Spun Bearings and now more Issues
 

Hello everyone, this is my first post on here and unfortunately it's a negative one but I need to get some feedback.

My BRZ is a 2013, never had any issues except when a rodent chewed my wiring harness but that was a year ago and replaced by the dealer, no issues further. 71,000 miles, all maintaince was performed by the book. No Issues ever.

Fast forward to the end of July 2017 I'm driving to work and I hear a horrible rod knock then about 30 seconds later the car shuts off. I get towed to the dealer and they tell me I "destroyed" two bearings, I need a new short block. My extended warranty covers it after I give them my service records and now I have a brand new short block. for about 3-4 weeks now. I needed a new clutch and pressure plate also and they replaced those for just parts cost with no additional labor (thank you!). Two weeks ago I get a p000b code and the car is running intermittently, dealer replaces the OCV which after arguing I had to pay for ($170). A week later, the same issue again, now I also hear a loud rattle when accelerating (some members on here posted videos of the same sounds at the same times and said it could maybe be an exhaust leak or heat shield. The car will stall at idle after it gets hot, I stopped driving it till Friday when I can take it to the dealer.

So last Monday I missed work because at 5 am my serpentine belt snapped because the dealer/technician also forgot to tighten and/or locktite the bolts for the alternator which lead to one backing out, hitting the belt and tearing it. The technician also left a screw driver in the engine bay, never put the rubber cap back on the alternator wire (no big deal really), and wrote in pen on the strut tower "#merica" (not a big deal but you're defacing someones private property who you trust NOT to do this).

So a friend of mine is a tech at a different company (not Subaru), he said what I am thinking - should have replaced a long block because now I probably have metal fragments from the spun bearings contaminated through everything which is blocking the OCV's and affecting the CAM timing. Now I'm not a mechanic by profession but I've replaced motors in cars before when I had a few 3000gt's, motorcycles, rebuilt them, etc.. so I have a pretty good idea how things work.

Has anyone else had problems similar to these? How did you handle it with the dealer? I'm hoping the service manager (who seems sincerely apologetic) will take care of this but I think the damage has already been done.

WOW! ....... some rough time with your BRZ.....:sigh:

Welcome to the forum .......:)

I'd suggest you ask the dealer to fix what is broke and not stress yourself out over what else in the engine might have been stressed by the spun bearings.

Let's hope the engine will settle down and run right.......:thumbsup:


humfrz

I'm curious how you spun bearings? Has it been burning oil? Has it ever run low on oil? Did you spin it under high g-load while winding it out? Every time I've spun one it's been under high g-load.

I kind of agree with you about contamination. I've spun a lot of bearings over the years and I've never had top end issues after rebuilding. But it does seem odd that you are suddenly having other problems. There must be a connection.

If you spin a bearing, anything that touches oil like oil coolers or the heads need to be disassembled and hot tanked.

Anything else and you risk contamination and ruining any replaced components.

^^This. And if they don't have a hot tank, or receipts they are inept and I am sure you mechanic friend would agree.

Yup. Hot tank or receipts would be what would keep me from contacting SOA and telling them to reign in their dealer.

My oil pump drive gear shattered and spun two bearings, and I had the engine replaced under warranty. They ordered a new short block and a bunch of various parts and built it there in the shop, and I've had no trouble at all out of it in the past 12K miles. They treated me very well.

Based on that contrast, it seems to me you might want to look for another dealership to take over from here. Is there another one nearby you can take it to?

seems like the 13 and some 14's have serious issues the later years don't. Al the more reason for Toyota to just cover repairs.

UPDATE**
So I dropped it off at the dealer.
They are replacing the heat shield in the engine bay and going over the entire car to make sure all the bolts and everything has been put back in order, torqued, etc. etc. like they should've done in the first place.

I asked why only the short block was replaced, they said the heads and everything else has been thoroughly cleaned before putting the new short block in and nothing else was needed. Expressed what I believe to be going on and basically told them I want a refund for the OCV I originally paid for the first time that the warranty didn't cover. The service manager told me they will look everything over and as long as its a fault of their own or because of contamination it's a possibility. I understand he can't jump to conclusions and just refund money until they inspect it so I told the service manager this and basically told him they need to do the job right, I'm not coming back again. Hopefully, this is the last time. They are accommodating giving me another loaner car (third one) while they fix this, I really hope they do me right this time. :bonk:

That's the best part, normal driving! lol. I was on my way to work, cruise set at 65-70mph and out of no where...BANG!

Wasn't low on oil, just did an oil change a few thousand miles previous and I check regularly (I once had a problem with a car loosing oil and I've been paranoid since). Never ran low. Once I did a burn out at about 45k miles for maybe 15 seconds. Never redlined.

I never beat on the car, I treat it better than my girlfriend now that I think about it :thumbup:

Dude. Time to pull out that lemon law card. Hopefully they would work with you and there would be no need to a lawyer.

Really? I would think that if I have the same issue again after this then it would be time to go that route. I've never dealt with any lemons (my dodge is more of a turd than a lemon).

Pennsylvania will lemon law a 4 year old car with >70k miles since purchase?

:eyebulge:

I think he's well past that, nobody is legally obligated to help the OP at this point, all warranties and consumer protection are up (except for the extended warranty stuff which wasn't mentioned)

My ex bought a Buick with the legendary l67 engine naturally aspirated. Widely known as one of the most bulletproof engines ever made. The previous owner babied the car it's entire life. Had under 100k miles (86k rings a bell). Maintenance followed to the T. All invoices and records as proof. She had it maybe 3 months and it spun 2 rods on a road trip. (All fluids changed immediately before being out up for sale).

There's is and always has been a trend with babying cars.

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90k on my Forester's built motor, every time she's driven she is driven to the limiter multiple times, 24psi of boost is achieve, and I've grabbed rubber in at LEAST 2nd gear, often 3rd. She's my outlet for power, and any problems she has I associate to the 195k on the clock, (supporting components.)

My 86 Celica GT-S was driven to 215k on the original clutch, engine, everything but starter and alternator. Bone stock. Redlined multiple times to and from work.

I'm a firm believer that cars are meant to be driven - hard. Very few cars come to me that were being driven good and hard and have failures. I see low mileage turbo/piston/clutch failures all the time where the owner was 'babying it as usual' and 'not taking it to redline - I've never done that!'.

That said, lots of cars are making too much power for their supporting mods and have a failure. That's a different issue.

Properly built cars that are driven hard are a different story. One of my customer cars is a stock block 185k 2010 WRX. Every single supporting mod in the book and protune done by 10k miles, and he's making 330whp. He only swings by for maintenance, and for me to inspect the mods/ensure everything is as expected. :thumbsup:

(AOS, full exhaust including equal length header, TGV/EGR/Airpump deletes, dyno tune, bushings galore, ACT HDSS.)