Whats The Best Way Of Running In A New Engine Or A Rebuilt Engine

[R31Nismoid]

Not saying he had a bad reputation.

But obviously something has been overlooked. Motors dont spin bearings due t "run in".

[Simon-S14]

like wise, seems like an oilcontrol issue there.

but yeah, we're not saying thrash the shit out of a fresh engine, just dont baby it whatever you do, besure to use most of the rev range and keep the boost to factory levels and load it up up hills often. this is how i have run in several engines in the past (rotors and piston engines) and ive never had a single issue with them.

someone posted the link, but seriously click it and read all about it.

HERE

[STATUS]

HAHA bed the rings in (use str8 mineral oil) for a few hundred km's.... then bag the shit out of it. We drove cats car (9k SR20 build) to mt buller... dropped the oil then road tuned it fully (1.5bar) on the way back the next day, never missed a beat.

Not exactly relevant but:

Ever seen them break in a comp engine at the moto gp or F1? few small revs then 5mins of 2000-redline-2000-redline-2000-redline-and so and so on... crazy shit. Sounds nuts, i was nearly deafened

Edited June 11, 2007 by URAS

[STATUS]

  SECUR1TY said:

this guy has a good reputation in the european car industry. hes one of the few builders in syd.

well it just took a nose dive..... run in wasnt the cause.

[Leewah]

From what I know and what I've seen on my engines and others:

Complete building engine

Install engine and ancillaries

Dyno tune run in. Ie. Run for about 20 mins varying the rev ranges and acceleration and deceleration levels. We were revving my car out to about 5500rpm

After the dyno run in, load in required engine tune

Put the foot to the floor and start pulling max power runs! FYI, with one of my engines before AutoSalon, we were pulling 450rwkw runs within the first 3 power runs and eventually settled at 632rwkw after about 9 runs and pulled it back slightly. After AutoSalon, we wound the car back to 380awkw and the engine was fine.

Good builds and good tunes, care when warming up and some sympathy lead to longevity of the engine. Once the engine is warm, it should be able to handle whatever you dish out at it within reason.

[arep3]

this will be discussed at length with my mechanic and i will pm him this thread. thanks to all for your imput. thanks to the topic starter as a lot of questions doubts worries etc have been answered.

Cheers, Ron

[Al]

Just a quick question, as i will soon be in the same situation:

How do you warm the engine? Sounds silly, but i want to clear it up. Do you just start the engine and let it idle till it reaches 60deg or so. Or start engine, start driving straight away, but taking it VERY easy till it reaches temp, then drive it hard(ish), within reason.

Once my car is back i plan to load it up with about 100kg in each passenger footwell (300kg), then take the back streets to Kinglake and surrounding areas, do an oil and filter change once i get home, then do it all again the next day.

It will be too hard to convince my mechanic to bed the engine in on the dyno then do a full power run and tune 20mins later. His build, his rules, his time and money should something go wrong

[monga]

my rb26dett got rebuilt about 15,000km ago and I just went up the hills in 5th changing it up with load, worked good. dropped the oil at 200km, then regular changes

[Leewah]

Personally, I after I start the car, I let it sit there for about 1 or 2 mins and then take it onto the street so that the fluids can circulate. Since I live in Richmond though, I've got traffic most of the day anyway so the car just sits and idles in peak hour traffic. I have always found that the temps come up a lot quicker if the car is moving. When I first hit the roads, I change gears at under 3000rpm and once the water temp gets to the middle of the gauge and I see the oil temp gauge get to to about 65 degrees, I think it's ready for some punishment. Usually, that's within about 10 mins of city driving depending on external conditions.

I did do an engine oil change after about 100kms of "running in" but didn't change the oil filter until the 1st service.

  Al said:

How do you warm the engine? Sounds silly, but i want to clear it up. Do you just start the engine and let it idle till it reaches 60deg or so. Or start engine, start driving straight away, but taking it VERY easy till it reaches temp, then drive it hard(ish), within reason.

Once my car is back i plan to load it up with about 100kg in each passenger footwell (300kg), then take the back streets to Kinglake and surrounding areas, do an oil and filter change once i get home, then do it all again the next day.

It will be too hard to convince my mechanic to bed the engine in on the dyno then do a full power run and tune 20mins later. His build, his rules, his time and money should something go wrong

[SECURITY]

  URAS said:

well it just took a nose dive..... run in wasnt the cause.

actually.. come to think about it, the bearings on the m3's are REALLY thin. the crank wasnt re-ground and new bearings were put in.

im sure that would need for the bearings to bed in to some extent. i guess on a fresh rebuild with the crank reground it would have less of an effect.

im just regurgitating information i was fed.

[r33_racer]

Nearly had it there security.

If you have the appropriate clearances for bearings, piston to bore and ring end gaps, you dont need to bed the engine in, you can just go and thrash it without any issues. However if you run tight clearances for bearings, piston to bore and rings then you have to do the whole run in process for fricken 1000-1500 kms. Before anymore misconception goes on, people should have an understanding of how it all works. If you take a rebuilt motor with tight clearances, and try and thrash it, it will shit itself! 9 times out of 10 it will be a spun bearing.

