List of mods to help engine last longer?

[YamahaR86]

New to the car scene.

Tried searching around on the forums and google, all I got was "make more HP/performance etc".

Are there any mods to help the longevity of the engine?

Only one I know of is oil catch can.

[Colombo]

That will help. Parts that reduce rotational mass like wheels will reduce stress on motor. Routine maintenance does more than anything.

[cdrazic93]

Oil cooler. Transmission cooler. Some side venting to prevent over heating. You're welcome.

[stugray]

Originally Posted by Colombo

Any parts that reduce rotational mass (i.e. Pulley, driveshaft, flywheel, wheels, rotors) will reduce stress on motor.

Not if removing said mass causes harmonics problems.

Running a lightened FW and pulley set is known to cause premature bearing failure.

The oil cooler that runs water through the oil cooler heat exchanger is good.

An external oil cooler without a thermostat is bad for a street car.
Oil cooler WITH thermostat = good.

[FirestormFRS]

Change the oil. Don't be an asshat to your car on a daily basis. Don't mod it at all. That should make it last for a very long time.

[Wes]

keep it stock

[solidONE]

Change oil/filter and maintain religiously, use good oil, fuel up with good high octane fuel, don't drive like a dumbfcuk.

[Calum]

Get a tune. Seriously, most of the tunes I know of run less knock than the factory tune.

Aside from that, use good fluids and change them often.

[Poodles]

Originally Posted by YamahaR86

New to the car scene.

Tried searching around on the forums and google, all I got was "make more HP/performance etc".

Are there any mods to help the longevity of the engine?

Only one I know of is oil catch can.

Oil catch can doesn't increase longevity...

Originally Posted by Colombo

That will help. Any parts that reduce rotational mass (i.e. Pulley, driveshaft, flywheel, wheels, rotors) will reduce stress on motor. Routine maintenance does more than anything.

Pulley: No, the stock is a harmonic damper
Driveshaft: No, the stock two piece is better balanced and won't vibrate (look up driveshaft critical speeds and why they used a two piece in the first place)
Flywheel: Yet again, no. The flywheel is actually there to reduce strain on the motor (that's why all motors have them in the first place)
Wheels: Yes. It will also reduce strain on the brakes and steering.
Rotors: Yes, but not always (as in going with smaller brakes would overwork the brake system)

Originally Posted by FirestormFRS

Change the oil. Don't be an asshat to your car on a daily basis. Don't mod it at all. That should make it last for a very long time.

If changing the oil was good for the engine, we'd be seeing lower oil change intervals, not longer. In fact there's an SAE paper on how changing oil too often can lead to increased wear as it takes time for the additive pack to activate and work to protect the motor.


If not driving like an asshat means never going above 4K RPM or full throttling it, you're doing more harm then good. Low speed grandma driving can lead to carbon build up.


Mods are subjective. Automatic transmission fluid cooler, thermostaticly controlled engine oil cooler, and differential oil coolers are all "mods" that would increase the life of those components.

Originally Posted by Calum

Get a tune. Seriously, most of the tunes I know of run less knock than the factory tune.

Aside from that, use good fluids and change them often.

Yep, a good custom tune can help. Even better if you can keep an eye on knock and trims yourself to see early signs of bad gas, etc.


Even "crap" oil is better than oil from ten years ago, so it's not going to really hurt much going with cheaper fluids so long as they meet the specs required (though yes, better fluids are more expensive for a reason and that's usually because they allow higher change intervals). Speaking of change internals, I already covered that, but like I said, the advantage is usually that you don't have to change them that often if you go with better fluids.


Want the car to last? CARE. Care that it's dirty or muddy as it could damage the paint or trap moisture in the wheel wells where rust can start. Care that it's making that noise and find the issue. Care that it's leaking oil and get it fixed. Care that your brake fluid is black or your trans fluid smells burnt. Neglect is the primary reason for a car's death and 99% of the time it's preventable.

