Oil Cooler Line Troubles, Yikes!
 

Today was a wonderful day. I'm currently selling my 86 Rx-7, and I had a guy drive out 250 miles to see it and take it for a test drive. Cleaned her up, everything was ready for the viewing. I decided I would take him to a nice spot on a highway a few miles away, and then we could switch drivers and he could drive it home.

And then it happened...

As I got onto the highway, I opened it up to give him a taste of the Rotary < 4000 rpm's. The takeoff was strong, clean, and excellent. At about 6,500 I go to 2nd, and when we reach 60mph, I'm nearing redline in 2nd gear.

I look in my rear view mirror, and all I can see is smoke. Smoke everywhere, like the car was on fire... so I say something like "Hmmm, that's odd, we seem to be smoking."

I quickly take it off the exit, and drive it the mile back to my house. I initially thought it was low on coolant, but didn't quite understand how that would cause so much smoke. As I was nearing my garage, I heard the "Eeeeeeeee" sound kick in, and I thought for sure, coolant was out, or leeking, or something.

I pull the car in the garage, shut her down, open the hood...

Engine bay is coated with oil. Turns out, when it touched redline in 2nd gear, one of the oil cooler lines sprung a leak, and proceeded to dump 4 1/2 quarts of oil into my engine compartment in about 3-5 seconds.

I have a few questions. I'm planning on just replacing the old cooler line that is damaged. Does anybody know...

1) What causes this hose to go? (Besides the car being nearly 20 years old?)
2) Should I be concered about the other hose going as well?
3) To get to these lines, do I need to drop the cooler, or can I just disconect the line?

If anybody has any experence on this and has any words of advice, I would love your input. Thank you in advance, and good luck with your Rx-7's!

-Ben Tarnowski

[Note] I'm actually very happy that if the line was going to go, it happened when I was driving it, and before a sale. That was the 2nd time the car had seen redline in the last 2 years, and I'm sure the new owner would have likely revved it up to see what it was capable of. He was very understanding about it too, and is still very interested in the car!

1) You answered your own question. Old age...

2) See #3

3) Buy a set of stainless sheathed hoses from Mazdatrix, about $180. Direct fit, look nice, now you can sell the car.

4) Your low oil level warning didn't go off?

Thanks for the help Wayne!

Yah the "Eeeee" chimed and the oil light showed up intermitendly on the drive home, which was very short. I'm just happy I was really close and there was enough oil in the engine to get her home safely.

I'll order the parts from Mazdatrix tomorrow.

-Ben

I just got my project together and test driving it never above 4k and one of my lines have a leak to. When oil presure gets higher it sprays out. So probly just age why they went. Did you exsplode yours? All that oil that sux sorry.

Why would you pay $180 to mazdatrix for the same SS braided lines you can get from corksport for $130?

You didn't read about the fitment issue with the Corksport lines, Kevin?

The guys had a thread going on about it a couple of days ago. Now I don't know if it was "operator error" or not, but I know that the Mazdatrix lines went into my car no problem about 3 years ago when the OEM lines sprung a leak.

You get what you pay for? Who knows :)

I'\ve put on about 4 sets of the corksports...no real issues. True, any SS line is tight, and tough to make turns with...the top line is hard to get turned around the radiator support to connect to the cooler...I regard this as a normal issue with any SS line...tight bends are difficult. IT's not a 50 dollar problem, though, I'll tell you that for sure ;)

Whoops wayne, you got taken... the Corksport lines and the standard (non AN) lines from Mazdatrix are exactly the same and even made in the same factory on the same production line to the same specs.

Won't be the last time I get taken, either, lol...

I'm partial to Mazdatrix, those guys have gone out of their way numerous times to help me get parts overnight that UPS lost halfway across the country. Add to that the sheer numbers of OEM parts for our cars that you can get with a mouse click on their site, and you'll see why I'm always singing their praises...

And if you're worried about cost, you're driving the wrong car. Really... :)

Why spend $130 at Corksport, when your local hydraulic hose shop can do it for $60-$80?

I got my oil cooler lines from here for $75 a pair!! http://mazdarecycling.com/ that was 2 years ago and I havent had any problems.

Dude, that happened to me. It happened in the rain. I was in 5th gear with the A/C, defogger, windshield wipers, radio, and lights on. I guess it was a bit too much, or the line was on its way out anyway. I opened the hood, oil everywhere. Thank God I shut it off right when the EEEEEEEEEEE came on, or else motor damage could have been a factor. $60 later, it was fixed.

I've tried that a few times before.

1) the shop will require your stock hoses, to use the ends off of. This means the car has to be down to do the job, and it means you have to get under the car twice, versus once (if you have replacements in hand when you begin the job).

2) I had a couple of shops refuse to do it at all, saying they didnt think they could reuse the ends, even though I told them it'd been done before.

3) even if you do get it done, theyre not SS braided (read: pretty) like the corksports.

Operator error :)

Mine went in very very simply.

Thats funny Kevin, I have a set sitting on the car right now made from SS Braided lin, from the hydraulic shop.

What my shop does (So you can edumacate yours) is to cut off the old hose fitting from the hard line. Then they braze a AN fitting on the hard line and make up a AN Hose to bolt in. Works fine lasts a long time.

Well, in any case, for 50-70 bucks difference in price, it's worth my while not to have a car down for a day or 2 (versus half an hour) and not to have to even deal with the local rednecks.

its a little off topic but I am having lines made up for mine, but they have to longer since im postioning the oil cooler right behind the bumper in view (not to mention its a three row thats 4" tall by 24" wide) and they only cost me $65/pair - canadian dollars too - and they'll be done tomorrow

you cant forget that for everything there almost always a way to do it cheaper, but on the contrary there is always a way to do it better....and sometimes when you're lucky the better way IS cheaper and IMO for the oil cooler lines - getting lines made up for half the cost that have the ability to withstand twice the pressure is doing it better and cheaper