We need to hire a Japanese sword smith to make us some apex seals.

A core of shock resistant lower carbon steel with a high carbon working edge, differentially heat treated into martensite and pearlite and polished to perfection.

Maybe they need the work since the number of swords they can make/sell a year is capped by the government.

Its pretty crazy that you could have had better apex seals made 1,500 years ago than you can now.

 

yeah but instead of $55 each it would be like $550 each!

 

i'd reccomend RA super seals, i used RA super seals on my old FC for about 5-6k miles or so and when i had to open the motor due to a premature coolant seal failure, the housings were still in great condition and so were the apex seals, just make sure you premix a little more than you would with other seals, i also have a friend with an FD who had his motor built by norm from jacksonville FL and he's running RA super seals, and has about 15-20k miles on that motor now and the car still starts right up as if it still has perfect compression, and he's running a 400whp setup. I honestly think the people here who got deep scratched housings from these seals must have somehow got a bad batch of the super seals, or got knock-off's because I ordered my seals directly from RA and never had a single problem with them.

 

ceramic seals are the best compromise, but for turbo engines pushing gobs of power i still don't really recommend them. in n/a applications you will never find a more durable seal with the least wear characteristics. mazda used them for their race endurance engines due to those facts, Pettit also won a few endurance series with ceramics.

in an n/a engine you could probably buy 1 set of ceramic seals for your whole lifetime, regardless of how much abuse you put them through.

 

Wonder if any of these non-OEM apex seals are made in a Chinese steak knife plant. Lol

 

...Or bad air filter...

 

+1

 

Would only a dirty air filter be considered a bad one , or is a low quality air filter considered a bad one as well?

I bought a purolator air filter for my stock air box just to use temporarily, didn't think it would be a big deal.

I'm sure there are much worse quality ones on eBay with their "cold air intake" kits, purolator at least is a major company.

I plan to get a k&n drop in soon after its running.

Rotary >Pistons

 

K&N's flow ok, but they do not filter that well, if anything the cheap paper filter filters better.

just from my experience, the HKS doesn't filter at all, they even have a graph on the box showing you how bad it filters. the AEM sucks too, we run one on the race car and the inside of the intake pipe is dirtier than the ground!

 

Really? Ive never heard any stories of k&n not filtering well, I always considered them the standard for performance air filters.

Maybe its just all in the name, seems they're all performance as far as flowing but as far as filtering is concerned it filters as good as using panty hose over the maf/afm would, hopefully its not that bad. Lol

Rotary >Pistons

 

Somewhere out there there is an "Air Filter Test" and from what I remember the foam oil soaked ones were the worst, like the Racing Beat ones, HKS(like the one I have on my car for instance), then the pre-oil cotton gause one were next to the worse ones and then a various number of paper ones.

And since I work for a dealership, I am proud to say most O.E.M. ones proved to filter the best.

 

How much are these OEM filters?

Rotary >Pistons

 

So what do you do if you want to build a engine for storage? What kind of lubricants are best when you don't plan on starting it for awhile?

 

from today!, https://www.rx7club.com/3rd-generati...g-air-1027856/

Debunking the K&N Myth - Why OEM is Better : Nissan Articles

notice the graphs there are basically the same as the HKS box, the better the filter works, the less it flows. the Rx8 uses a giant paper filter, so it filters ok, but offers low enough restriction that the speedsource 3 rotor cars use it

 

Mighty car mods has a good clip on pod filters.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/PAIxeQUSg-Q" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

I run a 5" K&N on my car because it fits between the turbo and radiator and serves as a location for pre turbo water injection.

On the subject of seals. I chucked atkins through the turbine of a turbo before deciding on RA super seals. I only had to replace the turbo once before choosing to go for softer seals. The super seals have held up fine since my last build in 2008 and have seen detonation at 100% load drag racing when I had a failing CAS. The car still starts easily and pulls healthy vacuum. I've probably put around 8000 miles on them using 50k miles S5 housings.

