What is with Rod Bearings dying?

[Erron Spalsbury]

My best guess would honestly be there was some type of debris that came loose or that is was so small in size (think aluminum powder) that the damage began right away but took a long time to finally spin. I would suspect it be during the cleaning process something was overlooked. It happens all the time. I've seen everything from the crank to the lifters not being properly flushed clean. Even the galley's on the heads being missed a number of times. I've clean out the oil cooler on my car as well. It took about 4 cans of brake cleaner and about 50 coffee filters to finally see nothing coming out.

I've only spun one ever. It was on a right hand turn in the middle of a race. I thought I was in 3rd coming out of the corner, nope, 2nd. 8700 rpm and 22psi is what did it for me. It was probably a combo of both the high rpm and the oil in suspension not getting back to the pickup quick enough. This was also on a shimmed oil pump with Crower rods. Since then i've gone to adding an additional quart of oil, yes, too much. But in a high rpm enviroment, it has work great over the last 3 years of racing.

Erron S.

[wraith]

Dont look to far away from the actual rebuild as the culprit. All of the issues with oil returning to the pan, viscosity etc., were designed when you biught the car by Mitsubishi to provide a long healthy life. If your pushing the engine way outside of operating range then some of these things might need addressing. However, you have not subjected it to huge power outputs and we assume it was never starved of oil, either during first startup or during the first 5000 miles. I hear many people on 3si suggest running heavier weight oils in these motors as a preventative measure, and I would argue that doing this may even accelerate engine deterioration, not extend its life.
I opted to just replace my short block with a new factory one to reduce down-time and remove incompetence from the picture, but if I knew of a reasonable shop that I could trust to do the work, I would have had a forged engine put in. Grooms sounds pretty reasonable for what they do. I would expect a good rebuild would survive at least as long as a typical stock motor. My original was still good at 117k miles when it was replaced and I never did anything in terms of maintenance but replace the oil pump when the 60k was done, and change the oil every 3000 miles with good synthetic at stock viscosity 10-30w.

[Mikes95RT]

This has to be long..( sorry.)

Let be give you some info that you guys might just look right over but it's food for thought. I have built quite a few aircooled VW motors.Some making 5 times the stock power.The AC VW world is one of the largest aftermarkets when it comes to cars period. Some of the parts that the serious guys build make the best 3s parts look like a kindergarderner pounded them out. Not to be crass but I'm talking guys who have been at this for 40 years so yeah they have their life devoted to it. Not taking away from our fabricators.

The guru. The guy who worked for one of the first VW dealers in the US when they imported the bug..the same guy who took a show room stock car and rebuilt the motor(Remember, this motor made a whopping 36 h.p.) a week before the Germans were coming to the dealer to train the mechanics. He said he took his car and made it "better". On a test drive the German engineers basically freaked out.They sent it back to the shop and every engineer drove the car.They sent for people to come from Germany to come drive this car. It wasn't long until this man.Gene Berg was taking this little 36 H.P. bug and modifying it to beat the crap out of any muscle car he rolled up on. He spent his whole life devoted to racing and developing parts.Even more he worked at finding what killed these motors. You have to think..air cooled.The oil is the lube and takes heat from a motor that runs hot to start with.VW's don't have oil filters.They have screens on the pick up that strain the large particles from the oil. Gene found that putting anything on the oil pick up tube and forcing the pump to suck the oil through it really harmed the ability for the pump to do it's job.However,converting the filter to a modern type filter so the filter was after the pump decreased the strain on the pump.These screens were not that restrictive to start with but really overworked the pump.Our strainer is basically the same thing.What Gene did after adding the new filter after the pump was to remove the screen all together.To catch metal he added a Cow magnet clamped to the pick up tube.Now the pump(oil)has no resistance.The oil pressure was greatly increased. Problem is the magnet will NOT pick up alluminum or brass.However a larger screen that was less restrictive could catch some particles.

Our sump screen is close to the pan.The holes are small and I can't help but think from knowing how bad it is for the AC VW that it can't be good for our car that has oil delivery,oil pump problems. I don't think I would trust hacking off the sump screen and going with only a magnet but maybe something with more surface area and larger holes along with a magnet may make a great difference.

If someone made a greater capacity pan with a less restrictive sump screen I think you would see a great increase with oil pressure and less wear on the oil pump that shouldn't be sucking oil through a restriction.

Sorry this is so long but I needed to explain my source.Gene devoted his life to cars and his writing are much more than babble and I've found much of his research to hold true to any automobile.I think the more oil to the bearings at pressure can't be anything but good.

[havok91]

Originally Posted by ruben2566

Coating the bearings is a waste of money. If they needed to be coated the manufacturer would have done it. The engine bottom end starves for oil because the oil is being pumped up to the heads, and if it doesn't return quick enough the rod bearings are first to go when the sump runs out of oil.

