The Celica is a small car & light car. Adding displacement only adds to the weight and undermines the handling. Lastly they probably don't want to add displacement if this engine is sold throughout the world. Engines with over 2.0L in many countries are considered more or less a luxury and taxed accordingly.
toyota 2zz-ge rod bearing failure, syntec 5w-30
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The following is what I've heard from a BMW engine specialist, and maybe it's relevant to some other makes:
Premature connecting rod bearing failure is fairly common in BMWs who are driven at high RPM all the time. Especially when a BMW engine seems to run especially well, due to the motor having losened up a lot (usually around 80-100k mi), there is an increased risk of the rod bearings not being able to withstand the increased power and pressure. The bearings have 3 layers (I think), and if the problem is caught early, then the engine can easily be saved. If the problem is neglected, then the engine will sooner or later self-destruct. It's advisable for BMW owners to have their rod bearings propyhlactically replaced every 80-100k miles. Then those engines last over 300k mi.
Harper;
The luxury tax, etc, might be true and makes perfect sense to me; but I disagree with your belief that adding cubic inches will make the car heavier. The LS1s are just about the same as the old SBC (346 vs 349+ CIs), but yet, the LS1 is way lighter. You make it sound as if I said, "Put a Chevy 454 in that sucker". I'm sure there are many ways to make a 2.0 engine or bigger that is as light or lighter than a 1.8 L.
Besides, they could have put a turbo in that thing and be done with it.
Rick
Read carefully. Toyota has to "export" the Celica to other countries as well. Read.. US Market. GM & Domestic mfrs export very little of its' output to countries that have high energy costs. That aspect affects the way they view their product.
At 8200RPM's 5W30 was not doing him any favors. At high RPM's it is very hard to keep connecting rods bearings lubed due to centrifical force. When you add high G-load like a banked track at high speeds and high rpms the oil is thrown out from the bearing and pressure bleeds off. This happens every time he takes a turn. It would show up as a fluctuation in oil pressure every turn when you download the track telematry. He might want to try Redline 10W40 or 20W50 next time. This is why the damage was mostly isolated or more sever in the connecting rod bearings. THe other plae high rpm abuse with low grade lubes shows up is in the cam bearing area's.
Has he reprogramed or chiped his ECM? If he has and his is able to stay at 8200 RPM's without hitting the fuel cut off it could be a harmonics issues as well but doubtful. Most Toyota products are good up to 9000-10000 RPM's before crank harmonics eat up the bearings.
Has he reprogramed or chiped his ECM? If he has and his is able to stay at 8200 RPM's without hitting the fuel cut off it could be a harmonics issues as well but doubtful. Most Toyota products are good up to 9000-10000 RPM's before crank harmonics eat up the bearings.
John Browning's post sounds like it is what Honda addressed in the Legend /NSX bearings by having concave and not flat surfaces to trap lubrication.
However, it is hard to imagine how turning G forces can affect this especially on a road car. If I remember correctly, the Celica has a transverse layout and the problem is exhibited in turns. This then means that cars with longtitudinal layouts have similar problems with acceleration and braking?
However, it is hard to imagine how turning G forces can affect this especially on a road car. If I remember correctly, the Celica has a transverse layout and the problem is exhibited in turns. This then means that cars with longtitudinal layouts have similar problems with acceleration and braking?
I would bet its more of a matter of oil uncovering the pickup on hard turns. Then have intermittant oil flow. Result: fried bearings.
Thats why true road race cars are set up with a dry sump system. The oil is held in a tank seperate from the sump, a pump that has several stages sucks oil out of the sump to the tank, the same pump takes oil from the tank and pressurizes the engine. Oil will crawl up the side of an engine due to g forces, the higher, the greater the potential to do it.
My 2cents.
Dan
Thats why true road race cars are set up with a dry sump system. The oil is held in a tank seperate from the sump, a pump that has several stages sucks oil out of the sump to the tank, the same pump takes oil from the tank and pressurizes the engine. Oil will crawl up the side of an engine due to g forces, the higher, the greater the potential to do it.
My 2cents.
Dan
Honda has had alot of experience in high rpm with their motorcycles and their formula racing .
