Could you post your A/F ratios, if you pre-mix, and did you us stock apex seal springs.

 

I have 300 miles on mine with used housings. The engine fired up the first time and has been running great so far. I premix cause my stock OMP is taking forever to fill the new OMP lines I made. I also re-used the old stock apex seal springs as they are still way better than the ones that come with the RA seals because the stock seals are heat treated. I'm going to do a preliminary compression check at 500 miles to see what my numbers are. Lastly, if you decide to go with the RA seals, contact me as I have some usefull installation tips for them.

 

13 BRE motor from Japan via Corksport. Bought new housings during the rebuild.


New RA seals and springs.


Drove the first 1K miles with no boost (you have no f'ing idea how hard that was, especially when someone in a new Corolla S is goading you into a race, and sometimes the lion just needs to kill something to remind everyone who is boss....but I digress).


Now tuned using Wolf 3D at 16 lbs. on a T04S single for California premium pump gas. Sees 16 lbs every day. No dyno, but it spins the rear wheels at 70 MPH at 5K rpm (9.5 x 17/265 Toyos in the back with Kaaz)...


No issues and I'm right on the bubble of 10K miles.

I do still run the OMP with a tiny bit of Redline smokeless 2 stroke (1 oz for a half tank) just for a little comfort.


This motor has seen 140 mph on a few occassions, and it is still pulling. Need a 6th gear.....

Beast

 

A/F is 11.5-11.7 above 4k, I premix with Pettit's Protek-R (4oz per 12 gallon fill up), 94 octane gas, and stock apex seal springs.

 

Thx it will interesting to see how things hold up the closer you get to 10k and up (which seems to be where some people have been having problems).

 

shift into 5th first...you should see 140mph at the top of 4th

 

My RA seals let go big time, but I had a crank angle sensor stud break off. Full advance+ 16 lbs boost = Kablooe. I have yet to pull it apart to view the carnage.

-Trent

 

Post pics when you tear it apart. I want to see what these seals do when they go.

 

Yea me too. I think it will be less damage compared to the old 3 piece seals that flip out of the groove, decenegrate and tear **** up.

 

just to gather more information pending my rebuild. RA recently launched a new range supposedly called the RA Super Apex Seals that are nitrite coated. Anybody have info on this? TIA

dave

 

^ What? If these turn out to be better, then I will be pissed since I bought my old set 3 months ago.

 

Can you point us to where you got this info from? I can't see anything on the RA site regarding these "Super Apex Seals"...

 

well, thats the thing. i have tried looking at their website but there's no mention of it. anybody in the states want to try calling them and finding out? i reckon some sort of information would eventually come around but if we can get some directly from the "horse's mouth", so to speak, it'll safe lots of people currently rebuilding heartache of knowing the availability of "better" seals before deciding.

 

Ive got at least 5k on my motor with RA springs and seals, significantly wider then stock exhaust ports and have had no problems what so ever. Just put down 187 NA HP with them.

 

i will be calling about the new seals tomorrow if i remember... oh the suspense!!!

 

well, here i am to admit i was wrong.

i blew the motor that i was talking about earlier in this thread with about 24k miles on the rebuild. The engine blew due to a dowel pin, and had nothing to do with any of the RA parts.

BUT, i finally got it pulled all the way apart last night, and the housings are both scratched up quite badly. it still made pretty decent compression, but i very much doubt it would have lasted more than 50k or so.

just letting y'all know.

pat

 

pics

 

Did you premix? I put new OMP lines on my rebuild and my pump isn't working so I've been premixing 100% so far. Now I really can't wait till I reach the 10k mark so I can break my engine down for inspection. In the end this isn't a really a bad thing patman because they may last long enough in a really high hp application and still be reliable. Wait how do your rotor apex seal grooves look? Are they still in spec? I'm starting to think that these RA seals are only good for extreme situations and not good for street usage.

 

Hmm anyone think nitrided housings would help out here? If we could find a way to cut down on some of the housing wear, we might be on to something special. I'm still fond of these seals since they bend and don't really break.

 

i didnt wear the side housings, i wore the rotor housings. other than expensive ceramics, i dont think theres anything you can do to the make rotorhousings harder. i didnt measure the rotor grooves, but they looked fine to my eye.

as stated in earlier posts, i used my premix/omp system where the mop pumps 2-stroke oil. everything looks to have been lubricated fine, except for those scratches. this engine went from stock turbo, maybe 220 hp when i first built it to af61, probably close to 500 hp when i blew it up on these seals.

I agree with you that if you are running engines on a 10k teardown cycle, and not afraid to replace the housings every 15k or so, then they would be awesome, because i abused the **** out of them and didnt break em. but i cant afford that kind of thing. I sort of need my engines to last at least 30-40k.

first 3 pics are the front rotorhousing, last one is where i ripped out the dowel pin.
cell phone quality, sorry.

note: these housings had 70k on them when i built this engine, and looked brand new.

 

24k isn't bad for the hp you were putting down and the abuse. Did you honestly feel any performance decreases up untill the point it blew? I feel your engine could have lasted many more thousands of miles had it not been for the dowel pin problem. How does the surface feel? Does your finger nail snag on any of those grooves?

 

yes, the grooves are pretty deep, some of them are at least 5 thou, probably closer to 10. I dont feel too bad about the 24k really, and you are right about the abuse.

as far as feeling any decrease, hell if i know. pushing 15-20 psi, its pretty hard to tell whether you are losing a tiny bit of compression or not. I did have a very slight low rpm/hard start problem right towards the end, but it could easily have been due to something else, ro maybe just my imagination.

as far as many more miles....10k, maybe. more than that would be sort of miraculous with that kind of wear after that few miles.

 

the funny thing is, im still considering an RA kit for the 20B. Its cheap and easy, and they were very easy to deal with last time. I like having the detonation protection, especially since I decided to run the 3 rotor with a megasquirt. I just wish I could count on 50-60k miles between rebuilds.

pat

 

Well consider this. 20b isn't going to be as stressed when compared to the 13b depending on your hp goals. Also new housings could probably allow you to reach that mileage. Lastly I believe the RA seals are heavier than the fatory versions. This extra weight could also have more of an effect on the housing wear (especially at higher rpms). 20b's don't need high rpm's to go fast.


I'm also going to megasquirt my 20b as well and since I'm staying NA, I'll be using stock 2 piece seals. RA seals IMO are over kill for a NA set-up. We need to keep each other posted on the megesquirt stuff.

 

[QUOTE=t-von]Well consider this. 20b isn't going to be as stressed when compared to the 13b depending on your hp goals. [/QOUTE]

yes it is. shooting for 650-700 whp

Cool. I just got my kit today. I'll keep ya posted on how it goes. unfortunately, i have to drill out some exhaust manifold studs and **** like that, so build is being delayed somewhat...

pat