Anyone have a beater car I can drive for maybe a week or 2?

JamesShort · **Posted:** Sun Feb 20, 2011 12:03 pm

My WRX blew up (either turbo seals or busted ringlands) and might be in the shop for a while. I had to get a rental to drive from Charlotte back to Durham and I'd rather not pay daily for a car that I very well might not drive (I can work from home) but 30-40 miles a week.

If anyone has a beater (who lives in the triangle area) that doesn't get driven much and is in need of maintenance, I can do oil/coolant changes, brakes etc to get you back (don't worry, the WRX didn't blow up due to lack of maintenance....I can assure you of that

...first thing out of my wife's mouth when I told her about the news is "Man, I feel like a real jerk for making fun of you about over maintaining your car" ).

Stephen/Michael....what should I change my signature to now that I done blew up an engine?

Steven Carter · **Posted:** Sun Feb 20, 2011 5:38 pm

James, you can borrow my e30...it's not awesomely comfortable as a DD, but let me know. so sorry your car's busted.

JamesFeinberg · **Posted:** Sun Feb 20, 2011 9:10 pm

Hey James,

If you don't take Steven up on his offer, I have a car you can borrow for a couple of weeks. It is a regular street car FWIW.

Jim

Michael Westerfield · **Posted:** Mon Feb 21, 2011 9:56 am

JamesShort wrote:

Stephen/Michael....what should I change my signature to now that I done blew up an engine?

In all seriousness, sorry to hear about this.

Andrew Jonell · **Joined:** Mon Mar 23, 2009 6:43 pm **Posts:** 1350

Koni and engine blowin' Sally wagon?

Too soon?

Matt McGrain · **Posted:** Mon Feb 21, 2011 11:57 am

I hate to hear about the turbo James. Best of luck with a painless and quick fix by Subaru, especially given the fact that you just crossed over to the dark side on race rubber.

JamesShort · **Posted:** Mon Feb 21, 2011 12:09 pm

I only got 2 runs....1st was drift city. Second was much better, but I was easing my way into them as opposed to going balls to the wall from the get go. I feel like I could have been just as quick on that 2nd run on my star specs, but at certain points on the course during that run I could notice the car was holding tight where I wouldn't have expected on the star specs.

Well I guess Subaru has a month to fix it before Sanford. You know me, I'll want to do at least 3 oil changes on it before I autocross it again

.

And I'm pretty sure it is not the turbo now. When me, Aaron and Keith were looking at it in the grid, I was just sick to my stomach and I heard 'maybe it's the turbo oil seals' so that's what I had in my head all that day. When the car was running there was exhaust smoke coming out of the oil filler tube. That is classic Subaru sign of piston ringland failure. That coupled with the fact that there was a lot of smoke out of the exhaust pipe and oil in the intake system/intercooler.

If it were just the hot side turbo seal blow, then there would only be smoke coming out the tail pipe.

Hopefully Subaru has a brand new EJ255 shortblock somewhere in the US.

Steven Carter · **Posted:** Mon Feb 21, 2011 2:29 pm

geez....wonder how long my car has left? I didn't think our ECU let it get as lean at high rpms as the STI tune did. Were there any trouble signs prior to noticing the initial oil leak? You're not wrong often, James...but I hope you are this time.

JamesShort · **Posted:** Mon Feb 21, 2011 2:36 pm

Steven Carter wrote:

geez....wonder how long my car has left? I didn't think our ECU let it get as lean at high rpms as the STI tune did. Were there any trouble signs prior to noticing the initial oil leak? You're not wrong often, James...but I hope you are this time.

The lean issues are around 2500-3500 rpms. At idle and at low rpms they want to run super lean for emmisions/cafe/ULEV crap. Then as the revs climb and boost builds, it switches over to a pretty rich A/F ratio. The issue is that the switch over to richer A/F ratio is AFTER the turbo is already building decent boost and that is not good. I actually try to downshift to 4th to pass on the interstate rather than just pass with boost in 5th gear right in the 'bad spot' of the rev spectrum. But as I've expressed, none of my overly anal precautions helped save my engine so it was probably just a waste of gas in the end.