Wow I stirred this up alot. Well the car stock has a fuel cut at 8200rpm and I know of many people (mainly auto-crosseres) who have been bouncing off the rev-limter/fuel cut for every run that they do because its quicker than shifting to third gear then to bounce off the rev-limiter many times. I was really wondering if the oil caused this problem? I have run my car to 8200rpm on the track many times but have been using Mobil 1 and Redline (unfortunatley this was before I foudn this board and learned that 5w-30 mobil 1 trisyn was umm thin). The theory that this could be from oil starvation at hgih g's seems plausible because there has been knowledge that this car can have oil pickup problems above 1g. I was looking into an Accusump to alliveate this problem.
About the 2zz: This engine was meant to be like this (high revving and lightwieght) . I will find the SAE technical documents about its design and the ligthweight valvetrain. I find this kind of engine far more fun to drive than larger slower revving engines. The ligthweight of the car gives the car far better handling abilites than one would expect. The label that this engine is a glass engine is from the many many reports of people mis-shifting the car and over-revving the car to 11k rpms and destroying the head and occasionally parts of the bottom end.
About the 2zz: This engine was meant to be like this (high revving and lightwieght) . I will find the SAE technical documents about its design and the ligthweight valvetrain. I find this kind of engine far more fun to drive than larger slower revving engines. The ligthweight of the car gives the car far better handling abilites than one would expect. The label that this engine is a glass engine is from the many many reports of people mis-shifting the car and over-revving the car to 11k rpms and destroying the head and occasionally parts of the bottom end.
cabgreylegend;
You still don't get my point, do you? I know that Toyota exports to other countries, but I am not talking about exports/imports.....I'm talking about what they "should" have done here in the states. Besides, the energy cost stuff is not very valid....last time I checked, Nissan was still manufacturing the Skyline, which happens to be an awesome car with only 2.0 Liters, but requires a lot of gas.....Japan is one of the most expensive countries to live in....they have to import just about everything, so life there is very expensive. Also, they make a bunch of different cars there that they never bring here AND viceversa....in fact, Toyota recently authorized the sales of the Lexus brand in Japan itself. The Japs could never buy one until now. If there is a will, there is a way.
Anyway, the Skyline is an example of what I was talking about....2.0 L with a turbo.....never mentioned anything about economics, etc, etc.
You guys take things out of proportion a lot!
Rick
I think Toyota got all this backwards. I think the current Celica should have been the MR2 and viceversa. I think they should have made the Celica engine, a low compression, bigger displacement (2.2-2.5), beefier parts engine, put a turbo in it and made the car rear wheel drive, instead of trying to squeeze 180HP out of tiny motor at above 7000 RPMs. You see, we (especially me) critisize GM for quality and finish, but at least they got the engine displacement part right. They rather give more CIs, than try to squeeze more out of less.
Rick
Rick
Dan4510 I forgott that this was a daily driver. Uncovered pickup is also a great point! SOme Auto-X guys will over fill the sump for this reason.
What I proposed is not theory but well proven. A lesser version of this can be seen if the engine has bad rod bearings. The engine will have fine oil pressure at idle but as RPM's climb the oil presure drops as centrifical pressure force increases. THe oil flows out of the bearing faster then the pump can supply. Once the RPMs drop oil pressure returns to normal. THe G-Loading only amplifies this effect. This especialy true with very concentric bearings. Race bearing are less concentric and tend to be groved differently. They would also have large chamfered oil supply port.
I am not saying that Castrol Syntec caused this problem. Abuse and improper preperation caused this. I was saying though that 5W30 Syntec is not the best oil for this ablication. 8200 RPM's in an OEM stock engine for prolonged time frames is not a good idea.
They did not design this engine to be run at 8200 RPM's while you do 5-20 laps around the track!
What I proposed is not theory but well proven. A lesser version of this can be seen if the engine has bad rod bearings. The engine will have fine oil pressure at idle but as RPM's climb the oil presure drops as centrifical pressure force increases. THe oil flows out of the bearing faster then the pump can supply. Once the RPMs drop oil pressure returns to normal. THe G-Loading only amplifies this effect. This especialy true with very concentric bearings. Race bearing are less concentric and tend to be groved differently. They would also have large chamfered oil supply port.
I am not saying that Castrol Syntec caused this problem. Abuse and improper preperation caused this. I was saying though that 5W30 Syntec is not the best oil for this ablication. 8200 RPM's in an OEM stock engine for prolonged time frames is not a good idea.
