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Rotary Build 101


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Long stroy; short.....kinda

 

Well, as some of y'all know, we rebuilt our original rotary from the parts we got from three e-bay 13b turbos. They came as a package, all three for $750.00. Dave Staten and I rebuilt it back around Thanksgiving of '04 and kept it stowed while working on the airframe. I got it running on May 30, 2007. I had run it about 8 hours, sending in the Real World Solutions engine computer for a couple of upgrads, running wires and improving systems over the past several monts....also, broke up with my S/O after ten years and got a bit side tracked in my build by the dating process :eek:

 

The engine was becoming increasingly harder to start. Hmmmmm. Last month at the EAA; Houston chapter meeting I found out why. I had noticed a small coolant leak earlier in the day and resolved to find it later. At the meeting an RV-10 builder friend noticed a small amount of coolant on the exhaust pipe.....uh, oh. I think I know what that means. Sure enough, I pulled the plugs and there was coolant on the plugs. DOH! Yep, coolant was in the combustion area. I turned the prop by hand without the plugs in and shot coolant 3/4 way down my port wing. Damn, damn, damn.

 

Ok, take a breath. The engine has to come apart. It was actually pretty easy. I have learned much about my engine and systems over the last few years. I knew I would have to replace the sealing O-rings, so I ordered a set from Pineapple Racing in OR. They insist they are extra heavy duty...well see.

 

Upon inspection of the engine all the major pieces seemed ok. The all seemed well within specs. They really were not as good as I wanted, but ok. I thought about replacing the rotor housing with new due to some pitting in the water channels, but I did not want to wait for them to ship. While apart I decided to go ahead and port the engine to a medium street port. It all went well until I used the wrong portion of the template on the intermediate housing and ground off too much metal and thus now had a nice boat anchor.

 

We think the reason we had a failure was that when we first got the engine started, we (meaning ME) allowed it to get way too hot. My temp gage was not working right and we are unsure how hot it really got. This is known to cause the O-rings to fail. Also, when it gets really hot the rotor housings can shrink causing problems. I also must admit that i was so thrilled to actually get it running at first I got distracted, thus not really paying enough attention to the temp. Silly, but accurate....and a bit expensive:o

 

Anyway, since I trashed the intermediate housing, I decided to buy a new one, since I was gonna have to wait for it to arrive, I also choose to get new rotor housings. While on the phone ordering from Mazdatrix I figured why replace three of five MAJOR parts.....so, I went ahead and ordered the two end housing too......all ported to a medium street port by the pro's at Mazdatrix.

 

Got all the new parts in last Saturday and over the last week I have made my aviation specific mods.

 

Today, my best friend, Russell and I (with some help from my close friend and mechanical engineer Blaine, who owns a company that supplies A/C systems to the likes of Cirrus, Moony, Cessna/Columbia, Eclipse etc) finished the build. For those interested, I will be posting some pictures of the build.

 

All the best,

 

Chris

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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More pix. I like the Blue and Gold together. They are my fraternity, Sigma Chi colors as well as the traditional colors of Law Enforcment and the Legal profession. If you remember, I am a lawyer and also became a cop three years ago.......but mainly, I think blue and gold is "pretty":)

 

The notebook computer is playing Bruce Turrentines 13b re-build video. Blaine is adding sealant to the "legs" of the front iron.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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The front plate is mounted to the engine stand with an adapter for the rotary I made. You can see the front stationary gears mounted in the center of the front plate. You can also see the nice port Mazdatrix added.

 

The front rotar is added and the front rotor housing is placed on the front plate. The side seals, oil seals etc were already added to the rotars and placed in position as a unit. The apex seals and there springs will be illustrated later.

 

It still amazes me how the rotars actually move in the housings. Wow, Dr. Wankle is to be commended.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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This shows how the rotor moves along the medium street port. The medium street port should help us achieve 200hp N/A. We are using the Mistral Intake and hope to turbo normalize down the road.

 

That is Blaine Streeter on the left and my best friend Russell Brown on the right. I have known Russ since he was 17. He will be 40 this September. Geesh, where does the time go?