[ZZT86]

^^ What an excellent post

[wlfpck]

I'm glad more people are starting to post about the potential dangers of the lightened crank pulley. People got pretty upset when I mentioned it a couple years back, even when I included supporting evidence (articles from tuners, ATI Fluid dampener, etc).

[bluesubie]

Originally Posted by Poodles

If changing the oil was good for the engine, we'd be seeing lower oil change intervals, not longer. In fact there's an SAE paper on how changing oil too often can lead to increased wear as it takes time for the additive pack to activate and work to protect the motor.

Actually, we are seeing lower oil change intervals with the interval on your 2015 being reduced to 6,000 miles for normal service and 3,000 miles for severe service (down from 7,500/3,750).

As to that SAE paper, this thread is a very good read and has some excellent responses from Ed Hackett:
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/3255625/1

I bought the paper and have read it twice. Where to begin? I might as well jump right to the meat of the matter.

This paper does not show that new oil strips the previous anti-wear layers and changing your oil frequently will result increased engine wear. In fact, shows that that doesn't happen. Quoting directly from SAE 2007-01-413:

"It has been shown earlier (see Figure 2) that the wear rate of the shim changed from 0.365 nm/h when the oil was fresh to nearly zero when tested with the 7500 mile drain oil. After that, the 7500 mile oil was drained, and the system was flushed twice with the fresh oil prior to putting in the final charge for evaluation. It was observed that the wear rate was no longer "near-zero" as observed with the 7500 mile oil, but it was about 0.11 nm/h over the test duration, lower than what was observed with the fresh oil before. The reason for this lower wear rate could be because the surface film laid out by the 7500 mile drain oil was not completely removed. It was observed before (2) that once a ZDDP derived film is formed, it stayed on the surface even when rubbing continued with base oil only. It is likely that the film will be removed ultimately or replaced by a different type of film, but it points to the fact that once the film is formed with a fully formulated oil, it is not removed very quickly. The existing film may affect the chemical mechanism for forming the new film which provided the reduced friction and wear rate benefit."

This was a bench test. The oil was aged in the taxies and then run on a bench top apparatus. Each oil started with its own new cam lobe and lifter. The new oil was always run first. Break-in of the parts and the fact that there was no previous anti wear layer in place were uncontrolled variables. The effect of an existing layer was stumbled on later in the experiment.

There are some major anomalies in the oil data that are ignored or just given a hand wave that raise several red flags for me. That's best left to another post, likely to be unmade.

SAE 2007-01-4133 The Effect of Oil Drain Interval on Valvetrain Friction and Wear. A.K. Gangopadhyay, R.O. Carter III, D. Uy, S.J. Simko and M. Riley. Ford Motor Company. C.B Phillips and H Gao. ConocoPhillips Company

[Poodles]

Originally Posted by bluesubie

Actually, we are seeing lower oil change intervals with the interval on your 2015 being reduced to 6,000 miles for normal service and 3,000 miles for severe service (down from 7,500/3,750).

As to that SAE paper, this thread is a very good read and has some excellent responses from Ed Hackett:
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/3255625/1

I meant in general, not on this specific car. My hunch is that they're seeing people toast early engines, and when they're sent back to determine the cause, it's that the oil is breaking down. It's likely because the cars are driven harder than expected and they lack an oil cooler IMHO.


It's been a long time since I read that SAE paper, and it was controversial from the start. Though one could easily keep track of wear with oil analysis if they wished to know what was actually going on in their motor.

[mav1178]

Originally Posted by YamahaR86

New to the car scene.

Tried searching around on the forums and google, all I got was "make more HP/performance etc".

Are there any mods to help the longevity of the engine?

Only one I know of is oil catch can.

Why are you looking at mods to make the car last longer? The suggestions so far all are along the lines of regular and proper car care/maintenance.

Engines last a long time when you take care of it, not when you mod it.

-alex