Catastrophic engine failure

[Jamo]

Get the balancing done via Aelred and borrow the torque plate from AndyP or Gnutz for the boring

[220bhp]

Madpugger, thanks for that I ment to say undersize,and yes I have them .25 for mains and .5 for big ends.
Jamo I am already in contact with Aelred, he is trying to sort my pistons for me, but I had no idea he also deals with balancing I will talk to him.
My engine block is at a local engineering shop,but when you mention torque plate,do you need a special one to bore the i5,forgive my ignorance.
Thanks for your help I need all I can get,I am a little out of my depth at the moment.

[Jamo]

Yes you need a special one for the I5, you don't 100% need it but as AndyP and Gnutz on the forum are in the UK and have them if you can get access to them it would be sensible to use.

Oh yeah Aelred has contact to 2 balancers, he had my stroker balanced, rebored and piston gapped top man

[Phil Payne]

We all have our own preferred specialists. I have always used:

Rugby Motor Engineering Services
35 York Street
Rugby
CV21 2BL
01788 542670

It's three guys who do nothing but serious engine work. They're all around my age and are fully time-served and very, very practical. If they regard the job as in any way questionable and feel they won't be able to do it perfectly, they'll just refuse it.

Best to go in person. You'll probably be greeted with: "HAVE YOU MESSED WITH IT?" in a fairly aggressive tone. The only answer is: "No".

If it's a rebore, they'll insist on the pistons - a crank regrind and they'll want a big end and the shells you intend to use. Or they can supply shells.

[220bhp]

Thanks for that Phil, but I think I am sorted. This has been a very bitter experience. Fortunatly for me this is my hobby car.and I don't need it day to day,I have my s6 for that,but it is still a pain.
You trust people in this world, and more so on this forum,but when things go wrong some run for cover,leaving you to pick up the pieces. but I have to say I went into
s2 ownership as a novice and I would have given up a long time ago if it where not for the help of the good people on hear.
Right now I am in need of help in order to get this bloody car up and running again,and I have no dought that I will get the advise and help I need from the people that truly mater on this forum,As for the odd selfish individual that puts money before honer,well they will get found out without my help from me,what go's around comes around.
Many thanks to all who have helped me in the past,and long may it continue.

[220bhp]

I Have been inspecting both stripped down engines this weekend and I am amazed at the differance in the amount of ware. My old engine that gave way,apart from the damage to cylinder three and the bent rod on2 the crank journals and the shells are near perfect,as are the bores,just like new.
As for the doner engine it is in very poor condition even though the bearings and rings where replaced about a year ago, Ihave no resson to dought they where replaced seeing that all the gaskets and seals etc are obviously new, along with all the nuts and bolts, which all undone quite easely, also had an rs2 head gasket and shells.
It needs a rebore to 81.5.the crank needs grinding on both mains and big ends, .25 undersize forthe mains, and .5 for the big ends.the head was done at the same time and is good b comparison.as the oilpump was also replaced at the same time. which got me thinking about things,and I remember when I bought the car seeing that the crank pulley had a wobble, and it was'nt lose,checked that when I got it home.
As this is a harmonic damper designed to stop resonance.can have a detrimental effect on the ware of the bottom end,if its out of balance.I know there are afew people on hear that have this wobbly pully problem.Quite interesting that my origanl pulley did not have this problem,infact the engine was very smooth,a fact comented on buy a couple of s2 owners that drove the car.Thats before the bloody thing exsploded.

[madpugger]

That reminds me, I need to send a pulley to the states for refurb.

[4WheelDrifter]

Hi Lou. I've just read through this thread today. Sorry the engine had to let go like that. Although it does give you a chance to start again, and hopefully move forward and get the performance the old engine was lacking.

I'm just wondering if I have any bits lying around that can help. I have spare blocks, but they also need work to make them good.

[220bhp]

Thanks for that Stu,I think at last I have all the parts. Block is being bored and honed to take the new 81.5 maule pistons, crank being ground to take the very hard to find undersize bearings,the rods are on there way from aronmatic,Aelred is getting the lot balanced, head is being done,and so is my wallet,might need some
of that famous advise in a week or two,and maybe I can borrow a fiver .
Hows the boxster buy the way, running ok I hope.

[JP]

KS undersize bearings are on the shelf in this country for next day delivery if you get the sputter big ends and triple layer mains. This needs to be done first with a regrind before balancing. As the crank is percentage balanced based on the weights of the full reciprocating mass.

With a rebore only use the torque plate for honing if not fitting sleeves. It's used to get rid of squaring at the top of the bores from the pull of the headstuds. To be totally honest though unless running total seal rings the need for the torque plate is debatable as the distortion on an I5 block is almost impossible to measure with a bore gauge.

If however you need a tq plate AndyP's is in my possession and has been refaced to be perfectly parallel and countersunk for use with overboring aswell as honing now as I fitted ductile liners in my stroker. As previously it was out by 1thou on the length and 1.5-2thou variant on the width which is no good other than for honing.

I also recommend to measure and potentially deck the block you are using as you'll find that if its out by 3-5thou it will distort the head enough to cause valve seat distortion meaning despite cutting seats and refacing valves and lapping them in they still won't 100% seal. A common problem often overlooked on rebuilds.

[220bhp]

RWD19T many thanks for that advise.The bearings I have are ks bearings.mains are.25
undersize, and the big ends are .5 ,what are the part nos that you have used.
I had to buy two sets off four bigends because I could not find any in sets of five.I had this problem a few years ago.

[JP]

Bung me a pm on Fri when I'm back in the UK and I'll dig the no.s out the catalogue for you.

[220bhp]

My new pistons arrived today,thanks to Aelred, just waiting for the conrods from Aronmatic and I have all I need to rebuild the engine

[Ross]

Good to see a very quick recovery here from a rather heart-breaking scenario...

[220bhp]

Thanks Ross,its hard to keep the faith under the cercumstances,as you know.