Pulled my engine apart (oh man, those O-ring holders are *gone*) and I noticed something odd... the apex seals are gouged on the backside, where the springs rest.

I have the "cryogenic" 2mm seals, and I bought the recommended springs from Atkins at the same time. Seals have ~30-35k miles on it, unknown because of odometer failure mid-season last year. Definitely at least 22k, and given my driving habits, it's possible to be as high as 40k.

I'm going to re-use them with new springs, but you can bet that they won't be in there for very much longer.

 

I have seen the stock seals have the same grooves from where the springs sit in the seals.

 

I have never seen this kind of wear before.

 

can you post a picture so we can make sure I am thinking the same thing? As in grooves in the apex seals from the springs?

 

I've seen these grooves on the bottom side of my used Atkins un-cryo seals with under 10k miles on them daily driven.. i didn't know what to think about it.. shrugged

 

I have the regular Atkins Apex seals with about 10k on them. I'll run them till the engine stops running, any more information regarding your issues (with pics) would be interesting to see...

 

The grooves were about 1 to 2 times as deep as an apex spring is thick. When I was installing the apex seal springs, I had a hard time with a couple of them because the short spring wouldn't hold tension between the rotor and the apex seal without the long spring in there as well. It is difficult, but possible, to install both springs at once, but I wouldn't recommend it if you don't have to do it. Good thing I'd superglued the apex seals together the night before...

Engine runs and has decent compression. I ended up sanding the rotor housings a bit to clean up the grooving, as well as some emery cloth on the apex seals. The seals were chipped and the housings grooved like the engine had been exposed to dust. (It has. Big vacuum leak + dusty conditions, at one point)