They did not design this engine to be run at 8200 RPM's while you do 5-20 laps around the track!
I hate to admit that I watch any fwd shows, but a show that has a pair of twins as the spokesman are building a 6 cylinder toyota motor that they hope to get over 500hp at the rear wheels.
To do this they replaced the stock rods and rod bearings with h-beam rods by carillo and the rod bearing width was taken from .7xx to .955. The crank was also made of high dollar forged steel. The said the stock toyota setup was only good for about 300hp.
Lots of modifications necessary to make the motor live with lots of boost and maybe nox.
They used neo synthetic oil as an assembly lube.
Maybe its a comibnation of things that went wrong. Bumping the rev limiter, uncovering the oil pickup in an engine not originally desinged to be road raced. And I think that the only way the oil pickup would not be uncovered in this instance would be extensive oil pan modification to keep the oil around the pickup. Doesnt sound like that happened. When you push the design of the engine that hard its not a matter of will something happen, its a matter of when.
I dont have any experience building 4 cylinders, but I built a mopar 340 some years ago that I still have fun with. My intent was to have fun with it on the street and it to live forever. One modification I did do was to braze dams to the oil pan to keep the oil from running away from the pickup. Another was to keep my rpms under 6000. Cam, heads, gearing was all optimized to work together in this rpm range. In over 10 years of use it broke one rocker arm. Over 1200 1/4 mile runs.
The engine had a sump that was toward the middle of the engine. I brazed in sheet metal so the oil couldnt crawl out of the pan. Had a windage tray installed also. I run 6 qts of oil and never have had a problem braking or accelerating uncovering the oil pickup. On mopar small blocks this especially happned during braking. usually #2 main was the first to go from this happening.
Dan
[ August 29, 2003, 07:40 PM: Message edited by: Dan4510 ]
In the 70's I modified a number of oil pans for 900cc Kawasaki Z-1 engines by putting a trap door in them to keep the oil from flowing back away from the pickup during hard acceleration.
A lot of Show Room Stock and other SCCA racers take a simple approach in classes where modifications are limited. They overfill by 1-3 quarts since at high RPM's a lot of oil stays in the upper part of the engines, and what's left in the sump often gets thrown away from the pickup under breaking, cornering, etc.
Of course how much overfill you can get away with is engine dependent but I'd bet it's almost always 1-2 quarts before you get into windage problems.
Nothing is harder on a vehicle than road racing. Those that think you can do it 100% stock and not suffer failures are doomed...
As for the flat torque curve, the Toyota has a very flat torque curve. Most big pushrod American torquey engines have a declining torque curve near redline. Most drivers mistake totally flat torque curves as "PEAKY" and declining torque curves as "FLAT". It is unusual for a normally aspirated engine to have an increasing torque curve. Check for yourself!
The oil's performance may have been the problem in this case. High RPM 4 stroke engines (I am referring to Ferarri engines in particular and Honda/Toyota) with redlines around 8K are prone to bearing failures when abused. The reason is complex, but it includes the following:
1. bearings are made as small as possible to reduce friction, as high RPM is not possible with high friction.
2. reciprocating mass puts very high loads on the oil film during high RPM use.
3. The oil's commonly used in automotive applications today have less viscosity and that leads to lower film strength.
4. oil pumps are made small for efficiency.
5. Some manufacturers feel it is acceptable to have limited engine life as a trade off for performance.
6. Turbochargers/superchargers generally put less load on bearings per HP/displacement than RPM.
Chris
The oil's performance may have been the problem in this case. High RPM 4 stroke engines (I am referring to Ferarri engines in particular and Honda/Toyota) with redlines around 8K are prone to bearing failures when abused. The reason is complex, but it includes the following:
1. bearings are made as small as possible to reduce friction, as high RPM is not possible with high friction.
2. reciprocating mass puts very high loads on the oil film during high RPM use.
3. The oil's commonly used in automotive applications today have less viscosity and that leads to lower film strength.
4. oil pumps are made small for efficiency.
5. Some manufacturers feel it is acceptable to have limited engine life as a trade off for performance.
6. Turbochargers/superchargers generally put less load on bearings per HP/displacement than RPM.
Chris
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