 

We started the build, however, we had some real issues with the suggested product called Hylomar. It is used to help hold the O-rings in the grooves while under construction. The manuals do not mention its use, however, it has become somewhat standard for rotary builds. I ordered mine with the engine parts, but the tube I got must have been super old as it was not in a very useable condidtion. We used it a bit on the front housing, but it was causing WAAAAY more problems. As mentioned, its only real purpose is to hold the O-rings when holding the plates upside down during assembly. Since it does act as a sealent many will apply it aroudn the rotor housings and a couple of other places to potentially aid sealing. Since we were having such problems with the Hylomar we decided to stop for the night and I would research and try to find more Hylomar. I wrapped what we had done and called it a night.

 

I went to seven different auto parts stores and could not find any Hylomar locally (heck, Houston is the nations forth larges city). I went to the Hylomar site and it states there is a shortage in the US and to expect about a three week delay. Geesh. Permatex use to supply it as did Locktite, but apparantly both have ceased production. Anyway, after asking about it on the Flyrotary.com web site I determined Hylomar is much more trouble than it was worth.....so, in later updates we used petroleum jelly to keep the O-rings in and are happy with the results. Actually, the petroleum jelly is used to hold in many parts, such as the side seals etc during assembly. For those of you who may not know, the Vasoline will burn off when the engine is started. You can see some of the Vasoline on the rotors in these pictures. More pix to come, but it is late.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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Chris, It all looks good brother. I am up here in Shreveport and maybe I should take a trip down in my Cherokee to have a looksee and a beverage! while I enjoyed the pics I didn't notice the video playing as I was distracted by the two hotties staring at me from your hangar wall....Sorry! Keep us posted as to your progress!

 

-Jonathan

6258J Piper

#1052 Ch 6

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Russell and I were able to get back to the engine on Sunday (4-7-2008). I again tried to find Hylomar to no avail....screw it. I am confident in the factory advised method, especially after some research and now that I have actually assembled the dang thing:p .

 

Since the engine set for a day and a half, I carefully lifted up the front housing so I could remove and re-apply silicone sealant to the "legs". It also gives a nice opportunity to see how the rotors sit on the front iron.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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More for those who may care.....

 

As with the other parts, we cleaned the intermediate plate with brake cleaner and compressed air, installed the O-rings and slid it in place. Intalling the intermediate housing is one of the few places you really need two people. It is nice in other places, but during the IH install you ust lift the ecentric shaft (e-shaft) up about one inch to allow the IH to tilt over the e-shaft lobe. It is straight forward. Just look how nice those new housings look <g>

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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More and more.:rolleyes:

 

Since we are reusing the apex seals, we are having to secure the small apex spring to the apex seal with super glue. FINALLY super glue seems to come in a package that is re-usalbe. It came with a little brush. We also used super glue to secure the end of the two piece little triangle piece to make the apex seal one piece for install. The manual shows installing the small spring going in first with the larger sping sliding in behind it, however, that is probabley easily done with new seal, but when we tried the larger spring would get jammed up with the small spring. Glueing the smaller spring in place worked great. The larger spring went in easily sliding behind the small spring as it should. You may notice the apex seals are held in with a rubber band until it is installed and can be held in position with the rotor housing.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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Russell preparing the housing, another shot of the apex seal and small spring, the rear rotor placed on the IH and finally the rear rotor housing. Note the rubber band in the third picture holding the apex seals in place in the third picture. It is removed as you start to slide the rotor housing on since the housing is then in place to hold in the seals.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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As shown, the apex seals get inserted before the rotor is placed on the intermediate housing. The two apex seal springs are inserted after the rear housing is placed over the rotor to hold in the rotor and seals. To install the springs you remove the "C" shaped end piece and its rubber insert. You then slide the small spring in...this is where we had some interferance so we super glued the smaller spring to the apex seal. The super glue will give way when the engine starts.....if it hasn't already when when spun the engine by hand. The larger spring is slid in behind the smaller spring. Both springs open area face AWAY from center...or towards the rotor housing. The glue trick worked great and the springs went in with no problem. The "C" seal is then placed back in place with the insert.

