Project DereK

I have my engine apart and before i spend $400 on racing seals and double springs... For the rotary experts, which apex seals hold boost. I know the carbon seals dont, and no one likes the 3mm. But the question is do 3mm seals hold more boost before poping? Not if they have more friction, I really dont care about surface area ect... I read all the posts about that. Now the choices I know about are:
2mm Stock Mazda seals
2mm Racing Seals
2mm Carbon
3mm Stock
3mm Race
3mm Carbon
3.5mm Race

If I am missing some please let me know... I am doing a big street port and Turbo on 9.7:1 rotors from a 1991 NA =) and I need to know what seals are going to hold. Im either going to build this engine and sell it whens its done, or drop it in a 1st gen or Corolla and rip some people saturday night!

PS: Check the video section for the 4 REAL RX7 music videos started about a year ago...

hurleyboi514

they all hold boost. what they dont hold is detonation (read: explosions). there is another post about why seals go out, go read it too. i personally would go w/ the 2 MM race seals, but u better know what your doing. it would be easy to kill the NA like that. why dont u use the turbo rotors? thats what they are for. when honda boys turbo their civics, they use lower compression pistons. theres a reason they do this. high compression (requires high octane) + boost (also requires high octane) = short lived engine (you would detonate like crazy unless you ran 100+ octane gas).... get a little more info and figure out what u want to do. dont rush it and make a mistake. good luck!
ken

Felix Wankel

If you run 3mm seals, you'll be cracking endplates when you detonate instead of cracking apex seals. You'll also have to send your rotors out to be machined for 3mm, costing more $$...

Angel Guard Racing Team

Use factory seals. We use factory seals, we ran 8:37 VP/Nitrous/Turbo on factory seals. Now we are running on Alcohol/Turbo on the same factory seals. We are talking over 20psi of boost. So take my advice and stick to factory seals. Hint... if the car is running too lean it does not matter what seals you use they will break, causin possible damage to the exhaust part of the turbo and will mess up the rotor and the housings very very bad so be carefull.

Project DereK

...I know what im doing this is my second high compression turbo engine built thank you... I know about detenation and leaning out, belive me this is a race car not a street car. This engine will never see less then AV gas. I was wondering if the 2mm seals will break or bend due to boost... Fuel wont be the problem the car will never lean out. Thanks Angel Guard for the tip about the 2mm seals, I will go with those. Also what are the specs on your engine? Is it a 3rd gen or 2nd gen engine, also what rotors are you using, and is it a 4 or 6 port?

hurleyboi514

oh cool! even better! ive heard of a few people trying that turboing an NA thing. i dont think im brave enough to do it! best of luck to you...

Angel Guard Racing Team

3rd gen engine (Ported intake and exhaust) T series turbo, haltech engine management and stock apex seals. It is a full metal 1980 RX-7 which weighs 2270 lbs. Over 700HP... If you guys know spanish you can visit www.pistonvsrotor.com this is Puerto Rico's #1 Rotary and 4 cyl drag race page. By the way we (Team PR) Beat team USA last night. Our car finished 2nd (because we red lighted).

jspecracer7

I agree...3mm apex seals are pretty useless.

Are you going Bridgeported? Full or Half? Either way, I've seen high boost(1.8 kilos) on stock apex seals. The engine's don't last long, but they'll hold. Could always get 2mm 2piece apex seals...