Possibly about to pick up a 93VR. The motor had a compression test, and it looks good. But the car has 73k on it, so its only a matter of time. Just curious who has dealt with Pettit? Thinking about just gankin the motor while I have the money and having it sent in to Pettit for heavy duty 3mm seals and a streetport. Is Pettit still doing the quality work they used to?

Whats 'gankin'?

yes pettit still does top notch work, infact i had the chance to meet and bullshit with cam himself over the weekend at elkartlake and from what i can tell ya he is one hell of a nice guy and smarter then alot of people who claim they know how to rebuild a motor.

just dont do the 3 mil seals.



Not worth it!

[quote name='rfreeman27' date='Aug 26 2005, 01:05 AM']just dont do the 3 mil seals.



Not worth it!


[/quote]





I agree. https://www.nopistons.com/forums/pub...IR#>/blush.png

Probably a dumb question, but what the hell is the difference between the two? Advantages and disadvanteges of the 2mm and 3mm seals?

People use 3mm apex seals because they think it will improve engine reliability. I don't see any outstanding proof that they do. If you ping the engine it will break a 3mm apex seal just as fast as it will break a 2mm apex seal. I am sure there is a marginal difference in the tolerances but I gotta believe that having the maps tuned properly would be better insurance and a smarter way to spend your hard earned cash. Not to mention I have seen 2mm apex seals take 30 pounds of boost and not break so if that is the case why bother with 3mm apex seals? I would guess that the 3mm apex seals are pricey compared to the stock ones and you have to pay someone to machine the rotors to fit the larger seal. A lot of money for a small gain if you ask me.



Thats my opinion anyway.

The arguement is that a 2mm seal will break after the first ping and a 3mm seal can take up to 3 pings. That's at least what all the manufacturers of 3mm seals will argue. https://www.nopistons.com/forums/pub...IR#>/smile.png But the price differences really don't make 3mm seals worth it.

Oh, ok. Thanks Dave. I knew it had something to do with boost.

Ok well lets say this. Out of all the shops out there, who would you guys personally take you're FDs to for a rebuild and streetport?

Also witht he 3mm seals, you have to machine the rotors to accept them. Then if you always have to run 3 mm seals.

most engine builders that i've talked to will only use 3mm seals when 2mm seals will not fit the housings anymore. cheaper to mill and use 3mm seals than brand new rotors, and clearancing side seals, fitting new bearings.. etc etc. and from what i have read 3mm seals are harsher on the rotorhousings than 2mm

[quote name='sweet7' date='Aug 27 2005, 04:06 PM']Ok well lets say this. Out of all the shops out there, who would you guys personally take you're FDs to for a rebuild and streetport?


[/quote]





It all depends on where you are located at. I took my car to BNR Supercars to have the motor rebuilt. Bryan doesn't do many engines but luckily he did mine for me. I'd feel safe having him do another. I've also recently met another engine builder close by that I'd trust. Anything over about three hours away would be out for me but luckily that leaves a lot of options open.

i know somewhere you can send it to get rebuilt and ported. does all my engine/tuning everything work https://www.nopistons.com/forums/pub...IR#>/smile.png

oooh, i meant apex seals will not fit the rotors.. not housings in my previous post... sorry too late for me to edit

I really dont care where I have to ship it, I just want quality work done.



Thanks Vosko, PM sent

[quote name='sweet7' date='Aug 28 2005, 08:57 PM']I really dont care where I have to ship it, I just want quality work done.



Thanks Vosko, PM sent


[/quote]





well i know a few placed down here in florida

Who?



I'm having a hell of time figuring this out. Everytime I think I have it nailed down, with regards to who I send it to, I read something or someone tells me not to go there. This will only be my 2nd rebuild, and the first one was way back when you could go to mazda and get a new motor. And the motor isnt the problem, I need someone that can do a good street-port. You name a company and I've looked into it, then someone comes along telling me how *insert whoever here* destroyed their engine.



GRRR

not 3rd gen related,. but 3mm related.



I got my car with 3mm seals in the motor already.



Now if anyone knows me when i had the car they know the abuse the motor went thru. I purposely tried to pop the motor more then a few times.



The internal wastegate imploded on my turbo (some old school t04e with an Int. WG) so the boost would just continually build. This was on stock injectors, stock ecu, stock everything, except i had a walbro...but i only added that for about the last 10k miles. This motor was run hard in pretty much that state for 60k miles. It also had slight (crappy) porting. SO other then 3mm Dual Sprung seals, FD Corner Seal Springs, Slight Crappy Porting, Straight Exhaust, Old T04E w/ Int. WG, and a cone filter it was completely stock, fuel, computer and ignition wise.



It ran like that for *60k miles*, just wanted to stress that again. More often then not every shift was at reline, and i saw 17psi on more then one occasion, on just normal 93octane, sometimes 94 if i was feeling frisky.



I, personally, believe the 3mm seals had something to do with that, because according to everyone else the motor should have exploded after barely 30k miles.



I do consider it an expensive thing to do for no reason tho, my motor came that way, if it didnt id have stayed with 2mm probably, until the rotors went out of spec then id machine it for 3mm.



That motor *NEVER* blew up, i finally gavce up and yanked it out before last winter to get the car painted and start my project i had been planning. I think i probably couldve ran it for another 20k miles as it had no problems running at all after the 60k, except the leaking OMP and some coolant issues that werent motor related.



edit: Oh and also as for 3mm seals being hard on the housings, my housings had no noticeable chatter from the apex seals, there was grooving possibly caused by oil starvation but it was not consistent with apex seal chatter. I believe they were new housings when the motor was built. so 60k miles of being beat to **** with 3mm seals and the housings would have still been very re-usable if it wasnt for oil starvation (leaking OMP lines, housings are being resurface with ceramic for the rebuild, then we will test 3mm seals vs ceramic housings)



kevin.

In a NA application 3mm seals (with proper engine maintenance) will last over 200,000 miles. GSl-SE baby.

I think I'm probably gonna do 3mm seals. It can't hurt.....can it?

I got 150k+ on my stock NA and have no reason to belive it would not make it past 200k no problem, I dont really see any reason for 3mm seals on a NA engine?

Truthfully they are over kill however, I think the key to long life is the structurally more stable 2 piece design. I hate the 3 piece seals. Once the top piece gets thin with high mileage, they have a tendency to flip out of the rotor grooves. Plus they carbon freeze easier than the 2 piece. Also the slightest detonation destroys them on higher mileage situations. My NA 91 vert had a rebuilt Mazda reman engine when I bought. The car only had 70k on it with 10k on the rebuild. The rear rotor had no compression. NA rotary's aren't suppose to blow apex seals that early. The car now has 134k and the rear seals are blown again. Car had perfect maintenance too. No oil leaks or over heating with 12k fuel filter and spark plug changes.