Proformance Unlimited 390FE for #50: a complete disaster.

[DuckRyder]

I still think its important to remember there are really two issues to be addressed here.

1. The engine failed in less than one hour, probably much less.

2. There is no way that the engine as delivered could produce they type of performance that they promised.

These guys seem to me like they are used to building SBC's, which despite all of our dislike for are pretty easy to get horsepower out of. The heads are pretty decent, there is a nice selection of off the shelf pistons for them and so on. You might be able to do a stockish rebuild with KB pistons and a Comp XE274 and make 1hp per cube, it isn't going to happen with an FE, not without some careful attention to the heads and careful piston selection compression ratio wise. The sad thing is that they could have gotten it in the high 9:1 - Low 10:1 range with L2291F's and it would only have cost about $100.00-$125.00 more.

Whatever happened to that "custom Tom's camshafts" cam? The one that was custom designed just for your specifications?

A, B, M: It is natural for them to want to re do it themselves vs paying someone else to, it might even be reasonable if they had offered it on one of the two occasions that you spoke to them prior to taking it back out. So, they charge $2300.00 to "rebuild" an engine, but they want you to accept 1000.00? I agree this is basically nuisance money, they figure its going to cost them that much when it gets to court. I'd say I'd accept the 2300.00 plus shipping (probably 800.00) both ways to resolve point number one, but what is their offer related to point number two? Based on what we now know about the build, I would never let them rebuild it, it wouldn't be any better than before.

C: I'll say it again, PU was responsible for delivering an engine to fit an 2wd F250.

D, E: I don't think this is a good indication. See Jamie's comments. I'll have to go watch the video again too.

F: I don't get this, you have never said anything here except 10 minutes. I'm sure you said 10 minutes on the phone, and if he wasn't sure he should have asked.

G: PU says Tom is doing it incorrectly? Is he serious? The spring doesn't care how it is compressed provided it is done evenly. There are a number of tools on the market and the one Tom is using is designed for that purpose.

http://www.summitracing.com/search/Depa ... Rank%7cAsc

I'd like to hear some specifics:

What valve springs, exactly, did they install?

What, exactly, did they do to "pay close attention to valve spring pressures" during break in.

H, I: So he is saying that they could get away with being sloppy because it has an adjustable valve train. Perhaps it is true that it would have been O.K. for a while, but it isn't right. As Jamie pointed out, the geometry is off and the rocker will not have been applying pressure to the valves evenly. It isn't all about lifter preload, if the rocker arms start out at different points in their arc, the wear pattern on the stem will not be centered. Then there is the performance aspect.

J: I do not believe that a picture is sufficient to determine that a hone would remove the scratches. Depending on where the piston to wall clearance started out and how bad the pistons are (and I think Tom said they would have been use-able) this may have been an option if the scratches were not very deep. Hyper pistons are not very tolerant of clearance issues and they are dimensionally stable. If Tom said it needed to be bored, I feel confident that he ran the numbers.

K: I agree if it were bent badly it could probably be seen in the video, without looking closely at the balancer, it could still be bent and not be seen. Bent is bent though. To your earlier question, no it isn't possible that it was O.K. but the need to turn it made it not O.K..

L: Tom did not show how he measured the guides.

N: So, let us go ahead and get this out of the way, whatever is wrong, Doug has a special tool to measure it and measures it carefully on every engine?

O: It is obvious to me from the videos that Tom takes no pleasure in criticizing others work, I think he'd prefer not to in fact. Maybe thats the style at PU, but it isn't everywhere. I think Tom will make an excellent witness, Steve, not so much...

P: It probably is good paint, like any paint it is all in the preparation. It looks a bit lighter than John Deere yellow to me though... Anyhow.

