Galley

Driving into work this morning, having a bit of fun with some blokes on R1's when suddenly noticed the engine management light come on. lost all power and was forced to pull into a lay by. soon afterwards i was confronted with a large cloud of white smoke/steam from the exhaust! when turning the ignition i can hear the starter motor working but the engine's not even trying to turn over. RAC chap said its possibly the cam belt!
I know this is gona cost me, but any ideas how much.
52 plate wrx by the way.

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

Ouch, sorry to hear of your misfortune. Was your car std or modified?

If it is the Cambelt, then that's bad news I'm afraid, something expensive is likely to have broken (would be strange if it had been changed on schedule though).

White smoke from the exhaust can mean a melted piston IIRC.

In either case, it's rebuild time for you You'd bee looking at 2-2.5k I'm afraid. Maybe there is a chance it's something less serious that just looks bad though; you need to find out from someone knowledgable and trustworthy, so you don't get ripped off.

Whereabouts in the UK are you

You could give David at API a call for a start.

Ns04

Galley

live in somerset mate.

have got a decat down and centre pipes fitted. sadly no remap!

the cars only covered 35,000 miles. surely the cam belt should last longer than this.

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

What does the service schedule say mate, mine's a classic so is different.

It's possible that the car could have run lean I guess owing to the decat but no remap, what petrol do you use? did this encounter involved sustained high speeds with high ambient temps?

Ns04

Galley

service manual says to change the cam belt after either 60 months or 50,000 miles. so well short of both!
always fill up with super unleaded.
was driving reasonably hard, but then it is a subaru impreza, thats what their made for?

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

Well, as std yes.

Let me put it this way, if by driving hard you mean sustained 3 figure speeds, that's probably your culprit- they don't like that!

If not, then it sounds like you've just been unlucky.

Give David at APi a ring mate

Ns04

phil_wrx

iTrader: (2)

manual says 95 ron petrol for wrx ? i heard wrx are a little fragile, is that right?

mikepaul

Rubbish, unless you try and keep up with F1 cars.

The engines are strong. 95 octane fuel will not cause it to die.

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

Correct, 95 ron is ok on UK cars. I still wouldn't run a performance car on regular, not cause it'll damage it though.

Anyway, this chap was using SUL

We need more info on the conditions under which the failure occurred really.

Ns04

Galley

Basically i was driving to work this morning, around 8am. i will admit that i was driving the car to the limits for around 3-4mins on a very fast road. i was kind of flat out until i approached a car in front of me and so let of the power as i followed the road round a right hand corner up a hill. as i reached the top of the hill i went to use a little throttle but nothing happened. i then noticed that the engine management light came on. there was nothing i could do apart from roll into a lay by. i got out of the car and heard the chap on the motorbike shout that he thought my car was on fire because of the smoke coming from the exhaust. it was deffinately white smoke/steam and didnt last long. i then realised that i had a serius problem.
i've got someone coming to look at it tomorrow, hopefully all will become clear then.
not sure if it did cause it, but, if theres anyone out there running their cars on decat pipes without remaps `be careful`.

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

Diplomatically put! If you were doing sustained high *ahem* speeds the you've probably fallen foul of the Impreza's high speed aerodynamic shortfall. Basically at *coughs* 3 figure speeds *coughs* the air goes over -not in-the intercooler scoop, inlet temps soar (compounded on hot days) then det sets in and the next thing you know you've got a big bill.

My money is on a melted piston unfortunately

I hope I'm completely wrong though!

Best of luck!

ns04

Galley

Thanks for the help ns04. i to hope that you're completely wrong! ha ha.
time to get the credit cards out me thinks.

hopefully i be back up and going in the near future.

just got to go and find the old trouser clips and get the push bike out the shed!

Galley

Just been out and taken the cover of the cam belt. it looks ok? does this possibly mean a piston problem?

Surgical Spirit

Mine seemed okay as it clocked 158 with all that nice dense cool air we had around last night

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

You'll need to consult an expert mate, I'm certainly not one, but a melted piston would be what my money would be on. As I say, phone David at APi. When you have the rebuild done, the cause of the failure will need to be established.

Just a thought, you were on your way to work how long did you give the car to warm up (in terms of miles) before driving it hard?

Ns04

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

Edited for legal reasons!!

Do you have a FMIC mate? I wouldn't be holding those kind of speeds on the TMIC for any length of time if I were you.

Ns04

Galley

not enough mate. learnt my lesson the hard way. i have a 10 mile drive to work each day. i bet it dosent warm up until i'm driving through the gates!

Just spoke to David, time to get the credit card out! all sounds very good though.

