artiste1212 Second gear | Join Date: Aug 2011 Location: Los Angeles, CA Posts: 235 |
artiste1212
Second gear
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Posts: 235
crankshaft failure on road trip
I bought a 1990 Miata in Los Angeles last summer, and began experiencing a small loss of horsepower a couple of months ago. This is my first car, so I don't know very much about cars yet. My regular mechanic thought I had a problem with an engine coil, and after replacing it the car worked much better for about 2 or 3 days. But after this, I began experiencing some severe issues related to the timing. Specifically, I have tremendous difficulty getting it up to about 5 or 10 miles per hour, but once I reach this speed I am able to accelerate normally. Because of this, getting up hills is difficult or impossible. I took it back to my mechanic, who said he didn't know what the problem was, but he could recommend replacing the air flow sensor. I took it to a Mazda dealership, and after they hooked it up to a computer, they told me that the crankshaft was moving when it's not supposed to. They recommended to either overhaul or replace the engine.
I am an impoverished graduate student and am spending the summer with my parents in New Jersey. Unfortunately, my car developed this problem only about 2 or 3 days before I had to leave my apartment for the summer, and I was planning on driving across the country. Two or three mechanics in California told me that I should be able to limp back to New Jersey without causing any additional damage to the engine, so I could figure out how to deal with this once I got home. I wound up doing this, and visited another mechanic along the way in Michigan, who told me exactly the same thing. Each time a mechanic inspected and reassembled the engine, it worked perfectly fine for about 2 or 3 days before again developing timing issues.
When I was at the mechanic's in Michigan, the courtesy shuttle driver told me about Miata clubs and suggested I look into them in New Jersey. I did this, and found a mechanic through them who knew Miatas extremely well (he was the first mechanic I brought it to who was able to open the hood right away without having to search for the hood release). He looked at it for about 15 seconds and was able to tell me immediately that the crankshaft was no good, and that I needed to either overhaul or replace the engine (exactly what the dealership in California had told me). He also told me that the bolt could have flown off at any time during my cross country trip and would have caused even more severe damage to the engine. I also have a few other problems with the car (leaky roof, catalytic converter no good, nonfunctional air conditioning, small amount of body rot, and accident damage including some serious body damage from an accident that I didn't know about). He offered to overhaul the engine and replace the catalytic converter and roof for $3000 total, which is very expensive for my graduate student budget. We decided that it made more sense to sell and replace the vehicle.
He referred me to his friend, who is interested in 1.6 engines (this particular mechanic only deals with 1.8's). The friend offered me $800, and wants the car so he can convert it into a race car. Given the condition of the car (it's not really drivable at this point), I doubt I would be able to get much more than this. However, I recently found out about a government sponsored program in California which offers $1500 to recycle California registered cars -- almost twice what I can get for it here in New Jersey, but I would have to get it to California.
The mechanic in New Jersey told me that he might be able to tighten the loose bolt which is causing these timing issues, but it would be only a temporary fix. It could come loose again at any time, perhaps even only 50 miles down the road. During the 2 or 3 times I had the car inspected on the road, they probably tightened this bolt during reassembly, and I suspect that this is the reason why it was working well for several days after each time I had someone look at it. Would I be able to drive back to California, stopping every couple of days to have the bolt tightened? I also read an article about a Loctite solution to this crankshaft issue, http://www.miata.net/garage/hsue/LoctiteCrank1.html. Would this solution help, and if so, how much would it cost at a repair shop? Is it worth trying to get this car back to California and receiving almost double the money, or should I sell and replace it here? I'd like to ask for an independent opinion on this, as it would not be in my mechanic's financial interest to recommend tightening the bolt or using Loctite.
Thanks for any help and advice you can provide.