You never addressed IF THE BEARINGS DO GET STARVED. Any increase in lubricity on the bearing surface will help. On a somewhat macroscopic level, the coating resembles a sponge. This somewhat porous substrate retains oil. A super smooth, slick metal will not. The adherence of the oil in the coating will save a bearing. Look up David Vizard--renowned engine builder and engineer. He swears by them. Why don't the manufacturers supply bearings with coatings? They don't? Look at Mahle's website (they own Clevite, bytheway). Here's a link: www.engineparts.com/p_heavyduty_bearings.asp
Ah, here's a quote from their website: "The exclusive Clevite® TriArmor™ engine bearings feature the industry's only engine moly/graphite treatment. This sophisticated blend, in a low friction PTFE polymer base, offers extraordinary protection and lubricity. Enhanced wear characteristics increase bearing life in race engines and high performance street engines. [TriArmor™ Link]
Now, high performance engine builders can enjoy the strength and durability of the legendary Clevite® TriMetal™ bearing construction coupled with the latest in coating technology - right out of the box."

A manufacturer offering coated bearings? According to you, if a bearing needed to be coated, the manufactuerer would do it. Unfortunatley, from Clevite, this is not for our specific application--hell, I can't find any manufacturers who offer coated bearing for us. We don't drive chevys! Therefore, we need look elsewhere--only if we want the added protection.
I'm not spending my time to machine, assemble and install my motor only to have the bearings have a potential to weld themselves to my new crank. Since we only have the option for a stock/replacment oil pump, keeping tight clearances and a surplus of oil (deeper sump as I said earlier) are the obvious crutches to aid oil supply (I'm, however, looking into dry sump oiling). I didn't want to pontificate too much about coatings, but, they will help. Do some research, read some engineering papers or periodicals on the stuff. You can also look at many of the racing circles. You will find coatings. It always takes time for technology to trickle down to the mass market. Is it worth the money? For me yes.

[chargerx3]

Many things help like coatings, fresh oil, dependable machinest, a not so itchy foot, a good last minute prayer.The truth of the matter is that the fatory replacements are very capible of giving you many years and miles of dependability if installed PROPERLY.

Remember that there are members on here with stockers that have over 300k on them and still run like hell. I have 270k on mine and she works just great.

...on a side note I must admit that im fairly new to the 3si scene, but have had plenty of experience with vintage muscle. I have yet to do a complete tear down on my 3s's(and really dont look forward to it), but I wonder how dependable these cars really are. I mean people run into problems right and left, but when they finally discover the issue its usually due to neglegence, or being a tight wad. Are these cars really that bad, or are we the mechanics, or the mechanics we dump them off to, the ones with the issue?

just some food for thought.

[silky]

wo what you are saying is we need a more pourace screen that can still trap metal....a magnatized screen?

[scrapiron7]

Originally Posted by chargerx3

I mean people run into problems right and left, but when they finally discover the issue its usually due to neglegence, or being a tight wad. Are these cars really that bad, or are we the mechanics, or the mechanics we dump them off to, the ones with the issue?

just some food for thought.

I think a large part of the problems and bad rep for these cars come from poor, young owners who can't afford to upkeep their car or properly fix them, so the cars end up breaking and getting a bad name.

[Patryn]

In my case though, not sure, car drove fine for 5k, drove it to the shop, then it blew a bearing on the dyno. Only addition, was timing control for the MAFT Pro everything else being the same that could have affected anything. Anyways, I won't know which bearing it is until I pull the engine apart. Hopefully it didin't turn to badly on the crank.

[UTRacerX9]

Just something to keep in mind guys, ALL cars are capable of spinning bearings. It happens to Porsche, Chevy, DSM cars, Mercedes... I know of examples from all of these makers.

That being said, there's nothing magical about our engines. Perhaps we get more than our fair share of spun rod bearings (my first car spun one at 59k) but I tend to believe that poor maintenance and human error are the cause for most of these failures.

Here's an old thread regarding drilling the crank for extra lubrication (to my knowledge no one has done it yet, and this goes back to 2004.)

Cross Drilling the crank - stop spun bearings ?

[chargerx3]

Originally Posted by UTRacerX9

Just something to keep in mind guys, ALL cars are capable of spinning bearings. It happens to Porsche, Chevy, DSM cars, Mercedes... I know of examples from all of these makers.

That being said, there's nothing magical about our engines. Perhaps we get more than our fair share of spun rod bearings (my first car spun one at 59k) but I tend to believe that poor maintenance and human error are the cause for most of these failures.

Here's an old thread regarding drilling the crank for extra lubrication (to my knowledge no one has done it yet, and this goes back to 2004.)

Cross Drilling the crank - stop spun bearings ?

Nice read. I would like to see how one of our cars would do with this mod. I would be worried about long term longevity of the crank under strong loads. I would also only do this to the later forged cranks.