So ironically enough, the tune issues that can kill pistons is more due to lower rpm stuff [edit]than[/edit] us bouncing off the limiter in 2nd gear runs at autox.

But no, no signs at all until Tuesday of last week when the intercooler hose was weeping oil. I mean, if I've been down on power over the winter I never noticed it, but I don't drive much or hard outside of autocross so who knows.

I have all 8 of my oil change receipts and maintenance logs ready to fax over to Folgers if they need it

.

JamesMilko · **Posted:** Mon Feb 21, 2011 10:53 pm

If you want to come put Jonell's car back together you can take it, till he calls the cops or something.

I'd loan you the Ranger if it wasn't up for sale currently.

Steven Carter · **Posted:** Tue Feb 22, 2011 1:15 am

JamesShort wrote:

The lean issues are around 2500-3500 rpms. At idle and at low rpms they want to run super lean for emmisions/cafe/ULEV crap. Then as the revs climb and boost builds, it switches over to a pretty rich A/F ratio. The issue is that the switch over to richer A/F ratio is AFTER the turbo is already building decent boost and that is not good. I actually try to downshift to 4th to pass on the interstate rather than just pass with boost in 5th gear right in the 'bad spot' of the rev spectrum. But as I've expressed, none of my overly anal precautions helped save my engine so it was probably just a waste of gas in the end.

So ironically enough, the tune issues that can kill pistons is more due to lower rpm stuff [edit]than[/edit] us bouncing off the limiter in 2nd gear runs at autox.

But no, no signs at all until Tuesday of last week when the intercooler hose was weeping oil. I mean, if I've been down on power over the winter I never noticed it, but I don't drive much or hard outside of autocross so who knows.

I have all 8 of my oil change receipts and maintenance logs ready to fax over to Folgers if they need it

.

huh. Did you get that info from seeing AFR on your Cobb AP, or dyno plots? (just curious) Seems to me the only take-away from your situation is not to be WOT below 30-35 mph (which is 3-3500 rpm in 2d gear) to avoid a "lean under boost" scenario. Hard not to be WOT in 1st, but at least it's not under a lot of engine load from the low gearing. geez. someone buy my M Roadster so I can use that money for a better autoX car!

Will Folger's give you an autopsy on the spent engine, or just replace it?

BTW, I've been lurking on NASIOC waiting for your thread to appear in the engine forums...most people there seem to think the ringlands/lean fuel exists only with the STI map, from what I've seen.

JamesShort · **Posted:** Tue Feb 22, 2011 9:52 am

Dyno plots. Search for irish44j on NASIOC. He posted his stock dyno and AFR plot.

The gearing is key as you said. I think 2nd gear is fine too. I'd say it's worse to be boosting under high load and low rpms in 5th gear, that's why I tried to avoid it. The plots from that guys dyno pulls were in 4th gear of course, so maybe low load conditions aren't as bad.

EDIT: Found it:

http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthr ... ?t=2069474

Aaron Buckley · **Posted:** Tue Feb 22, 2011 9:57 am

I will be honest, if I grenade my engine, it won't be even mentioned on any forum or public place... to me that's the smart way of going about getting a dealer covered. - AB

Chuck Branscomb · **Posted:** Tue Feb 22, 2011 10:00 am

Wow, I'm not an engine tuner by far, but if that plot is from WOT through the whole rpm range, that looks nasty. Imagine a 5th (or 6th? if the car has it) long pull up a steep mountain highway with a fully loaded car. Seems like a dangerous factory "design" plan?

JamesShort · **Posted:** Tue Feb 22, 2011 10:08 am

Chuck Branscomb wrote:

Wow, I'm not an engine tuner by far, but if that plot is from WOT through the whole rpm range, that looks nasty. Imagine a 5th (or 6th? if the car has it) long pull up a steep mountain highway with a fully loaded car. Seems like a dangerous factory "design" plan?

Yep, that's why downshift into 4th at highway speeds to pass to get into the 11.xx:1 range above 4k rpms.

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