[BobbyFord]

The valve spring shims have nothing to do with varying stem lengths as it pertains to the rocker arm. The valve spring shims are there to ensure that the spring heights (seated and open) are consistent and that the seated and open spring rate pressures are consistent. In the picture of Tom measuring the spring, if the picture is of the spring at installed height, the spring pressures are too high and greatly contributed to the failure of the camshaft. The spring tool that Tom is pictured using is accurate and is being used correctly.
As to PU "breaking in the cam", I would be curious what method they used. I"m just wondering what they did to get the engine and the oil up to operating temperature during the break-in procedure, as recommended by cam manufacturers and professional rebuilders.

[sideoilerfe]

PU has probably started reading the threads here about this situation and their lawyers are preparing arguments. It is clear that they have no intention of refunding your money and are trying to convince you that it is your fault that the engine failed. Get your own lawyer now and get to work on getting your money back + legal costs. They are taking advantage of your good nature of not "slamming" them and will walk all over you if you allow them to.

Bottom line, the windage tray did NOT cause this engine to fail, PU's sloppy and overpriced work did. You may not want to slam them but I have no problem with it. Proformance unlimited is clearly a crooked company that does sloppy work at best, period.

Good luck to you.

[70shortwide]

[robroy]

Good day Jamie, FoMoCoGuy, 70_F100, ToughOldFord, Robert, BobbyFord, SideOilerFE, and Jeff W., thanks for your superb replies!

A. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. It was on them to make sure that if you were doing the windage tray and oil pan swap that you knew what you were doing. How would you know that they actually did more than repaint it and put it back together with a new cam?

True! I'd have no way of knowing.

B. Is go away money, a simple quick settlement that gets them out of any legal wrangling down the road. You did good.

Indeed, that's how it seemed. Although they did have a sensible explanation for their method for arriving at that amount, all things considered, I'm unconvinced that it's a generous offer.

C. Since he had two months before the parts showed up at his shop from Jegs (yeah right) he could have written up some stuff on changing them out correctly. He should have ate the $200 to ship the motor both ways to make it right.

Perhaps that would have been best!

D. On vacuum gauges... A normal guage has a pulse restrictor in the port to keep the needle steady. A diagnostic gauge doesn't so the needle will move a lot. What do they have on their jackleg engine running stand? I don't remember from the video, but even if it's an Autometer gauge they have the restrictor (it's so the mechanism doesn't wear out quicker)

This is very interesting information! I'd like to hear Steve's response to this. The gauge they're using in the video appears to be an Autometer gauge.

E. He's right, it didn't sound bad, possibly because you couldn't hear the engine over the exhaust leaks...

That's a valid point--Doug even mentions in one of the videos that the motor's "a little loud on the pipes."

F. Salesman pitch... If he cared enough to listen to what the customer was actually saying instead of rolling his eyes while hearing some poor kid who doesn't know what he's doing try to describe a problem... Prejudice is bad in all it's forms...

Interesting. Yeah I'm sure it's obvious over the phone that I'm a beginner!

G. Regarding spring pressures, nonsense. Set the spring to the installed hieght and measure the guage, set it to the valve open height and measure again. Pro stock guys can check the valve pressure in the car in about ten minutes.

Interesting!

H. Do yourself a favor read up a little on incorrect rocker arm geometry and the effects on valve trains and guides. Heck copy the links and send them to Steve so he can explain them to you with his twisted logic. While explaining ask him how the recessed valve seats effect flow.

Perhaps I'll investigate this topic, thanks for the suggestion!

I. This is called cheating. See above about the valve train geometry which is the most important thing with the roller rockers. With the seats all screwed up they should have used different length pushrods so the geometry stays correct. Once again, it shows that they don't know what they are doing, plain and simple.

Also interesting!

J. Hey, what's another 20,000 miles of wear on a brand new motor?

I see your point.

K. Bent is relative, bent where? If it's the snout and it's .030" you wouldn't see it on the balancer, but the grinder and balancer would have a fit over it. I almost suspect they had this crank laying around the back of the shop turned down and it either fell of was left lay on it's side. I'm also pretty sure they didn't balance your engine. Were the base of the rods caps ground down to get the same weight? If not then I doubt it was balanced.

