Finished up the engine bay (Custom IC Duct for the Greddy, misc. polishing and cleaning) about a 10 days ago... took it for little drive last Saturday and presto "one blown motor". All the normal symptoms (spiting up coolant.. did not overheat, very difficult warm start, no power, etc.) spell rebuild time!

Here are the pics of the engine as of today. IMHO it looked good for the short time it ran once everything was done. Seriously thinking of going the LS1 route now.. if so everything in the engine bay (including the PowerFC and commander, and various other aftermarket electronics) will be in the "for sale" section soon.

 

Couple more pics...

 

man your car looks awesome....please dont go LS1 go 20b N/A

 

sorry to hear about your motor. but its the best looking blown engine I've ever seen. good luck with the next one. I see a lot of good parts in here if you go the LS-1 route.
Jeff

 

if u part out got dibs on all the t-bolt clamps

 

Man that is one sweet looking engine bay. *hypontized by all the shiny parts*

 

Who made you that duct?

 

A blown engine is never a good new but yes that engine look really great it would be a pity to go Ls1.

 

What happened to the motor? Did you run it lean? Bad tank of gas? Ran it too hard before the thing warmed up? Ran out of oil

Anyway, your car looks awesome. You'll need bigger wheels in the rear to handle all that extra torque down low if you go LS1. In that case, I have dibs on your current wheels

 

I did, wasn't too hard (just took alittle time). I think the total cost in material was around $28 in alum. sheet. and around $15 in Dynamat Extreme for a grand total of $43. Not bad and works great (if I say so myself )

 

Awesome looking engine bay. So clean and soooo polished. I love it.

 

Yeah, to bad it went boom!

 

Would you be able to make one for me? I wouldn't mind paying you for your time/materials.

 

Richard,
That really sucks after all the spit and polish that went into making your engine and components so pretty. I blew mine last November and spent seven months putting it all back together. I did the same thing with polishing all the aluminum, painting, and adding my blue motif as well. The new street port short block that Rob Golden at Pineapple did for me is awesome.

Im remaining a purist at this point with keeping the rotary. Im sure youll agree that the rotary is so smooth and really is a nice power plant for this car if everything has been done to maximize reliability. I will say it is very expensive to go with the rotary rebuild and doing it right. I love V-8's too and ultimately a V-8 is probably cheaper over the long run. Maybe when Jim Labreck gives me a ride in his when it gets done I will become a convertee.

Chuck

 

What happened? It sucks but engines don't just blow up. Is the motor a recent rebuild/reman? Or original? How many miles, etc? If you don't mind me asking.

 

The motor is original as far as I can tell (the turbos have a little under 28k on them according to the previous owner) and had 71k on it before the water seals went. I have done all the reliability mods and basically went through everything mechanical on the car (except putting in a reman motor) and I do mean everything . The motor recently (within the last 2 months) began to eat coolant (white smoke at startup, all the normal symptoms for an o-ring leak) so I knew it was on it's last legs so to speak.

Wasn't pushing the car or anything it just decided to let go. I have an auto that I want to convert to manual and started pricing the costs involved and decided to look at costing it against an LS1 with a T-56 conversion. I was surprized at how close in cost the two are (not taking into account what I could get from selling my rotary performance parts), it's easily a couple of grand cheaper to go with LS1 conversation if I sell off my current setup (minus bad engine of course).

Still trying to decide on which way to go... I have read just about all the threads on the pros and cons for both subjects. I have to say that I'm leaning right now to going with the LS1 swap.

 

Thanks Chuck!

 

Rebuild it, and while its apart have it ported.

 

Sell me your OEM mudguards

 

Wow!! Clean FTW

 

coolant seal rebuild ~$500 if you pull it and rebuild it yourself.

~$100 for the seals
~$400 other seals and springs you should replace

 

A proper complete rebuild kit is going to be over a grand. I ordered one from Ray not too long go for a friend's engine.

 

^I was just saying...re-using apex/side/corner seals(and springs)...and replacing the failed components, along with a couple MUST's like little o-rings, mains, oil control...one could do it on budget. Not necessarily give up all hope and ditch the rotary...now for the money he'll have to spend on a LS set-up...one could have a frightening fast 13B!

it doesn't look like he pushes his car down the track, so a complete extreme build wouldn't be necessary.