Ok guys i have a blow motor (rear rotor went out) and im looking at the rotary aviation rebuild kits now theres a huge difference in price with the "master kit" and the "basic kit" the basic kit is only $580 and the master kit is $997 the only thing the basic kit doesnt bring are corner seals and side seals.. can i reuse the ones i got or should i just save up and get the master kit?? i need this car back and running asap so.... i do plan to have this car as my daily driver / track car so i wanna do a nice street port with it now that i have everything taken apart so tell me what you guys think?
Thanks
TwEaK

 

How many miles on your motor?

I've got about 6,000 miles on my RA master kit, no problems...

 

Tweak - Unfortunately, the only way to know is to tear the engine apart. You probably won't need them, but you never know. I didn't need them, and my engine had over 200k on it when it was tore down. I ordered new side seal springs, just because I felt like it, and they let me mix and match parts (aren't they so nice?).

I also have about 6000 miles on my RA rebuild (all new soft and hard seals, except for sides and corners), no problems here either

 

why dont you just send it to rotarty resurection, he does rebuild for the same price as that master kit

 

Like wonko said, you wont know till you open her up. BUT, the corner and side seals are two things that wear out the slowest a lot of the time, so if I were you I'd bank on just buying the basic kit and then if you NEED to buy the side and corner seals seperately from atkins or something.

 

Forgot about shipping huh? Thats another chunk of change

Oh and as far as I know, his 1000 dollar rebuild is not a full and complete one as the Master kit would provide. His rebuilds are 1000 and up, and once he opens up the engine he sees what is required. Don't get me wrong Kevin is an awesome guy and does amazing work, but it would end up being more than just a grand just from shipping, let alone what other things may need to be replaced once its opened up.

 

already talked to kevin and it will cost me $1700 for the way i want my motor (Streeported) thats not including shipping so i guess ill go with the basic rebuild kit and try to rebuild it myself the motor that i know of doesnt have that many miles its an S5 jspec said to have had about 30k miles on it but i guess ill yank out the motor as soon as this hurricane passes.
TwEaK

 

that whole 30k miles is bullshit, if it was true the motor would still be fine,i also use to believe that,also people recomend to get the corner seals off a fd

good luck with the rebuild

 

well i just went with the basic kit when i rebuilt mine, and when i pulled it apart i ended up breaking all but like 3 of the side seals, so i ended up spending another $100 to get a set of side seals from atkins (came with springs too). I reused my corner seals though

It was a little scary to see how brittle those side seals are, mine cracked in half so easy, i know they never see the kind of stress i put on them to break em, but still it was a little shocking to me, i think it was caused by overheating. But you can still wait, id just go with the basic kit and if you happen to need side seals you can get em for a hundred more bucks

 

Another point regarding sending the engine in vs doing it yourself is the wonderful "How many miles does it have?" question.

"Around 130k, 6000 on my rebuilt engine."
"Oh? Where'd you get the engine rebuilt?"
"I did it in my garage. They're not bad."
Responses here range from "That cool!" to "YOU rebuilt it?" depending on your perceived tech skill.

Plus, after rebuilding the engine? Nothing in the car scares you to work on anymore.

-=Russ=-

 

Except rebuilding the tranny, lol

 

Actually, that's the only thing left that scares me. I'd love to take apart a scrap one though, see what sort of magic lives in the case.

-=Russ=-

 

I'm in the process now, I've got to get off my duff (as Hailers likes to say) and get a mainshaft pusher thingy to split the case next...

 

ok, so tweak, have you started or already finished your rebuild. don't know how old this thread is. anyway, same situation as you about the rotary aviation's kit C without the side seal and corner spring deal. did you need it or not.

my car will have 170,000 miles by the end of this month. it is my dd so i have 1 month (winter break) to tear down and rebuild and hope it runs. unless i get the turboII running then it can be down longer.

my motor still runs (strong? at times) but major oil leakage. used 7+ quarts of oil coming back from SS (grapevine in LA was actually killing me). anyway, did you have to replace those two parts? recommend getting the side seals and corner spring with the kit?

 

S5 or S4?

I have an S5 with slightly less miles than you that I'm rebuilding... but I want it to last another 100k at least... or maybe 70k of my style of driving. It was doing about the same, ate oil like a mother... maybe about 1 quart per tank of gas. Not that that was too bad, but I decided it was a good idea to rebuild before anything blew and damaged the rotors or something. So I went with new apex seals, re-using all except two side seals (used them to clean the rotors... one of them ended up breaking like 5 times while I was using it, other one didn't break but using the edge to remove carbon rubbed it down so it probably wouldn't seal anymore if I used it), new springs all around and new corner seals even though they are NOT needed one bit. The wear in my engine was unbelievably minimal... I'm thinking I should sell someone the parts I'm not re-using because they are at the very highest specifications listed in the manual... not even half way worn. I didn't get a chance to measure the apex seals (didn't feel like measuing each piece individually, etc etc) but Kevin told me they're the most common wear point. I think the housings are fairly worn though too... I haven't measured them but I will when I finish cleaning them. I expect to see a noticable amount of wear, but at the same time the chrome isn't flaking or anything (that I can tell) so generally it looks like a brand new engine.

If yours was the same case as mine, you'd get away with replacing the oil rings inserts (I haven't put the new rings in yet.. but... I was told it's kind of easy to break the control rings doing it... I'm hoping I don't 'cause they're a little expensive), the springs all around except for the oil control ring springs if they're in spec. And on the corner seals you'll probably have a broken seal plug or two... I was told you don't even need the plugs... but I'm a little paranoid, so instead I invested in some solid corner seals. Oh and get the FD corner springs, just look at the pictures of the FD vs the FC ones and you'll see why.

Other than those things you need all the gaskets and o rings, seals, hylomar and all that... should come out to less than 500$ maybe down to 400$

--Gary

 

ok, so i decided to go with the RA basic kit, and probably (might) even take out some parts. anyway, thinking about the corner seals. how are the solid corner seals treating you. i was reading that the stock ones with the rubber inserts are better at sealing at lower rpm and the solid ones better at high rpm. if its not necessary, i may stick with the stock design but i do like the concept of the solid design. i might have a LITTLE porting done as well, well see.

my motor is an 86 n/a. i do have a fairly low mileage s5 motor that i will also be tearing down to use parts from, say rotors, rotor housings, other stuff to make it work. i can probably obtain some usuable parts from the s5 motor.

 

actually i sold the car i said **** it wasnt going to go threw the trouble and just bought another 7 with brand new rebuild with a master kit from RA already 3mm apex seals n everything so far i havent had a problem and ive revved the **** out of that motor...
TwEaK