As to exactly where the crankshaft was bent, I could find out more specifically if it turns out to be a key point. All I heard from Tom is that it was bent at the "snout." I could also probably get a measurement on exactly how bent it was.

Sames goes for the bases of the rod caps--I could ask about this. Thanks for these fantastic suggestions!

L. Hmmn, if he doesn't trust the valve pressure and doesn't understand the gauge... My blown 302 had rock steady idle and vacuum with guides that smoked horribly because the builder had honed them too far. Granted I took them to him because I had dimples on the pistons and the valves had galded into the guides. Still I could move the valve side to side when it was .5" open which is no flippin good. If the valve moves sideways that's no good, period. If he argues, go find another builder, I did.

I see!

M. So where did the other $6500 go for your motor? Ask him that, loudly. Perhap you could look up some other motors keith craft, etc. that have excellent street reps for comparison.

Good point. Early on, before actually buying the engine, I asked for information on exactly where the cost was going in the engine. As a newcomer, it wasn't obvious to me where the whole $8,995 went, and I let them know that I'd feel more comfortable buying if they'd explain this to me. At the time, I heard something about performance parts costing a lot more money than stock engine parts. At some point I figured I was being too "picky" and went forward with it, even though I never had my question answered to complete satisfaction.

In retrospect, I should have called several engine builders and asked ALL of them to explain the price of the engine to me. I'm fairly certain that if I'd done this, I would have gotten some really outstanding, detailed replies and bought from another builder instead. I suppose it pays to shop around!

N. Moot point. It's out of Tom's spec and he's building you a real 436hp engine not a peice of paper with numbers on it...

I see your point!

O. How ironic, I didn't see Tom criticizing a lot, just pointing out what wasn't to spec or sloppy (which is the same thing really). Thinking out loud here, how do you think he could even check the deck for height and squareness. You put a ground round bar in the mains saddles and measure off of it. It's technical and I don't think I could get repeatable numbers. I remember reading a MMFF last year where they showed a block getting the deck machined, no bar through the saddles and it was just shimmed to sit level on the table of the grinder.

Indeed, it's obvious to me that Tom has no desire to put down anybody's work--you can tell he doesn't enjoy doing that. He's not a competitive type of guy, despite what anybody says about the nature of the whole industry.

Would you like me to ask Tom about how he measured the deck height and squareness?

P. I usually just say to folks, 'Hey, it's your lie, tell it however you want to. We both know the truth'

I can understand why you'd say something like this! In my situation though, I don't believe they're necessarily trying to deceive me--perhaps they simply have a different view on the truth. Hopefully if Steve posts his formal rebuttal to this thread (more on this later), their view of the truth can be better analyzed and tested!

Honesly I think the cam failed hard once you go it. It was on the way out, but did you notice it running rough while listening to the windage tray? A 400 cubic inch motor will idle smooth on seven cylinder with the plug wire off. If it's firing it will run smooth with a couple lobes going away. A 302 will sound rough but still run.

I remember the engine sounding somewhat rough during the limited time I ran it. Yet you know, perhaps that could have been simply due to the camshaft specifications. It's hard to say I guess! It was also spewing tons of smoke, as you can see in the video clips, but that's probably unrelated.

Regarding the cylinder scratches, you bought a new motor if they were scratched at ten minutes of run time what's the point of honing the scratches out, then the piston wobbles in the bore more, the rings don't seat or seal as well, oil control goes out the window and you end up with blowby sooner. If anything just put it back together and forget about it, why make it worse.

I see your point! If I remember correctly, I heard from Steve that the additional honing could be done without putting the ring clearances too far out of spec, because performance engines naturally have looser tolerances.

M. So where did the other $6500 go for your motor? Ask him that, loudly. Perhap you could look up some other motors keith craft, etc. that have excellent street reps for comparison.

That's exactly what I was thinking ( besides not being surprised at the defense of sloppy work). If he gets $2300 for a rebuild, that means that you could have supplied him with a $200 core engine and got a PU engine for $2500 plus shipping. That's a far cry from $8995.