 

Well I want a good filter that filters and flows , isn't there a happy medium or is it just like the apex seals lol.

Rotary >Pistons

 

or NO filter.. I did this for about 30k miles...
I didn't have to take the engine down because of this, but after looking at the housongs I put a filter on my next motor

 

On the subject of air filters:

I did oil analysis over 40k miles on my Protege5 which showed that the K&N cone let dirt in, resulting in high Silicon reading and bearing wear; yes it was well maintained.

After reading up on bobistheoilguy forum, finally found the Amsoil 'ea' line of filters. They are excellent and cleaned up the car's oil analysis.

AMSOIL AMSOIL Ea Universal Air Induction Filters

No I do not sell them

 

its simple, if you want a filter that filters it needs to be big.

 

I doubt they offer a filter that would work for the stock airbox though.

Guess my purolator might be on there awhile lol

Rotary >Pistons

 

the stock air filter is totally fine.

 

im with u man i have leaned out my car sooo bad too many times and detonated it a whole bunch of times . thats why i i like ra just save yourself the headache of any mistakes while tunning later on . do that with atkins or mazda seals ..boom

 

I'm going with als I've heard pretty good things about them.

Rotary >Pistons

 

Yes, that is correct...I used to(sell them)...I have one on my '03 Silverado with 210,000 miles on it. I have NOT found a means to put one on my 10th Anny which is why I use the HKS on, as it is small enough.

 

correction to my previous statement about the Atkins seals so as not to dissuade anyone or pass premature judgement on them.

just pulled apart yet another engine(13B-REW) that was damaged due to detonation that had 5k miles on it with resurfaced housings with the Atkins seals, engine originally ran stock twins but upgraded to GT35R after breaking 2 sets of twins, tuned by unknown on the 35R but was originally tuned by me on the twins. 3 seals chipped and 1 corner seal split in half, housings and seal surfaces were fine otherwise, albeit crowned in the centers from the heat generated.

after pulling apart several engines well beyond the break in periods..

resurfaced rough cut housings:
Atkins seals= gouging/striations
OEM seals= gouging/striations
Goopy seals= smooth seals/housings
(gouging was inconsistent and did not happen on 2 engines back to back on the OEM and Atkins seals)

resurfaced fine cut housings(2 step process):
Atkins seals= smooth seals/housings
OEM= smooth seals/housings
Goopy= smooth seals/housings

OEM finish used housings(not resurfaced):
Atkins seals= smooth seals/housings
OEM= smooth seals/housings
Goopy= smooth seals/housings

the best compression results came regularly from the resurfaced housings but the results varied depending on the seals used and the finish provided. these are housings that i personally resurfaced so as to gather better baselines on the finish, quality and byproducts.

as of yet i haven't seen the Goopy seals gouge the housings but time will tell. they are coated with a soft material which i have gathered is what aids them to prevent gouging regardless of the housing conditions. reusing used seals on a refinished housing may yield similar results as other seals.

so as of now i personally believe the seals tend to gouge the housings based on the preparation of the housings themselves as well as break-in procedures, filtering and tuning.

i personally do not recommend scuffing your housings unless you have experience in doing so. if you do a 45* cross hash is recommended as well as refining your grit smoother after a rough scuffing(400 grit should be plenty). my fine polishing after cutting is machine cut but with the grain of rotation(not by hand, so different process that i recommend for those without the proper tools).

the mirror smooth housings tend to have the least issues, as long as the surface the seal rides on is flat and true(this is not as easy as it sounds to measure, my finest feeler gauges generally cannot pick up surface warpage/wear beyond assist boot wear at the housing edges, many housings beyond 30k do have a bit of immeasurable wear that still can overheat a seal while breaking in). chucking up a special rig to measure wear could be done but not worth the hassle(surface dial indicator with a 90* brake to keep it level and even).