MY Q: How Do YOU Spun A CRANSHAFt bearing in a svx?

[kjoyes]

My question is i thought these engine were suppose to be pretty much bullet proof expect for the crappy gaskets and cam and cran seal.
what i want to know is how are some members on this form spining there cranshaft bearing? is it from abuse not changing the oil reving the hell out of them? or what just would like a explansion of how one goes about spining a bearing? i not a gear head and i dont know much about how engine work but help me figinger out a guesanwer?

[Wikedjuggalo]

Originally Posted by kjoyes

My question is i thought these engine were suppose to be pretty much bullet proof expect for the crappy gaskets and cam and cran seal.
what i want to know is how are some members on this form spining there cranshaft bearing? is it from abuse not changing the oil reving the hell out of them? or what just would like a explansion of how one goes about spining a bearing? i not a gear head and i dont know much about how engine work but help me figinger out a guesanwer?

Nothing last for ever...

[Green1995SVX]

Wow, that was difficult to read.

At any rate, I think all of the things you listed are contributing factors. Another key element is that these engines are now 20 years old in some cases. No matter how well built an engine is, there will always be failures over time. Overall, these are great engines. Also, keep in mind that you're coming to a forum where people go for assistance with problems. You're far more likely to see a post where somebody says "Help! My engine just blew!" than a post where someone says "My engine is running great today!"

[XT6Wagon]

Two ways I know of off hand.

1. oil pan damage, which limits or completely removes the clearence between teh pan bottom and the oil pickup. This means the oilpump will not pickup sufficent oil.

2. too heavy of an oil. While the SVX likes heavier oils than most engines... I've seen STi's lunch a bearing or 3 when someone swtiches to 20W50 "race" oil. The other side is that the SVX has a much older engine so its tolerance for oiling issues will be small.


That said a 3rd possiblity is oil filter.

I have some suspicions that the SHO I used to own ate its bearings in part due to the walmart putting on fram oil filters even when I requested other brands. They would clog around 3K miles causing massive restriction in the oiling system. Only happened a couple of times but...

[Crazy_pilot]

Originally Posted by kjoyes

figinger out a guesanwer?

I literally have no idea what that means.

It's an old car. Keep up the maintenance, don't abuse it, and hope for the best. My car made it almost 3 years with a rod bearing failing before it ate the whole thing.

[Sean486]

Originally Posted by Crazy_pilot

I literally have no idea what that means.

It's called "I have a smart phone and it is so hard to type on it that it makes me look stupid".

[Huskymaniac]

I'm not buying the "it's an old car" reason for everything that fails on someone's SVX. I'm sorry but either there was a major design flaw or people are abusing their cars in some way. One could argue that one should be able to drive a sports car hard. That's fine. Then you either need to step up preventative maintenance efforts or accept that these things will eventually happen.

Even F1 cars need to be rebuilt on a regular basis. Shock, vibration, high temperature operation, thermal cycling and damp heat are all known causes of accelerated aging. No car will experience these things and not also experience failures prematurely. If you add to that other factors which increase wear or compound the above effects (crappy air filters, crappy oil filters, crappy oil, crappy coolant and/or not changing those items frequently enough) then you have a recipe for disaster.

With Subaru, I think there are well known design deficiencies, which is sad, in my opinion. They regularly screw up wheel bearing, brake rotor and head gasket specifications and/or design. If you drive the car hard and/or don't maintain it well, these deficiencies WILL show up. And many other high stress parts on the car have a good chance to fail prematurely as well in these situations. But, in either case, it isn't because of age. If you are gentle on a car and maintain it well, your probability of seeing a failed engine bearing go WAY down. However, if a car is capable of pulling 0.9g, 0-60 in 4s and can go 160MPH and you regularly push the car to those limits, ANY car will have a higher rate of failure at a shorter period of time. Two people can drive the same car and one can see an engine bearing go at 150K miles at the 15 year mark while another would never see the engine bearing fail even if they drove the car 500K miles over 50 years.

Just because a car CAN do something doesn't mean it can do it without sacrificing lifetime.