I see your point! This question hasn't been completely answered by Proformance Unlimited.

If he tries to tell you it's because it's a "high performance build", you can tell him that stock compression ratios, stock heads, pretty much stock EVERYTHING besides an aftermarket cam, pistons, and roller rockers does not make a $9000 400+ hp engine.

Makes sense! As others have commented upon, perhaps with Chevy engines this combination could have strong results, but it seems certain that FEs can't generate 436 HP and 463 ft/lbs of torque at 4,000 RPM with the combination of parts I received.

Lets say we add $1200 for nice pistons, cam, and rockers. You're still at $3700. At least half of the left over money should have gone into machine work to make it all right. Let's say he had spent another $2500 in machining; that still makes for a $2700 profit. Heck, throw in another $1000 for intake, carb, and acessories. That's $1700 profit now IF all that machine work had been done. So, I think it would be pretty fair to say that you weren't even offered anything close to the PROFIT that was made on your engine.

Good point!

For that money every aspect of every part of that engine should have been as good as or better than new, period. No loose valves to suck oil into the engine, no recessed seats to hamper flow, no tapered bearing surfaces, no bent crankshafts, period. It should have had everything decked and had PERFECT mounting surfaces, especially the exhaust side of the head.

Agreed.

Did it even have a mild port job done to the heads? Were the chambers smoothed or polished? Were the ports at least smoothed and cleaned of any surface defects?

The heads didn't have any porting done to them at all, and the chambers looked stock (unpolished). And the ports weren't smoothed or cleaned at all--everything was 100% stock.

The fact is that the majority of the problems that this engine has have nothing to do with the windage tray or the camshaft. You have absolute proof of that.

Yes perhaps, at least strong evidence.

If it all plays out and it is agreed that PU holds no responsibility for the cam and tray (which they ARE responsible because the tray (and pan for that matter) should have been right in the first place), then subtract pistons, bore, and cam from Tom's estimate. That's $1685, so that leaves PU responsible for $6815, minus a couple hours of labor.

Interesting! Your logic sounds good here.

Robroy, here is the tool he was talking about (Rimac):

http://www.precisionmeasure.com/valve6.htm

This one looks more like the one that Tom was using:

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/PRO-6 ... mage=large

Oh, I see! Thanks for posting those links, 70_F100! Do you have any comments on whether or not the Rimac's significantly more trustworthy?

Hmmmm, special tool...

Indeed, I suppose it is, although it may not be very exotic!

I still think its important to remember there are really two issues to be addressed here.

1. The engine failed in less than one hour, probably much less.

2. There is no way that the engine as delivered could produce they type of performance that they promised.

Good points. With all the discussion going on here, it's important to keep these two points in mind.

These guys seem to me like they are used to building SBC's, which despite all of our dislike for are pretty easy to get horsepower out of. The heads are pretty decent, there is a nice selection of off the shelf pistons for them and so on. You might be able to do a stockish rebuild with KB pistons and a Comp XE274 and make 1hp per cube, it isn't going to happen with an FE, not without some careful attention to the heads and careful piston selection compression ratio wise. The sad thing is that they could have gotten it in the high 9:1 - Low 10:1 range with L2291F's and it would only have cost about $100.00-$125.00 more.

Very interesting!

Whatever happened to that "custom Tom's camshafts" cam? The one that was custom designed just for your specifications?

I haven't heard anything more about that, nor have I specifically asked (since we discovered that it was really an off-the-shelf Comp Cams camshaft).

A, B, M: It is natural for them to want to re do it themselves vs paying someone else to, it might even be reasonable if they had offered it on one of the two occasions that you spoke to them prior to taking it back out. So, they charge $2300.00 to "rebuild" an engine, but they want you to accept 1000.00? I agree this is basically nuisance money, they figure its going to cost them that much when it gets to court. I'd say I'd accept the 2300.00 plus shipping (probably 800.00) both ways to resolve point number one, but what is their offer related to point number two? Based on what we now know about the build, I would never let them rebuild it, it wouldn't be any better than before.

