i bought a S4 10th ann saturday. about me; im a car nut. familiar with BOXXER engines and AWD. noob to this Rotary thing, but ive owned 2 AE86's, currently have a 88 fc vert, and just picked up this FC T2

story/history/whatnots;

previous owner bought it off teamfc3s with a Jspec motor (blown coolant seal), and had it rebuilt by sombody's friends underground mechanic. all emmissions removed, converteed to premix, was dirty as hell and a bit ghetto. but its good for my rebuild plans.

originally it was leaking from the blocked off OMP, and oil cooler lines, but i took care of that. was running non-thermostat, but i fixed that

so the good things:

coolant system is A-OK. no issues with overheating or buring/loosing coolant.
Gearbox and rear end / clutch are great. all syncros are rather nice.
chassis is straight- much chipping of paint as ive heard about 10th ann, but that was in the plans anyway.
Brakes are reasonable for a 2900 lb car. (im used to a 2650 lb awd subaru with 330mm brembos).
spools up fast - my external boost guage says .35-.4 kpa's - i believe tahts ~7 psi.
acceleration is solid, ran a mountain pass today (30 minutes of hard driving, 30 minutes there, 40 minute drive back). everything was lovely.

setup:
stock S4 JDM motor, S5 intake manifold, Stock TMIC, blitz BOV, HKS mushroom filter guy, stock downpipe/exhaust. supposedly RC engineering 550cc primaries, and some rebuilt and flowed secondaries. (i know absolutely nothign about this business. BUT im running rich- 12 mpg. sparkplugs and wires just changed, oil changed


bad things:

burns oil like a ****. im assuming T2 13b-t is a 6 quart capacity sump, i fill to full of dipstick and it will burn like CRAZy. smoke CRAZY amounts of smoke. it stopped burning oil so i checked it. took me 2.5 quarts to fill to full line. then it started buring oil like crazy again.

i am rotory noob, not car noob. i converted my subaru to JDM spec Sti-RA RHd. please dont harass me too much :P yes i have searched :P

Starts up great. no overheating (at all - gets to middle of guage), coolant flushed and not getting eaten at all.

#1- is my oil dipstick wack and im overfilling? im guessing not right? it seems impossible to mess that up....

#2- when i run low on oil, my oil pressure guage starts dropping. im trusting it because once i add oil it goes back up. is there any reason not to trust it?

#3 - my current logicon is pinning the buring oil to a toasted turbine centre bearing seal on the hot side. on the cold side, the turbine is clean and dosnt have too much play (theres a bit, but it seemed close to reasonable for a used random turbo). no dead blades or anything, although i can check again tomorow-

if you watch it while you rev, puffs of oil smoke comes out of the turbine area- liek lots (while lots is coming through the tailpipes). im guessing crack in teh turbine housing?

any suggestions on how to attack this? being a piston guy, my reflex is to hate on the apex seal. i dont have any reason to though, it revs perfectly, has quite decent power, spools and holds consistant boost too when i lift my foot at 6500 rpm or so because the turbine has run out of steam.

please help. make me smarter!

 

sounds to me like your turbo is drinking oil....

was this turbo put in with the J-spec engine, or was it left over from whatever engine was replaced?

 

Is there a certain RPM that it burns the oil? or is it just all the time?

Apex seals will usually have nothing to do with burning oil, they will contribute to low compression etc.

 

it burns all the time, although sometimes it will randomly stop. ha

i have no idea of the history of this turbine- is there any turbine company that specalizes in rebuilding turbines from Fc's? like porting, polishing, clipping, hybriding,etc?

 

RX7store.net

 

can anyone fill me in on s5 turbine on S4 motor details? my motor is a S4, supposedly has S5 intake manifold and S5 turbine. how do i tell?

h

 

Can I ask what dumbfucks from TeamFC3S.ORG did you deal with?

My theory...
They fucked up the PCV system...
Try and remove the oil fill cap and see if it still does it.
If the smoking stops, the PCV is all plugged, and there is no way to evacate the "crankcase".
If this is the case and it's been doing this for a long time, this will damage the turbine piston ring and cause the turbo to smoke oil (through the turbine section) almost all the time.

You right - total capacity is just about 6 quarts.
Upon oil changes, the car takes just about 4.5 quarts.
1.5 quarts ends up mostly in the oil cooler.


-Ted

 

so every oil change u would drop the oil, and only add 4.5 qts? y is the capacity 6 qts and u only add 4.5? i dont get it..sorry im slow

 

What about the turbo seals? There might not be any traces of oil on the compressor side but if you look on the exuast side inside you might see oil. It might not be that obvious.
Or how about the oil seals inside the engine?? What would rule out those two major areas

 

Dud, come on man.
Ever heard of the oil cooler?
I don't just dump 6qts of oil in there, .. I dump about 4.5-5 and check.
6qts of oil is too much I think unless you drain the oil cooler. I think draining it is good, because that's dirty oil in there..

 

Pull off the hose that goes to the intercooler....

Is it oily or clean?

James

 

When you do a normal oil change, the oil sitting in the oil cooler and oil lines do not come out.
Thus, about 1.5 quarts of the old oil still stays there.


-Ted

 

Can you give more information on the PCV. i just bought a tii that is smoking a crapload, but it stops sometimes. i assumed oilseals are bad in the engine, but id like to rule out EVERYTHING else first. thanks

 

#1- It kind of is impossible. Kind of. I've only seen one case were a guy had the wrong dipstick.

#2- I don't trust the stock oil pressure gauge and neither should anyone else. A good mechanical one is essential to being sure.

#3- You are a step ahead.

You want to get smarter, you already are, you have a 10th AE TII. ;-)

 

haha.

word. well, the mechanical oil dipstick was correct. so was the oil pressure guage, bc when it was low i was almost running dry.

bought a S4 turbine and mani and swapped....... no more buring oil!.

turns out the oil seal on the hot side of the turbine was SHOT. had liek 5mm of in and out play. suprisingly, the turbine fins were still all alive!

so side note-

S4 and S5 turbine has differnt banjo bolt for water feed. S5 turbine is much bigger, S4 is smaller. so get all hte banjo and fittings, my S4 turbine is currently on oil cooling only:P

i cant boost it past 5psi though, even with boost controller. does my wastegate have a weak spring?