The problem is the exchange rates. That's what happens when you import things.

 

I trade forex, and its not exchange rates that are the issue

 

we are near a historic low in the dollar vs yen rate. Is it any wonder that the guys who have been building engines for 7, 8, 10 years remember rotor housings being way cheaper? around 2002 especially the exchange rates were very much in favor of consumers holding dollars.

http://www.forecast-chart.com/exchan...anese-yen.html

 

Ahh cool-
The Japanese is an export economy, so thier central bank does the best it can to keep the ratio in thier favor. Personally I would not have anything made in Japan these days, as most of its going to be farmed out to the Tiawanese or Chinese anyway.

 

And rotor housings were ~$50 in 1980, at least according to people who were around back then.

An RX-7 was a $10k car back then. Is the RX-8 at ~$140k car? No.

 

The cost of rotor housings in japan is also at an all time high. I think the last time I checked they were close to 70,000 yen which is over $800. Less than 3 years ago they were about 35,000-40,000 yen and the dollare rate was at $1.16 to 100 yen.

Aluminum prices were way up for awhile but I am not sure what they are at now. There is a theory that Mazda is pushing prices up to kill off housing sales for older cars and eventually stop making them.

 

Hey Naysayer's It seems someone on here (Bigyellowcat AKA 12 rotor man) has beat me to it His 12 rotor threadhttps://www.rx7club.com/old-school-other-rotary-63/12-rotor-engine-945021/

Here are the pics of the sleeves already pressed in I would have done it slightly different,but same principle.






P.S to Naysayer's,**** YOU

 

lol, not yet! read the fine print, its more money than a new housing, AND its untested. i'm sure with the right coating the apex seal will slide fine, but what happens when the sleeve starts warping? mazda had problems with that...

granted for a 10A/12A where rotor housings are NLA, this looks good

 

How many thousand miles has it run?

How mature.

I suppose it never occured to you that scientific expansion is performed by naysayers, not mutual-masturbators, right?

It's not about what you can do. It's about what you can't do, and how to overcome it.

I see a lot of problems. This is coming from somebody who enjoys trying to do things that shouldn't work just to see what works and what doesn't.

I mean, for example: electric wire works as coolant seal, as long as you only use the car in the summer. If you let the engine get cold and then try to start it, they will fail. The people who I learned about this from were road racers, not people trying to start their car to drive it to work when it's 15 degrees outside.

A lot of things "appear" to work, when they are used in a narrow operating range. I'm sure I could buy a $10 set of wrenches and grind them to size and use them as apex seals... and they may work fine for a drag car, but I wouldn't want to try using them in a daily driver that I expect to get 150k out of.

 

Answer to your first question,Ask Bigyellewcat.


It's called playful banter hence the emoticon with that P.S,don't be pathetic,read my previous post on this thread first before making asinine comment's regarding the subject,my previous thread post are well defined (minus photo aids) for what i would have done differently.if you are having a hard time understanding then that's your problem.

 

The fact the the wheels are in motion with regard to the project is what matters to me.

Dude keep in mind that this is a niche market,and naturally any product is gonna cost more when first produced and release to the market.

 

on a side note.. -peejay- that's interesting the statement you make about speaker wire not working in cold weather, i understand the point u were trying to get across, but so far for me that statement doesn't hold true. a few thousand miles and a couple of -10 degree days during its outside hibernation and 5-6 months later it still fires up and not an ounce of coolant missing. I believe its the amount of rtv right stuff i used, the rtv layer sandwiched between the housing and plate each side of the jacket probably maintain the seal alone, wire or not. That makes me wonder if the wire is even necessary. Keep in mind i only did this process on the outer seal. for inner seals i used mcmaster.

back on topic, its nice to see somebody with the resources to undergo this level of experimentation. what sounds like it will work in theory and on paper in reality sometimes doesn't and vice versa. I'm just glad someone is about to prove some of these theory's one way or the other.

 

"**** you" and middle fingers isn't playful banter.

Exactly. When used as an inner seal, it doesn't work well at super cold temps because the tension bolts lose enough tension that combustion pressure can spread the housings enough to blow past the seals, which aren't very pliable.

For the outer, RTV would probably work well enough. I'm going to be using nitrile and Hylomar on my next engine because cleaning RTV sucks, lots of time in a bath of kerosene with a wire brush. Hylomar melts off with carb cleaner.

 

I spent a while thinking about it, and I think I may have concieved of a workable fixture, but it was dependent on how well certain processes would work.

So, I tried those processes by hand. Short version - it worked extremely well, just rather time consuming. Aside from the areas on the housing where the FOD dented the chrome, the end result looks a lot like that photo. All "normal" scoring, chatter marks, and discoloration gone, just a fresh chrome surface remains.

Even with the fixture that I'm envisioning, the $125 he charges is an absolute steal given what he does for you and the expected process costs in labor, set-up time, and cleaning. Either he's got things down pat, he's charging a hell of a lot less than normal shop rates, or he's doing this as a labor of love for the rotary community.

Nothin' at all wrong with that.

 

^^ Was a compound used? Like Valve Grinding Compound?

 

I've seen a place online in Canada that does a surface thermal plasma coating of the rotor housing and then re-machines it.

The compound is Cermet, ceramic metallic i assume and from their disclaimer, it seems to be quite a successful process. They've obviously spent a little money on r&d but i was wondering if anyone has had any real life experience with their process.


Since i'm in Perth, Western Australia, it might not be too feasible for me to ship 2 housings to the other side of the globe, especially without a little more knowledge of the product. So i'm looking for someone locally that may be able to process my housings in a similar fashion. Even if it means giving up a set of housings for r&d

Not sure if this is an option anyone else here has considered. I myself think that it is the absolute ducks nuts and would much prefer to do it this way than a re-sleeve.

Cheers, Adam

p.s. since i haven't posted enough on this forum, it wont let me post a link, but do a search for jhbperformance