Good points! Their offer with regard to point #2 (that the engine couldn't have performed as promised) is: the engine would indeed have performed as promised. They're standing behind that promise, despite everything I've presented them with.

C: I'll say it again, PU was responsible for delivering an engine to fit an 2wd F250.

Indeed. I'm hearing from them that as soon as they sent me the right parts, they'd fulfilled 100% of their responsibility. But had they?

I remember way back before I'd ordered the engine, I was asking Steve about how they handle problems with engines. I asked him what they do if a customer has an engine that develops are serious problem, and he said that they ask the customer to send the engine back to them. I also heard that if an engine has non-serious problems, they'll arrange to have a mechanic do the repairs on the engine for the customer. I remember these points being made pretty clearly back then, before I'd paid the $8,955!

D, E: I don't think this is a good indication. See Jamie's comments. I'll have to go watch the video again too.

Thanks for your advice on this! There are two videos of the engine running at Proformance Unlimited, and I'll post the links again at the end of this post.

F: I don't get this, you have never said anything here except 10 minutes. I'm sure you said 10 minutes on the phone, and if he wasn't sure he should have asked.

That's how it seems to me, but we're both human. It doesn't shock me that we remember things differently after all this time.

G: PU says Tom is doing it incorrectly? Is he serious?

Yes, they're serious! To be completely accurate, I heard that the method Tom used isn't a good method for getting proper, accurate readings on springs, but that somebody could "get by" that way.

The spring doesn't care how it is compressed provided it is done evenly. There are a number of tools on the market and the one Tom is using is designed for that purpose.

http://www.summitracing.com/search/Depa ... Rank%7cAsc

That makes sense to me!

I'd like to hear some specifics:

What valve springs, exactly, did they install?

What, exactly, did they do to "pay close attention to valve spring pressures" during break in.

I could ask for these specifics, but I don't have 100% confidence that this information was even written down.

H, I: So he is saying that they could get away with being sloppy because it has an adjustable valve train. Perhaps it is true that it would have been O.K. for a while, but it isn't right. As Jamie pointed out, the geometry is off and the rocker will not have been applying pressure to the valves evenly. It isn't all about lifter preload, if the rocker arms start out at different points in their arc, the wear pattern on the stem will not be centered. Then there is the performance aspect.

Very interesting!

J: I do not believe that a picture is sufficient to determine that a hone would remove the scratches. Depending on where the piston to wall clearance started out and how bad the pistons are (and I think Tom said they would have been use-able) this may have been an option if the scratches were not very deep. Hyper pistons are not very tolerant of clearance issues and they are dimensionally stable. If Tom said it needed to be bored, I feel confident that he ran the numbers.

Indeed, I also believe in his judgment about whether or not they needed to be bored. And specifically on this point, I asked him (Tom) the other day if he took measurements of how deep the scratches were, and I heard that the tool normally used to measure bore diameter wouldn't fit in to those scratches, so it wasn't feasible for him to measure it.

But man, let me tell you, I felt those scratches and they were impressively deep. In some areas of the cylinders, it felt like an impressive amount of metal had been removed--there were some serious dips in the surface.

K: I agree if it were bent badly it could probably be seen in the video, without looking closely at the balancer, it could still be bent and not be seen. Bent is bent though. To your earlier question, no it isn't possible that it was O.K. but the need to turn it made it not O.K..

OK! Thanks for answering that question!

L: Tom did not show how he measured the guides.

Indeed, yet the attitude I heard from Proformance Unlimited was one of "guilty until proved innocent," with regard to the measurements of the guides. Their confidence in the methods they used would make such an attitude natural, I suppose.

N: So, let us go ahead and get this out of the way, whatever is wrong, Doug has a special tool to measure it and measures it carefully on every engine?

You got it!

