Custom Clevite Rod Bearings

[kawasaki00]

Originally Posted by swamp2

Group think is clearly the way to design a critical component at the heart of an engine. I'd love to hear more about the eccentricity on these new saviour bearings and how that was chosen based on high load rod big end stretching. Guess what the BE bearing folks and no one on their team can answer this because they are basically guessing.



Yes indeed, qualifications for this discussion and the design itself should be whether or not one turns the actual wrenches. Do you understand how absurdly wrong this point of view is? How many of the engineers that design all of the critical part of all production vehicles have "turned the wrenches" on the particular parts they design? The answer is not a very high percentage. Engineers design, simulate and test. Builders turn wrenches. Sure that is a huge generalization but it is also largely true.

You are not going to hear about the eccentricity of the bearings because we have to measure them our self to find out. These parameters are secret and proprietary to Clevite. NOBODY gets the print from Clevite of the eccentricity or the formula on how they manufacture a bearing in the free span state that runs in the compressed state unless they sign a confidentiality agreement. Even then most people do not get it.
In other words, you don't have the proper security clearance for that info.

[jcolley]

Originally Posted by jcolley

Can we ask how many S65 and S85 engines you've taken apart and rebuilt?

Originally Posted by swamp2

Yes indeed, qualifications for this discussion and the design itself should be whether or not one turns the actual wrenches. Do you understand how absurdly wrong this point of view is? How many of the engineers that design all of the critical part of all production vehicles have "turned the wrenches" on the particular parts they design? The answer is not a very high percentage. Engineers design, simulate and test. Builders turn wrenches. Sure that is a huge generalization but it is also largely true.

The irony here is in your questioning of the credentials of everyone involved, yet your basis for making statements such is failure being a "rare" problem are apparently backed up by "but I read on the internet".

My day job is oversight of an engineering organization on a nuclear shipyard. The engineers you speak of which have no practical experience using or operating the equipment they design are far and above the worst to handle. Their utter lack of practical experience results in zero real world understanding of the application of the components they "design, simulate, and test". They have zero ability to analyze problems when it falls outside the assumptions made during the design phase or the parameters they set when creating their simulation. Once the product is complete and "tested", they pass off any failure of their product as the responsibility of the end user and "conditions beyond the scope of the design". A 100% confirmation of the "group think" you reference and zero lack of understanding on the part of the engineer the ultimate environment and conditions in which the part the design will be utilized in.

Having operated some of the crap for 20 years that these particular types of engineers designed, yes thank you, I would like to have one that turned a wrench and practical experience. Otherwise you end up removing a light fixture and removing part of the floor to operate a valve (no, not kidding). The notion that engineers shouldn't do anything more than "design, simulate, and test" are the exact reason there are so many shite products available today.

[takrdown]

Submarine engineering 101.....jcolley we need to get together....I'm a bubblehead too

[BMRLVR]

Originally Posted by jcolley

The irony here is in your questioning of the credentials of everyone involved, yet your basis for making statements such is failure being a "rare" problem are apparently backed up by "but I read on the internet".

My day job is oversight of an engineering organization on a nuclear shipyard. The engineers you speak of which have no practical experience using or operating the equipment they design are far and above the worst to handle. Their utter lack of practical experience results in zero real world understanding of the application of the components they "design, simulate, and test". They have zero ability to analyze problems when it falls outside the assumptions made during the design phase or the parameters they set when creating their simulation. Once the product is complete and "tested", they pass off any failure of their product as the responsibility of the end user and "conditions beyond the scope of the design". A 100% confirmation of the "group think" you reference and zero lack of understanding on the part of the engineer the ultimate environment and conditions in which the part the design will be utilized in.

Having operated some of the crap for 20 years that these particular types of engineers designed, yes thank you, I would like to have one that turned a wrench and practical experience. Otherwise you end up removing a light fixture and removing part of the floor to operate a valve (no, not kidding). The notion that engineers shouldn't do anything more than "design, simulate, and test" are the exact reason there are so many shite products available today.

A lot of us have made this same statement to Swamp already but he will never agree to it.

One of the most brilliant engineers and people I know is also a licensed mechanic who spends his time building cars when he is not working. In my opinion that is the ultimate, he understands both sides of the spectrum.

[jcolley]

Originally Posted by pbonsalb

Scary. Seems really odd to me that WPC treated bearings were as bad at 14k as original bearings at 60k. First, the new bearings reportedly have minimally increased clearance and second the WPC treatment may further minimally increase clearance. I'd like to know what rod bolts were used since there is some evidence ARPs may distort the bearings.

