GTRgeoff

Just for info, here is the JUN site with their baffle. http://www.junauto.co.jp/products/cylinder...html?en#oilpump There is also a place in Melbourne that fabricates a new sump for GTR that is larger capacity and baffled for around $900. Yellow pages is your friend. I can't remember who they are.

Can't say I've competed with the Toyota club down here, but the MR2 club is pretty good and the Track Secretary is a mate of mine. Also the WRX club is good and the burgeoning SAU Vic club will kick all ass when CAMS approves us

Amaru, the sump can come out with the engine in, but you have to remove the cross member that holds the engine up, so a cross brace has to be fabricated to hold up the engine while the job is done. On top of the cost of the baffle or modified sump there will be up to $1K in labour/manufacturing depending on the workshop. The sump baffle will prevent oil surge around the sump and pressure loss under extreme cornering forces, not high temperatures. For temps you need an oil cooler. Going off SK's worst case of a conrod snapping, that would leave almost nothing reusable on the engine (I've been there a few times before) and a second hand RB26 is around $7K complete plus labour, so yeah, this is a pretty expensive fix sometimes, hence my desire to quantify the problems and solutions in a nice neat thread. Carrying on, I had a little Corolla road car with the 1.5 engine (4K) that I ha twin webers on and high compression ratio. I had a little smoke from the exhaust on a long drive and at the next servo put some Wynns product in to stop it. I put it in while stopped but the product was pretty cold and thick. Then I started the engine and within 10km it had snapped #4 conrod and punched 4 holes in the block and sump. The piston was 3/4" thick. The destruction is violent and final when you put a "leg out of bed". I will never use another engine additive other than good quality oil after that experience. Was stuck 10km out of Warwick in Qld for 12 hours waiting for a mate with a trailer. I don't wish that on anyone. Especially GTR owners.

Usually senior members of the organising club. They would have had their CAMS licens a long time and have good results in club comps etc. Experienced friends can be good too.

Not stupid at all. Click the go advanced button just below the new message screen, then there will be some new options on the next screen. Click the manage attachments button and a new window will open. click the browse buttons and find the file you want to upload. Then you click upload files and wait for the response. They will automatically appear in thumbnails at the bottom of your post.

Bepo the best way to go about not smashing is to use any instructors at the track day. They are always asking if you're a novice and want an experienced trackie to sit in the passenger seat and give some pointers. Reliability, just make sure it's serviced and all fluids are correct levels or even a little above. I run an extra litre of engine oil, but it's a different engine. If anything seems suspect at any time just back off and head for the pits. You can never guarantee it will all be smooth sailing.

cazz, would have been awesome to listen to all those triple webers. I was just going off the numbers in the NDSOC mag for the Winton excursion. Throw some pics up here or put them in the classic Skylines area as I'm sure we'd all love to see them.

Here's my second: Engine/Car: RB25DET GTS25t Type of failure: Big end bearings. Pulled down to discover 2 pistons faintly cracked. Factors influencing the failure: Hot day (38deg) and had been conducting some testing on water sprays into intake and intercooler. The previous engine rebuild had the wrong pistons fitted at 0.5mm OS and was getting excessive blowby. I believe the bearings may have been reused as the car had only travelled 20000km since rebuild. At the last service I saw sparkles in the oil residue indicating bearing deterioration. State of tune of the engine: Rigoli modded turbo, 11psi boost, cat back 3" Suspension and tyres: RSR Springs, ZR tyres as above. Oil used and service interval: Havoline synthetic changed every 5000km with a filter change. General comments: during the road testing I had experienced detonation (2 aubible pings) when accelerating very close behind a porsche turbo in third on an extremely hot day. I also discovered the engine oil had blown around 300ml out into the catch can and drained this off and replaced it. Several days later on the very hot day I was driving normally in traffic and heard the rattling off the side of a passing van. When I arrived home to park in the garage it was becoming very audible. On pull down the #3 big eng had spun. All bearings were very worn and I discovered the pistons had been installed too small hence the blowby. I won't trust an engine builder again and now do it myself.

So perhaps it is a chronic design flaw. But even SK would have to admit that the number of GTR's that would catastrophically fail on road tyres at the track would be in the very low end of overall track failures, and similar numbers would be revealed on the road. I've seen a few that blew holes in pistons from leaning out, but RB25's are even more common in that area. After taking yet another hard look at the sump design it is still a concern to me that oil surge is the primary culprit. So lets perhaps attempt to establish a database on the forum of engine failures and the suspected causes. Can it be attributed to a particular circumstance (track/corner/style of driving), a particular grade of oil or other environmental factors. We know the inherent weakness of RB25 pistons when exposed to detonation. Are GTRs commonly getting away with a little more detonation due to the piston strength. The follow on effects are increased impulse energy through the conrod, putting excessive compressive loads on the big ends and bearings that can penetrate the dynamic oil cushion. When rallying toyotas I found that the 18RG engine was fine for road use but in competition was prone to blowing head gaskets. The eventual solution was to torque the head 20ft/lb beyond recommended. That seems pretty extreme given the bolts/threads as designed are usually close to limit but there was at least that safe extra torque in the design. We still had 3 spare engines, just didn't need them all. Our other solution is to completely stop all of our friends from taking a GTR on the track or any "spirited" cruises where corners get in the way until they spend around $2-3K getting a sump baffle installed, and that will be a sad thing. Lets not leave it a roll the dice option when we may be able to do something about it. Heres my starter thread: http://www.skylinesaustralia.com/forums/sh...4864#post944864

