It could be as simple as the oil filter not being fully tightened. I had that happened to me once and had several quarts of oil get dumped on the garage floor.

 

Good news, everybody!

Vey messy but not terminal, it was the old double oil filter gasket trick.
When the old filter was removed, the gasket remained stuck- and unnoticed- on the block.
The oil change was the first thing we had done and during the course of the day, the engine had been run multiple times as we flushed/filled/bled the cooling system...she was twice run up to 195° to verify fan operation...and during all this, not a drop of oil leaked. In fact, we had commented right before the final, ill-fated test run on how well the bay was holding up, Dusty, but completely dry and very presentable.

Apparently, Sigfrid dragooned his entire family into the clean up, which took about 3 hours and new oil and filter later, she fired right up and seems to be operating normally. S. even claims she runs better than before but that makes no sense and I'll attribute it to excessive relief on his part.

So Ratchet will live to **** us over another day.

 

I have had the ol' double gasket get me before as well. Fortunately it only dumped its guts in the service bay and not on the road.

 

I read this last night and I figured it was the whole double oil filter gasket magic. I also figured it wouldn't be catastrophic considering a complete loss of oil pressure and lubrication will cause an engine to clatter and bang VERY loud.

 

Yeah, the complete absence of noise or vibration is why I initially thought the sending unit had become disconnected.
The water temp didn't budge either, so I'm thinking it didn't run completely dry.
When S. drained it yesterday I don't know how much came out...I'll have to ask.

(Or maybe, because S. is the one who changed the filter, it would be better to just let it go and hope for the best. I'm sure he is chagrined enough as it is...)

 

Think of it this way, early engines were splash lubricated and ran OK enough. It might be just fine.

 

If it wasn't clattering and banging at the loss of oil pressure reading on the gauge I wouldn't worry about it. There might be some metal particles in the oil even if he drained it and filled it back up so I would recommend changing the filter again at 250 miles just to be safe, and the oil just to make sure. A magnetic drain plug would hurt either.

From personal experience, if the engine didn't make any noise than it should be fine.

My personal experience is this...

Eleven years ago I hopped into my step dads 96 Toyota Camry with somewhere around 160k miles on it. The engine was in fairly good shape but she was just starting to drink a tad bit of oil. He neglected it and never checked the oil EVER. I fired it up one morning to take it and put tires on it for him, and when I did, It clattered and banged. It was below freezing that morning so I figured the oil must be thick, but after about 10 seconds it was still clattering and so I shut it down. Pulled the dipstick and it was bone dry. I put a couple of quarts of 10w-30 in it and the noise went away.

That car lasted until 280k miles before it just gave up ghost.

I think sigfrids car will be fine, just change the oil and filter at 250 miles or less just to be sure any potential metal particles are gone, if there is any.

 

Woo! That means the terrific tale of Clokker continues!

And I have something to read.

 

Proof of life:


Old engine stripped & disconnected, just sitting on the mounts ready to lift out.
I left the rad and its cover in place...it makes a nice worktable and is probably the safest spot for the rad until the engine actually comes out next weekend.

Whatever happened to this old motor, it was in the rear housing.
Oil/water splooged out when the manifold was removed...not a whole lot though and the motor still spins over freely.


No real idea what happened and frankly, little interest in finding out.
My attention is focused on this thing now:


Sigfrid was out of town all week so the Z wasn't driven and the long term effects of the oil fiasco are as yet unknown.
But he was a busy boy anyway...the incident scared him into buying a daily driver to backstop the Z.
He picked it up today, a pretty black on black RX8.

Just like the one he sold three cars ago.

Despite the fact that it contravenes the whole concept of "daily driver", I'm guessing he'll start pouring money into it within a week.

 

As I perused my punchlist (there's a surprising number of little details to address, even when you're only refreshing a shortblock) and reflected on the process so far, one thing came to mind...a blessing, as it were.

Taking Sprocket apart has been easy.
Almost four years ago I swapped into this chassis and during assembly I used new hardware and spent (seemingly) hours chasing threads and applying anti-sieze...and boy, it certainly paid off.
Even the exhaust came apart easily.

If there is a lesson to be gleaned from my trials and tribulations, it would be "Pay attention to your hardware".
Your future self (or the next worker bee in line) will really appreciate it.

