blown motor

[chad8]

so we are the nuts of the automotive world. At 7 in the morning i come on this site and find 127 people reading about OIL.
I was thinking about the other thread that tries to give a percentage or people using synthetic. How about a more usable statistic.
What is the percentage of people using this site have ever grenaded a motor? I figure that with all my fellow oil nuts out there it should be very low.
You can include whether it was before or after you became an oil fanatic.
I have been driving about 40 years with over 40 cars owned. I took engine shop class in 1972 and it has served me well. I raced cars down the famous Woodward avenue in its prime(over 120 mph). I have had a couple motors that had the heads off in over 1 million miles. I have sold a few that were going south fast but never a lower end explosion. I believe it is because i have never let any vehicle go too long without regular oil changes or run out of oil. We all know that this is The cause of engine problems.
How about the rest of you?

 

[oilboy123]

Never blown a motor.

 

[javacontour]

The only motor I've blown is a lawn mower engine. That one was loaned to my former FIL. Shame on me for not making sure it was full of oil before he used it.

Of course it didn't totally fail when he had it. He let it cool off and kept going later, but did tell me it overheated. I found it low on oil when it was returned.

I think I used it for the rest of the summer and into the following year before the crank broke.

Yes, the crank broke.

Aluminum from the rod transferred to the crank during the overheat and kept transferring after that until it built up enough to "weld/braise" the crank and rod together, resulting in a broken crank.

I've only loaned a mower out once since then and I made sure it was full of oil before it went to the neighbors house.

 

[Colt45ws]

Im doing the headgasket on a GM 3400 in a Pontiac Montana. But that is from never changing the coolant.
When I was a little tyke, my Mom ran the oil out of her Ford Tempo and locked it up.
Thats all I can think of.

 

[JohnBrowning]

I never damaged a daily driver just race engine. Normaly something would fly apart due to RPM's and creat such a bad off ballanced situationt hat the crank or rods where damaged before you could shut it off.

 

[Herz]

Never, nor do I intend too

 

[Familyguy]

I've done a lot of driving over the last 25 years or so and have never been able to blow one of my own engines, even with a number of track days.

I did manage to blow one GM 3.1L V6 while running it on the dyno during a NY state emissions inspection. Without any warning at all....POOF...rod through the block.

With any reasonably new engine, I'd say you need to be pretty darned unlucky to blow an engine on a street car if it has been properly maintained.

 

[Drew99GT]

I haven't even blown a motor when I've tried! tried to knock the rod out of an old Craftsman mower and Homelite weed wacker.

Both just burned up the cylinder walls/rings and had no compression.

The Homelite was close, but a neighbor yelled at me for having a weed eater engine running full throttle with no load, a lean mixture, and best of all, no muffler.

I use to tinker a lot when I was a child.

 

[WishIhadatruck]

In college my parents had an '87 Escort as an extra car for me to drive when I was home in the summer. It ran fine but used a lot of oil. You had to add a quart at least once every thousand miles. My mom hydroplaned they Regal into a cement barrier in a construction zone and was driving the Escort for a while before I came home from college one spring. She ran it out of oil.

I bought a '91 Corsica with the 3.1L V6 and it started knocking and ticking around 95k miles. I had owned it since it had 58k miles on it and changed the oil every 3k miles at that point in my life, I used Pennzoil at the time. I eventually pulled the motor and put in a rebuild.

 

[river_rat]

Nope. Closest I ever came was years ago when my girlfriend drove my '72 Mustang 351 with the oil light on and burned up the top end. The cam and bottom end were OK.
Don't know why it ran low on oil---I guess I was 20 years old and didn't think to check it. I don't remember actually ever changing oil on that car.

 

[SAJEFFC]

Well I'm ashamed to admit I've blown about 20 this year! Of course they were cash for clunkers and had it coming.

It was sad but kinda fun at the same time.

 

[Shagger]

I have blown pistons in both an 1987 Nova, and a 1989 Grand Am Quad 4... The Nova was my fault, it was not a hot car and I drove it pretty hard. The Grand Am on the other hand was like a girl at the bar in a tight shirt, short skirt with some FM heels on. You could tell that she wanted it...