I do not have any intention to check my replacement WPC treated bearings until they have at least the mileage of the originals (60k on originals when replaced, 10k now on WPC), unless I notice some sort of problem (no problem noticed on originals; preventative change) or have some extra time and money and need a project.

This was my engine SuckaGDog is referring to and the bearings were changed preventively while I was inspecting the bottom end of the engine after fuel injector stuck open. The engine hydrolocked (only on the starter fortunately) and I wanted to ensure the cylinder walls were not scored and the rods were not bent prior to driving it again. Since the oil pan was off anyway and I had planned to change the rod bearings preventively a few months later, I went ahead and did so with OEM 702/703 bearings and new OEM rod bolts.

Oil was M1 0W-40, changed at 5k intervals, with absolutely religious warm-up regimen and 100% never revved over 3k RPM until oil temp needle was vertical pointing down. Zero track usage, zero shenanigans as my two daughters are normally in the car with me in car seats.

I have two core S85's I'm rebuilding, one for my car and one for a Superlite SL-C, so I actually sold the engine out of my car to pay for the tooling necessary to rebuild the S85s (and I get bored easy). When I removed the engine, I wanted to verify the bearing condition before the new owner took delivery. I pulled the oil pan and was amazed. I still have them WPC bearings, will take and post some better pictures when I figure out what box I put them in.

[jcolley]

Originally Posted by takrdown

Submarine engineering 101.....jcolley we need to get together....I'm a bubblehead too

C'mon up to Portsmouth. I don't get to Groton much these days. Not terribly unhappy about that either, I miss Pearl.

[LangRacingDevelopment]

I bought a set of the Clevite bearings to check the clearances on. I just checked one rod with stock bolts and I got .0026". The eccentricity seemed pretty different compared to the stock bearing. The clearance on at 90 degrees was lot more open. more like .0045" or .005". These bearings seem to have quite a bit less crush than the factory bearings.

WPC treated factory bearings were .0025" and about .0035" at 90 degrees.

Just thought this was interesting.

[JRV]

Originally Posted by LangRacingDevelopment

I bought a set of the Clevite bearings to check the clearances on. I just checked one rod with stock bolts and I got .0026". The eccentricity seemed pretty different compared to the stock bearing. The clearance on at 90 degrees was lot more open. more like .0045" or .005". These bearings seem to have quite a bit less crush than the factory bearings.

WPC treated factory bearings were .0025" and about .0035" at 90 degrees.

Just thought this was interesting.

Just to be clear you bought a set of the BE rod bearings?

[LangRacingDevelopment]

Originally Posted by JRV

Just to be clear you bought a set of the BE rod bearings?

Right

[8600RPM]

Originally Posted by LangRacingDevelopment

I bought a set of the Clevite bearings to check the clearances on. I just checked one rod with stock bolts and I got .0026". The eccentricity seemed pretty different compared to the stock bearing. The clearance on at 90 degrees was lot more open. more like .0045" or .005". These bearings seem to have quite a bit less crush than the factory bearings.

WPC treated factory bearings were .0025" and about .0035" at 90 degrees.

Just thought this was interesting.

Can you elaborate if this is good vs bad? And in what way for us amateur Internet speed racers to understand

[8600RPM]

Personally I had an e92 go 100k miles of redling had driving on original bearings. My current e92 with 200 miles will also be driven hard without hesitation on oem bearings. If there was a no-compromise clear cut answer, I feel bmw would have went with more clearance. To me there is a trade off that w just don't know about yet

[LangRacingDevelopment]

Originally Posted by 8600RPM

Can you elaborate if this is good vs bad? And in what way for us amateur Internet speed racers to understand

I'll let someone else do that.

[swamp2]

Originally Posted by kawasaki00

You are not going to hear about the eccentricity of the bearings because we have to measure them our self to find out. These parameters are secret and proprietary to Clevite. NOBODY gets the print from Clevite of the eccentricity or the formula on how they manufacture a bearing in the free span state that runs in the compressed state unless they sign a confidentiality agreement. Even then most people do not get it.
In other words, you don't have the proper security clearance for that info.

Entirely skirting the question/point.

So BE Bearings does not specify their own eccentricity?

All of the prior eccentricity measurements have been posted by RG. The question is not what was measured but which, if any of the very different measured eccentricities is good/sufficient/better? You and BE don't know. You copied what BMW already did. Clevite, almost for sure did not come up with the specification for the eccentricity of the factory S65 bearings, BMW did.

Who knows the S65 engine dynamics well enough to understand how much rod big end bearing deformation exists under the most extreme cases? You, your company, BE Bearings, Clevite? Very likely none of you do. So, again it is back to significant guessing and copying of prior work done by engineers with deep/thorough understanding of such topics.