 

These pix also show one of the four 0-rings that MUSt be inserted around dowlings that are inserted through the engine otherwise there will be oil leaks (at least that is my understanding.....so I figured we should go ahead and install them <g>)

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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The rear plate is on but you can still see into the engine through the rear stationary gear hole. The rear stationary gear is placed in position to close up the rotor housings. The last pix is of me applying silicone to the length of the engine tension threw bolts. The silicone is applied to dampen vibration. These bolts literally hold the sandwiched parts of the rotary togehter by running from the rear to the front of the engine. There are a total of 18 that keeps everthing secure. There have been a few issues/concerns that even with the slight vibration of the rotary, that these bolts MAY be at risk, so a "best practice" has developed to run a bead of silicone down the bolt to dampen vibration issues.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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The tension bolts are tightened up in a prescribed sequance in three steps. 10 lbs, 20 lbs and 28 foot lbs of torque. Russell did the first two passes and I got the honor of the final turns of the torque wrench to button up the interior of the rotary. We then moved to the front housing area wher there are some critical bearings (of course what isn't critical;) ) as well as the oil pump and gears for the "crank angle sensor"

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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Even though I thought I had everything together this is a shot of me looking for something. I must have found it since we were able to placing the bearings on the front of the engine. By the way, we have turned the engine around on the engine stand as the initial build is from front to back. We are now, however, working on the front of the engine.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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One of the componants of the front housing is a spacer which determins the amount of end play the engine has around the e-shaft. There are six different sizes. The difference between the sizes is hardly decernable by the human eye...well, my eyes anyway and my Lasik has been holding well so far.

 

You must install all the front housing bearings and washers etc to be able to measure this end play. It really is critical to get it right. If after you install one spacer and it is not right, you must remove the assembly install one of the other spacers until you get it to the right tolerances to spec.

 

You use a dail gage stuck on the end housing with a magnet to get the reading. I had five of the six spacers available from Mazdatrix. Russ and I were suprised that we picked the right spacer on the first attempt, even though it seems to be known that the "V" spacer is usually the right one, so we started with it. You may be able to see on the gage that it is reading at the second tick on the gage, or .0020, IIRC, which is where we want to be. Pineapple Racing has a good online video on this process as well as the Bruce Trurrantine rebuild DVD.

 

Next the oil pump sprockets/chain and e-shaft sprockes go on as a unit. The lock washer in this application just gets bent on one side to secure the bolt on the oil punp sprockets.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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There you have it a rough overview of the build of a Mazda Wankle 2nd gen 13b rotary engine. It really is NOT very difficult and there is a certain elegance in the way it all works.

 

I still have to put on variouls other parts, such as the water pump assembley....I have to close up the factory fuel injector ports since my Mistral intake has all the injectors on the intake. Also, I will show grinding down the oil filter mounting surface. We are using a remote oil filter and the origianal mounting surface has a very slight interfearance with the Mistral Intake. Since the Mistral engine (http://www.mistral-engines.com/index.htm) uses the 2nd gen turbo Mazda as a template for the development of its certified rotary, the parts fit nicely with this and a couple of other minor clearance issues. All can be easily solved with a bit of grinding. Stay tuned folks, that and other info to come.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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Another shot of the completed block. A thanks to Russ. His pressance and piece of mind and skill gives great comfort and confidance to the process.

 

The third pix is of the water pump parts

 

The forth pix is of the ground down oil mount.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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These pictures are of the open primary fuel injector port s into the rotor housing. I purchased a kit from Racing Beat to seal these ports. The kit was nice even though there are various was to close these off. Some use the ports, but as mentioned the Mistral Intake includes them in the intake.

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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FINALLY;) , for now anyway :cool2: is a final picture of the fuel injector port sealing kit. The last thing done for the day was to install the oil filler neck and the small vent tube.

 

Thanks for looking at my rotary build. I hope it proved interesting for some.

 

On to more tasks......

 

All the best,

 

Chris

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Christopher Barber

Velocity SE/FG w/yoke. Zoom, zoom, zoom.

www.LoneStarVelocity.com

 

Live with Passion...

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