NB!!! Everybody should read this - very important

AR 200SX wrote:

i agree guys.thats when my nightmare started with pieter's s14. just when he took it to snails for a dyno.broke teeth of the vvt cam sprocket.

i still maintain that something very wrong must've been done with that!

Status update guys:

First off: I warned everybody because of my experience that I'm going through - if you feel that Snail conversions is the shit, by all means give the guy your money. As with all things in life I can only give my opinion and if your not interested just ignore it.

I phoned the previous owner of the SX and firstly he's seriously cheesed off with the fact that his "friend" did him in by R16k and he has told me that he's even willing to give me a police statement saying that the only workshop/person that has ever worked on his SX is infact Snail conversions.

After speaking to him I phoned Riaan from Snail and told him about the motor. His response was that he wouldn't weld or glue studs and gaskets...this I will concede may be possible. But the best part was to follow: when I told him about the pistons that are too small he had the following three replies:

1) "Ek bou nie kak engines nie..." - some of you guys seem happy with his work so fine. But numbers 2 and 3 makes me seriously suspect of his expertise.

2) He said that it must be an engineering problem and that the block was overbored. If that's the case how the HELL can't an experienced engine builder spot the problem if the pistons fall right through the block!!!

3) And this one is my favourite, and I quote:"Die motor moes overheat het en toe krimp die pistons.." at this point I was stunned - truly speechless. Apparently he has figured out some awesome new metallurgical process that nobody has ever heard of (or thought of) before. When I asked him why the headgasket and head seemed fine he had no brilliant new breaktrough reply..

In any case, that's the story. I'll probably go llok at the motor again this afternoon and I'll try to take pics with my phone.

Like someone I know says:"Nou gaan jy skoolgeld betaal seun..."
How true....

agree guys.thats when my nightmare started with pieter's s14. just when he took it to snails for a dyno.broke teeth of the vvt cam sprocket.

i still maintain that something very wrong must've been done with that!

yeah, i agree.. that doesnt just happen!

Enzio wrote:

...
3) And this one is my favourite, and I quote:"Die motor moes overheat het en toe krimp die pistons.."

W T F

Enzio wrote:

2) He said that it must be an engineering problem and that the block was overbored. If that's the case how the HELL can't an experienced engine builder spot the problem if the pistons fall right through the block!!!

Did you drive with this motor? Sounds like it wouldnt have had any compression! 😮

Like you say its all opinions, I had a good experience with them, but that is only 1 persons story. I hope you get your new cabby sorted.

You can read more about my rebuild here http://tobykurien.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=291

:"Die motor moes overheat het en toe krimp die pistons

😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 😂 classic stuff...

gotta be one off the ten best quotes of the year

Sokar: that's exactly the prob.

This whole thing started because I didn't think that the car was pulling as strongly as it should have. Before tuning it a compression test was done and voila!! no compression...and now u know the rest.

Vlade wrote:

Toby is on 1337 posts... that spells thats leet h@x0r style dude

just dont post ever again and you will always be leet

Yeah I don't think there is any other mechanic that will ever work on any car of mine other than my self...

Look Calibrator did good work, in the end his focus was just not at our cars and he tried to please everyone, which obviously didn't workout.

But other than that... Paid plenty of school fees, but now I'm happy, got 3 CA18's running around that I built, and all 3 is reliable. Proven.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Status update guys:

First off: I warned everybody because of my experience that I'm going through - if you feel that Snail conversions is the shit, by all means give the guy your money. As with all things in life I can only give my opinion and if your not interested just ignore it.

I phoned the previous owner of the SX and firstly he's seriously cheesed off with the fact that his "friend" did him in by R16k and he has told me that he's even willing to give me a police statement saying that the only workshop/person that has ever worked on his SX is infact Snail conversions.

After speaking to him I phoned Riaan from Snail and told him about the motor. His response was that he wouldn't weld or glue studs and gaskets...this I will concede may be possible. But the best part was to follow: when I told him about the pistons that are too small he had the following three replies:

1) "Ek bou nie kak engines nie..." - some of you guys seem happy with his work so fine. But numbers 2 and 3 makes me seriously suspect of his expertise.

2) He said that it must be an engineering problem and that the block was overbored. If that's the case how the HELL can't an experienced engine builder spot the problem if the pistons fall right through the block!!!

3) And this one is my favourite, and I quote:"Die motor moes overheat het en toe krimp die pistons.." at this point I was stunned - truly speechless. Apparently he has figured out some awesome new metallurgical process that nobody has ever heard of (or thought of) before. When I asked him why the headgasket and head seemed fine he had no brilliant new breaktrough reply..

In any case, that's the story. I'll probably go llok at the motor again this afternoon and I'll try to take pics with my phone.

Like someone I know says:"Nou gaan jy skoolgeld betaal seun..."
How true....

From the above, my reaction will be not to do business with the mentioned entity

Chem's dollars

rat wrote:

Vlade wrote:

Toby is on 1337 posts... that spells thats leet h@x0r style dude

just dont post ever again and you will always be leet

Haha, damn! I think I should go delete some old posts of mine to keep it there 😂

Vlade wrote:

But other than that... Paid plenty of school fees, but now I'm happy, got 3 CA18's running around that I built, and all 3 is reliable. Proven.

i concur with that one!!!

Hey guys - I've taken the shots of the motor as promised. But I don't know how to upload.... 😳 Any help???

Other than that I need some help - but will post a new topic for it.

You need to use an image hosting site, like http://www.photobucket.com. Then you just link the images in.

Ok the pics as promised:

http://www.badongo.com/pic/3899558

This first pic clearly shows the label on the feeler guage as 0.48mm.

http://www.badongo.com/pic/3899571

This pic shows the 0.5mm feeler gauge - I included the other pic because the feeler size is shown clearer. The 0.5mm went in quite easily so something even bigger could probably have fit as well....

So there u have the proof of my "shrinking" pistons....

OK, sorry the image doesn't seem to work - so there are the url's to the pics.

Enzio wrote:

Ok the pics as promised:

This first pic clearly shows the label on the feeler guage as 0.48mm.

This pic shows the 0.5mm feeler gauge - I included the other pic because the feeler size is shown clearer. The 0.5mm went in quite easily so something even bigger could probably have fit as well....

So there u have the proof of my "shrinking" pistons....

There is no pics uploaded on that links....

it is impossible for the pistons to shrink - i am sure the block expanded

There should be a gap on the top of the pistons, cause pistons are tappered. But they are more like 0.05mm not 0.48mm.

I hope you come right this time round, who is doing the rebuild??

Doing most of the work myself - can't trust anybody these days...

I like widowmaker's "expanded block" theory... 😀

Anyway - will let u guys know when it's done.