Just more evidence of possibly being right but being right for the wrong reason...

[jcolley]

Sounds better to me than said engineers being wrong for all the right reasons with their "deep/thorough understanding"

[swamp2]

Originally Posted by jcolley

The irony here is in your questioning of the credentials of everyone involved, yet your basis for making statements such is failure being a "rare" problem are apparently backed up by "but I read on the internet".

Not sure this is irony nor that I understand.

First.

Folks here "designing" bearings don't even know what they don't know. Do a literature search. Look at what goes into modern bearing design. It is downright deep and a complicated engineering and scientific endevor. Just spend 10 minutes browsing some books on Google/Amazon in the search "hydrodynamic bearing lubrication". The folks here involved, clearly do not have the credentials required to make good, correct decisions and make them with certainty (i.e. for the right reasons). So again, this may very well turn out to be a good product. But it pretty well for sure won't be justifiable or right for the right reasons. For me personally, this would be a risk I still would be willing to take only when presented with some significant and compelling empirical test evidence as to the improved longevity of the product.

Can you disagree with this?

Second.

There is not enough data to fully determine the failure rate. I have made some very reasonable estimates of extrapolating the known/reported failures, along with knowing how many folks on the forum report actually owning an S65 M3 to determine underreporting and then an approximate failure rate. This process indeed indicates this is a rare problem, specifically between 0.1% and 0.5% (numbers likely increased since then as they will naturally do in time with more data and more failures). Link: Post 55 here: http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthr...=935368&page=3

If you would like to refute (or even modify) that analysis go ahead.

Originally Posted by jcolley

My day job is oversight of an engineering organization on a nuclear shipyard. The engineers you speak of which have no practical experience using or operating the equipment they design are far and above the worst to handle. Their utter lack of practical experience results in zero real world understanding of the application of the components they "design, simulate, and test". They have zero ability to analyze problems when it falls outside the assumptions made during the design phase or the parameters they set when creating their simulation. Once the product is complete and "tested", they pass off any failure of their product as the responsibility of the end user and "conditions beyond the scope of the design". A 100% confirmation of the "group think" you reference and zero lack of understanding on the part of the engineer the ultimate environment and conditions in which the part the design will be utilized in.

Having operated some of the crap for 20 years that these particular types of engineers designed, yes thank you, I would like to have one that turned a wrench and practical experience. Otherwise you end up removing a light fixture and removing part of the floor to operate a valve (no, not kidding). The notion that engineers shouldn't do anything more than "design, simulate, and test" are the exact reason there are so many shite products available today.

Interesting anecdote and I clearly do not disagree with bold part above.

Coincidentally, back in college (undergraduate) I was offered a position in NUPOC (Nuclear Propulsion Officer Candidate Program) and although a technical/"engineering" position, it definitely is not anywhere close to the scientific and engineering capacity of the engineers and physicists who actually develop and design the reactors. In my view a NUPOC guy is more in analogy to an engine builder and the engine designer/engineer is more analogous to the engineers/physicists who actually design the reactors. Perhaps we see pretty well eye to eye on this as well?

I never purported that engineers do not become even more insightful, valuable and experienced when they marry some strong analytical foundations along with hands on skills. In fact, those can very often be some of the very best engineers! At some point, and among larger organizations, it becomes a problem of resource balancing. No one wants to pay a person a compensation rate for a type of work that can be done effectively by a person at a significantly lower rate. Hence engineers design, test and simulate, technicians (and test engineers) build and test and finally "labor" assembles for production.

In short, it sounds like you worked in a particularly dysfunctional military/government bureaucracy. That does not make it a universal state of affairs across all industries. It also does not change the truth of my high level observation that the common notion proffered over and over again here on the forum that one is not qualified to speak about X unless said person is "hands on" with the associated physical structure, is rubbish. How many astrophysicists have voyaged to or inside another star or planet? How many rocket scientists (propulsion designers) have installed pump turbomachinery blisks? How many chip designers install chips in packages or onto PCBs. Etc, etc., etc. This common notion proposed here is clearly false.

[swamp2]

Originally Posted by jcolley

Sounds better to me than said engineers being wrong for all the right reasons with their "deep/thorough understanding"

We are really beating a dead horse here as I have discussed this extensively in the other long thread, but to politely engage if you missed that...

