New Pistons - Oil consumption better but, not great?

Pull the plugs and see if they are oily. Compression check wouldn't hurt either.
 
with a car from 2009, the valve seals should get changed out, guides checked too. (doing piston swap, foolish not to check while parts are scattered)
Comes down to rings, whether they're carboned up. Oil controls, same. And valve seals hardened up.
 
Honestly, give it a couple oil changes and see if it improves.

But this is why you never want family/friends working on your stuff...especially for ”free”. You can’t complain, take it back or anything now. If you do? You look like a fool and you seriously cause stress in that relationship. The guy did it for for free...how do you tell him that he screwed it up? Or your sister...you can’t complain to her now. Heck, if you go and get it fixed by someone else now...even then it’ll be awkward because he’ll think...you paid someone else? You didn’t pay me. I didn’t do it good enough? is that what you’re saying, because I know I did it right. Lol. I’m probably going extreme here, but its not that extreme.
 
Load the piston rings. Go load your car up with 300 pounds of rock salt and another person find a loonnng up hill hwy and stick it in manual mode and find a gear were you can full throttle it at around 2,500 to 4,500 rpm and it holds the longest. Like 4th gear then 5th gear. Do this 5 times.
 
Load the piston rings. Go load your car up with 300 pounds of rock salt and another person find a loonnng up hill hwy and stick it in manual mode and find a gear were you can full throttle it at around 2,500 to 4,500 rpm and it holds the longest. Like 4th gear then 5th gear. Do this 5 times.
Then go down the hill and let engine compression do the braking. You want the load on the rings on both sides. If yo see oil smoke, I would start to look towards valve seals. Lots of newer engines don't want a bore job. It removes the "nikasil' type coating from the aluminum and most places will use a steal liner if the walls are bad.
 
Wow, how are new rings suppose to seat right with the bores ?
Recall a TSB from the 80s from one of the major engine parts companies stating that honing cylinders wasn’t necessary. As per them their rings were designed to use the existing glaze as break in function. Several Chevy dealer techs I worked along side of in the late 70s used to never hone cylinder bores. Ring of choice there was a TRW “10-up” ring kit. We used to say they would bore as they wear. Very hard and high tension rings for worn cylinder bores...
 
Unless the cylinders are made from a weird material they should be honed. Maybe you could get away with pulling the head. Turning the crank until each piston is at bdc and hone what you can?
 
No but it mirrors an SAE article from some years ago which basically has the same info.
IMO honing is a must are a re-bore but I also question the value of honing on a cylinder that still has the factory honing crosshatch and are in spec.
Obviously manufacturers have looked into this also and concluded it isn't necessary in some instances as shown by the FSM the OP posted. Times and methods change.
 
Load the piston rings. Go load your car up with 300 pounds of rock salt and another person find a loonnng up hill hwy and stick it in manual mode and find a gear were you can full throttle it at around 2,500 to 4,500 rpm and it holds the longest. Like 4th gear then 5th gear. Do this 5 times.

It's a great idea to load the rings to force break in. You can do this in many ways. I prefer multiple full throttle runs.
 
I would, but I'm afraid to. He got really mad at me when I told my sister some bolts on the valve cover were loose. He did rebuild the engine for free minus parts.
Buy him two six packs of his favorite beer, minimum. If that’s not his thing then do another kind gesture for him if you haven’t already done so. This is where the focus should be instead of a 12 year old car that consumes oil.
 
Buy him two six packs of his favorite beer, minimum. If that’s not his thing then do another kind gesture for him if you haven’t already done so. This is where the focus should be instead of a 12 year old car that consumes oil.
This!

Why would OP tell sister valve covers were lose? This is why a lot of people do not like to do favors for family. This would have cost OP a significant amount of money if he had it done at a shop. He should be grateful to his BIL!
 
I had a new 70 Toyota corolla 1188cc car. I ran 10w40, and car at 5k rpm which is 75 mph. It seemed to use a quart in 1000 miles in a time when that didn't seem too bad. By time I got about 10k miles on it, the consumption went to less than a quart during the 3k mile oil use. I figured at time that the rings had worn in. I was a very early user of Toyota, and didn't know just how good it was. Car had 12 inch wheels and waS geared to hit 90 mph at 6k rpm. i ran it over 100mph a few times. Once, during valve adjustment I noticed one 8inch long valve was bent, but didn't replace, just sold car at 55k miles to buy a RX3 Mazda.
 
Buy him two six packs of his favorite beer, minimum. If that’s not his thing then do another kind gesture for him if you haven’t already done so. This is where the focus should be instead of a 12 year old car that consumes oil.
I bought his some hot sauce ;-) I agree. We're cool now, so I'm not going to bother him with any more car concerns. That's why I have you guys!
 
First of all, I am not professing to know more about this than Toyota engineers or technicians - but we do many "on the cheap" builds and we frequently use a bottle brush hone - to give a fresh surface for sealing and break-in. I have never had an issue with oil consumption. In fact, last night we did a quick hone on a Kawasaki 750. IMHO, your new parts are already "broken in" and your oil consumption will not improve. Also, IMHO, there was no point in "getting the car up to 100".
 
I know on some of the newer engines the piston to bore clearance is very tight, I think they are trying to help prevent piston slap.
If the original crosshatch is there then there doesn't seem to be much point, with modern FI and air/fuel mixture controls you don't see an real glazing any more either.
I have to study more on this stuff, the methods we used year ago are outdated but thinking out loud I would much prefer an nice OE bore that is in spec with its OE finish then a honed one. It stand to reason if the OE finish is there the crosshatch has held oil and protected it from wearing away.
Going this route may very well result in a significantly better rebuild and better piston fit.

Ring break in may well be a thing of the past as well unless it has been bored and honed and not just new rings. I started thinking about this years ago when I bought a new compressor, the break in was a 20 min run under no load. It must have worked because it uses no measurable amount of oil and never has, I suspect it may have a smooth bore with a 2 stroke type ring system I'm not sure.
If the original crosshatch has not been buggered with a hone why would the rings need breaking in? I don't know it will take a lot more study than I have at the moment.
 
I know on some of the newer engines the piston to bore clearance is very tight, I think they are trying to help prevent piston slap.
If the original crosshatch is there then there doesn't seem to be much point, with modern FI and air/fuel mixture controls you don't see an real glazing any more either.
I have to study more on this stuff, the methods we used year ago are outdated but thinking out loud I would much prefer an nice OE bore that is in spec with its OE finish then a honed one. It stand to reason if the OE finish is there the crosshatch has held oil and protected it from wearing away.
Going this route may very well result in a significantly better rebuild and better piston fit.

Ring break in may well be a thing of the past as well unless it has been bored and honed and not just new rings. I started thinking about this years ago when I bought a new compressor, the break in was a 20 min run under no load. It must have worked because it uses no measurable amount of oil and never has, I suspect it may have a smooth bore with a 2 stroke type ring system I'm not sure.
If the original crosshatch has not been buggered with a hone why would the rings need breaking in? I don't know it will take a lot more study than I have at the moment.
My LTFT is a little high as well. It varies, but sometimes gets up to about +10. Could that have anything to do with it? If it's an exhaust leak, (cat was replaced) it could be giving a false lean reading and adding too much fuel.
 
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