California Dreaming

Before someone gets mad I did do a search and I am sure this question must have been answered before but I couldn't find it. Anyway, I just wanted to know approx. how many miles the engine rebuild will last before you need to do another one. Thanks.

nashman69g

iTrader: (3)

It all depends on who builds it, how you take care of it, and what quality parts were put in it. I know people with 40K on rebuilds. That tends to be the average in some cases. Others less--others more... Like I said a lot of varibles determine the life of the engine!

GoodfellaFD3S

iTrader: (213)

anywhere from 1 mile to 100,000 miles and up. My good friend Chris at www.rx7.com told me of an FD that had over 140,000 miles on the original engine.

California Dreaming

thanks alot guys, thats all I needed to know

HDP

iTrader: (2)

I've got a little over 110,000

nashman69g

iTrader: (3)

The guy was asking about a rebuild not the original engine!

HDP

iTrader: (2)

Why wouldn't a rebuilt engine be as good as an original... if it was rebuilt correctly?

black93RX7

My origional motor laste 92,000 km's and my rebuild lasted 6,000km's

Alot of it has to do with the builder and how you maintain your car. My advice is to learn how to do it yourself, don't cheap out on maintenance and have it tuned by someone who know's what they are doing.

Bridge_FD3S

Usually 9/10 rebuilt motors will be making more power than an original. More power, more stress. It might be "as good" but wont last as long.

rynberg

Because a lot of people seem to think rebuilding an 80k+ mile engine without getting new rotor housings or all new seals is OK...and then they're surprised when the motor doesn't last very long!

If you keep the car relatively stock and maintain it properly, there's no reason you shouldn't expect 90k+ miles out of a PROPERLY built motor.

tiger18

iTrader: (1)

That kind of scares me,,, i used my old rotors and used rotor housings (that where in very good shape), i was kind of expecting to get at least 50 000 miles out of this engine...,, now maybe i only get 5000 LOL

HDP

iTrader: (2)

Note that I did state rebuilt correctly

RotaryResurrection

iTrader: (8)

I think there are a lot of "armchair rebuilders" here who think they know everything there is to know about internals yet have probably never seen more than one engine disassembled in person (if that).

HDP

iTrader: (2)

I admit, I've never seen a disassembled rotary engine before, but I have seen, disassembled and rebuilt several piston engines.

RotaryResurrection

iTrader: (8)

Right, and whether or not we get admissions from anyone else here, the fact is that this is true of probably 85% of the people posting here.

The point I'm trying to make is that if you dont have significant experience with seeing the condition of internals, you're probably not qualified to speak on what does and does not constitute a good rebuild, why one that might last over 50k miles, or the reasons they fail to begin with.

And, if you think about it further, that means that the majority of postings made on the subject are just regurgitations of previously posted information made by others.

HDP

iTrader: (2)

And as of this morning, that is the final chapter

rynberg

BS. I don't have to pull apart 100 engines to know that rotor housings wear out, especially on turbo rotary. Are you honestly going to sit here and argue that a rebuild using 80k+ mile rotor housings is going to make as good of compression and last as long as a rebuild using new rotor housings? (again)

Based on your experience, you have YOUR OPINION on what constitutes a proper rebuild. But that's all it is. A lot of engine builders with comparable or more experience have different or completely dissenting opinions than yours.

From your other thread on this topic: "Now with that out of the way, I can make my point. You have a modded car. You need an engine. You KNOW that, regardless of who you pay to build the engine, and how much that engine costs, that you're most likely GOING to tear it up within 2.5 years, sometimes in as little as 6 months."

Sorry, but that's NOT the attitude I want from an engine builder -- "well, it's going to blow up in a couple of years at the most, so why put new parts in." My builder has 10 years and 50k+ on his personal built motor -- it's been through a T-78 setup and now 99-spec twins. He hasn't been ripping up motors every two years.

To me, it all comes down to a matter of quality -- some of us rebuild an engine with new housings/parts. Some of us don't. Some of us buy qualilty-fabricated downpipes/midpipes from long-time RX-7 vendors, some of us buy cheaply made parts, outsourced to sweat shops, that don't fit right. Some of us run quality, lightweight wheels, and other's run ADRs.

The entire human race learns in that fashion -- if everyone had to personally experience something to learn about it, almost no one would be knowledgable about anything. I hate to break it to you but the majority of structural engineers have never actually BUILT a building/bridge, but that doesn't seem to stop them from designing them.....

Mr rx-7 tt

iTrader: (5)

I have seen my rebuilds go 120,000 plus.

RotaryResurrection

iTrader: (8)

Depending on the condition, yes, I will. I will also, AGAIN, offer you the challenge (or whichever builder you're sackriding this week, since you dont know enough to do it yourself) that I offer everyone else. Build your "all-new-housing, all-new-seal" engine for a stock car, and I'll build mine as I normally would, noting the regular cost for each. I'll then apply the cost differential in mods for my setup. After a short breakin, we'll go dyno, and you'll be off in the corner bragging about how much compression you're making (maybe 5-10psi more, if anything) while I'll be printing off my hp numbers that proved you wrong.