I don't think it has been established that they are "wrong" in the first place. I think there is an often a wide band of grey area between good and bad designs. In the complexity of most real world engineering designs and challenges there is never a perfect nor fully optimized (i.e. a single "right") design. Perhaps at best they made decisions for reasons unknown (and likely never to be known) to the public knowing and accepting some consequences of a higher than normal wear/failure rate in order to achieve other specifications or gain other benefits (noise, efficiency, ultimate bearing load capacity, losses, thermal considerations, etc.).

Do you think the BMW engine test folks saw NOTHING in parallel to the observations of those reporting failures and premature wear? Could it be again that they had entirely different bearings during test and all was just rosy but then production units are entirely different (and don't meet spec hence some massive QA problem)? If there is absolutely no downside to a larger clearance and all upside with bearings that will be virginal for 200k miles how could something so completely simple escape BMW? Oh yeah, group think did it, just like in your military/government example... No, sorry, don't buy that either. Too much financial risk for something so simple to get by.

I await your explanation of how this "massive screw up" by BMW made its way through design, development, dyno testing, road testing, engine tear down inspection, QA and inspection, production, etc.

Most seem to lean toward a middle ground here that the design is tight, likely purposefully so, extreme ends of tolerance stack probably produce cases with insufficient clearance and that, perhaps along with a thick oil causes a higher than normal wear/failure rate. Unfortunately, out side of coarse rules of thumb this remains pretty well pure speculation. This also clearly is not the same as the E46 M3 sudden/widespread and always catastrophic bearing failure scenario that was acknowledged by BMW and corrected.

Last but not least. In order not to beat the dead horse here and keep the thread more on topic, I suggest we take further discussion to another new thread or PM. We can certainly provide a link here for folks that want to follow the tangential discussion. Thoughts?

[swamp2]

Originally Posted by JRV

Just to be clear you bought a set of the BE rod bearings?

For sale before any testing has been completed and shared/published? Odd... Not what I thought the folks said they were going to do.

[BMRLVR]

Originally Posted by swamp2

For sale before any testing has been completed and shared/published? Odd... Not what I thought the folks said they were going to do.

No one claimed that the bearings would not be sold before testing was completed. All was said is that testing would be done comparing new OEM bearings in a completely stock engine running 10W60 with the new updated bearings and the data would be posted for all to see. The data is currently being captured and once it is available it will be posted for all to see.

[Green-Eggs]

Originally Posted by LangRacingDevelopment

I bought a set of the Clevite bearings to check the clearances on. I just checked one rod with stock bolts and I got .0026". The eccentricity seemed pretty different compared to the stock bearing. The clearance on at 90 degrees was lot more open. more like .0045" or .005". These bearings seem to have quite a bit less crush than the factory bearings.

WPC treated factory bearings were .0025" and about .0035" at 90 degrees.

Just thought this was interesting.

Good to see you putting the measurements to the test. I would expect the BE Bearings eccentricity to be about the same as the Clevite 088/089 and VAC custom bearings, but less than the current factory 702/703 bearings.

In the bearing wiki post #4, the factory Clevite 088/089 bearings were 0.00135 clearance, and 0.0040 at 90 degrees. The VAC Clevite custom bearings were were 0.0022 inch clearance, and 0.0046 at 90 degrees. Factory non-Clevite 702/703 bearings were 0.0015 inch clearance, and 0.0060 at 90 degrees. So it sounds like the BE Bearings are exactly where they should be.

[BMRLVR]

Originally Posted by swamp2

For sale before any testing has been completed and shared/published? Odd... Not what I thought the folks said they were going to do.

By the way, no data is being posted because RG is unable to post anymore. Data is being collected every day while the car is being driven but until RG can post it the data will be slow to get posted here.

[thekurgan]

Originally Posted by BMRLVR

By the way, no data is being posted because RG is unable to post anymore. Data is being collected every day while the car is being driven but until RG can post it the data will be slow to get posted here.

Maybe he should post it on some other public site.

[BMRLVR]

Originally Posted by thekurgan

Maybe he should post it on some other public site.

Here is a cut and paste reply from RG that he sent to me:

Why should I? People will cross post to m3p and I won't be able to answer. Why should m3p benefit from any more of my work? I was going to write a bunch of programs that would let m3p users generate queries on all the data logs. Now I have no motivation to do that. I'm still committed to giving out the data, but it will likely be hundreds of gigabytes and I won't be writing any log analysis programs. So anybody who downloads the logs will be on their own to figure out how to analyze it. There's just no reason for me to benefit m3p and spend all my time if I can't even participate in the discussion.

If you guys want the information and data that is being collected from the testing, message Jason and let him know that RG should be reinstated so that the community can benefit from the testing being done. No one as of yet has invested nearly as much time and resources into the S65/S85 platform as RG has....... It is a shame we all can't get the information because of this ban.