- City
- south central
- State
- AK
And back out.
The engine ran great for about a 45 minutes or an hour while we were trying to set the fuel sync and then doing a little initial driving around for break-in, and to shake out the bugs (two vacuum lines too short, dealing with some pulley issues, etc.). It sat for a day as I went wheeling in the Scrambler, and then I got back to it on Sunday night. After maybe 20 more minutes of running, it went to 0 psi. The next morning I got a new sensor, put 20 minutes later it was back to 0 psi. Warrantied that one, and 20 minutes later, had zero psi. The machine shop had me install a mechanical gauge to verify what I was seeing, and although it didn't actually drop to zero, it was close. We also started hearing a very light knock, but it was completely inconsistent, and wasn't coming from a rod (verified by pulling plug wires). They asked me to do an oil change and go from 5W-30 to 10W-40, and that essentially didn't make a difference; it still idled at 4 psi when hot, and I couldn't get it over maybe 25 psi even when at 4000 RPM. They took apart the old filter and found babbit material, and then asked me to bring in the "new" filter that I'd just put on. They also asked me to go home and grab the balancer to see if I could move the crank back and forth by hand (I could, maybe 1/32"). At that point, with roughly 3 or maybe 4 hours of run-time, they told me to bring the engine back in. It turns out the main bearings immediately failed and took out the thrust bearing--thus creating the erratic knock as the crank shifted laterally.
The engine ran great for about a 45 minutes or an hour while we were trying to set the fuel sync and then doing a little initial driving around for break-in, and to shake out the bugs (two vacuum lines too short, dealing with some pulley issues, etc.). It sat for a day as I went wheeling in the Scrambler, and then I got back to it on Sunday night. After maybe 20 more minutes of running, it went to 0 psi. The next morning I got a new sensor, put 20 minutes later it was back to 0 psi. Warrantied that one, and 20 minutes later, had zero psi. The machine shop had me install a mechanical gauge to verify what I was seeing, and although it didn't actually drop to zero, it was close. We also started hearing a very light knock, but it was completely inconsistent, and wasn't coming from a rod (verified by pulling plug wires). They asked me to do an oil change and go from 5W-30 to 10W-40, and that essentially didn't make a difference; it still idled at 4 psi when hot, and I couldn't get it over maybe 25 psi even when at 4000 RPM. They took apart the old filter and found babbit material, and then asked me to bring in the "new" filter that I'd just put on. They also asked me to go home and grab the balancer to see if I could move the crank back and forth by hand (I could, maybe 1/32"). At that point, with roughly 3 or maybe 4 hours of run-time, they told me to bring the engine back in. It turns out the main bearings immediately failed and took out the thrust bearing--thus creating the erratic knock as the crank shifted laterally.
Last edited: