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Thanks everyone for the comments. I have been spending the last few weeks breaking in the engine and fixing small issues. I have a total of 125 miles on the engine since the install. It is killing me to not be able to really wring it out. Below are some of the minor issues I had over the last 2 weeks.
First break in run. I am a mile from home after doing the break in sequence and decided to stop at Dunkin Donuts for some Iced Tea and had a major pucker moment. The low oil pressure light lit up at idle. Immediate panic as I shut the car off and pop the deck lid and go through the following trouble shooting. No oil on the ground, no visible oil leaks in the engine compartment. No oil in the coolant reservoir. Oil on the dipstick so no oil was lost. Started it up and 1 have one bar of oil pressure and the light goes away with RPMs as the gauge goes up with RPMs as well. Lightly drove it home and put it on the lift and started doing research. Oil temp was 105 degrees celsius and coolant was 95 degrees. I also hooked up a manual oil pressure gauge the next day and was able to verify that engine has good pressure. 60 psi at idle on cold start up. Basically, oil pressure sending unit needed replacement and break in oil will give a bit lower oil pressure than regular oil.
Second issue was a coolant leak. Was worried I had a cracked hose somewhere as I had pressure tested the system before installing coolant and all was good. Luckily, it was just the hose clamp on the small hose between the metal pipe on bank 2 and the front engine console. It wasn't completely on and when the engine heated up, it softened and loosened up. Fixed the hose clamp and all was good.
Today was the first trouble free day after fixing the above issues and I really had fun putting some miles on it. I can't wait until I hit the 400 mile mark and swap out the break in oil for Driven HR5 non synthetic oil and I can really get on it a bit.
Here is a picture of the low oil pressure light. You can see that I had 1 bar of pressure.
I have seen that same warning while driving on my turbo and on my wife’s car (03 C2). it can be a real panic moment. Both times, it turned out to be a loose connection on the oil pressure sensor. Notice you do not get the oil pressure warning light like you do when the ignition is on but the car is not running.
Wanted to give an update. So since the engine was installed, I noticed a tick and a bit of hesitation at 3K RPMs. I was thinking a stuck lifter but I didn't have any codes for the first few months so I though maybe just a loud lifter. The end of October I got a misfire code for cylinder 2 and a code that indicated the lifter was not working for high lift. I ordered a pair of intake lifters and some gaskets and then lowered the engine and pulled off the cam cover. Sure enough the lifter was stuck in the bore. I went to pull the lifter out and it wouldn't come out. So, the next step was to remove cams, and all lifters and remove the lifter carrier. Once the carrier was out, I had to bang the lifter out of the hole and I could see that somehow the bore was damaged. Luckily, I have spare parts from the donor 997 engine. I cleaned up the spare lifter carrier, and installed it. I Installed the lifters and cams and put the cam cover on. I went to put the valve lift solenoid in and it wouldn't fit. I did some research and found that Porsche changed the solenoid early in the 997 run. Luckily, I had a 997 solenoid from the donor engine and installed that. Put the rest of the car back together and waited until the next day to start the car after filling up the engine with oil.
Started it up and to my amazement the engine sounded great. It was quiet with no tapping. I took it for a drive and let the car warm up. Did a full throttle pull and WOW!!! The car was finally running on all 6 cylinders. This was about 4 weeks ago.
I think finally the chapter is closed on this engine. I don't know why or how the lifter got stuck. When installing, I put each one in and slid it up and down and verified that they moved smoothly. Thankfully this was bank 1 as I don't know if I could have done bank 2 in the car.
Here are pictures of the bad lifter and the bad lifter bore. The picture of the bad bore is of it sitting on my spare head as that's where it is currently stored.
18496782[/url]]Wanted to give an update. So since the engine was installed, I noticed a tick and a bit of hesitation at 3K RPMs. I was thinking a stuck lifter but I didn't have any codes for the first few months so I though maybe just a loud lifter. The end of October I got a misfire code for cylinder 2 and a code that indicated the lifter was not working for high lift. I ordered a pair of intake lifters and some gaskets and then lowered the engine and pulled off the cam cover. Sure enough the lifter was stuck in the bore. I went to pull the lifter out and it wouldn't come out. So, the next step was to remove cams, and all lifters and remove the lifter carrier. Once the carrier was out, I had to bang the lifter out of the hole and I could see that somehow the bore was damaged. Luckily, I have spare parts from the donor 997 engine. I cleaned up the spare lifter carrier, and installed it. I Installed the lifters and cams and put the cam cover on. I went to put the valve lift solenoid in and it wouldn't fit. I did some research and found that Porsche changed the solenoid early in the 997 run. Luckily, I had a 997 solenoid from the donor engine and installed that. Put the rest of the car back together and waited until the next day to start the car after filling up the engine with oil.
Started it up and to my amazement the engine sounded great. It was quiet with no tapping. I took it for a drive and let the car warm up. Did a full throttle pull and WOW!!! The car was finally running on all 6 cylinders. This was about 4 weeks ago.
I think finally the chapter is closed on this engine. I don't know why or how the lifter got stuck. When installing, I put each one in and slid it up and down and verified that they moved smoothly. Thankfully this was bank 1 as I don't know if I could have done bank 2 in the car.
Here are pictures of the bad lifter and the bad lifter bore. The picture of the bad bore is of it sitting on my spare head as that's where it is currently stored.
Probably some residual debris, which I’ve read is the most common problem with engine rebuilds.
Glad you got it sorted!
It’s wonderful these computers in our cars have codes that call out specific failure items.
1 year+ update. I changed the oil today and switched to DT40 as the 4,500-mile break-in with non-synthetic is done. I have changed the oil twice in that 4,500-mile range with the Driven HR-5 Hot Rod Conventional 10w-40 Motor. Now the engine is past any special break-in procedures. The car has been running great and is a blast to drive, It has torque throughout the RPM range and still revs as fast as the 3.6 did. I love this engine!
@amargari That is really great to hear! You went through a lot of ups and downs and you landed on top.
My rebuild only has 420 miles on it so far but it gets better every time I drive it.
How many hard pulls and engine breaking did you do? Realistically I probably did 30-40 hard pulls over the 400 miles and it isn’t using any oil and no blow-by so I assume everything is good.
@amargari That is really great to hear! You went through a lot of ups and downs and you landed on top.
My rebuild only has 420 miles on it so far but it gets better every time I drive it.
How many hard pulls and engine breaking did you do? Realistically I probably did 30-40 hard pulls over the 400 miles and it isn’t using any oil and no blow-by so I assume everything is good.
Really glad yours is running so well.
Dan
I did a few, not sure how many, but it seems good. From what I read the break-in of the rings happens in less than 30 miles.
1 year+ update. I changed the oil today and switched to DT40 as the 4,500-mile break-in with non-synthetic is done. I have changed the oil twice in that 4,500-mile range with the Driven HR-5 Hot Rod Conventional 10w-40 Motor. Now the engine is past any special break-in procedures. The car has been running great and is a blast to drive, It has torque throughout the RPM range and still revs as fast as the 3.6 did. I love this engine!
The original build with tools, clutch, and flywheel was just under $15K. I didn't keep as many receipts for the rebuild, but the spare engine cost me $700. I was able to reuse a lot of the parts from the first rebuild, but the second rebuild was around $7k. I still have parts from the spare engine to sell that may allow me to recoup some of that money. I have a good crank, head and other parts I can sell at some point.
09-01-2022, 11:36 PM