 

Not even the slightest ounce of curiosity? I am certainly interested in seeing what happened, and what the internals look like at this mileage.

 

Exactly as he said it.

Take the damn thing apart and find out what happened. We'll all learn from it.

 

Oh, well- framed as an educational exercise, how could I refuse?
It's "for the children", right?

OK then but it'll be a while, probably August.

 

Even the exhaust came apart?

What virgin and which volcano did you toss them into to get that fortunate?

 

Yup, the downpipe came off the manifold and the other end came off the main cat...no problem, no virgins.

I wasn't fortunate, I was prepared.
Antisieze is a hell of a drug.

 

I use the crap outta it at work, but in my business. I never want it to come back, unless it's for a different repair. Nothing worse than having to redo exhaust manifolds on a car that requires engine removal.

 

I anti-sieze the hell out of everything when I work on my cars just incase I have to go in there again. I've sawsalled enough suspension bolts going through bushing because the bolt rusted to the bushing sleeve. I don't need any more practice. Coat the bolt generously, even the unthreaded part when assembling.

 

^
The long studs on the waterpump housing are partularly prone to corrosion too.
I also use studs on the thermostat cover so I don't have steel bolts seizing in the alloy casting.
(If you've swapped to an efan, the cute 6mm studs that used to hold the thermoclutch to the waterpump work great for the thermostat mod.)

 

Good to know. The only place I have stopped using anti-seize on is brake parts. I use a good quality ceramic/silicone lube that doesn't wash off. I had an issue with anti-seize causing unusual wear on pad ears that actually dug into a caliper bracket and damaged it. I had to weld the divets in the bracket and grind them smooth.

 

For high temp applications there is also a Copper anti-seize. It work great on SS exhaust hardware that would otherwise gall all to hell.

https://www.permatex.com/products/lu...ize-lubricant/

 

Well, yesterday was weird.

Sigfrid came over at 8:30am, we had some coffee and then yanked the old engine and installed its replacement.
We finished at 9:45am.

It was so easy, neither of us could really believe it.
Mating the engine to bellhousing happened almost without effort or contortions, they just kinda thunked together on the first try. Maybe five minutes of jiggling/rocking and...done.

After returning the hoist to the rental place ("Wait, weren't you just here?"), I was kind of at a loss.
Hadn't planned on getting that far so quickly, wasn't mentally prepared.

Sigfrid had family stuff to do and left, I took a nap.

A refreshing few hours later (Work smart, not hard!"), I ran into the first obstacle, seemingly minor but weird.
When I acquired the "new" engine it was missing an exhaust stud and rather than spend the $9 for a new one, I figured I'd just harvest an old one from the just removed block. It screwed in just fine (recall that I've chased every thread I could) but the new hardware wouldn't work, so I removed it and went downstairs to chase the threads only to discover that unlike the other three studs, this one was a 10mm x 1.5...the other three are 10mm x 1.25.
I don't get it, Mazdatrix lists the same stud for every single rotary ever (although they don't say which thread pitch it's supposed to be) but I have two (apparently original) sets that are different.
And I absolutely detest mismatched/crappy hardware, it's one of my top pet peeves.
Not sure what to do about that yet.

When I removed the manifold/precats a few days ago, I paid zero attention to the main cat.
Yesterday, while under the car, Sigfrid looked and says it's absolute trash, so that will be this morning's first big disappointment, I fear.
I almost don't want to see.

Anyway, the brute physical part is done, now it's just all the piddly ****.

 

Maybe someone broke that exhaust stud before and that was what they had on hand? Or robbed from somewhere else on a donor car? I think I threw my main cat away. If I have it, I don't know where.

 

congrats on getting the engine in!

my friends FC passes smog in CA with a cat that would qualify as "trash", if its the factory cat, keep it, they work better than the aftermarket even when they are "broken".

you may certainly buy an aftermarket to save the factory cat just for smog, time honored tradition that

 

That may very well be true, considering what the recycler's give for those factory cats - but with the very heavy wall SS construction and lots of reactive substrate, they are also very heavy, as is the factory exhaust manifold.

 

I got $400 doll hairs for my my factory cat a few years ago.