O: It is obvious to me from the videos that Tom takes no pleasure in criticizing others work, I think he'd prefer not to in fact. Maybe thats the style at PU, but it isn't everywhere. I think Tom will make an excellent witness, Steve, not so much...

Precisely. Tom has a very mellow and positive personality. Prior to me telling him about Proformance Unlimited, I don't think he'd even heard of them before! It seems very unlikely to me that he'd have any motive to unduly criticize their work.

P: It probably is good paint, like any paint it is all in the preparation. It looks a bit lighter than John Deere yellow to me though... Anyhow.

Good point. It looks lighter than John Deere yellow to me too! And besides, on an earlier occasion I heard that it was Duplicolor "Daytona Yellow." The number of different stories I've heard regarding specifics on the engine makes me suspect that they didn't write much down--if it were all recorded, why wouldn't they simply send me the data sheet?

The valve spring shims have nothing to do with varying stem lengths as it pertains to the rocker arm. The valve spring shims are there to ensure that the spring heights (seated and open) are consistent and that the seated and open spring rate pressures are consistent. In the picture of Tom measuring the spring, if the picture is of the spring at installed height, the spring pressures are too high and greatly contributed to the failure of the camshaft. The spring tool that Tom is pictured using is accurate and is being used correctly.
As to PU "breaking in the cam", I would be curious what method they used. I"m just wondering what they did to get the engine and the oil up to operating temperature during the break-in procedure, as recommended by cam manufacturers and professional rebuilders.

Great points BobbyFord, thanks for writing that out. I'll have to confirm with Tom that that spring pressure tool he was using was indeed measuring the spring at its installed height!

PU has probably started reading the threads here about this situation and their lawyers are preparing arguments.

Perhaps! I know for sure that they're reading the thread, at least, because I heard that they were aware of it during our last phone conversation.

It is clear that they have no intention of refunding your money and are trying to convince you that it is your fault that the engine failed.

Seems so thus far, yet the story isn't over yet either. They may surprise us.

Get your own lawyer now and get to work on getting your money back + legal costs. They are taking advantage of your good nature of not "slamming" them and will walk all over you if you allow them to.

You could be right about this. Hopefully they'll reconsider their offer and/or explain themselves in more detail--I'd much rather not be forced in to hiring a lawyer and investing more time in to this (naturally)!

Bottom line, the windage tray did NOT cause this engine to fail, PU's sloppy and overpriced work did. You may not want to slam them but I have no problem with it. Proformance unlimited is clearly a crooked company that does sloppy work at best, period.

I can see why you'd say this based on all the information so far! Yet they haven't outright refused my refund request so far, so let's see how things go.

Good luck to you.

Thank you very much!

Thanks for your interest Jeff!!!

Here are the updates:

1. Last time I spoke with Steve, I heard that he was aware of this thread and would be posting a rebuttal here defending their work. Since I'm interested in getting as close to the truth as possible, I'm interested in this and encouraged him to do so!
2. I haven't heard from Proformance Unlimited since last Wednesday.
3. I sent an e-mail to Steve and Doug today asking for an update on their offer, and inviting Steve to post his rebuttal here.

Here's the e-mail I sent today: EmailToProformanceUnlimited_2010Jan06.txt

And here's the same e-mail, included directly in this thread via the "code" widget.

Code: Select all

From robroy@robroygregg.com Wed Jan  6 11:22:16 2010
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 2010 11:22:15 -0800 (PST)
From: Robroy Gregg <robroy@robroygregg.com>
To: slejda@proformanceunlimited.com, info@proformanceunlimited.com
Cc: doug@proformanceunlimited.com, dougm@proformanceunlimited.com
Subject: Re: Job #8148:  Complete engine failure:  Requesting $8,497.39 refund.


Good day Steve!

Thanks for discussing my situation with me last Wednesday!

Have you heard any updates from Doug as to whether the $1,000 offer is his 
final offer?

