Schnell Gelb

EPS should pay you to correct their "Instructions" and do a video !
Your comments should be saved by anyone planning to install a roller bearing IMS. I presume the FVD Instructions for their roller IMS (in German) are better !
Just to be fair & balanced - the LN Instructions for their IMSB are 17 single spaced pages full of IMPERATIVES ! You can almost hear Jake's voice in them all the way from Georgia !
http://lnengineering.com/files/IMSR-...n-Warranty.pdf
Clearly a 'different' standard :-)

911Tobbe

The written instructions from EPS is pretty bad, it's obviously a rewrite of the instructions for previous types of bearings both in text and in pictures, they do however answer quickly on their support email. The instructions I found do specify the size of the hole to be 1-3mm in size. Don't get hung up on the threadlocker used, it's only a recommendation to use it, not a requirement, according to their support they don't even use it themself.

Schnell Gelb

Exactly my point. And they also claim the hole is unnecessary but fail to point out that gives you the option of fitting the upgraded oil-pump shaft(Modes of Failure !) if you are not needing their (weakened) grooved drive shaft.
The product may be good (& probably is) but the marketing is bungling amateurish. FVD anyone?Part number is : FVD 105 901 03 but I can not find any Instructions from FVD to offer Rennlisters.
Meanwhile Rennlisters will provide the band aids and comforts - like 'don't worry about the free play in the central bolt ' YIKES ! See point 4. in Post 30 above.

jaetee

Man, Schnell, be careful! You are starting to sound like a broken record (or a parrot)! LOL!

Counterpoint: Having held both the bearing and the grooved replacement shaft in hand and examined them up close, I never felt anything less than pure confidence the parts would more than adequately do what they need to do. The groove shaft fits snugly into position and appeared to be of very high quality. Once inserted into position, I tried pulling it out with my fingers and it would budge. And that groove is definitely not deep enough to appreciably weaken the part for the loads it experiences.

Granted, the paperwork and marketing materials were not polished up by someone with any kind of degree in English, but having spoken with the Vertex folks on the phone it's obvious to me their first language is Spanish. I guess they don't care to market to the pedantic. Maybe a consult with a professional proofreader or product marketing specialists would do EPS some good, but I'll also add that the lack of polish on that front is directly reflective in the decent pricing. I feel like they passed some of that savings on to the eventual end-users as $450 for what you get (and what it does) seems quite a bargain compared to some of the other IMSB solutions out there.

Sometimes you have to see through things like that and let the product speak for itself. Having put over 1500 miles of rigorous driving on mine, my confidence in the product has grown since the install. And if things end up going south in my engine due to having picked this bearing, I'll be the first to report back here and share that. But, no regrets at all so far....

Schnell Gelb

"And that groove is definitely not deep enough to appreciably weaken the part for the loads it experiences."
If you read up on the oi pump drive shaft, ,it has a history of snapping. And that is before a groove(stress riser) is machined into it !But because you couldn't pull it out with your fingers it was not weakened ?Yup that it the EPS engineering standard alright.
"I never felt anything less than pure confidence the parts would more than adequately do what they need to do" How can feelings validate the engineering and metallurgy of an engine part?
To quote another Engineer here:As an engineer I have zero (0.000) capacity to feel any emotion about this topic as I view it as purely technical data and am thankful for the information. Some folks clearly have an emotional investment in this data which frankly completely baffles me.
Unsubscribed.This is now a 'feelings' thread !
cue Parrot wings flapping.

RRTEC

I will post some pictures, my stock hex key did have some stress marks as if it had been flattened or "stressed". I can definetly appreciate the concern. Although I will also post a comparison of the two drives. The slot is so small it could be confused at a tooling mark. The product has been refined since it initially hit the market.

Noz1974

I didn't think the instructions were too bad myself but I agree that some of the pictures need updating as they have changed the design a little.