Right, and based upon what SOME BUILDER told you, you have YOUR OPINION. That's well and great, but I get tired of seeing you go around pushing it on everyone else as law. I'm here to show the other side of the story. IF you dont like it, tough ****, I'm not going anywhere. I've proven many others (like you) wrong time and time again, and will continue to do so.


That statement is not based upon the builder, or the parts used in a rebuild. It's based upon the MAJORITY of people's driving habits and modification paths. I see it all the time, and if you were "in the business" rather than "armchair building" as I'd call it, then you'd see a lot of it too. There are people out there who could abuse a tank and have it dead within 6 months. No builder skill and no amount of quality parts can prevent this. I didn't say DEFINITELY, I said MOST LIKELY.

How many modded FD owners do you know that are on the same engine for more than 3 years, and how many do you know that are not? Regardless of builder? I have taken apart engines (blown) from many high end builders, including mazda (remans) that had <5k, pineapple motors that held up 3 months, $3500 KD engines that lasted 5k miles, rick's rotary engines that lasted 7k miles, and a marvelspeed motor that lasted 3k miles. Surely all those shops use shitty used parts too, huh. More like, the engines were highly modded setups that were undoubtedly beat on in their short lives. Meanwhile the last modded FD block I built from used housings (and a few reused sideseals) is making +375rwhp on high compression rotors and a gt35/40 that's hit as much as 21psi on pump gas. But, used housings aren't worth a ****, huh.


I guess you can't fault my factual points and you can't say anything about my engine builds so this is the best thing you can come up with? Please. Stop being childish. Next you'll be saying "my daddy can beat up your daddy" or something similar.

Unfortunately most of my work is done for out of town/out of state people that I don't keep in regular contact with, so I dont get to track what goes on with mine all that often. Generally, though, no news is good news, since people will come back and bitch if there is a problem, so the fact that I dont have people coming back with complaints tells me that mine are probably out there running around just fine, some for about 5 years now.

Mahjik

iTrader: (1)

Back onto the orignal post....

California Dreaming, it all really depends on too many factors to give an average mileage/time duration. I had a Mazda Reman installed in '99; blew it in '04. However, the engine had less than 30k miles on it (probably more like 26k but I can't remember the actually mileage when the engine was replaced).

Now, that mileage may not seem high, however, that was 5 years of some good beating on the track and other places (check the avatar). With my current rebuild in process, if I can get another 4-5 years (regardless of mileage), I'll be quite happy.

To be honest, had I spent the money up front, the engine would still be here today. Basically, my "on the track" driving skills began to be better than the car could deliver in the state it was in at that time. I'm spending the money now to make it more track worthy and hope to be beating on it longer than the 4-5 years if possible.

KompressorLOgic

iTrader: (6)

i belive a propery rebuilt motor ( good condition housings ect) will last a long time,

you have to admit 90% of the rebuilds that dont last long either, were

1. used bad condition housings
2. used to many out of spec or , used parts
3. people running unproperly tuned , ex leaning out detonation, grenading the motor.

a rebuild with used housings will never have as much compression as a new motor, but if they housings are good condition it will be close anyway...

fastcarfreak

engine rebuilds vary way to much on rotary cars to even give a number. The first motor i had in my car was a factory reman. It lasted 6k miles on stock twins and almost stock boost levels and when i switched it to single turbo it only lasted 2k more miles. So thats only 8k miles total. The next motor i had built by KDR, It used 2 brand new housing and 2 brand new rotors along with new 3mm seals. it only lasted about 2500 miles and 5 months (and these were mostly highway miles). Now i have another KDR motor in the car and I am at about 4k miles now. Im hoping that with my more conservative tune (done by steve kan), i can actually get 10-15k miles before it goes.

I know one guy who has a 30k mile reman motor in his car and put a t78 in his car a few thousand miles ago. He drive pretty much wide out throttle wherever he goes. He beats on the car about 10 times (no joke) more then i do and his motor is fine.

All in all, i think engine life has less to do with who built it or how high of quality parts were used, and more to do with how well the car is tuned. It is also really important to find the reason why the motor blew in the first place and correct that problem before just throwing in a new motor (unless of course it blew from old age and tons of miles).


Adam

fastcarfreak

ah a little difference in compression isnt going to make much difference power wise anyways. the difference between a couple of psi compression is only going to equate to a couple horsepower anyways. I bet you wouldnt even be able to tell the difference unless the compression was way off. Besides, you can run more boost on less compression

manatecu

iTrader: (6)

my original motor lasted 86k. I bought a remanufactured engine from mazda and sent it to a rebuilder for upgraded seals, springs, oil and coolant improvements, and a few other goodies. I have 21k on this motor. When I dropped the motor in I completely shifted to single setup and learned to tune my own motors. all 21k have been at 17+psi.

I think if you start with good components, good supporting components (injectors, wires, etc) and put a good tune on the car it will last for quite a while.

Good luck

Note: I have seen several opened motors and helped rebuild them but I still want to leave my high horsepower motors to a professional. Skill and technique a learned over time.

fastcarfreak

Dude, that sucks man. Did you forget to knock on wood after your first statement or something?