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The Car Thread


MadManMike

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Marvellous day for a drive. Clean car, sun shining, sounds superb. 

 

The sun however highlighted an issue I hadn't noticed before and now can not stop thinking about. It emits a shit load of blue smoke when stomping back on the loud pedal after being on over run. Looks like my stem seals went a long way... 

 

I knew it used a tiny bit of oil, and to be fair even on 5w30 I've only had to top it up 500ml over two months (excluding Curborough lol), but it seems the stem seals aren't doing consumption any favours. 

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Ordered a set of supertech valves, guides and some OEM stem seals. 

Will be whipping the head off when it gets sprayed in July with all the other work and get it all fitted. 

Did a leak down test this evening and ring wise it's healthy with even readings across all 4. 

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Decided that I'm going to keep my engine for a while longer yet, I want to hit 250,000.

Going to order new cam belt, water pump, alternator belt and power steering belt to refresh it all. I'm going to paint the cam cover while it's off too.

Has anyone painted a cam cover on here? Some people say you can just use normal alloy wheel paint, others say it has to be special high temp stuff. I would expect high temp paint is necessary, given the area it's being used on...

Any thoughts?

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My thoughts are... don't bother with the cam belt, they very very rarely let go and even if it does there'll be no damage, if the water pump isn't leaking leave it alone, other two belts are easy / cheap so worth doing.


Cam cover: you can probably guess my opinion :D

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My car is on 243k with no history of the cam belt being changed (It obviously has been, but no idea when). Maybe I'll leave the water pump then, but I want to feel more confident about longer journeys in my car and cam belt is one of the fears I have. Other problems I can limp home with but the belts are very much game over if they go. Alternator belt is definitely on the way out, it looks pretty mangled.

And yes, I know your view on aesthetics :P

 

 

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For oil consumption on those, I found mine uses less when I drive it 'properly', and more if I just use it for commuting and stuff.  Just commuting it goes through oil (not super fast, but I just top it up from time to time), whereas it didn't use any at Curborough despite it getting ragged pretty much all day.  Without wanting to jinx it savagely, the only times my car has really felt iffy has been at low speed bumbling around stuff.  When it's all warmed up and good to go it seems to just be cool with whatever really.

PS - Alternator belts are mega cheap and super fast to replace - why haven't you already done that :P

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It got through a litre in a day because I was red lining in 2nd gear the whole time and I had 6 hours of driving to get there and back. I've since done a few runs locally and the oil level is fine.

Yeah Mark all the belts are cheap and easy enough to replace, I've just been focusing on other mechanical stuff that was really needing change - broken suspension, brakes, exhaust etc...

Now my choice is either totally rip the front out and replace everything, or just do the essential belts and keep the current lump running as long as I can. Having no lock up any more and not yet owning a house with a garage, I don't really have anywhere that I can rip its guts out - that is still the long term plan and ideally I'll have enough funds to drop a turbo / supercharger in at the same time then too :)

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That's kind of what I meant though - when it's all warm and up to temperature it seems like they hold oil better as I guess it's all sealing a little better?  I'm sure Adam will probably shoot that down if that's wrong :P  With the amount of oil I'd been going through (which I think may have surprised me more as I think I missed out an oil check at some point, so left it longer than I normally would have done) I was concerned about Curborough but it ended up being fine.  Just local little trips are the issue, albeit a relatively minor one.

As everyone's been saying, I'd just do the alternator belt then keep an eye on stuff.  Through Adam's work at Clear I've been able to see the truly horrific state some MX5 engines get into, but they seem to just carry on through.  The stuff coming out of Bessell's engine was f**king horrific, and that had been regularly ragged to f**k with no problems.  They genuinely are tough little bastards.

That's kind of why I mentioned the alternator belt too - I changed one in my lunch hour and still had time to do other stuff, so if it's a concern for you then just going out and doing it would solve that.  It took me less time to do than between now and when I last posted, for example :P 

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If I get stuck somewhere near the evo triangle with a snapped cam belt and 10 mile recovery, I'll be livid. The cam belt is definitely being changed. I'll do the 14 degree mod at the same time.

Yes you're right about the seals, mine are worse when it's cold, but they're bad enough now that they never really seal. I don't know the science behind it, but it's definitely worse when I rag it.

I'm just going to change all the belts and the water pump, at least then there's only engine or clutch failure that could cause me a headache - I won't be so annoyed either, because they're bigger jobs. If the cam belt went I'd just be thinking "ffs, why didn't I just do it?"

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12 minutes ago, MadManMike said:

inb4 "Get better breakdown cover then"

Yes I need to, but not changing a cam belt when there's no record of it is asking for trouble.

You do right. If it's running well, albeit using oil like a lot of old Jap motors do, then not replacing the cam belt is a little silly for how easy they are on MX5s. 

Relatively inexpensive too if you can do it yourself. I'd also be changing the water pump too, while you're there. 

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Why not pop the head off, regrind the valves and replace the stem seals whilst you're at it? Good learning curve and fun to do if you have time available.

If you're only really burning oil on over run then a few quids worth of stem seals might be worth doing to give more life, at least as long as it takes to bugger the rings / bores.

Of course you then have had gasket costs as well but if you're taking the cambelt off why not go a couple of steps further for the learning experience?

Worst comes to the worst, you buy a spare lump to drop in :)

Edited by forteh
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By all accounts, stem seals are an absolute ball ache on MX-5's. I looked at doing them earlier and was massively put off by how much of a job it is.

Based on "easy" jobs taking a long time, I don't think I'm willing to start a job that is widely considered a ball ache. Oh and time, I have no time these days, at all, which is why someone else will be fitting all the belts.

Yeah the spare lump was the original idea, but I don't have any space to fit it now, so it's gotta wait 'til we buy the house ideally.

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Fair enough, I was working on the assumption that it would be a case of head off, cams out, springs off, seals and rebuild :)

If it's a bitch of a job then I agree full lump transplant is the way forward.

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1 minute ago, MadManMike said:

Looks like I may just go the whole hog and revert to original plan of ripping the heart out and replacing it.

Buy the belts and the water pump and take it to a garage to have them done. That way they cant charge you more than the parts worth + labor. You only have the labor to worry about. 

If you dont have the time to replace the belts then a full engine change isnt the answer just now given your circumstances stated. Jap motors run forever burning oil, just keep an eye on it as you have been and I doubt youll have too many issues. 

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