coolant burn on start up!!! HELP
 

hey guys and girls,

just bought my first rx7. everything was ok then started tomissfire and puff white smokeon start up, gave it a few seconds all would clear and everything would be fine, once cleared is fine, no smoke when driving etc etc,

butnow when i start it i get massive white smoke plummingout the back, but agin clears outand is fine after ward.

deffiently burning water, and its obviously onlygetting into block when engine off.

is there a fault that is similar to head gasket on a 4 cylinder engine, or i got a seriuos problem going on??

thanks

phil

u need to rebuild your engine to fix the problem. your coolant seals/o-rings are broken

lol woopppiiieeee, is it going to be just that, as the car drives fine afterward, guessing the tips etc etc will be ok, worth changing whilst out??

sorry my first rotary :) obvisouly not the best one lol

i had the same problem when i bought my fd, it got worse and worse and progressively harder to start due to the coolant buildup. theres plenty to change while u rebuild and it can get expensive. there are some good rebuild how-to threads floating around :)

u'll want to confirm that its coolant burning before u do anything though.. good luck

lol its under warrenty, i got told it might of been appexi seals?? but deff coolant not oil, also the coolant temp gauge is messing around, shows just off the second mark all the time, then jumps to half and puts the buzzer on, itsnot low on coolant as im now topping up due to start fault, guessing a temp sensor fault, or wiring issues??

thanks mate :)

Broken/chipped apex seals (function somewhat similar to piston rings) will result in bad compression, rough running, and a loss of power. They will not cause coolant loss. The segments of the engine are sealed to each other by the coolant o-rings. When these start to leak, you will often get coolant loss, temperature weirdness like yours, and lots of steam on startup.

the head gasket equivolent on a rotary is completely internal and requires a rebuild as others have said.

However, condensation on the rotors and in the exhaust causing a little white smoke on startup is perfectly normal, especially if you live in a humid region...

Apexi is a company that makes aftermarket electronics, exhausts etc. The proper term is 'apex seal.'

why thank you sir :)

cheers for your help guys guess its engine out then, not having any power loss etc so prob just the o rings, what milage you guys recomend tip swaps etc

everytime i start up mine, i have to wait about a min and a half till the white smoke clears and goes back to normal. i only drive mine weekend to weekend, so i have a good bit of condensation build up. just make sure thats not your problem before you start tearing stuff apart

Hey if it is under warrenty and they are willing to rebuild it and know what they are doing let them. Few of us are lucky enough to have an engine rebuild on someone elses dime.

he prob paid about the same amount for dealer pricing, as he would for a rebuild. but i could be wrong

hell, i'd be suprised if they knew how to do rebuilds. correctly that is...

lol im sure i could manage, bit of research, work for lotus as a tech so...

but dnt wanna be rebuilding a car i just bought lol.

yeah they can do the works to it, but like you said need to find someone who knows what theyre on about,

in the uk that dnt seem to be many people unless any of you guys know good peeps in uk

Best advice yet.

Jesus...there are countless posts about guys that are convinced their "coolant seals are shot" but are actually just seeing condensation...something EVERY car does. The ignorance of some car owners just baffles me.

I mean, ALL of these cars with "shot" coolant seals that suddenly run fine once the car is "warmed up"?

Give me a break, go back to Car 101 in grade school. :rlaugh:

lol would agree with you there buddy but im topping up every start up anjd it isnt just a little bit of white, it like someone has thrown a bucket onto a fire lol, and the car misfires like a twat on start up, either way il get it stripped and checked and report back
and i drive mine every day ?? and night lol, so not much chance of condensation on that lvl

thanks all :icon_tup:

Baja, did you read the OP's post? Sure sounds like coolant seal failure to me. What the hell are you doing out of the Lounge anyway :D?

my FD kinda has the same problem where it's huge white smoke at the startup but then it clears. Once i hit 4000 rpms it starts smoking, pretty much when i run it hard it happens. It'll happen randomly also, it'll be fine and then i look in the mirror and it's like driving in a cloud haha. Any ideas on why it's at 4000 rpm that it happens? btw it's not the turbos, just had them replaced with efinis.

id go with what ever goodfella says, hes been building motors and helping alot in thread.