Engine Break-in

varying RPM's and change the oil EARLY (500 miles). Thats the way I break in all my four stroke engines.

 

varying rpms. Dont change oil until the required 5000.

 

Yeah! That way you can flush out all of that snake oil Moly that they put in the oil for break in!

 

When I rebuilt mine, I changed the oil at 3000. I figured that since it had been honed, I should be easy and change the oil pretty soon, because I know that with breaking in an overhaul, the honing causes peaks and dips and whatnot in the walls, so those peaks are going to be chopped off, leaving little pieces of metal in the oil. At least that's what I figure.

I was pretty easy on Stonewall during the break-in period, which I called as being the first 2000, just to be safe. Didn't dog the hell out of him much. But now, it's a different story. I'll romp on the pedal every now and then, and if you've ever seen me take off from a stoplight, you'll see that i enjoy jackrabbiting off the line sometimes.

 

bottom line....drive it the way you are going to drive it! any engine builder will tell you that. Don't baby it.

 

This.

 

Frankly, I don't give a damn how other people break in their engines. Follow the recommendations in the owners manual is the way to go.

 

At work, we run our brand new police cars in normal conditions, wide open throttle, and extended idling. Never had any problems with oil burning or anything through 100,000 miles on them. That said, I had a mustang 5.0 that I put a rebuilt engine in. I babied the engine through the break in period and had immediate problems with burning oil (that may have been attributed to the fact that hardly any rebuilt engine is good). There is such a thing as babying an engine too much and not letting the piston rings have a chance to seat properly. My suggestion is to drive it normally through the break in period.

 

New engines have such tight clearances, there's really is no break in process. Just drive it.

 

I've broken in dozens of new airplane piston engines. With new top and/or bottom ends you run them at 75% power or better for at least the first 5 hours.

Fire it up for a minute, leak check, re-cowl, fire it up again & get it in the air ASAP and circle the field for an hour as close to WFO as you can get. Land, change the oil and do it again…. For an engine broken in right that gets used regularly, you will notice a difference in the oil consumption and more consistent compression numbers.

 

In my experience I've kept the RPM's varied for the first 5k and avoided redline by 500 RPM or so. From 5k-10k I beat the everliving shit out of it to score the pistons. After that she's pretty much good to go.

 

I picked up my 2013 Tacoma Baja in Portland, OR and drove it home to Albuquerque, NM, about 1600 miles, and for the first 1000 miles I didn't use the cruise control and driving highway speeds. At 6000 miles seems fine.

 

I have always keep varying the RPM's and under 50 mph for the first 500 miles and under 70 for the next 500 and then do an oil change and drive it like you stole it. Lol Tim

 

Yeah, and we pre-heat aircraft piston engines below 40f as well. Those engines are really a different animal as compared to modern toyota engines.

 

Yea, me too, but I AM old!

 

I just drive the piss out of it from mile 1. Never had a problem with any of my Toyotas.

 

i had a quick puff of blue on startup for the first few hundred miles. Then it seemed to clear. They may be "broken in" on the assembly line. But, they certainly are not fully broken in until the truck has some miles under its belt.

I bought my wife a brand new Honda Odyssey in 09' we were getting ready for a trip down south and i took it to the dealer with roughly 1800 miles on to get an oil change before the trip. He refused to do it because he said the engine had not had the proper break in period. He advised me to wait until we returned from the trip.

So anyway thats been my experience with "break in" on modern engines. Im curios how many people go the full 5000 miles for their first oil change? to date i only have 456 miles on my Taco.