Rhythm

Hey everyone! I have started my first turbo install on a LS swapped 5th gen Civic hatch. When I pulled the oil pan to tap it, I found small metal chips in the bottom of the pan. I also removed the oil pick-up and the screen had more metal chips in it. The oil filter had a few chips as well. I removed the windage tray to look at the crank, rods, and pistons but everything looked fine to me.

I swapped the motor 1,000 miles ago and this was the first oil change. The compression was checked before the tear down and it was 185 across all cylinders.

Any ideas as to what these metal chips are? They do not stick to a magnet, so I'm thinking aluminum or copper. Wouldn't there be a loss in compression if the piston was blown? Isn't a spun bearing obvious to see?

Please let me know what else to look into. I'd hate to put the turbo on and blow it on the dyno!

Thanks in advance...

Tactic$

are they "chips" or does it look like "metal powder"??

Rhythm

I'd say that they are actual chips with a few chunks. The largest size pieces are about 1 mm thick and about 2 mm in length. I tried to take pics, but they were pretty blurry.

non-VTEC

is the engine re-build in anyway or you just swapped in a stock engine?

metal chips in the pan is no good........

Rod.

sound like my problem back then....bearings

dustin

bearings

oxSLEEPERxo

you might want to hold off on your turbo install. See if its really the bearings or something else and get it replaced

Rhythm

Thanks for the replies... The motor was stock when I swapped it in. I'll pull the caps tonight to see what I come up with. Does anyone have pics of bad bearings? Will it be obvious that something is wrong?

dustin

here is a spun rod bearing:



You can see how it is really thin in the center, hehe.

funvtec

yes very obvious

you will see the different levels on the metals in the bearings it it will be burnt black or chunk missing

civicross

Do an oil analysis at blackstone labs. They should be able to tell you what it is.

Rhythm

Pulled the rod caps and bearings were fine. The mains are next. If the bearings are good, could it be parts of the piston? From what I could see underneath, the pistons looked ok. I guess I'll have to pull the head if the bearings check out.

Any other suggestions would be great!

dustin

How many miles are on this motor? Stock motor?

Sure these aren't just clumps/pieces of carbon in the motor? I've seen that on lots of motors with relatively high mileage.

Rhythm

The motor had 19k miles when it was pulled (according to the carfax). But I'm not sure how many cars it was in since then. The pieces of metal are shiny like aluminum. I'm lost...

Tactic$

Did it make any abnormal sounds before?

I would think that if it's a bearing problem (bad enough to see "chips and chunks" of metal) it'd be making hella noise before you started the install.....

Rhythm

Nothing abnormal that I could tell. I did have a baseline dyno done on it while it was running and it seemed about 10 less hp and tq than it should've been. I had 110 hp and 101 tq. My tires were low (25 psi) so I thought that was the culprit. Who knows.

Johnyquest

That sounds pretty normal for a stock LS... 110 whp is not bad at all, I think the motor is only like 140ish flywheel?

Matt

dustin

They usually dyno more than 110. But that is not an indicator that anything is necessarily "wrong" with the motor.

.nate

yank the oil pan grab the ends of the rods where they bolt around the crank and shake them. There shouldnt be too much play there...

Rhythm

Still have to check the crank bearings, but the rods had little play if any at all. If the mains look ok, I guess it would have to be the pistons? Can anything from the head fall into the oil pan?

At this rate, it looks like a rebuild is in order. How long does it normally take to replace the pistons, rods, and bearings?