Sw20Cts

I was just looking in to buying a 85, the porblem is the car does not want to start. And when you do get it started it does not want to idle. But once the engine gets warmed up it does get the car going. I am not very familar with rotaries, but I have been told that chances are the apex seals are worn. So, is it possible to put in new apex seals without any special equipment? Just the physical size of the engine suggests that it is not that tough to pull out of the car, but how hard is it???

spanacheck7

I recomend buying a Hayes manual before you start. There are a few special tools that you will need to borow or rent. The book explains all the procedures of cleaning and proper assembly of gaskets, to things like bolt patterns with torque recomendations. These things would be very lengthy to explain. There are seals and oil rings and corner seals on each of the rotors. Some of these items are quite small so when you are ripping the motor down be aware and label each part and where it came off the rotor. This will make the assembly quite easy. Clean all these parts individually with ketone and soft brush and compressed air. Don't use emery paper or wire brushes. You will need gasket sealent, vaseline(for rebuild lubrication) motor oil for bearings and stationary gears. A gasket set (you cannot use the old ones because they expand too much). A breaker bar with a 54 mm nut or 2 1/8 sae for flywheel removal. Also a 7 ton flywheel puller with appropriate size thread that thread into the flywheel itself. A good set of sockets and box wrenches in mm Keep us updated. Good luck.

Sw20Cts

How difficult is it compared to a piston engine. I mean most people can rebuild a piston engine with a couple of hand tools. How do apex seals actually go in?? Do you have to use a press or anything? I just don't want to get in over my head.

Oh yeah one more question, I've heard the 4 stroke piston equivalent of a 13b would be a 6 cylinder 2.6 liter. But isn't it acutally a 12 cylinder 2.6 liter??? Since each rotor fires 3 times per revolution and the engine fires 6 times total in 360 degrees. So for 720 degrees the engine would fire 12 times as much as a V12, correct?

Thanks in Advance

spanacheck7

I don't know the equivalent vs a piston engine. You will need a few special tools. The apex seals are three parts. An assist piece wich is a tiny triangle. There is a apex spring and then the larger apex seal. They sit in a chanel at each apex on each rotor. When assembling a rotor inside of the rotor housing the spring and the apex seal slide down in the chanel. The assist peice then is set flat on the corner to give the spring tension. There is no special tool to set these. Vaseline is used on these assist pieces to hold them in place while the intermediate housings are put in place. It is a bit tricky to do this but patience conquers all. Remember the parts are small and the secret to doing this is having a clean workspace with all your parts labeled and ready to go. The special tools that are needed are threaded gear puller for flywheel and the large breaker bar as mentioned above. The flywheel as you will find out is the bitch of the bunch as it is machined on the eccentric shaft at like 370 lbs per 2 inch. A simple four foot metal bar with holes drilled in to mat against the flywheel and placed against the floor will counter the force it takes with the breaker bar to get this bolt off. A piston engine has many many more parts and time consuming to rebuild. Rods arms cams piston rings tapets. None of that here. So good luck buy a manual and enjoy the rebuild..

check my site
http://www.geocities.com/spanacheck0...B_Rebuild.html

fcturbo2

2 years ago i got my first rotary. Its a 1987 TII. After driving it for few miles the engine blew. Without further knowledge of rotary except countless hours of spending time researching about this unique cars (engines) i decided to pull the motor with a help of my 10 bucks cheap socket sets!..I was able to pull the motor by myself. SUrprisingly enough this motors are so small and light compare to piston cars. I even took the same motor apart to study it. Bought a shop manual and Hayes book and now i think i want to do the rebuild myself also!..I have taken 2 motors apart now. I also read my manual alot.

spanacheck7

Hey fcturbo, it sounds like your ready to tear into one. I would recomend anyone who has a set of good tools and a little bit of history to go ahead and give it a shot. Belive it or not this was my first engine ( not the last ) it took only a couple days of cleaning everything else was fast. The cleaning of the carbon out of all the seals and rotors took awhile. The assembly and instalation took one full day.

Evil Aviator

The rotary engine has less parts than a piston engine - no valves, no lifters, no pistions, no camshaft, etc. Unfortunately, rotary engine parts are a bit expensive, so you don't really save any money. You will not need any more tools to rebuild a rotary enging than you would a piston engine. There are some videos floating around that show how to rebuild a rotary engine.
http://www.3rotor.com/

The Racing Beat catalog also has lots of good 1Gen info.
http://www.racingbeat.com/

Before you tear apart the engine, check out the carb choke. My 84 does the same thing because the choke is removed for racing. A compression check will tell you if the seals are gone - be sure to get this checked before you buy the car!

A rotary engine fires all of its rated displacement per revolution like a 2-stroke piston engine, where a 4-stroke piston engine fires only half of its displacement per revolution. This is why most racing organizations "double" the rotary engine's displacement for classification. The 3-sided rotor thing is discounted by the fact that the eccentric shaft has a 3:1 reduction, which means that when your tachometer shows the output shaft at 6000 rpm, the rotors are actually moving at 2000 rpm. Therefore, if you divide the 12-cylinder example that you gave by 3, you get 4 cylinders. All this comes down to the 13B being mostly like a 4-cylinder, 4-stroke 2.6L engine.

fcturbo2

Ohhhh and i also have a VIDEO "Overhauling Mazda's 13B Rotary"!.. All i need to do now is measure my rotors and Eshaft and clean them!..Everything else is brand new. The only thing im worried about is the END PLAY. I know you have to use spacers to take care of it.

Also. I want to do a mild streetport. How hard is it?..I have an air compressor and i will buy me a die grinder from HOME DEPOT.

TYT 7

Get yourself a good template also.

RxSeven1

iTrader: (2)

what does it cost to rebuild an engine urself??? is it possible to do a homemade street port

spanacheck7

If your are going to port the engine get a template from Mazdatrix. If you rebuild the engine and all the internal parts are within specifications the minimum it will take is gasket set priced at around 140.00. New corner seal springs are recomended also and those cost 4.00 each. If your engine needs bearings or apex seels the price will go up. It all depends on your engine condition.

Damnfuct

Where do you buy those parts from for that price?

spanacheck7

Gasket set from mazdatrix for 13B 137.92 to be exact.

FdFrog

I am currently prepping myself for my first rotary rebuild, 87 turbo II.. big turbo bridgeport and I'm trying to find reliable places to buy parts also. Atkins rotary seems the most legit so far, someone said mazdatrix too. Any other places? This thread is great thank you guys.

Spalato

iTrader: (33)

nice! a 13 year bump

It all depends on what parts you need. Atkins and Mazdatrix are legit, I bought from them before. Rotary Aviation is also good if you need rebuild kits...Pineapple Racing as well, they have some tools you might need. If you need a rebuild kit there are many threads on here which discuss the kits offered by the above sellers.

And don't forget a great place to find parts is the for sale section of this forum

FdFrog

Wow.. sorry i didnt even realize it was that old. Thats what research gets you, i guess. Lol thanks Spalato.

fendamonky

iTrader: (6)

Malloy Mazda also sells rebuild bits, Ray Crowe (their parts manager) has a couple FD's and is able to offer excellent prices. It doesn't hurt that Ray is also familiar with just about every bolt on these cars

Malloy Mazda - (703) 490-5296

I actually just dropped a $700-$800 dollar order with him earlier this week do I can start my own rebuild this weekend.

FdFrog

Thats awesome monkey thank you for the info!! Good luck with the rebuild.