I wanted to provide you with the FORDification link to post your rebuttal 
of the criticism Proformance Unlimited has received:

    http://www.fordification.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=46540

First you'll need to get a FORDification account, which you can do here:

    http://www.fordification.com/forum/ucp.php?mode=register

As you've probably gathered by now, I'm seeking the truth, and have zero 
interest in attacking Proformance Unlimited's reputation.  If you're able 
to provide information in this public thread that helps us to understand 
the truth more accurately, I'd be grateful for the time and effort you'd 
invest in doing so!

If there's anything I can do to help you with the account or posting 
procedure, please let me know.

Thank you very much Steve!
Robroy

Jamie, FoMoCoGuy, 70_F100, ToughOldFord, Robert, BobbyFord, SideOilerFE, and Jeff W., thanks for all of your insightful, detailed replies!

Robroy

[robroy]

Good afternoon! In my previous post I forgot to include the links to the live run videos of the Proformance Unlimited engine (taken at their shop):

Here's the one that was posted on their web site: Robroy_390.wmv

Here's the one I received on a CDR disc with the engine: Num50_390.wmv

Thanks very much for all the excellent advice!
Robroy

[70shortwide]

I didnt notice the vac gauge being especially steady in those videos. you dont have much of a chance to see it other than when hes revving it, but there is a brief moment that you can see it at idle.

Hope we can all keep our cool here once Pro Formance unlimited joins us, the main point is that Robroy gets what he deserves out of this mess, if we can keep focused and add only helpful input I think we can have a huge influence on the outcome.

[robroy]

Good afternoon Jeff, thanks for replying!

I didnt notice the vac gauge being especially steady in those videos. you dont have much of a chance to see it other than when hes revving it, but there is a brief moment that you can see it at idle.

Yes perhaps it's not especially steady--I'll have to review them again myself. Thanks for checking them out!

Hope we can all keep our cool here once Pro Formance unlimited joins us, the main point is that Robroy gets what he deserves out of this mess, if we can keep focused and add only helpful input I think we can have a huge influence on the outcome.

Well said Jeff!!! A polite debate with Proformance Unlimited here should be most revealing. An impolite exchange would be unproductive (at best).

Thanks for your quality reply Jeff!
Robroy

[sideoilerfe]

Regarding the video's:

PU: "I did my job, you tell me how good of a job I did..." HA HA HA!I think everybody knows now! Why would you rev a brand new engine to 6 grand? Why?

[robroy]

Hey SideOilerFE, thanks for your excellent reply!

Why would you rev a brand new engine to 6 grand? Why?

Is the safety of doing so questionable? I figure he was simply trying to show how nicely the engine revved, for demonstration purposes.

Thanks again SideOilerFE!
Robroy

[eggman918]

you have the right frame of mind,If I had ben involved in that motor in any way I would not sleep well if at all until a accurate postmortem was completed,weather I was the kid that hot tanked it or the owner.If you dont know what happened it is likely to reoccur...

[ka_jd7and1]

Did I hear correctly on the second video that he said once you change to synthetic oil, you can't change back?

[robroy]

Good afternoon EggMan918 and Ka_Jd7And1, thanks for your great replies!

you have the right frame of mind,If I had ben involved in that motor in any way I would not sleep well if at all until a accurate postmortem was completed,weather I was the kid that hot tanked it or the owner.If you dont know what happened it is likely to reoccur...

Thank you! Indeed, I think it's important to get to the truth, as much as that's possible in this situation! Needless to say, it's a big deal when an $8,955 engine self-destructs that quickly after being fired up. Some guys would have to plan and save their cash for five years or more to pay for this!

Did I hear correctly on the second video that he said once you change to synthetic oil, you can't change back?

That's what I heard also. Do you think this isn't an accurate statement? I'm not sure how pertinent it is to the situation, but it's of interest nonetheless.

EggMan918 and Ka_Jd7And1, thanks again for your excellent replies!
Robroy

[eggman918]

Good afternoon EggMan918 and Ka_Jd7And1, thanks for your great replies!

you have the right frame of mind,If I had ben involved in that motor in any way I would not sleep well if at all until a accurate postmortem was completed,weather I was the kid that hot tanked it or the owner.If you dont know what happened it is likely to reoccur...

