will be labour. If you have some time (and this will depend also on your mechanical knowledge), you could ask him if you can have the car back, remove the engine and remove everything like manifolds, turbos, coilpacks, etc off it, and then give him the bare long motor to work on. Then when they are finished with the repairs, you can re-install everything. That will save a lot of dollars of labour, but puts a lot more of the weight on your shoulders. Bear in mind it will likely take the boys down there 3 to 4 hours to remove it, and a similar time to put it all back in. If I had the choice, I'd pay him. But I've done this before (and it took me a few weeks, although not straight)

[krazynayba]

That makes a lot of sense, thanks! Yeah I don't blame him really, I mean an initially low power figure could realistically indicate any number of things so there's no way he could have known. So long as getting the bearing done has a good chance of restoring some of the power that the engine seemed to be lacking then I'm happy to have it done. I'm thinking it's pretty likely the case given that everything else seemed to be fine with the car previously and there haven't really been any other noises/error codes that would indicate anything other issues.

 

Will probably need to mooch some money off family members or something but perhaps going with the bearing replacement is a good option - more affordable and wouldn't have to go through the hassle of sourcing most of a new engine.

[Tim.]

As i understand it: Bad tune = Ping/knock/detonation = Big end bearing failure = Knock causes ECU to retard the timing = Low power figure.

 

i.e. most of the damage would've been done prior to even driving into S&J's driveway.

[TSG]

Exactly, my ECU was holding the engine back and limiting boost to 7psi after it pinged under load. That's when I noticed something was wrong, and drove it like a grandpa until I figured it out. There was no check engine lights at all, so unless you know the car, you would really not know anything was wrong. Other than it being seriously down on power. After fixing the problem, my car is running like the day I bought it now - whether or not there was any permanent damage (big end) remains to be seen. Running fine for a week now.

[MrSober88]

A nightmare everyone has.....

 

Good luck with it all, hoping everything works out well!

[krazynayba]

Exactly, my ECU was holding the engine back and limiting boost to 7psi after it pinged under load. That's when I noticed something was wrong, and drove it like a grandpa until I figured it out. There was no check engine lights at all, so unless you know the car, you would really not know anything was wrong. Other than it being seriously down on power. After fixing the problem, my car is running like the day I bought it now - whether or not there was any permanent damage (big end) remains to be seen. Running fine for a week now.

Thanks for this story and glad to hear yours is running much better now! It's very likely mine was having the same problem so at least this sheds some light on the whole situation, and explains why the car has lasted so long without dying. Now I'm much more inclined to just go ahead with the repairs to the big end. With yours would you mind sharing exactly what work was done? Did you just get the bearing replaced? All the bearings? Did they need to grind or replace the crank? 

Would anyone else recommend having anything in particular done if I were to go for the repair? Is it worth having forged internals chucked in while they're at it or will this be at an exorbitant cost? I just figured if they're ripping the engine apart it might be worth it to get any other big end work done in the mean time.

 

A nightmare everyone has.....

 

Good luck with it all, hoping everything works out well!

Thanks mate

[Jimbo]

 

The problem with these TTs is the fact that while swiss cheese syndrome applies to all motors, the holes are so much bigger with these engines. Anything can go, and they are literally renound for doing big ends.

 

I disagree and agree with you there. It's all down to the shitty AUDM tune we got with the B4. TT's if maintained well can last just as long as any other, there's just much more that needs to be maintained. There's a multitude of reasons why bearings go, down to frequency of oil changes, driving habits, tunes ect. To be honest, i have never heard of a Gen3 JDM Legacy GT-B having an engine failure, as opposed to a AUDM B4 in which they seem to munch them on a weekly basis, with a stock tune. Not having a dig!

To the OP, sounds like your pretty spot on with the diagnosis, heavy oil would have kept the knock quiet but just not enough for the knock sensor to pick it up and retard timing. The guys at S&J unfortunately unknown to them were shortening the fuse. Like others have said, if it wasn't then, it would have been later, and most likely somewhere reaaaaaaally inconvenient, like pretty much all of us when we've had a catastrophic failure. Typical!

If you have the cash to spare on it, get some forgies in there while its all out, they're lighter and have a higher tolerance to detonation. Wouldn't be a bad idea to have your heads refurbished also, along with timing belt and water pump ect. I know it sounds expensive, but worth it for the long run and longevity of your engine.

We all start somewhere so if your feeling confident and have the space available with the tools, you should have a crack at getting the engine out on your own. It's really not that hard and the experience will help you. Especially the confidence as it can save you $ on mechanical bills later on, when you can manage it all by yourself!

 

[TSG]

Thanks for this story and glad to hear yours is running much better now! It's very likely mine was having the same problem so at least this sheds some light on the whole situation, and explains why the car has lasted so long without dying. Now I'm much more inclined to just go ahead with the repairs to the big end. With yours would you mind sharing exactly what work was done? Did you just get the bearing replaced? All the bearings? Did they need to grind or replace the crank? 

 

No I'm not at that point, I was just explaining what I noticed happened with my ECU. I had a restrictive air filter choking my engine to death. All we did was change that to a genuine one, give the MAF a squirt with some CRC MAF cleaner, and it came back to life. Once the pinging had gone I did an upper engine clean, dropped the oil and then reset my ECU. So far so good. Hopefully yours runs good again after a rebuild. But I'd almost be inclined to do a single turbo conversion on it if I was at that point, just to make life easier in the long run.

[allpaw4]

They will need to linish the crank, and depending on how much metal they take off, re-balance it. But S&J's farm out their machining work to a local company speciallising in machining. So rest assured it will be up to spec. New pistons and rings is a good idea, but may not be necessary. Depends on the damage really, and how much money you are willing to throw at it. When Dad and I pulled down the first block that I spun the bearing in, the pistons and rings were fine. Rod and crank were bad, engine would have needed new rods and bearings, and the crank linished, but nothing much more.

 

Have a chat to Sean, but it probably wouldnt be a bad idea to replace all the bearings on principle, even though only the one failed. When I pulled mine down, we found manfacturers defects in no. 3 big end bearing as well, so it really was a time bomb. Nothing much, but in time it would have likely failed.

 

Certainly true Jimbo, so not so much the engines, moreso the car in general. The ADM B4's were shocking on engines... JDM equivalent not so.

[Mosti]

There always good deals on brand new EJ207's. Think last one i saw was $2200? Probably the best and quickest option. I personally wouldn't put a used motor in when it's history isn't known. Even if a compression test comes back good I'd still be sketchy on forking out a few thousand for it to pop again.

[krazynayba]

Thanks again for the input people!

Sean has sent me a detailed list of the parts and labour needed to fix the bearing. In the interest of time and finances I've decided on going through with the repair. I'm hoping that along with fixing the main issue some of the engine's power will be restored. Hopefully something more positive will come of this whole situation.. I've certainly learned the importance of saving money!

Anyway, I'll keep you all posted on the progress!

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk

[Morgan]

All the best with it, mate!

[Delete This Account]

You should get the tune for free for your troubles