So my oil light flickered a few times on Thursday, and I heard a couple of "clacking" sounds...stop at gas station and pour in 2 quarts of cheap oil to get home. I find out that I've burnt probably 3 quarts of oil over the last 1000 miles, maybe, I'm not sure. I immediately did an oil change the day after and inspected my old oil filter. I didn't see signs of excessive metal shavings, just super dark oil, no milkiness or anything.

So obvious next step was to do a compression test. Results were: 168,185,128,175,185,175. Poured oil into cyl 3 and it rose to 210. This comes as a big shock to me because when I bought the car last year, all cylinders were more or less even. I changed the oil the day after I bought it, used a K&N filter. Got tuned by JMS in December, didn't mistreat the car. Only thing I've changed since my tune (regular bolt-ons) is long tube headers instead of high flow cats. Didn't think that would make a big difference, but I'm at a loss as to what would fry the piston rings like that.

My plan is to find a used motor and swap it. I considered dumping the car, but I've put so much time into it, I just can't let it go. I'd like to see my work come to fruition. Just wanted to post my sob story and see if anyone has any hookups on used motors. Thanks.

 

Sorry to here about your misfortune, that's crazy.

I see quite a few motors on Craigslist here in Dallas on a regular basis. I'll keep an eye out for you.

Do you think you can limp the car around for a few weeks while sourcing a motor?

 

sorry to hear, but yeah there's a lot of motors on sale on craigslist from what i saw

 

Oh the car runs like the day I bought it. That's how it burnt so much oil without my noticing. No smoke at idle or under load, no hiccups. Still makes enough power for me not to notice a decrease, so I wouldn't call it "limping" around. I know these motors consume oil, and I usually checked it every 500-1000 miles. This time I hadn't gotten around to checking it at my normal interval because my garage door broke and I was going to wait to check it when it was fixed.

To add insult to injury, my Exotic Speed exhaust showed up a day after I found all this out. I threw it on anyway because it sounds sexy, but knowing that my car is dying takes a lot of fun out of driving. I'm going to check the oil level weekly and check compression on cyl 3 (maybe 1 as well, getting low-ish) in 2 weeks just because I'm curious.

 

How goes your motor?

 

It could be detonation due to a bad gas or tune. Good luck

 

im currently deployed in japan and i can get my hands on almost any low milage running engine. If you want more details feel free to PM me. The bonus is the shipping is free but the downfall is the time till it will get there.

 

i already have a vq35 im shipping but i have enough weight for one more engine... i was thinking about grabbing a s2000 and trying to sell when i get back but let me know if ur interested