Beware of bad machine shops!

[boost_boy]

As the title says "Beware". I'm not perfect guys/girls as I have made mechanical errors in the past and have accepted responsibility as well as corrected my errors. But when we enthusiasts drop stuff off to a machine shop, it is done knowing that that machine shop has professionals inside and are very thorough, right? Not always the case, unfortunately !

My fully built CA, with the amount of money I spent buying components and sending various components to more than one machine shop, I thought I had paid for peace of mind, but I was sadly mistakened. To make a long story short, the solid lifter height positioning was so off, that the engine showed 90% leakdown during testing. So I took it upon myself, consulted a member of this forum for some advice (thanks datto) and did my own adjustments on my JUN head set-up. The engine now has awesome leakdown numbers and is now ready to be droppped into my DRAG sentra. I also learned how to process solid lifters and shims for installation and now will never use the machine shop for such a feat again.

Dee

[ca18detgabby]

me want to see pix

sucks that sometimes you trust someone and pay for piece of mind only to take it in the rear.

[float_6969]

Gabby, I'm not sure that I want to know how you know about taking it in the rear.

Dee, it sucks that you got screwed, but it's awesome that you're finally gonna get that motor in the car

[themadscientist]

When one little panda talks about another little panda taking it in the rear, that's sexual harrassment; that makes me a sad panda.

[ca18detgabby]

Gabby, I'm not sure that I want to know how you know about taking it in the rear.

perv

I would have expected that from tim.... but you.

O well, tim was just showing me the "moves" you were teaching him.

[float_6969]

Tim isn't here, so I had to fill in for him. It's a tough job, but somebody has to do it.

As for my moves, well, Tim maybe be a lot of things, but a quick learner isn't one of them!

[themadscientist]

Is this the move?

[float_6969]

Wow, my video got out fast!

[ragenasian]

HA HA

This thread didn't even make two replies before Float flushed it.

[MeanGreenS13]

dee, trust me brother i hear ya. I actually live throwing distance from the shop that did my machine work the first 2 times, before i took it down south. first time i blew the head gasket. Second time, i blew the head gasket during a WOT pull, poured coolant into a cylinder, came up on compression stroke and KABLAMO! thank god you found your issue ahead of time!

[bentvalves]

I have always been a firm believer in the saying "if you want it done right, you HAVE do it yourself" I also never assemble anything from the machine shop without double checking/verifying the clearances they machined for me.

[MeanGreenS13]

well the thing was... i DIDNT assemble the rotating assembly and i didnt drop the head on the first time. and when i found out it leaked we attributed it to the cometic like everyone said. So we put a felpro on, and it leaked again after a little while, so i put yet another one on after checking the head, which was straight, and after that is when it tanked on me. Ended up being the block was off. something i didnt think was possible to really f*** up. My ignorance on not checking it to begin with, but still no excuse for them. ive got a big sticker with their LOGO that he gave me on the back glass of my car now.

Says LAUFFER Racing Engines and underneath it says SUCKS...

i have been threatened so it may have to come off lol

[boost_boy]

I have always been a firm believer in the saying "if you want it done right, you HAVE do it yourself" I also never assemble anything from the machine shop without double checking/verifying the clearances they machined for me.

Sad part is, this is one of the reasons why I also hesitated on installing this motor. Shady V8 machinists don't take import stuff seriously. They don't seem to realize that clearances are important and also fail to understand that because whatever works on a V8, doesn't mean apply the same theory to an engine that he's never heard or ever built before.

If I would've put this engine in my car, it would've failed and I would've been mad at myself for not following my instinct and double checking these folks' workmanship.

Problems:

1. Base height of camshaft to lifter was all over the place between the 16 valves and their supporting components which resulted in a leakage of air past some intake and exhaust valves.

2. Per some of my buddies who have a shop and have done many a car, I dressed my NISMO headgasket in some dressing that completely blocked oil and water holes (what a messand I was a noob for listening ). I had a huge mess to clean-up and had to be very careful as to not let that stuff fall into the oil and water ports because that would spell disaster via my oil pick-up.

3. (Dee slaps self ) My headgasket was on wrong, so that's twice I've done this. I put this engine together early 2003 and was kind of rushed because it was at my friend's shop, but that's no excuse and it too could've been disastrous. That was the last time that had happened and I've since built over 30 engines, so I'm more focused and relaxed nowadays. So yes, I am human thus I'm capable of making mistakes; except when I'm tuning .

So now my dramas with this motor is over and I can't wait to drop it in. Goal is simple, I Will Have the most powerful FWD CA powered car in the world or I will destroy it attempting to do so. No biggie, I have a few more CAs to build, so it's either go or blow .

Dee

[themadscientist]

Wait, how did you put the head gasket on wrong? How is that even possible?

[MeanGreenS13]

if you dont pay attention it will drop on upside down...

[r34 gtr]

I drop it on the wrong way almost every time, you just have to make sure that that one big oil passage is on the correct side, as the rest of the gasket if really f'in symmetrical.

[ca18detgabby]

Tim isn't here, so I had to fill in for him. It's a tough job, but somebody has to do it.