OK here's my first one: Engine/Car: RB25DET GTS25t Type of failure: Ring lands and turbo compressor oil seal. Factors influencing the failure: Hot day, suspect load of fuel, hard run in the country, loss of traction over a hill close to redline in third. State of tune of the engine: As delivered from Japan, generally unknown but had been rebuilt once before as pistons were 0.5mm oversize. Standard computer and timing. 13psi boost. Standard intecooler and 3" cat back exhaust. Suspension and tyres: RSR springs, 235/255-40-ZR17 tyres. Oil used and service interval: Shell Helix synthetic (blue) General comments: Too many things at once to pin the problem. Shell had some problems with fuel quality, the compressor oil seal failed, detonation occurred near redline cresting a small hill and wheelspin occurred. Resulted in huge white/blue oil smoke cloud behind the car. Same result if I tried to accelerate into boost. After a 1 hour cooldown the problem disappeared until 2000km later when severe blowby indicated ringland problems. Turbo was replaced within days of the incident to overcome the oil injestion problem.

In an attempt to quantify the major causes of failure in the engines we so much love in our cars I want forum mambers to take a few minutes out to report the failures they have had/witnessed and the circumstances. I suggest the following format to help reveal as much as possible. Pictures are not necessary but can be emailed to me if available. In particular I am interested in RB26 failures but all are necessary to establish the elements of concern. PM your friends to get broadest involvement in this survey on behalf of the forum members. Engine/Car: Type of failure: Factors influencing the failure: State of tune of the engine: Suspension and tyres: Oil used and service interval: General comments:

Merli I've only been racing for a little over 20 years, and have years of experience mechanicing and a mechanical engineering degree to base my opinions on. So I put it to you that ane engine is an engine is an engine and the causes of those types of incidents would be more suspect that simply a chronic design flaw of the GTR vehicle system. I personally run an extra litre of oil in my engine but tend to base opinion on analytically justified reasoning. At the moment I deal with weapons systems, so lives are at stake every time some of those big guns or guided missiles are fired. I'll stand by the statement that a GTR with all else being in good condition and correct oil levels will not run the bearings on ZR road rubber. On R type rubber it would be a somewhat different argument and I would consider that marginal. There are too many GTR's on track with no mods to be scaring people like this with once upon a time stories. I ran bearings just driving up the main street in traffic, and it was just the engine was a bit tired from too much track work. No warnings it just started rattling but never suffered oil starvation. GTR's don't handle that well stock to be a concern. So you tell me what GTR experience a guy who was an importer of Skylines and other impoerts might have had? I'll tell you if you're right.

0408 124 767 in case anyone else ever needs it.

Hopefully there'll be someone else to have dinner with so all are welcome for the early gathering. Woulda guv Roy a lift since it's not far out of the way but I don't need anymore free feeds

Bloody SBS (sump baffle syndrome) panic merchants. (waves to merli) Don't need them until running slicks or an extreme suspension setup and type R tyres. What Roy said basically. Don't try be a world beater first time out. Just take it easy and have some fun to see if it's your game. I fyou don't get off on it then you haven't blown a heap of coin for nothing.

If you're just doing track days, bleed the brake fluid, check oil levels and mechanicals and just come have some fun. No point spoiling it by trying to set the fastest times first day out.

WOOF Containers were only an extra 250 which was the cost to DHL a Soarer CD Stacker to Aus. Pricks couldna' touch a thing.

I'll be there from 6:30-7:00 as I want to grab a feed before getting into some work before the meeting.

Free bump to get the Monday morning prime time viewers. Sounds like fun and there are plenty of cars that would meet your requirements. Mine unfortunately is built for go and not show. I call it the Picasso. Looks great from a distance, but is a bit messy up close so I'll decline the offer. I also lack the prerequisite monster body kit to be the archtypical Jap import showcar.

Ni I always used containers to ship cars after a few things got lifted. Doesn't get opened until the customs agent arrives so your babies can never be mistreated or ripped. Also doesn't cost much extra and container ships run more often thar car carriers so car arrives sooner

The official SAU Track Whore!! Just needs a running car...can anyone make a short loan?

Funniest moment was Shan standing there sticking his fingers into a piece of KFC trying to warm them up. Earlier in the day my mate Dat from over the road was there with his RB20'd 180SX and was standing around in THONGS and everyone thought he was mad. It was raining at the time as well! Great day Steve. Thanks for setting it up.

I have to kick in for the DIYers guys. Shopping around can find you good stuff. For hoses and fittings I always check out the local Pirtek as they are usually pretty affordable. You can also get oil coolers from RX7's and GT4 Celicas for just over $100 from many wreckers, and they come with a drain plug on the cooler for servicing. Thats a further reduction of cost. You don't need to have the brand name stuff. I tend to just keep an eye on my oil condition during events. It isn't going to fail catastrophically and so as long as you monitor it there should be no reason for the cooler until you start doing massively long straights at full throttle for the whole time for multiple lap sessions of 10-15 laps or more eg Sandown with 2 long straights. If your oil cooler is just for drags or show, well save your money. I'd be interested to see if many of the guys "needing" oil coolers can give me a detailed reason for their fitment, supported by data on oil condition and temperature..........but if you can justify it, why spend more than you have to?