Thank you! Indeed, I think it's important to get to the truth, as much as that's possible in this situation! Needless to say, it's a big deal when an $8,955 engine self-destructs that quickly after being fired up. Some guys would have to plan and save their cash for five years or more to pay for this!

Did I hear correctly on the second video that he said once you change to synthetic oil, you can't change back?

That's what I heard also. Do you think this isn't an accurate statement? I'm not sure how pertinent it is to the situation, but it's of interest nonetheless.

EggMan918 and Ka_Jd7And1, thanks again for your excellent replies!
Robroy

my machining specialty for last 15 years has been industrial repair,a accurate postmortem IS possible.and SHOULD be desired by ALL involved.It could be much worse,it was an EXPENSIVE mistake
thank GOD that no one was hurt.when things fail it can have a lasting impact.And we all need to keep that in mind whenever we repair/modify anything

[stephen44]

http://www.carbibles.com/engineoil_bible.html

"Mixing Mineral and Synthetic oils - the new hotness

That's the thing with progress - stuff becomes out-of-date. Fortunately for you, dear reader, the web is a great place to keep things up-to-date, so here's the current thinking on the subject of mixing mineral and synthetic oils. This information is based on the answer to a technical question posed on the Shell Oil website.
There is no scientific data to support the idea that mixing mineral and synthetic oils will damage your engine. When switching from a mineral oil to a synthetic, or vice versa, you will potentially leave a small amount of residual oil in the engine. That's perfectly okay because synthetic oil and mineral-based motor oil are, for the most part, compatible with each other. (The exception is pure synthetics. Polyglycols don't mix with normal mineral oils.)
There is also no problem with switching back and forth between synthetic and mineral based oils. In fact, people who are "in the know" and who operate engines in areas where temperature fluctuations can be especially extreme, switch from mineral oil to synthetic oil for the colder months. They then switch back to mineral oil during the warmer months.
There was a time, years ago, when switching between synthetic oils and mineral oils was not recommended if you had used one product or the other for a long period of time. People experienced problems with seals leaking and high oil consumption but changes in additive chemistry and seal material have taken care of those issues. And that's an important caveat. New seal technology is great, but if you're still driving around in a car from the 80's with its original seals, then this argument becomes a bit of a moot point - your seals are still going to be subject to the old leakage problems no matter what newfangled additives the oil companies are putting in their products."

Synthetics

Despite their name, most synthetic derived motor oils (ie Mobil 1, Castrol Formula RS etc ) are actually derived from mineral oils - they are mostly Polyalphaolifins and these come from the purest part of the mineral oil refraction process, the gas. PAO oils will mix with normal mineral oils which means Joe public can add synthetic to his mineral, or mineral to his synthetic without his car engine seizing up (although I've heard Mobil 1 is actually made by reformulating ethanol).
The most stable bases are polyol-ester (not polyester, you fool). When I say 'stable' I mean 'less likely to react adversely with other compounds.' Synthetic oil bases tend not to contain reactive carbon atoms for this reason. Reactive carbon has a tendency to combine with oxygen creating an acid. As you can imagine, in an oil, this would be A Bad Thing. So think of synthetic oils as custom-built oils. They're designed to do the job efficiently but without any of the excess baggage that can accompany mineral based oils.


Pure synthetic oils (polyalkyleneglycol) are the types used almost exclusively within the industrial sector in polyglycol gearbox oils for heavily loaded gearboxes. These are typically concocted by intelligent blokes in white lab coats. These chaps break apart the molecules that make up a variety of substances, like vegetable and animal oils, and then recombine the individual atoms that make up those molecules to build new, synthetic molecules. This process allows the chemists to actually "fine tune" the molecules as they build them. Clever stuff. But Polyglycols don't mix with normal mineral oils.

maybe this helps?