Tuesday, March 22, 2011

A rotary engine story, or, The $200 TII

Once upon a time, a friend of mine (Theo) said a classmate of his told him his RX-7 Turbo II blew it's engine and for $200 Theo could have it. He didn't want it but he offered the car to me, and I gladly accepted.

I paid and Theo brought me the car. Looked decent, except the exhaust rotted from sitting so long. I checked it out, no compression. Squirted some oil in the spark plug holes, rotated the engine, repeat a few times, put plugs in, hooked the car via tow rope up to Theo's 1993 Honda Civic. I popped a battery in, turned it on, and just sat in the car with it in gear and my foot all the way down on the gas while Theo drove in circles at about 10MPH.

After a few minutes of this you could hear the exhaust note was changing, smoke started pouring out the back.

A few more minutes and I noticed I was catching up to Theo's car at WOT . . . . but if I hit the clutch the car wouldn't run on its own.

Around a few more times and you could hear the turbo spooling . . . and it ran . . . .

With a bit of cleaning and a few fixes it passed MD inspection and was my daily driver for over a year, then I sold it.

Thanks, Theo!

3 comments:

Laura said...

heh...i didn't know the backstory to the black TurboII. you seem to be good at picking up turds that end up running with a little work.


want my Ninja 500? :P useful parts bike, possible runner (with effort).

Jason Viw said...

I don't know how I missed your comment for MONTHS. Doubt you still have the bike but SURE :)

Laura said...

LOL, it got picked up last month. :P A little late, there.