how do you guys put up with price of parts.
03-12-13, 05:04 PM
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how do you guys put up with price of parts.
So I have a 79 that I race in it7. The engine is on its last leg. Its been reliable but I did a compression test on it and it looks like one rotor is around 75-80psi and the other is 40s.... yea its about to go. Even if I messed up the test somehow something isnt right. So now im trying to find options on rebuilding myself, getting someone to do it, or getting a used engine in good shape. The car is good, has miata internals in the trans, geared lower, nice setup with coilovers etc. But it is not worth 3k in an engine. Im thinking a dime over 1k would be a waste and just get rid of it asap and let someone else deal with it.
I searched, but all I find is exorbitant numbers on apex seals alone! Look rx7 isnt an exotic looking car that is sought after by all. I feel like ferrari parts would cost less. 1000 for new apex seals for each housing is insane. Might as well just drop a v6 in and call it a day.
I dont want to be this way and I love the idea of a rotary and have so much fun with even an underpowered one, but there is a point I have to just draw the line. Am I missing some dealer or an easier way to do this? Or should I just get a decent used engine and call it a day for like 500 bucks.
I searched, but all I find is exorbitant numbers on apex seals alone! Look rx7 isnt an exotic looking car that is sought after by all. I feel like ferrari parts would cost less. 1000 for new apex seals for each housing is insane. Might as well just drop a v6 in and call it a day.
I dont want to be this way and I love the idea of a rotary and have so much fun with even an underpowered one, but there is a point I have to just draw the line. Am I missing some dealer or an easier way to do this? Or should I just get a decent used engine and call it a day for like 500 bucks.
03-12-13, 05:52 PM
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If you've priced out what it costs to do a piston engine, you'd see that rotaries are still the cheapest option for a RACE engine.
You could buy all new seals for your engine just for what it cost for a cam and lifters for a V8. And a high performance cam will require new lifters every 10-15,000 miles, and if you're lucky it doesn't spall the cam and require a new cam too.
Where I work we do a lot of $10-20k engines and the naturally aspirated ones need lots of expensive regular maintenance due to the valvetrain.
Look into what it costs to build a piston engine that can tolerate everything a rotary can handle with mostly stock parts. It's not cheap.
You could buy all new seals for your engine just for what it cost for a cam and lifters for a V8. And a high performance cam will require new lifters every 10-15,000 miles, and if you're lucky it doesn't spall the cam and require a new cam too.
Where I work we do a lot of $10-20k engines and the naturally aspirated ones need lots of expensive regular maintenance due to the valvetrain.
Look into what it costs to build a piston engine that can tolerate everything a rotary can handle with mostly stock parts. It's not cheap.
03-12-13, 06:14 PM
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i don't know about Ferrari, but once in a blue moon i get a 911 bug, and to fix it i just look at how much it costs to build one of those.
pistons and cylinders for those are like $4k for the set, and then you need basically every other part of the engine except the case and crank (even the intake manifolds go bad!), which is another 4k
or even pistons and liners for my old Tr3 were like $1500, which isn't bad, but you can rebuild the whole rotary for that.
or even V8 parts, sure they are cheap, but you need 8 of everything!
if you're signed up at www.mazdamotorsports.com you can basically get the best deal in the us
pistons and cylinders for those are like $4k for the set, and then you need basically every other part of the engine except the case and crank (even the intake manifolds go bad!), which is another 4k
or even pistons and liners for my old Tr3 were like $1500, which isn't bad, but you can rebuild the whole rotary for that.
or even V8 parts, sure they are cheap, but you need 8 of everything!
if you're signed up at www.mazdamotorsports.com you can basically get the best deal in the us
03-12-13, 08:30 PM
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Well, Porsche is Porsche so there's the aircooled tax on top of the German tax on top of the snob tax 
But building my Audi engine... ugh. Just putting a used engine back in the car is expensive. Head studs and head gasket - $200. New exhaust valves - $175. (There's only five of 'em.) The head that came with the car needed to be milled .017" to get it flat, so it's not really useable, so I'm out the cost of cleaning and decking PLUS what it cost me to source another used head, which will also need cleaning and decking, and if it cleans up okay then we get to spend more money on the valve job and maybe new guides. Then there's the timing belt and guide pulleys, haven't priced that out yet, and water pump because the timing belt drives it. Lots of little O-rings that aren't quite standard like Mazda O-rings are. And this is not touching the bottom end, which if it has to come apart would be getting $800 worth of rods and probably the same in pistons, and a hundred or two for rings, and if we're boring it then we may as well square the deck, and the bearings for it make Mazda bearings look cheap...
And this is still not for a "RACE ENGINE" where it makes a significant power output and I'd feel comfortable bolting the throttle down for minutes at a time and feeding it nothing but fuel and oil changes as it requires it. A Porsche 911 engine is probably the closest thing (next to a Mazda rotary) that was a race quality engine sold for street use.
The 13B I built last year ran me maybe $500-600 in new parts, mostly seals and springs and bearings. I make my own coolant seals out of Viton cord, and use an RX-8 front cover gasket, Harbor Freight O-rings for the dowel pins and oil pedestal, and silicone for the oil pan and exhaust manifold. Make my own intake gasket from rubberized stock, which is necessary anyway since I have a 13B 4-port that I added the fuel injector bleed ports to. Mazda never made an injected 4 port 13B, so no off the rack gasket will work.
I run the snot out of it at SCCA RallyCross, sometimes doing double time with a co-driver.
But building my Audi engine... ugh. Just putting a used engine back in the car is expensive. Head studs and head gasket - $200. New exhaust valves - $175. (There's only five of 'em.) The head that came with the car needed to be milled .017" to get it flat, so it's not really useable, so I'm out the cost of cleaning and decking PLUS what it cost me to source another used head, which will also need cleaning and decking, and if it cleans up okay then we get to spend more money on the valve job and maybe new guides. Then there's the timing belt and guide pulleys, haven't priced that out yet, and water pump because the timing belt drives it. Lots of little O-rings that aren't quite standard like Mazda O-rings are. And this is not touching the bottom end, which if it has to come apart would be getting $800 worth of rods and probably the same in pistons, and a hundred or two for rings, and if we're boring it then we may as well square the deck, and the bearings for it make Mazda bearings look cheap...
And this is still not for a "RACE ENGINE" where it makes a significant power output and I'd feel comfortable bolting the throttle down for minutes at a time and feeding it nothing but fuel and oil changes as it requires it. A Porsche 911 engine is probably the closest thing (next to a Mazda rotary) that was a race quality engine sold for street use.
The 13B I built last year ran me maybe $500-600 in new parts, mostly seals and springs and bearings. I make my own coolant seals out of Viton cord, and use an RX-8 front cover gasket, Harbor Freight O-rings for the dowel pins and oil pedestal, and silicone for the oil pan and exhaust manifold. Make my own intake gasket from rubberized stock, which is necessary anyway since I have a 13B 4-port that I added the fuel injector bleed ports to. Mazda never made an injected 4 port 13B, so no off the rack gasket will work.
I run the snot out of it at SCCA RallyCross, sometimes doing double time with a co-driver.
03-30-13, 03:07 PM
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It seems that 13B parts are more plentiful than 12A's so I'd say it's better in the long run, if you keep your class that is.
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