Break-in Questions for my Rebuilt motor

JDMITR98 · Post by **JDMITR98** » April 9th, 2003, 10:04 pm

I just got my R back finally after 6 months- I now have SRP oversized pistons and a mugen headgasket.
What do I need to do as far as breaking it in goes? How many miles should I wait before getting on it? When is it safe to race it?

Thank you- I just don't want it to break yet again.

pic's-
http://www.msnusers.com/jdmitr98

DontBlink · Post by **DontBlink** » April 9th, 2003, 10:29 pm

your probably gonna get a ton of different responses on this one. heres mine. i have 1500 miles on my motor right now(GE sleeved block,endyne roller wave pistons,eagle rods,etc) i started the car for like 20 minutes or until it was heated up and then i changed the oil do clean out all the moly lube or and loose metal shavings there were hidin in the motor , then i drove it varying the rpms(meaning i didnt get on a long highway and drive it at a constant rpm for a long period of time) shifting at 4k after 200 miles i took it to 5k and so on still varying the rpms i changed my oil at 500 miles and then 1000 miles. so thats what i did and i havent had any problems so far. good luck.

Type R 98 · Post by **Type R 98** » April 9th, 2003, 10:37 pm

when i broke mine in on a rebuilt motor i was told by the dealer mechanics to rev it no further than 4500 rpm, i'd even consider not going over 4000... for 1200 miles.. they changed the oil once and i changed it after 1200 miles, what ever works for you though...

Aj · Post by Aj » April 10th, 2003, 2:55 am

Well, I'm gonna agree with the run it for 20 mins and change the oil, it's not a bad idea, though not completely necesary, I'd actually push it another like 15 mins, cause it takes a new motor a while to get to operating temperature and burn all the crap of in your motor.

In all honesty, about the whole break in thing, assuming everything is fit correctly, the quality of machining these days really doesn't require any break in. It's really more along the lines of dated american cars where the rings needed time to seat, and there needed to be a little carbon build up here and there to fill in some of the gaps. In all real terms, we build race motors for some of the ITR guys locally, and well try and tell them that they should take the first lap or two around the track nice and light durring test and tune, but by about 3/4 of the way around turn six at homestead miami speedway, you can hear a 9500 rpm Vtec pass, so you can tell how well they listen. Any way, point being, so far we have yet to blow one up from not breaking it in. keep in mind though, on the other side of the coin, we're also not expecting to get 40-50K miles out of one of these motors either.

I'm personally pretty paranoid about stuff going wrong, especially in my street car, I usually change the oil at about 700 miles, then again every 500 miles untill I hit 3,000 miles, at that point I switch to synthetic, let it run through for a couple days, maybe a couple hundred miles or so, then start to get on it. As long as you're not pushing it above 4K durring your break in period, you should have no problems. The other advatage for breaking it in for longer is that you'll be able to hear any suddel noises that you might not hear just driving it normally. It's one of those things that's sort of a test and feel thing. You'll notice that the car drives a little differently after like a month or two of break in, at that point, if you have like 2200 or something like that, It's fine to blast away, a couple hundred miles here or there is no big deal. You're really better of making all the miles durring break in city driving, cause as the guys mentioned, you really should be varying the rpm. Any way

Later,
Aj

JDMITR98 · Post by **JDMITR98** » April 11th, 2003, 1:49 pm

Thank You! The guy who bulit my motor told me that after 100 miles he wanted me to get on it - nothing above 7 rpm- every once in a while. So to make a long story short, I got on it for the first time last night and well now the motor is leaking oil from somewhere

So tonite when I get off work I am going to have to figure it out- but I know its not from the headgasket so that is good. And what kind of oil do you recomend that I put in after 500 miles? I bought synthtic mobil 1.

Aj · Post by Aj » April 11th, 2003, 3:06 pm

No, don't use synthetic yet, you need to get some wear on the motor. You want to use organic for at least a couple thousand miles, whether you're breaking it in or not.

As far as leaking oil, check your oil pan gasket a lot of times people dont seal them very well and they leak. It's no big deal, you just have to silicon it if it is...

Later,
Aj

JDMITR98 · Post by **JDMITR98** » April 14th, 2003, 4:26 pm

Aj- what kind of oil do you recomed that I use? Valvoline? Mobil 1? Just plain old 30?

Aj · Post by Aj » April 14th, 2003, 9:03 pm

I'm a big mobil fan, so on break in I use just normal Mobil 5W30 and after break in, I go to Mobil1. Out of all the oils i've used, it seems that Motul performs the best, second to that, amsoil. Though, they are a good deal more expensive, and unless you have a dealer near you, may take a while to get.

Any way,
Aj

JDMITR98 · Post by **JDMITR98** » April 16th, 2003, 12:30 am

Thank You very much for all of your help!!

After how long can I run full synthic?

Aj · Post by Aj » April 16th, 2003, 12:34 am

I'd waite for at least a couple thousand miles, minimum 2K.

B2FiNiTY · Post by **B2FiNiTY** » April 17th, 2003, 12:49 pm

I waited till 10k for synthetic.

I recommend Castrol GTX 10w30 for regular oil. That stuff is the best.

Aj · Post by Aj » April 17th, 2003, 2:41 pm

To each his own with oil, but as far a 10K miles to switch, that's a bit much. You really just want to allow your rings to seat a and bearings to sit in before you switch, which at most is about 5K and that's being really really conservative....

Later,
Aj