The groove in the oil pump drive is really shallow I'm sure it's not deep enough to weaken the shaft, hopefully it's an improved material like the one from LN but not sure

Schnell, there is no notch in the flange for an oil feed it must just be the pictures making it look that way, as you know the oil feed through the ims, the groove in the shaft governs the flow making the hole behind it which is punched in not as critical from a size point of view as the flow has already been restricted by the groove in the oil pump drive if you see what I mean!

Device2

I have to agree with NOZ1974 the grove on the Hex-drive for the pump looks almost etched and not very deep as it would have you believe from their advertisement picture. Just finished installing the Roller Bearing EPS bearing option in my car. Still assembling the motor from a refresh and tear down, but I will report once the bearing gets some miles under it's belt.

jaetee

I do see your point... published load numbers would make things considerably more clear as to exactly how good the product is. Pricing, and the complete absence of negative reviews after product has been available for over 2 years had more to do with my purchase decision than my feelings. Or rather... the lack of negative reviews made me feel good about my purchase decision.

jmj951

My indy reports exactly the same thing. He's been working on and racing 996's since they were first made and hasn't had a single failure of a stock/OEM bearing that had the outer seal removed. He removes the IMS bearing seal on every clutch job he performs on any 986/996/987/997.

My original dual-row IMS bearing had failed at 75k, though not catastrophically, and fortunately we caught it in time. The bearing cage closest to the end (the viewable side) had broken, and the IMS was only supported by the inner bearing set. He doesn't trust aftermarket bearing solutions, so his plan was to replace it with an OEM 997 IMS shaft and bearing (which requires the case to be opened and would have also required a later 996 crankshaft because of the different type of chain/sprockets, but he had that lying around anyway). By pure luck/accident he ran across a new OEM 996 IMS shaft with a dual-row bearing that had gotten lost in one dealer's inventory and was just found last year, so we installed that without the bearing seal. The indy said, with full confidence, that I will never have to worry about it. Only 3,000 miles since that, but I have pretty good peace of mind. Breaking open the case is an extreme, expensive solution, but if you're in a situation where the engine is apart anyway (I was getting head work done due to a bad water pump failure that circulated debris throughout the engine, so he pulled it all apart), that seems like the way to go.

EPSAuto

Hi Rrtech,

Thank you for choosing our EPS Patented Cylindrical IMS Bearing. We appreciate the time taken to post your experience on our product. You mentioned that you can’t find any failure report about our product, this is true. Since we started to sell our EPS Cylindrical IMS Bearing since 2013, we have sold 5,000 units in total, and we have NOT had a report of a single failure.


The reason why our IMS Cylindrical Bearing does not fail is because it is made of a completely different technology than the traditional ball bearing at Porsche and LN. The reason for the IMS failure is due to the type of bearing that is employed. LN and Porsche use a ball bearing that applies the load on a single point of about 1.0mm. Our EPS Cylindrical bearing spreads out the pressure point, applying the load on approximately 15mm.


You can see how the ball bearing is inferior to the cylindrical bearing by referencing Porsche’s attempt to correct the IMS problem throughout the years. Porsche changed the ball bearing 3 different times. First, a single row of 47mm, then a double row of 47mm, and finally a single row of 62mm. All three bearings failed.

Just to give you a little spec information, the IMS shaft turns at HALF the speed of the engine (max 3,500 RPM). Our EPS IMS Cylindrical bearings can operate at speeds up 15,000 RPM. The speed that the IMS bearing is operating originally at (max 3,500) is a leisurely pace compared to its ability of 15,000 RPM.



Hope you enjoy our product and share your experience with us later. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to us.



Thanks,
EPS Team
epsauto.com

Sneaky Pete

Quick question. You say your IMS bearing is patented. What is the patent number and when did you get it? Just wondering.....thanks!

318touring

Was looking through their site and came across this info:

patented system - U.S. Patent 9004766B1

Gulliver

...

Sneaky Pete

Did you search what it is?