Does the RX7Club have a listing of good mechanics that will work on RX7's? I need someone with experience to analyze my 1st gen so I know if its worth the trouble to keep fiddling with it or tell me its got major problems.

 

just discribe ur issues and we'll all pitch in to try and help. there's alot of guys on here with many yrs of experience concerning rotaries. and welcome to the club. i'm sure someone on here from ur area will chime in with any known mechanics in Tenn.

 

Ok. Two issues. I have the dreaded white smoke on startup. I know about the engine seals from reading the forum. Engine has 145K on it and I took good care of it and did all my own mx. My guess is the OMP stopped working at some point, because I recently replaced the clear tubes connecting it to the carb (because one was leaking) and the new ones show no visible oil in them after some driving. I will start putting a pint of 2 cycle in each tank now in case the seals are not completely gone. My feeling on this is, if the only consequence at this point is that it burns more oil and smokes on startup, I can live with that.
Second issue: The carb is apparently gummed up inside because once in a while the float really sticks and I get pools of visible gas in the carb barrels after shut down, making it impossible to start until the gas evaporates. It also idles rough. The idle problem clears up when I spray a small amount of something flammable down the carb, which points to a lean condition and possibly a vacuum leak. I took it to my regular mechanic in Memphis, who is good with imports, and he told me what was wrong but that he could not work on it. So I primarily want to fix the carb first so that it stops the flooding routine and makes it more reliable, then I will deal with whether I want to fix the engine seals or just limp it along until it dies. Either way, I would like to find a mech to do the carb work initially.
Hope all that was clearer than mud.

 

there's a guy on here the i've read does wonders with the stock niki carb. his user id is sterling, ie. sterling carbs. if the smoke on start up clears up shorly after it's running, the yes it's probably the oil seals, which can only be solved with a rebuild. but it's kinda blueish, tho. white smoke will be coolant seals, which doesn't clear up. the proper 2 cycle mix has been covered on here also.

 

The coolant seal comment has me wondering. It does use a little coolant over time. Where are those located and how hard are they to repair?

 

inside the engine. you would need to do a rebuild to repair them aswell. if you want to do the cheap way out, you could tear it down, replace the coolant seals, and put it back together. the problem with that is everything must go back in the exact same place it came from. plus, it's so cheap to rebuild(if you do it yourself) that it is pointless to tear down without doing a full rebuild.

 

one quick thing to check before deciding on tearing up the whole engine, is to take the intake manifold off and check the O rings coming from the engine into the manifold, these may be brittle and hopefully that's where your coolant leak is, also, if you feel like you need to, go ahead and replace the gasket there, it may also get rid of your vacuum leak, a way to find out is to spray some carb cleaner (it works better than wd-40) around the intake manifold to find where the leak is at, you might be able to basically kill two birds with 1 stone.


edit: i forgot to ask, i didn't see it posted, what year is your car? the repairs i mentioned are for first gens, so i'm not sure how well it'll apply to a 13b.

 

Thanks blackdeath. Yes its an 85 12a. Can you clarify the carb cleaner comment? I have heard people say this but when I spray a quick shot of carb cleaner anywhere near the carb intake the engine chokes and sputters. So what exactly am I listening for when I spray it on that gasket interface? I have tried this and its done nothing, which I guess is a good thing, but I'm not sure what a bad thing would look like.

 

usually it'll just make the revs go up, and you can listen to the engine, if you spray it and it "accelerates" then that's where your vacuum leak is at, spray it where the manifold bolts to the engine, all around it, and where the carb bolts to the manifold, also, there's a vacuum line, hooks up to the manifold near the exhaust, and it often gets burnt up. so check that hose. https://www.rx7club.com/1st-generation-specific-1979-1985-18/hose-question-750125/



also, check this section of the forum https://www.rx7club.com/1st-generation-specific-1979-1985-18/ most of your questions can be answered there, just make sure you do some sort of search, and read the FAQ page before asking questions, or you'll get lots of **** for it.