Rx7 \'engine unreliability\'

[neil_jdmr]

Are there many owners who give their car a thrashing often and have no issues with them?

Had mine coming up to 5 years now and put 25k on a jimmys rebuilt engine mapped at wgt to a safe 330fwhp. Its still running stock sequential and is a great street tuned all rounder. Not had a single problem with it and can honestly say its been the best car ive owned so me, personally doesnt buy that unreliable cack. If you treat it badly or dont research what upgrades you plan for it then yes she will bite the same as any other sports car.

[DJ Tommo]

I bought my rex with NO receipts, just a previous MOT without viewing it off eBay.... :Typing

I have covered 15-20,000 miles in it since i bought it, have used it daily (and abused it daily).... :3gears-rh

I max out the injector duty reguarly (100% and 52deg timing) from over boosting, run it down to almost empty on fuel (risking injector blockage), ran it with less than the minimum oil level (as I forgot to check it for a few months, managed to fit 3 litres in!!!), havent changed the oil at all since I bought it, just the plugs and coolant...:guinness

I have even carried out a couple of mods (air pump removal, larger rad, BOV,) and its still running.... :rollin

The clocks reading 150,000 KMs and hasnt been converted to MPH yet so unless the clock has been changed that should be accurate....:Nono!

Unreliable....My arse....:rollin


Bring on the slating for my blatant abuse and lack of maintenence for my 13B;)

[Will66]

That\'s some abuse.  Try changing the oil a bit more and making sure it\'s warmed up before you try to kill it, it\'ll probably keep coming back for more.

[jetpilot]

I\'ll bet this thread exists on every car forum globally no matter what car and i\'ll bet someone always says, at least you havent got a rotary, knowing nothing about the engine and imho the relatively low cost of repair comparatively.

I read a thread recently on Pistonheads with regard to 996 Porsche intermediate shaft or variocam issues. Apparently a common problem it would seem, but all the Porsche lovers dont want to acknowledge there is a fault and bury their head in the sand trying to blame the other owners for their driving style, history of the cars, dealers used, in fact, what ever they could blame apart from their beloved Porsche brand and admitting perhaps the design is flawed. The cost of repair is often more than our complete cars!

You cant expect a performance car to be bullet proof

[Will66]

It\'s quite telling the amount of rotaries that are involved in motorsport and the amount of engine mechanicals failures they don\'t have.  If you look after a rotary it will take immense abuse for the whole of its working life.  If you spend your time in a piston engined car nailing it at maximum rpm it will be scrap far sooner than a rotary.  Short of detonation or overboost when the rotary wears out and eventually stops starting when warm you\'ll just need to strip it, replace the warn out seals, put it back together, run it in and you can go again.

[oyvindjs]

Here is a GREAT piece of rotary racing history by the great Howard Coleman.
from rx7club.com:
"
Back in 83-89 when i was racing rotaries versus factory backed piston  engines in SCCA GT3 class one of the most significant aspects of the  rotary was that it was bullet proof. The $20,000 four valve Toyota  engines that were the primary competition were running cams that were so  radical they had about 4 thou piston to valve clearance so as to make  enough hp to run w the rotary. Over-rev 500 rpm on a shift and you had a  bushel basket of shrapnel for your $20,000.

My Roger Mandeville or Daryl Drummond motors ran from 7000 minimum to  10,000 max for the entire 35 minute race. i remember at the 83 Runoffs  at Road Atlanta asking Roger after qualifying if he thought we should  throw in a fresh motor. The motor  in the car had run 12 National races,  plus two days of practice and two days of Runoffs qualifying... Roger  asked if the motor hot started O K and i answered in the affirmative. He  laughed and said that if we liked working we could change it but it  wouldn\'t add another hp.

Try that w a piston engine.... the valve stems would be loosey goosey  leaking oil into the combustion chamber, the valve springs would be  shot, the rod bolts would be stretching etc etc.

I ran 72 National races, 5 Road Atlanta Runoffs and had one blown motor.

The circumstance of my one misfortune was after the first day of  qualifying at the Runoffs I was fourth. I asked Daryl if we might put  one more tooth (Speedway Eng quick change rear end) in the overall gear  ratio for Q2. We were pulling 10,000 at the bottom of the hill after the  long back straight… the change would add an additional 400 rpm in 5th.  Daryl said it would be 50/50 the motor would live as it had been pulling  hard from the keyhole. I gave it a shot and the motor lost a seal at  10,400. Unlike a piston motor, most of it was salvageable.

Even when wounded, racing rotaries just keep on humming. i remember  seeing Chris Dembs at the (approx) 82 Runoffs pouring oil down his Weber  carb to get his rotary started and he blew off a very strong field...

Perhaps the most demonstrative example of rotary reliability was in the  24 Hours of Daytona. During the 80s Mazda racked up a huge number of  wins in GTU and GTO over Porsche.

At the end of the 24 hours all the Mazda racers would make a point of bringing their cars into the pits and letting the engines idle  while they leisurely extricated themselves. The engines (huge  bridgeports or peripherals) would just brap brap away like they had been  on a cruise.

Bullet Proof.

The piston engine cars still running after 24 hours would idle  at about 5000 rpm. They were total junk. I use the J word literally.  After a 24 hour race most piston engines are torn down and almost all  moving parts are discarded or sold for pennies down the food chain.  

Rotaries ruled the 24 Hours in the 80s. All from a shortblock that is  approx 13 inches by 13 inches by 13 inches... w no rods to bend, no  valves to crunch, no cams to screw with no windage problems in the  crankcase....

So what happened to the FD rotary?

Turbos happened.
"