SirFozzalot

I have heard that having a decat without a remap can cause the engine to run lean.

Certainly sounds like a piston failure to me.

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

D'oh!!!- sorry mate!! As you've found out 10 miles is about what it can take for the oil to warm, so ragging it before that is a no, no.

I think everyone gets a bit of a shock when they find out how long it actually takes to get a car's fluids to operating temp. Maybe we should have a sticky so all new owners that come on here are made aware of this and do not learn the hard (and expensive way).

You're in very good hands with David. APi know Scoobies inside out and he's completely up front and won't take money for stuff you don't need. Also, you can be assurred that the rebuild will be done properly and will last!

Ns04

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

Yep,

I think this poor chap just broke the 3 "rules" of Scooby ownership, which some people genuinely aren't aware of and learn about the hard way. It's very unfortunate must be awfully upsetting.

1) Never rag a cold car and it can stay cold for quite some miles!!
2) Avoid sustained high speed on a TMIC
3) If you're going decat, it's best not to push the car to its limits untill you've had a remap.

It's been very hot recently as well which doesn't help, he could have also got a bit of a bad batch of fuel.... etc..

Ns04

Scooby400

Sorry to hear the bad news. Sounds pretty serious.

Count yourself lucky you haven't had a piece of broken turbo bearing rattling around inside your engine since March! Now that is expense!

I've also sent my car to API. Not back yet, but it seems like the place to go if you want a proper job done. And they'll pick the car up from you which makes things easy.

Only thing to consider is they're pretty stacked up with work at the moment so it won't be done too quickly.

Good things come to those that wait though.

ALi-B

iTrader: (1)

Problem could be anything, there is no information given in this thread that is specific enough to say there is anything terminally dead about that car or the engine. Stop speculating if the engine is knackered...if it holed a piston it would still run!!! If it threw a big end, it'll either have gone bang (quite noticably, or if it didn't, it'll still run, but knock like a granny's knees.

RAC's "cambelt diagnosis" is a common fob off. Usually on their behalf, so they can give their controller an easy excuse on the reapir report to tow it rather than repair at the roadside. Thus why it appears intact, although a dodgy tensioner can cause them to slip a tooth or two.

White smoke could be anything, if the fuelling went mega rich enough (or loss of ignition, but still fuel being injected) before it died, it could well be unburnt petrol. I have had clouds of it when I've suffered a serious fueling/ignition problem (lost the jet out of a caburettor - also an old jag where all the injectors were stuck fully open ). Looks like steam, but the smell is very noticable.

Poor bloke must be paranoid...Api Dave save him from this speculation!!

Galley

They said i should have it back on July 8th. thats gona be 4 weeks of riding my push bike the work. 10 miles either way!

Ha, at least thats 4 weeks without having to put fuel into my car! that should pay for the rebuild on its own!

Surgical Spirit

No mods other than a new back box, only had the car a few weeks!

I think we're all guilty of giving it the full berries before everything has come upto temp, hopefully Gally's car won't cost too much for us all to learn this lesson.

Will start thinking about a FMIC now, especially if I'm going to use my private road on a regular basis!

New_scooby_04

iTrader: (4)

Ali, I did say -right from the outset- that it might be something that looks a lot worse than it is and he should contact David at APi who would tell him for sure.

You are, of course right, we won't know untill the engine is stripped what went wrong, but there are three things mentioned that could all be contributing factors to a failure, it is a discussion forum and he did ask for input!

All owners should know not to rag a cold car, avoid sustained Vmax runs and be careful when you have a decat but no remap. If it saves one person the heartbreak of having to shell out 2k+ for a rebuild through ignorance they are points worth re-iterating, even if the cause of this mishap turns out to have nothing to do with them.

All the best,

Ns04

Scooby400

The exercise will do you good!

You're not wrong. My insurance company have supplied me with a TDi Octavia. Its an auto, and gives 50mpg on a run! I've never had a car even give 30mpg before now!!

Scooby Lee

Ross (Galley),

Sorry to hear of your trouble...everyone at work keeps telling me about it.

...I'm sure they all think I'm the 'Head' of the Scooby Gang, which is a little weird!

If you ever need any information in the future, feel free to come and have a chat with me...I don't just supply Technical Advice for work; Scoobies are one of my other specialities!

From personal experience, I've found that the addition of carefully chosen instrumentation assists in assessing the state of the engine, thereby providing you with confirmation all is well before you have some fun!

I must admit I never give the WR1 any 'abuse' until it's nice and warm. Consequently, my drive to work is not that frantic!

Regards,

Lee

P.S. I'm sure one of the 'lads' will give you a lift to work......I would offer, but you'd have to walk 5 Miles to get to my house!