Tight specs means run in required, loose specs mean you can thrash it straight away. Road cars for instance are almost always rebuilt with tight clearances, while race engines or high horsepower engines will be built with looser clearances as they are expected to be thrashed and not run in as most race cars cant be driven on public roads.

URAS, f1 engines are built for a short lifespan. There clearances would be spot on for instant full noise racing. Once a motor is built, their run in is as you say it, and after that its probably tune check and then go for gold. Once that race or two are over its a new motor again.

Edited June 11, 2007 by r33_racer

[STATUS]

  r33_racer said:

URAS, f1 engines are built for a short lifespan. There clearances would be spot on for instant full noise racing. Once a motor is built, their run in is as you say it, and after that its probably tune check and then go for gold. Once that race or two are over its a new motor again.

yeah thats why i said not exactly relevant.... i build a lot of engines and if you do it right they dont need much bedding in (1500 is way overkill), machine tolerances are 100 times better than what they were.... gone are the days where you have to wipe bearings to get em exact. Shit i get each bore finished to suit each piston and filter through a pile of bearings (maybe up to 4 boxes) to find as close to perfect as i can get.

Edited June 12, 2007 by URAS

[Beer Baron]

  Al said:

Just a quick question, as i will soon be in the same situation:

How do you warm the engine? Sounds silly, but i want to clear it up. Do you just start the engine and let it idle till it reaches 60deg or so. Or start engine, start driving straight away, but taking it VERY easy till it reaches temp, then drive it hard(ish), within reason

al, the worst possible way to warm up a car is to let it sit and idle till it's up to temp. especialyl bad if it's a fresh engine. for any engine the best process is:

start car.

wait 20secs or so ensure oil pressure is up and everything is cool.

start driving.

take it fairly gently until oil temp is over 70 and water temp is over 70.

then you can give it some stick.

so in short the best way to get a car up to temp is by driving it. don't forget your gearbox also need to come up to temp and tha'ts not happening whilst car is idling in garage, same goes for diff (and transfer case if you have one) and brakes etc.

[Abo Bob]

  r33_racer said:

Nearly had it there security.

If you have the appropriate clearances for bearings, piston to bore and ring end gaps, you dont need to bed the engine in, you can just go and thrash it without any issues. However if you run tight clearances for bearings, piston to bore and rings then you have to do the whole run in process for fricken 1000-1500 kms. Before anymore misconception goes on, people should have an understanding of how it all works. If you take a rebuilt motor with tight clearances, and try and thrash it, it will shit itself! 9 times out of 10 it will be a spun bearing.

Tight specs means run in required, loose specs mean you can thrash it straight away. Road cars for instance are almost always rebuilt with tight clearances, while race engines or high horsepower engines will be built with looser clearances as they are expected to be thrashed and not run in as most race cars cant be driven on public roads.

URAS, f1 engines are built for a short lifespan. There clearances would be spot on for instant full noise racing. Once a motor is built, their run in is as you say it, and after that its probably tune check and then go for gold. Once that race or two are over its a new motor again.

I was thinking along these lines. What piston to bore clearances did you use on your GTR Leewah?

For my 2c I told my engine builder my planned run in process (which I had got from someone else and involved about 5000 k's) and he told me load it up where possible, vary the revs as much as possible, increase the revs gradually over the k's and I should be redlining it occasionally by the time I got to about 500k's. He said if it's going to blow up he wants it to happen within 500 k's.

I certainly noticed the tightness as first and it didn't fully free up until about 1000 k's. I have tight clearances though. 2.5 thou piston to bore.

[Leewah]

  Abo Bob said:

I was thinking along these lines. What piston to bore clearances did you use on your GTR Leewah?

I honestly don't know. The engine was already built by the time I got to the factory and it was in the car. I'm not one for the really technical stuff. I just posted what I saw but my engine still seems to be going strong after 6 months

[Bass Junky]

Hi Load, lowish revs.

Take it to the longest hill you can find, load her up.

don't let it shudder, let it work.

[Al]

Thanks guys!!

Appreciate the info and clearing that up for me.

[tridentt150v]

  Beer Baron said:

al, the worst possible way to warm up a car is to let it sit and idle till it's up to temp. especialyl bad if it's a fresh engine. for any engine the best process is:

start car.

wait 20secs or so ensure oil pressure is up and everything is cool.

start driving.

take it fairly gently until oil temp is over 70 and water temp is over 70.

then you can give it some stick.

so in short the best way to get a car up to temp is by driving it. don't forget your gearbox also need to come up to temp and tha'ts not happening whilst car is idling in garage, same goes for diff (and transfer case if you have one) and brakes etc.

^^^^ This is correct, I don't know of a car manufacturer that doesn't recommend this method now. They all say the best warm up is normal driving.

[Italiazr1]

sorry guys havent been on sice i started the post.

i would be interested in arep3's mechanics advice and how you go with your "run in"

i havent really askd my mechanic the best way yet but im pretty sure he said take it easy for the first 1000

i will ask him in detail...

let me know how you go my car is about a month and a bit away still he just started ordering parts.

do you guys really think its necessary to change the oil at like 200km?

i guess it would be good cause you get rid of all the shavings but i thought it would be only done at 1000 - 1500 mark and that was it??

[SECURITY]

ive been told to do it at the first 500, then again at the 1000, then from then every 5000 as per usual.