2014 BRZ Limited - Break In Hard...

[thill]

I pushed mine for the first 1000 miles, I was not taking any chances....



Seriously, just drive it within reason. The manufacturers recommended break-in period, is more lawyer speak than anything else, otherwise all FT86 cars sold worldwide would have this guideline in their owners manual.

[TchDwnUGA]

Just bought mine the past Saturday with 43 miles on the clock. I'm up to 250 and i've been gentle the entire time.

I work in an engine shop for Hyundai, and based on what i've seen building 700+ engines a day, i'm being gentle for the first 1000 miles.

[Marcoscrdo]

If i were you i would just drive it easy for the first 1000... Why not. One thing i would not do though is drive long distances just to get 1000 miles thats just pointless to me. Just drive it normally carefully under 4k until the time passes, because it will get there just wait.

[brillo]

what ever you do just be sure you warm the car up first in terms of oil and cooland before you beat on it. Doesn't matter if its mile 1 or 100,000.

[SirBrass]

I'm going to try and go 1000 miles without seriously flogging her. Set the shift light to 4k to remind me. I still go above it for a bit daily, but not too hard and not to redline, and not immediately after start. I usually wait till I'm at least on the freeway, so it's at least about 4-5 minutes after the car starts rolling, and even then I don't exactly flog her.

But it is kind of boring to drive this car below 4k all the time... damn torque dip.

[Ralph Spoilsport]

Rule #1: *Never* flog the car until at full operating temp. This means oil too. I drive it like a Camry for about five minutes after the water temp has stabilized. Longer in cold weather. The crankshaft is a big heavy ole piece of steel. It takes a long time to warm up and while cold, the risk of (high rpm) oil starvation to the rod bearings is real. Cold steel means cold oil where it really counts. Think this has killed quite a few WRX and STi motors

It's best to break in the engine in sooner rather than later. For this I prefer highway driving, full throttle acceleration (1 or 2 gears), varying cruise speeds, fast enough to have some load on the engine (70-ish is ideal), keep revs under 4K to start, gradually start opening up the rev range after at least 500 miles.

Don't change oil until you are well broken in and you can feel the difference in the way the engine responds. This should start to happen at about 500 miles, but it isn't finished at even 1000. The factory fill has a lot of friction reducing molybdenum compounds in it, you want them in there during break in. I changed mine out at 2500.

During break in, avoid if possible: extended idling, short trips on cold starts.

Breaking in the MT6 was the real challenge on this car. It's a very weird unit. I changed to redline MTL fluid at 2500 (helped some, especially in cold weather) and figured out a new way to work that was 75% mountain roads and constant 2-3-4-3-2 shifts. 2000 miles of that worked wonders, it's actually turning into a pretty nice shifting trans.

Oh, and as long as you have the car up in the air to change the trans fluid, change out the diffy fluid too: you'll find quite a lot of very fine debris on the mag plug that doesn't need to stay in there (completely normal).

My $0.02, anyway.

[autobrz]

I didn't get the honor of breaking my car in since I bought mine used with 5k miles but I would have done it hard. I'm surprised so many people are taking it easy...

[felonyforest]

In regards to interstate driving… is there a better way to accomodate a thoughtful break in over a 40 mile stretch of traffic free interstate where speed limit is 70 mph. This is my every other day drive to work and home, and easy to keep under 4000 but, to accomadate thoughtful variation….. any suggestions?

[SirBrass]

Originally Posted by felonyforest

In regards to interstate driving… is there a better way to accomodate a thoughtful break in over a 40 mile stretch of traffic free interstate where speed limit is 70 mph. This is my every other day drive to work and home, and easy to keep under 4000 but, to accomadate thoughtful variation….. any suggestions?

Since the car is quite able to accomodate a wide band, try some downshifts along the way just for the heck of it to move the needle around?

I've got long freeway drives daily, too, but since I deal with traffic I'm having to regularly throttle down and downshift and throttle back up which means until I hit my cruise legs, I'm varying my revs pretty well.

And with what I've read here, I'm going to say "screw the lawyers. the engineers didn't write this" and load the engine and enjoy the car, but restrain from getting too near red line or letting the tranny brake the engine with non-matching downshifts or anything stupid.

[felonyforest]

I like this! Kinda what I was thinking but, better stated.

Merci!

[forzajuve]

Lame

[chiefshayan]

I spun the rear when leaving the dealership about 50 feet around a corner, but it was raining

[Luis_GT]

I followed the manufacturer specifications down to the only rev the engine above 4K only in "Emergencies"

I had a few "emergencies" along the way...

Changed the oil at 1000.

[subwaynm]

I say stick close to what Scion suggest.