now i know i dont post a lot on this site but i do read it alot now heres some questions that could offend some and will probably open debate or not here goes.
why on earth would you do a breakin for 1000 to 1500 miles on a junk rich "tune" attempting to stay out of boost. the way i see it that overly rich condition for 1000 miles will kill your engine more than the "benefit" of 1g breakin will give you. what i wasw planning on doing once i stack my moter is run extreme light to no premix on first tank not over set rpm yada yada yada as it goes for 300 to 500 miles max at that time i will check compression in relation to what fresh rebuild compression was and go from there.
now on the the "no boost for breakin" why are you running a turbo at all then during this time, a quick adapter from your manifold to downpipe would eliminate that problem for your breakin or even n/a headers. i see the benefit of not having to worry about as many dont do's as possible a good thing. now i may be wrong but thats just my opinion. but for those cheap people out there an open waste gate i think would do the job just fine as well
just my 2 cents im open for opinions
z

 

Well... Your opinion is silly.

Just stay out of boost. What's so hard about that?

Plus, who ever said anything about a "junk rich tune"? A rich condition won't do JACK to your motor in 1000 miles aside from *maybe* fouling your plugs...

Then again, you do whatever you want. Fab up an "adapter", throw on some "N/A headers", disconnect your WG (although you'll still see boost), whatever. It's still just a good idea to be careful with a fresh motor.

 

i dont see how it wont touch yyour engine only your plugs. i mean isnt that the point of looking at plugs to help you diagnose what the rest of your combustion chamber looks like or what its doing, honestly now. i plan on running n/a headers on mine regardless i actually have other body and driveline things to tend to as well anyway. before i deal with boost.
later
z

 

Drive that fresh motor around the block a few times, park it and change the oil, then go out and lay into the throttle and tune the thing. You are overthinking this IMO.

 

i'm with this guy ^^ I've seen more cars with low compression after 1k babied miles because the seals never seat, or in the case of piston rings, they never fit to the bore properly. You need heat and pressure to season the engine. I would put like 20 miles on an engine, change the oil to get all the crap out of the system, flush the coolant, then treat it like you're ready to go...tune it and beat the **** out of it like its meant to be!

 

I'm going to stick with the 1k miles of easy driving, over the "beat the crap out of from day 1" idea. Some boost while in the breakin period is fine, but no 15+ psi dyno runs on a new engine. Just my .02, CJ

 

I agree with the idea of a quick header or NA manifold to break it in NA for a while. It will allow a better seat-in time. Then slowly add boost when you put your turbo on.

However, I feel that you need the oil there during break in. Yes, you are putting an initial wear on the parts, but the oil is needed to lubricate for that. If not, it causes recrystallization in the metals, can glaze, and just plain wear wrong. Oil is essential. If you learn how to tune properly, you wont have a "junk rich tune"

 

I agree, Piston engines tend to benefit from "hard break ins."

Can you prove that rotaries do, too? Because I have never seen it.

 

builild your engine properly, keep your specs at the tight end of the mazda specs, with new housings, and new seals, lapp your side housing's. use premix for the first couple of tanks and vary your rpm, load, and boost over 600 miles starting at low load, low rpm and low boost and gradually work your way up to WOT/full boost by the time you hit 600 miles.

this is more than the required break-in for a bebuild if you have done your engine correctly.

if you are using sloppy /no tolerances or lots of used parts with marginal tolerances, then you might want to stretch it out over 1000 miles, but regardless by the time you hit the 1000 mile mark you should be experiencing full boost and WOT on a regular basis.