As for my moves, well, Tim maybe be a lot of things, but a quick learner isn't one of them!

its kind of like finding a parking spot and thinking......... I could never fit in there, but then you fold the mirrors in and what do you know your in.

[ca18detgabby]

glad to see you got it all fixed up Dee. cant wait to see the final product.

making mistakes is part of learning im told........

[Myetball]

The shop I had trusted until recently really let me down. I'm helping my son and his friend build up a high compression H23 with stage three cams. Long story short, get the short block back after an align bore, install mains and torque it down, crank won't turn.

Take it back, the shop dorks with it and the boys bring it back. Say the guy at the shop used a wrench to turn the crank and said it was good. Crank still won't turn, call 'em up and they say they've built hundreds of motors that are that difficult to turn...mind you only the crank is in, no pistons and no head yet.

Take it apart and all the mains are scored from metal to metal contact. Take it back a third time, show him the bearings and after a second align bore it works.

Actually, that was the fourth return. The very first was to take it back to get the cylinders honed. They tried telling the boys the cylinders didn't need to be honed.

Time for another shop. BTW, this was Montoya's in San Antonio.

What pissed me off the most was them insisting I was wrong when it was crystal clear they were wrong....YES cylinders need to be honed, and YES the crank should spin freely when installed by itself.

[bentvalves]

haha yea i had a friend install a crank in his KA before and the thing was bound up like all hell. I dont think you could spin it with a wrench, and that is how he was going to run it until I suggested he bring it back to the machine shop. Turns out he installed his crank girdle backwards....not the machine shop but rather the owner.

[Bstrd240SX]

i once had a crank that wouldnt turn, pulled it back out, put everything back on the bench in order, cleaned everything again reinstalled, seamed better, repeated, spun perfect, measured perfect, plastigauged perfect, car has made hundreds of pulls @ 12psi since

i have no explination f why it was doing that, maybe one of the bearings was slightly out of place or had something behind it, but it works now

the shop that did that block ticked me off, they ruined a head, barely hot tanked it, never tapped any of the holes like they were supposed to. hell, there was still old head gasket on it ! and of course i wasnt around for the owners lil fight w/ the machine shop, so i never had a say in how it had to be done right .... i just got to clean up the mess afterwards

my next engine build will be for myself, and it will go to the machine shop as spotless as possible, and my requirments will be on paper and well understood by the shop. i already know whos going to be doing .... the guys a national racing legend

[float_6969]

I do standalone installs and tuning for a local shop. We recently got a Neon in that had a built bottom end and a turbo installed. The guy had been running the car on an FMU setup and said the car always ran like crap after he got the motor rebuilt, even before the turbo was installed. It smoked and never seemed to have good power. The guy thought it was from the FMU and bought a standalone from us. We saw that it smoked and did a compression test. The numbers were low, but we were told the compression had been lowered way down (it hadn't, the customer mis-understood/was mis-informed). So we installed the standalone and when we went to put it on the dyno, the motor broke down before we could even make it through the first pull. It had lost all compression on 3 cyl. We tore the motor down and the piston to cylinder clearance was half of what it was supposed to be for forged pistons. The motor was so badly worn that there was no cross hatch on the cyl's, all of the cyl's had SEVERE side loading marks, and the 1st three cylinders and pistons were destroyed.

We told the customer. He took the shop to small claims court and won. The owner said he was going to appeal and when we got out of the courtroom started yelling and screaming at us, saying that we ruined the motor by overheating it. The overheat tag on the motor was intact, and the motor never got over 190°F. One of the things I do to protect the motor incase of an overheat is to have the motor get horribly rich at about 220°F and die out so that it can't overheat.

Once again, never trust a machine shop....

[ca18detgabby]

I do standalone installs and tuning for a local shop. We recently got a Neon in that had a built bottom end and a turbo installed. The guy had been running the car on an FMU setup and said the car always ran like crap after he got the motor rebuilt, even before the turbo was installed. It smoked and never seemed to have good power. The guy thought it was from the FMU and bought a standalone from us. We saw that it smoked and did a compression test. The numbers were low, but we were told the compression had been lowered way down. So we installed the standalone and when we went to put it on the dyno, the motor broke down before we could even make it through the first pull. It had lost all compression on 3 cyl. We tore the motor down and the piston to cylinder clearance was half of what it was supposed to be for forged pistons. The motor was so badly worn that there was no cross hatch on the cyl's, all of the cyl's had SEVERE side loading marks, and the 1st three cylinders and pistons were destroyed.

We told the customer. He took the shop to small claims court and won. The owner said he was going to appeal and when we got out of the courtroom started yelling and screaming at us, saying that we ruined the motor by overheating it. The overheat tag on the motor was intact, and the motor never got over 190°F. One of the things I do to protect the motor incase of an overheat is to have the motor get horribly rich at about 220°F and die out so that it can't overheat.

Once again, never trust a machine shop....

thats crazy

[bentvalves]

overheat tag! where do I gets em?!

[float_6969]

I have no idea. The machine shop that did my motor put one on the head and told me that if the middle of the tag melted, the motor overheated and he wouldn't warranty it out (I think it's made of lead or some other metal with a low melting point.