This REW shortblock reusable?
 

hi guys,
bought an REW engine that was said to have a blown coolant seal. had no compression on all but 2 faces in the rear. bought it cheap to at least learn about the rotary. so took everything apart and want to know if any of the housings or irons are reusable. please let me know. thanks.

front iron:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-A...hoto%25204.JPG
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Z...hoto%25205.JPG
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-k...s800/photo.JPG

center iron (side 1):
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-f...hoto%25203.JPG
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-F...hoto%25204.JPG
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-w...hoto%25205.JPG

center iron (side 2):
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-M...hoto%25201.JPG
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-g...hoto%25202.JPG
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-E...hoto%25203.JPG


rear iron:
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-F...hoto%25201.JPG
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-m...hoto%25202.JPG

housings, no chome flaking but have gouges. are these just paper weights?

front housing (apex seal broke and gouges around the exhaust port and gouge above spark plug):
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-O...hoto%25201.JPG
https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-3...hoto%25202.JPG
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/-C...hoto%25203.JPG
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-A...hoto%25204.JPG


rear housing (broken apex seal and gouge around exhaust port and small nick):
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/--...hoto%25201.JPG
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-7...hoto%25202.JPG
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-K...hoto%25203.JPG
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-E...hoto%25205.JPG

can't tell how much wear is on the irons or if the walls are all intact for the coolant seals, follow the FSM to inspect them and make sure the coolant seal walls are in one piece.

the rotor housings are pretty beat up with some debris that went through the engine, they either should be resurfaced or find replacements.

Those rotor housings are indeed paperweights. I don't think any of the resurfacing options available current will help with those.

from the pics the irons look fine, just need to flat block them and then check to make sure they are in spec. the housings are pretty bad though, you could probably get away with it but I wouldn't chance it.

the gouging and location of the damage is in a non critical area, the rest of the housings look easily machinable. one exception will be the gouge near the trailing plug hole, that one is iffy and didn't notice it before. if that particular one is deep enough to catch a finger nail on i would consider it junk, there is quite a bit of chrome on these housings though and the center area of the chrome is the thickest.

in fact even housings that look perfect usually are far from it. take a patch of 120 grit paper and run across the housing cross-wise and you will almost always see gouging that isn't visible to the naked eye. usually there is some grooving in the center of the housings that you can't feel or see.

good luck

Thanks guys. I will not be using the housings. So to clean up the iron surfaces, I just use fine emery cloth? Is emery cloth better than something like 2000 grit sandpaper?

The center housing looks to have lost the coolant seal wall in a couple spots on the first imaged side.

Side Housings has many more details to help you check them all out.