What caused a apex seal spring to flaten or loose its tension? I bought a 89 TII engine that was milled out for 3mm seals, i was going to put it in my car. I was inspecting the engine and i noitce that one of the apex seal spring had no tension. The apex seal just bounces back and forth freely. It doenst look like the seal itself is broken, but i'll find out this weekend when i tear it down.

Do the apex seals look new? If so who ever built it probably used old springs maybe. And do you know the mileage on that rebuild is it fresh or has it been ran on? That's the thing when I build a motor for someone I don't have a problem with them looking over my shoulder to see what I'm doing. I show them exactly what I'm putting into their motors. And most of my repeat customers don't even question me they give me the parts and tell me to call them when it's done.

the apex seal is supposed to be able to move back and forth, but how much tension does it actually take to move it?



the first batch of rotary aviation seals had problems with their springs (because they weren't heat treated?) and a few people have had them flatten out, but they've since fixed the problem.



do you know when the motor was put together and what kind of apex seal springs they used?

I'm still pissed about the engine, it was suppose to be a running engine. I bought the engine about a year ago, it was sitting in the guys garage for about a year or two. He drove the rebuilt engine for about two to three years about 30k. So it was built by Tri Point about 4-5 years old. I dont think they have RA seals in them. Even if it did i dont think RA's 3mm seals come with springs. I'm running the RA 2mm seals now. Five of the apex seals have about the same tension on them, on the sixth one theres no spring tension at all. I'll probably know by the weekend. At least i get to see how Tri Points porting looks like. From what i can tell on the outside its pretty mild.

sat in his garage for a year or two, then sat in your garage for a year? so this thing has just been sitting for 2-3 years?



man, hose that **** off with some wd40 from the port runner and spin it around a bunch.. try to free things up.... the one moving seal might be just fine--it might be that all the other seals are stuck.



give it a shot. rotaries don't like sitting for very long.

I doubt its stuck since the seal moves freely in its groove. Unless the spring somehow got stuck completely flat.

[quote name='guitarjunkie28' date='Apr 15 2005, 08:30 PM']give it a shot. rotaries don't like sitting for very long.


[/quote]





Bullshit, my current daily driver sat for 4 years without being started. If you are that concerned about sticking apex seals soak the motor in Mystery Oil or ATF.

I'd say you were lucky then. I bought my car after it had been sitting in a garage for a number of years, and it was siezed real good. I poured all kinds of **** in there trying to get it unsiezed. I ended up having to rebuild the engine. I had to disassemble it backwards(front cover first), because I could not move the e-shaft enough to get the center iron off other wise. I got it disassembled and had to lightly tap the rear rotor out of the housing, because I could not even push it out it was stuck so bad. So, I know from experience that there is truth to guitarjunkie's claim. https://www.nopistons.com/forums/pub...DIR#>/wink.png

Tear it down.

Why you messing around with a questionable apex seal in the first place?





-Ted

Just tore down the engine this weekend. I have two flatten apex seal springs, three flattened corner seal springs, two cracked corner seals, one cracked 3mm apex seal and six missing corner seal inserts. But i have no damage on any of the housings. And this was suppose to be a running engine. I have one 89TII rotor and one fd rotor, the fd rotor has a dent on it. The exhaust port does not have a bevel on it and its a square shape on the bottom of the port, the top looks like stock. Whats the advantage of having a square opening on the exhaust port.