But like many things in my life, I guess I redlined one too many times...

 

[Fazzone]

Never actually blown one up, but came really close. I was given a Delta 88 for an early graduation present and within months it began using oil, a lot of oil. After about a year, it was check the gas, fill the oil(2+qts a week). Needless to say, forgot to check it one week and well when the oil light flashed on going around a corner, I remembered. Took almost 4 qts to fill it. Couple weeks later pulled the plug and I could feel grindings in the oil. Turned out to be a good thing, we had a nice 455 laying around that bolted right in place of the 307. That was a fun car after that!

 

[Jason2007]

Blew some head gaskets one time using Nitrous, but knock on wood I have never blown an engine.

 

[OVERKILL]

I've never blown an engine.

I have a good friend on the other hand who's killed at least six. Including rod-windowing two SBC's, spun a bearing on a Ford 4.6L in a Mustang (how, I have no idea) and seizing a K-car.

 

[Chris142]

I've killed a few. Lost a rod bearing on my 2 stroke 1977 kawasaki dirt bike around 1983.

Bought a brand new ATC 250R in 1984. Took it home, let it warm up, rode off very gentle and the piston siezed in 3rd gear right out of my driveway.

My 1886 Mitsubishi pickup needed a valve job @ 35K. The crankshaft broke @44K totaling the engine.

Had a 1970 Elcamino with a tired 350 that got a rod knock driving home from work one night.

My moms 1987 Dodge Omni needed rod bearinga at around 60K.

1968 Scout had piston slap and one day the skirt broke off and that piston turned sideways in the bore.

Had a 2001 Kawasaki quad that developed a rod knock with over 56K on the engine.

All of these engines were properly maintained and just died on their own.

 

[StevieC]

I have blown engines on purpose for recreation in cars that had rusted to a dangerous point, but never accidentally or due to lack of maintenance.

My sister on the other hand seized 2 engines before her current Hyundai and to be honest with you I'm surprised she hasn't seized that one. It has seen 20-30K KM OCI's a few times using bulk Dino and Fram style filters.

 

[Drew99GT]

Originally Posted By: StevieC

My sister on the other hand seized 2 engines before her current Hyundai and to be honest with you I'm surprised she hasn't seized that one. It has seen 20-30K KM OCI's a few times using bulk Dino and Fram style filters.

That's ironic considering her father and brother are both mechanics!

 

[ziggy]

I was 19, 1994. Had a 1985 Isuzu I mark hatchback. I had very little knowledge about how important maintenance was, and changing oil! Back then me and friends drove all over the place! stop n starting all the time, and never changed the plugs:/ So one day, took car in, and mechanic i knew back then told me the engine was dead* I had left the oil in hte car so long, and beat it to [censored], so much carbon built up it screwed the pistons and the head. Same thing back in 1998..had a 1991 subaru wagon, and didnt chang the oil in like 2 1/2 years. Eventually, the oil pressure went scewy, nad it died. Since then i had learned about doing oil changes, atuo mechanics, and to this day i cant get enough of it
oh, thier was an incident, when i wan 17 lol. My first car, was a 1983 buiick century. One day driving with friends, not aying attnetion, car swirved off road, and into a ditch. Was able to get out. Later my father noticed the car wasnt runnig right. Took it ot mechnic, i had messed up hte automatic transmission..he recommneded a new car, as the cost of repairng it was far surpased the blue book value of the car$500.

 

[BuickGN]

I've blown one, broken another.

One was making massive hp on the stock bottom end and having the methanol nozzle plug. The detonation pushed the crank out of the block with the torque convertor still attached. That's what happens when pushing stock parts this hard, over double stock hp.

The other was when I was young and didn't know how to tune properly. Car was only running mid 11s back then, maybe 450hp but I was running lots of boost on pump gas and not monitoring knock. I broke a stock piston. Nothing went bang, just broke a ringland and had a dead miss. However, if I floored it, it took about 10 seconds for the turbo to spool but once it hit 10psi boost the dead cylinder would fire back up and it felt like full power. I actually beat a Vette in the two days I drove it around like that. He got a good 5 cars on me before the dead cylinder fired off.

Nothing oil related but I have had excessive wear from thinner oils.