You should not be babying it still at 1000 miles. my experience is from 12 years of N/A 1st gen racing, and the last 8 years playing with turbo engines in my cosmo. I am currently rebuilding my first 13bt (prior to this it was all just 13b n/a's and while the turbo is a power adder, the breakin is close enough.


kenn

 

well its good to see that there are people out there that dont believe in the 1000 to 1500 and i actually like the 20 miles change oil and run but i myself prolly wont do that. now thaough with a little insight and debat ill prolly end up at 100 miles or there about start with the dyno tune street tune for that 100. cause ill be really pissed at all the money i spent and cant beat it till then.
later
z

 

I totally agree with Kenn on this. Although I have not dipped into my rotary(yet ), piston engines, particularily perf engines break in well by changing load which forces the piston rings into the cylinder wall and seats them well. You really need to do this on chromemoly rings.... they either seat or they dont in alot of cases. Moderatley getting on the gas to about 4000-4500 then backing off the throttle completley letting the engine break works well IMO. Then slowly progressing to full passes after you have made some time on the engine. You wouldn't have to do this for 600 miles straight on a piston engine but the rotary would be a little more complex with the corners seals and side seals and such. Kenn's theory is how I was planning on breaking in my motor if I get it apart here before spring.

I used to have a hi perf 400 chev that I built and the first time I broke it in I was pretty ginger on it. Then I oil starved it(long story). So I fixed it and the second time I took it out.....I hammered the crap out of that thing! I dont think I will try that this time..... to much to go wrong.

 

Using a header and waiting to install the turbo later is a lot of work that is easy to avoid by just managing your foot for a little while (should you choose to stay out of boost for any length of time). Break-in goes quickly if you have been waiting to drive the car for a long time.

-Max

 

Ok... Don't get me wrong, I know of a guy who let the car idle for 30 minutes, drove around the block a couple times and then took it to redline under boost... It was *kind of* an expirement, but it's worked thus far (for the guy).

On the other hand, what is so hard about waiting 1000+ miles before taking the car to redline/running full boost? If you're using older housings, it's necessary to allow the apex seals time to wear down into the housing's groove pattern. If you're compression is great (like you're using NEW housings) by all means, do a shorter break-in...

I too have heard the 'piston rings' need a quick break-in, and "you won't achieve full compression unless you beat the **** out of your fresh rebuild", but that is simply an opinion held by people familiar with piston motors... Apex-seals are NOT piston-rings.

Whatever, the "guru's" that I'm familiar with all recommend at least 1500 miles to allow the compression a chance to level-off before ripping on a rotary. Do I WANT to rip on my TII after a week without driving it, while it has a fresh rebuild? Of course! Have I done that? No. Why? Because eventually rebuilding gets tiresome and expensive, and I'm willing to go the extra length to be SAFE.

 

Go 500 miles real easy, very little boost, but varied RPM, then progressively go a little harder on RPM/boost (not more than 10 psi), and not abusively. Change oil. Drive as usual.

 

For the different motors I've had over the years (12a, 13B peripherals, 13B large street port, 13B mild street port) Rob@Pineapple allways had me do less than 4k rpms for the first 500 miles, then slowly uping the RPMs until hitting redline at 1k miles. I've never had a engine fail on me due to a poor break in. All the motors i've had fail on me where my own fault. Like a nut dropping down into the engine, or the nitrous cylnoid sticking on, etc. CJ

 

On my rebuild I kept rpm's pretty low >4500 for the first 350 miles, and ran moderately from 350 up, no Hi-boost, but after about 450 just let her have it. Haven't ran to redline yet, but only have about 950 miles on the rebuild(all new seals, and rotor housings, but old bearings, Ive heard an old bearing is better than a new one, unless its very warn), I've had other problems, leaking oil injector lines, and broken diff mount so I haven't really got to drive it much, and usually get a speeding ticket when I do. I'm interested to see how long it runs, before I break an apex seal, because it will probably happen. But the motor has ran great, started everytime when cold(flooding prob), and runs great! I hope it last a good 70K! We'll see!?
I'd like to hear more about a short break-in VS Long break-in? If your using used engine seals with new ones, give it some time, but if its all new give it some time. I don't say go out and Boost the heck out of it, but drive it sensibly and work your way up. I have no idea what I'm talking about though...
Old People know about engines because they are old, like the engines and have the wisdom of seeing a rebuild, needing a rebuild.