first, this is an idea that came to me after tearing down engines from another shop so i would like to give some credit to that shop for the idea. when tearing down a few engines from Rick's Rotary of pleasanton i noticed he was using about a 12" length of ribbon material on the compression side of the inner coolant seals, i can only assume this was to either add tension to the seals to aid in cold engine coolant seal blowout for the later model engines.

it could also be that his thought was that the coolant seal walls broke more often in those areas so this would aid in preventing the coolant seal failure as a result of the walls fatiguing and breaking off with used irons to prevent possible warranty/premature engine failures.

so i took this a step further and fabricated a metallic liner that will not corrode and has enough stiffness to hold the seal in the event of a coolant seal wall failure. the other benefit is when using OEM coolant seals they still have more room for surface tension, taking up additional space next to the seal puts more pressure on the seal to hold it's original height, giving it better grip on the sealing surface.

this version takes place 360* around the outer edge of the inner seal to aid in those 2 issues above.

i ran the test ribbons in a test motor with several seal wall breaks for about a year and never had any coolant seal issues as well, the ribbon is still reusable after that period of time giving me a bit of confidence that this will help prevent premature engine failures due to the possibility of coolant seal wall failures and even aid in coolant seal blowouts due to colder engine abuse.



my aim is to help make these engines more bulletproof, coolant seal failure is a big part of the problem especially with the age of the engine parts being used, the cost of replacements and the factor that there is no way to guarantee that the walls will last 5k, 10k or 50k+ more miles.

anyways, on to the point..

i'm opening this up to see the possible demand for this product. being that initial cost of producing them will cost approximately $600-700 to fabricate them(sure doesn't seem like it but the materials, size and shape are not something found on the shelf, i have spent days checking and getting quotes) it would take at least 8 units sold to break even on the investment.

keep in mind these are for those who are in the process of rebuilding your engine, they cannot be installed without the engine completely torn apart and cleaned for reassembly. i also would not recommend them as a fix for currently broken irons but as a safety measure in the case that they do fail.

pricing for a full set of 4 for a 2 rotor will be $90 shipped to the US and $110 worldwide. and $35 for each pair of 2 additional, so $125 shipped to the US for 3 rotor engines and $145 worldwide.

please let me know the series of engine, although this is mainly aimed at 13B iron groove based engines so if you want a set for 12A i will have to trim them accordingly. 12A engines usually do not suffer from premature coolant seal failure like the later model engines.

these will work with most coolant seals but i would not recommend them in conjunction with the Rotary Aviation encapsulated and my FEP encapsulated coolant seals as they are designed to take up 100% of the coolant seal valley, putting sleeves in as well something is going to give way.

turnaround would be about 3 weeks after enough people are interested and have paid for the seal savers.

if truly interested and ready to purchase then add yourself to the list and i will contact you and update the list accordingly once we have enough interest in this.


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Thanks,
-Ben

 

If possible I would like to be able to add this to the list of items on my upcoming rebuild. We can discuss further details when I drop my car off at your shop.

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sure, sorry i didn't think to mention it as i just decided to get this rolling today.

 

Lookin smooth. Next rebuild I have you do, you can throw these in for me.

 

Will these be made out of Stainless wire or a material other than steel that will not corrode?

 

it is a stainless alloy but not a wire.

 

Ben, I wished you were doing these before when I had you rebuild my engine. BTW, the engine is still here in my shop sitting on the engine-stand looking shinny! Thanks for the awesome craftmanship!!!

Highly recommend what Ben is doing, I wouldnt hesitate to recommend anyone to have him rebuild their engine + getting whatever mods he recommended on their engine, keep up the great work!

-Eric

 

thank you for your support.

 

can i get a set asap? bout to rebuild my motor.

 

sorry but if you note these are not pre-fabricated yet, this is an interest thread as per the title to see if there is enough people that may be interested in these. if you don't expect to have the engine done for about 6 weeks or so then perhaps it will be doable, if enough people want them. i'm not dumping anymore money into the business hoping that it works out, i do enough for next to nothing and get tons of crap from my gf about it.

as soon as there is 8 people signed up and paid then i can fabricate them and send them out, estimated at 3 weeks but i put that as a high estimated turnaround time it likely could be as little as 1 week after this gets rolling as i can get the items gathered up, ordered and shipped to me in about 3-4 days.

 

still hoping this goes somewhere, worst case i will try to figure out a method of making a few sets to satisfy some of the demand and have a spare set for my TII when i do tear it back apart.

i figured these might be popular but i could have been more hopeful than anything.

i'm sure most people are hesitant due to the cost but it really isn't such a simple process to fabricate them and premade materials would not save the pricing either, plus i'm **** about quality and just about everything i sell has my hands on it.

 

I like the idea of these. Free bump, while I think about this.

 

i think u need to market these better because this section is not visited very often. Perhaps even contact a few forum builders to market to (such as banzai, djseven, crispyrx7,etc.).

 

Karack, just wanted to chime in that I really love the innovation. I am going to get a pair of those oil lines for the FC & FD when I get things planned out a bit more. If this really does help coolant seal life, I really don't see why it would be difficult to sell these. It would be nice to have these available in the future (currently shooting for a new engine), and agree with Bryan maybe offer this item up to other rebuilders!

 

what am I, chopped liver ?

I keed, I keed

Ben, i'm interested in these. I tear down my share of motors with chunks missing out of their retaining walls

 

i'll see what i can work out as far as pre-production goes. there is some interest it seems but not as much as i had hoped, then again not everyone has their engines torn apart in pieces at this moment in time.

i figure most other builders will just capitalize on the idea, which i hope won't happen but likely will in many cases as i'm not going to realistically drop $5k plus lawyer fees to patent it.

 

Nader, you can drive down to Vegas and blow up your engine in front of the shop so you have a reason to rebuild ...and put you name on the list.

Plus your car can keep mine company while it's there. Black FD's FTW ?

Rich, maybe you can be down for slots 3-10 ??? (crosses fingers )

 

I picked up some spare irons, so I guess over the next year ill be piecing together another engine(not that anything is wrong with mine). So I am interested! I prolly wont check this thread all that often, so shoot me a PM when you decide yes or no on making em, so I can pay if you decide to.

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will do, i'm currently looking into how much it will be for a shop to cut the materials for a first run. either way i won't really be making anything off the first run of sets.

 

i have ordered the materials to get started on this and sublet the cutting to spec to another shop in the meantime to see how well they do.

hopefully this becomes a staple diet to most rebuilds going forward.

i will make another thread once i get the first few sets completed. so this interest thread is no longer of interest but i will move it beyond this stage on my own.

 

Sorry to be late to the party. I actually have a couple of motors waiting for assembly and would be willing to give these a whirl in one of them. Or simply to buy a set just to see whatcha got cooking and then decide whether or not to try them out. Go ahead and consider me a prospective buyer if this pans out.

Regards,
Crispy

 

i'll let you know Crispy, i should have some done within the next 2 weeks.

 

I am very interested in a full set. I am building my motor in approx 4 weeks so I would obviously need them by then.

 

have the materials back from the machine shop and everything looks good, will start making sets and have enough materials for about 7 sets to start with.

will update and make a new thread soon with the production sets.

 

well creating a welding system is proving to be a little more difficult than i anticipated. the spot welder i bought for this project is too powerful and is only a 110v unit. i will have to return it and try a variable amperage stick arc system with a spot weld gun attachment next... the mig isn't really going to work well enough to be cost effective and give decent results so either that or i will have to invent my own spot welder from a low amp transformer. ugh.

oh well, i should have known it wouldn't be easy working with this rather fragile thin material.