Breaking in New Engine

[GnTooFast4u]

Alright guys any day now I should be getting my car back from my mechanic with my new rebuilt motor. Its all fordged enternals, I heard many ways to break in a turbo motor. drive it with low boost,drive it with no boost, drive it like your gonna drive it. what is the right way to break it in. I spent lots of money on this engine and I want to make sure it breaks in right. Any ideas comments.

Allan

 

[FJM568]

First off, what valve springs are you using and what kind of seat pressure are they set up for??? If anything, to break in the cam and lifters only, use the old stockers until after the cam and lifter break-in and then change them to the ones you want to run later...

Break the cam in for like 20 mins, varying the idle from 2000 to 3000 rpm...DO NOT LET THE CAR IDLE WHILE BREAKING IN THE CAM AND LIFTERS!!! Keep an eye on the coolant temps and oil pressure while breaking the motor in...If you can, have someone help you...One person sitting in the car pressing on the gas and watching gauges and the other watching under the hood and under the car for leaks and other problems that may pop up while starting an engine for the first time...

After that, change the oil and filter, and take the car out for a drive...OH YEAH, DID I SAY NOT TO LET THE CAR IDLE??? Find a deserted stretch of road and put the tranny in L1 and accelerate and let off the gas, and coast to a stop and repeat several times...This will help seat the rings(if they aren't seated yet)...Keep an eye on the oil pressure and coolant temps...Drive for about another 500 miles and change the oil and filter again...Drive another 1000 miles or so and change the oil and filter again...DO NOT USE SYNTHETIC OIL DURING BREAK-IN OR FOR THE FIRST SEVERAL THOUSAND MILES...

Drive it like you stole it...

Good luck!!!

 

[BlackBuick84]

I didnt drive over 50mph when i first got mine back. Did that for the first probably 700 miles and pissed alot of people off, heh heh. After that, i began to have fun w/ it.

 

[1984grandnat]

I asked that question to one of the local (long-time) drag racers, and he said to let the engine run at 2000 rpm for 20 minutes. After that you should be able to drive it like normal (within reason, of course). That's the process he uses on his 8-second alcohol-burning V8, anyway. Obviously, you probably don't want to race it hard for several hundred miles at least. Keep the oil changed, and don't run synthetic for a couple thousand or so. That process seemed to work fine on my last engine.

 

[cool 84]

Break in the cam like described above. Then drive it normal. I keep the boost ~15psi for the first 500 miles and don't go past 5,000rpm. I also drive it in third gear around town to keep the rpms a little higher. I'm sure it wouldn't hurt anything to make a full pass after the cam break in but that's just me. I also change the oil very often for the first 3,000 miles. For some reason all 3 of my motors got faster around the 2,000 mile mark. Don't know what that means but it was noticable every time.

 

[Relentless]

If I were investing a lot of $$$ into a motor I would do the following:

1. Turbo pre-luber. Why? Get the OIL preasure up before any attempt to turn that virgin motor over. Contact ATR if you need one, its cheap insurance! Terry to the 'nth' told me to remove the distributer and run a drill to get oil preasure built up before starting a new engine, but that was before preluber existed!

2. If it doesn't light off immediately, STOP! The cranking you just did just wiped the assembly lube off your camshaft (they did use lots of "moly" assembly lube on your cam, right? If your engine didn't start you better find out why before you flatten your cam lobes into low horsepower city.

3. Once the engine is running, make sure your oil preasure is correct (you have invested in a good guage, haven't you?), make sure the belts are tight and there are no leaks, then take it out and vary the rpm for an hour or so. Not max rpm, be reasonable. Every time you accelerate try to think of those piston rings rubbing clearance against the cylinder wall. To seat those rings smooth acceleration presses them against the cylinder wall, backing off relaxes them. You need to do both. The whole goal of breaking an engine in is to allow it time for parts to 'rub' the correct clearances, so change the non-synthetic oil a lot and keep your eyes open for metal contaminants and shavings(!). Don't run synth because you need the oil to allow parts to wear away the high spots, but switch when the engine is broken in. You should be able to tell because the cylinder leak-down will reach a consistent point. Do a preasure check before you start the motor and then monitor it. Don't pull the distributer wire and crank that new engine over to do this check!!!!

The other advice from FJM568 sounds correct.

Hope that helps

 

[EyeTalk2Trees]

once when i was dyno-ing (a former job) with Nicken Brothers racing (houston) I asked them the same question. They said assuming the cam is broke in correctly ( allthe stuff previously mention for a hydrolic cam) just take it easy the first time untill the motor gets to operating temp and thats it. The rings should be seated, then go have fun. simple...just my style

 

[FJM568]

Going with what Relentless said, if you can't afford the pre-luber, then pull the cam sensor, and prime the oil pump to bring up the oil pressure by using an electric drill...Make sure that you packed the oil pump with vaseline or assembly lube so that it will draw oil from the pan...You should be able to get a healthy amount of oil pressure by spinning it with a 1/2" drill motor...Then put the cam sensor back in, set it, and make sure everything is set to start and fire it up, and bring it up to 2000 immediately...Then refer to my previous post for the rest of the procedure...