I'm sure many of you guys are already bored by my earlier comments on stopping engine oil leaks with oil additives designed to stop engine oil leaks and that you are probably already divided into two camps - those who don't believe it and those who have tried it. But at the risk of boring you some more, I feel a morale obligation to my fellow rotorheads, especially those on a budget, to report an experience that shows why this is worth trying, especially if your little indentation behind the 12A logo fills up about every 100 miles, as mine was.

My earlier post was about getting my first GSL, which was leaking oil like a sive. I changed the oil and that made it worse. I checked on a new engine and this would have cost almost as much as the car did ($2,100). Since the car was running fine, I decided to try something I didn't myself believe in: Engine Oil Stop Leak. I had the good fortune to try a product made by GoldenEagle, called Engine Oil Stop Leak for Brown Leaks, thick honey colored stuff. It worked, after the first oil change, the oil leak was much reduced and after adding fresh Stop Leak with each of the next three or so oil changes, the leak was all but gone - no more adding oil between oil changes.

Now I thought that was cool and did my post - a few tried it and liked it. But now, more than a year later, I've had another even more amazing experience with this stuff. The car got whacked last June at sat for a year - when I got it going again, you guessed it, it's leaking like a sive. I couldn't find any of the GoldenEagle stuff at the walmart or parts store, so I tried a different brand, which was cheaper and of much thinner consistency. It didn't work and I'm thinking this is the end. Then, in the Kmart the other day, I found some Engine Stop Leak made by STP, also very thick and more expensive. So I gave it a try and guess what. My little indention is empty after 600 miles, no more oil leak.

So, I promise I'm not getting a percentage on this. And it could save some poor rotorhead thousands of dollars. Does anybody know any reason why you SHOULDN'T do this.

Ray

 

You could just tighten the tension bolt to stop the leak also.

 

mine was leaking in exactly the same spot. i tried "wynn's" stop leak, cost me bout 10 bucks, its pretty thick stuff, didn't help at all, actually it appeared to be getting worse, my cat was smoking because of the oil spray while i was driving. i put some liquid alluminum/jb weld on it, and i'll have to see what that does, if anything when it dries. i'll try the stp stuff, see if it makes a difference.

hey nimrod, if i tighten the tension bolt, do i also have to torque all of them to the same spec?

 

I have used a product by Lucas with great success (Lucas Heavy Duty Oil Stabilizer), although not on a rotary yet. In fact, their power steering leak fix stuff fixed my Audi when everybody said nothing would work.

Lucas seems to make some damned good products in my opinion...

 

stop leak is designed to swell your seals, then they turn to mush. i've pulled a tranny apart with stopleak **** in it and it was a slimy mess and the soft seals literally fell apart. you might as well throw some straight 40 weight oil in there for the same effect.

 

I found a miracle cure for oil leaks, though it is a much different solution than an additive. My engine used to leave a 4 or 5 square inch puddle of oil in the garage every day. I have yet to figure out where the leak was coming from. A few months ago I took the advice of a fellow RX-7 owner and switched to 2-Cycle motor oil. Since then I have never seen a puff of smoke (used to smoke constantly at start up and high rpms), cold starts have been much easier, and my huge oil leak is now almost gone. Every once in a while it will leave a small drip on the ground, but that's it.

 

Now let me get this straight... You're putting 2 cycle in the engine exclusively ? Jeez... that's a new one on me. Can any of you builders chime in and add anything on the use of 2 cycle as sole lubrication for bearing surfaces AND combustion ???

 

i thought he was premixing

 

How could that possibly help his oil leaks ?

 

are you f'in serious? wow. i dunno about that but hey, how long have you been doing that?

 

Lets see... I changed my oil in January I think. I have had no problems so far, but I don't know if anything will come up. I didn't really have too much faith in the whole idea, but since my friend swore by it and I had 2 back-up engines I figured I'd give it a shot. The one I'm using it on has the most miles on it and was previously owned by a speed freak who didn't believe in tachometers, so if it decides to explode or something it won't be of much consequence.

As for why it stopped the leak, I haven't the slightest idea, but it seemed to do the trick.

 

Wouldnt tourqeing up the tension bolt over spec possibly cause some abnormal wear inside the engine as 1 bolt is tighter then the others. I have the same leak problem and was thinking about giving that top tension bolt a little snugin up but was just wondering who has done it or thought about wear on the side housings.

 

I thought these types of leaks were from failed dowel pin O-rings.

I have leaks from two housings I think, so I'm going to try some stop leak myself. I wouldn't bother, except that the engine smokes after highway runs and it's exceeded even my tolerance for ghettoness.

 

rebuild!

thats the one tru cure for leaks...all the other **** is marketing bullshit that is bad for your engine anyhow...

 

Hey Ray - thanks for the tip. My 80 weeps just enough oil at that spot to keep me in there with Simple Green every week... ;p I'll keep this in mind if it gets worse....
Stu Aull
80GS
Alaska

 

Yeh it's especially effective when the leaks are just starting, a couple of rotorhead friends have told me it fixed their minor leaks. I should note that I also use Castrol 20-50W motor oil, but this alone did'nt solve my problem until I added the stop leak. What the heck, what have you got to loose? Unless your just dying to tear that engine down and do a rebuild.

Also, for those who worry that this will dissolve your seals and destroy your engine, I've been using the stop leak in my 84 GSL for 40,000 miles now and it is running better than ever, and not leaking oil anymore. It's an original engine with 142,000 total miles and it runs like it was new (well, probably a bit better, with my modest upgrades). It's good to hear that other rotorheads have discovered this easy fix too.

Ray

 

a rebiuld is all fine well and good but I can't seem to biuld an engine that doesn't have atleast one little leak! lol



whats the verdict on the 2-cycle oil in the crankcase folks??


which oil exactly did you use?

 

I usually never have leaks! All about not having warped surfaces, clean surfaces for gaskets to work, and using pipe sealant on those high pressure oil cooler lines. It also is a good idea to not use a water to oil cooler. Those are very bad at keeping the rubber o-rings from getting too warm and aging faster. If you drive like grandma, you'll be fine though for a while.

My opinion is the water/oil cooler is good for getting the oil to operating temp quickly though! But after that point, not so good IMO.

 

I use 15w40. Is that bad?

 

Nah, I use 20w50 Royal Purple.

 

Unless you have a crap engine like mine I wouldn't suggest trying 2-cycle. We'll wait a while and see if my engine blows up

I don't remember what type I used, but I think I have it written down somewhere. I'll look for it

 

Had a 12A some years back with 118,000 on the clock. Was leaking really bad in the dowel pin seal area. Three oil changes with automatic transmission sealant and the engine went on to reach past 250,000.

 

Automatic transmission sealant in your crankcase? Never would have thought of that one!

My issue was with the oil control rings. Draining off the excess amount of oil helped to eliminate about 90% of the problem (blowing smoke during deceleration). Beware, the Haynes manual says an oil change requires 5.5 quarts in the front of the book, but in the supplement in the back it says that later models only need 4.9, so that's what messed me up. After the change the oil was so clean you could not really read the dipstick, so I didn't know that I had overfilled the system.

Lucas Heavy Duty Oil Stabilizer fixed the other 10% of my issue. IMO this stuff is awesome! I put a little bit on the end of my hedge trimmer the other day and started it up. You could actually see the stuff crawl right down the length of the blade until it was totally covered with a fine film. Normal oil doesn't even come close to moving around like this stuff does. I will be using it in everything I own from now on...

 

im new to the rx7 do u need to use a certain kind of oil

 

I've always had the best luck with castrol 20-50 every 2000 miles.