woman.driven
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Hi Everyone!
My name is Doris and this is my first post and I have a 2018 Shelby GT350. Currently I'm in the process of rebuilding the engine. Here is what it looked like before the engine was pulled:
A little back story on the car. Bought new and kept rpms under 4k till the 1000 mile break in. At which point the first oil change was performed using Amsoil. A JLT intake was installed and tuned with flex shortly after. My first time at the track was a 2-day affair back to back. I had about 1400mls by then. No issues with the engine.
Removed flex tune and got a 91octane tune only (for the intake) and used AFD Proflex as my flex kit. I had four more track days without issues, not a single drop of oil burned. I performed a second oil change sometime in between at 3500mls along with a brake flush to Motul 660. All was good until the summer came around. By then the car was just under 5000 miles, mostly track miles.
Outside temp was around 95 degrees. 1st time out, no problems; 2nd time out, I got a check engine light and pulled off the track. Checked the code and it stated bank2 was running too rich. I had a 1/4 of E54 in the tank. So I filled up with 91 right after. My 3rd session out, I got another engine light so I pulled out. Checked it and it showed a misfire on cylinder 8. I went home right after.
I swapped out all plugs, no more codes. I went to my 7th track day at night during the summer as it's supposed to be cooler. 1st session, no issue;. 2nd session I got a misfire on the same cylinder. I didn't finish the remaining sessions and went home.
At this point I swapped coils and drove the car. Same misfire on the same cylinder. I moved around the injectors, same thing. Swapped out the plug for a new one, same thing. At this point I contacted my dealer and told them the situation.
*Here is what most don't understand. If you have a good relation with the dealer\service adviser, no matter what make of car you have, they will advise you bring the car in stock form. If they don't tell you that, they aren't looking after you.
I removed everything mod wise that I could. That includes the front bumper as my splitter is 3inches from the ground. The entrance to their bay is a very steep incline. Why not remove the spiltter only?..it was easier to just remove the bumper and they didn't see a problem with it. I also removed my trunk as it had an APR gt-250 wing. They leave the cars outside and assume no responsibility for damage or theft. Why not remove the APR wing.. it was a pain to put on lol. So it was easier removing the trunk.
*Here is another piece of info most don't know. The dealer makes no call or decision on the GT350 or Raptor engine when it comes to replacing. All they can do run a few tests to determine if there's indeed an engine fault. All info is then submitted to the Ford hotline where a "specialist" makes the call. The tech ran a compression test and noted #8 was way way under the 20% minimum average between all others. He checked with a borescope and saw damage. Info was submitted and the hotline which came back with a "more info request". They wanted pictures of the engine bay. At that point they noticed my stock intake elbow was "cleaner" than the rest of the engine. They suspected it was swapped out for an aftermarket one. They asked the tech to take a picture of the diagnostic screen when plugged into the ECU for some data.
The smoking gun was the ignition cycles of the car. It was showing a count of 5 or 6 cycles in it's lifetime. A red flag stating the car has been tuned. How do they know? When you flash or remove a tune, the ignition cycles are reset. So when you have a low cycle relative to a car that had 5000mls, it does not add up. At that point, they denied the claim. Understandable, but I know the problem wasn't tune related, but they didn't care to prove it.
It's easier to deny a claim by looking at something else to blame. The dealer didn't want to give up. They suggested I take the car back and try to turn on and off the car 100 or so times, then bring it back. They wanted to try a different angle to see if I can get a replacement. I'm not the first tuned car they've dealt with that got denied at first. But they have had some success of a replacements after months of trying.
I made the decision to not waste time on that. There are cases of stock engines blowing a rod, bearing or otherwise.. so I highly doubt a tune caused my issue after 5k miles and many track sessions in place. It looks like heat was the problem for #8 which appears to be a common theme for these modular engines. I will say there are more working voodoo engines than those with issues. But to ignore there is an actual problem is just ignorant towards the many cases of proof affecting stock engines.
That being said, I have been on this site since I've gotten my car. It's provided me with so much insight and knowledge about the voodoo platform. Although, I have read some members comments on here about me..good ones..and a lot of bad ones, but I'm not here for opinions. One thing about being on YT..I can't take those comments and move on. I will say there are some members on here that I've spoken to and have helped guide me. I thank them for that and will mention them in my technical posts.
I'm here to provide information that anyone can look for and hopefully use. Which brings me to my point. I could not find a detailed thread about how to drop this particular engine and all of the small annoying things that get in the way. So I will upload all the pictures I took, along with the tools and methods to drop this engine. If there is, then let me know and I can save space on the servers by not uploading redundant info ;)
Following that will be a complete detailed break down of all the engine components, along with inspection. I do plan to build this up myself. Which means upgraded parts and the process\steps involving that. This is my first time doing so, so expect delays as I figure things out and leverage the community for any questions and help I will need.
I apologize for the abnormally long intro. I wanted provide some clarity in relation to my GT350 and the direction of this thread.
Thank you all,
-Doris
My name is Doris and this is my first post and I have a 2018 Shelby GT350. Currently I'm in the process of rebuilding the engine. Here is what it looked like before the engine was pulled:
A little back story on the car. Bought new and kept rpms under 4k till the 1000 mile break in. At which point the first oil change was performed using Amsoil. A JLT intake was installed and tuned with flex shortly after. My first time at the track was a 2-day affair back to back. I had about 1400mls by then. No issues with the engine.
Removed flex tune and got a 91octane tune only (for the intake) and used AFD Proflex as my flex kit. I had four more track days without issues, not a single drop of oil burned. I performed a second oil change sometime in between at 3500mls along with a brake flush to Motul 660. All was good until the summer came around. By then the car was just under 5000 miles, mostly track miles.
Outside temp was around 95 degrees. 1st time out, no problems; 2nd time out, I got a check engine light and pulled off the track. Checked the code and it stated bank2 was running too rich. I had a 1/4 of E54 in the tank. So I filled up with 91 right after. My 3rd session out, I got another engine light so I pulled out. Checked it and it showed a misfire on cylinder 8. I went home right after.
I swapped out all plugs, no more codes. I went to my 7th track day at night during the summer as it's supposed to be cooler. 1st session, no issue;. 2nd session I got a misfire on the same cylinder. I didn't finish the remaining sessions and went home.
At this point I swapped coils and drove the car. Same misfire on the same cylinder. I moved around the injectors, same thing. Swapped out the plug for a new one, same thing. At this point I contacted my dealer and told them the situation.
*Here is what most don't understand. If you have a good relation with the dealer\service adviser, no matter what make of car you have, they will advise you bring the car in stock form. If they don't tell you that, they aren't looking after you.
I removed everything mod wise that I could. That includes the front bumper as my splitter is 3inches from the ground. The entrance to their bay is a very steep incline. Why not remove the spiltter only?..it was easier to just remove the bumper and they didn't see a problem with it. I also removed my trunk as it had an APR gt-250 wing. They leave the cars outside and assume no responsibility for damage or theft. Why not remove the APR wing.. it was a pain to put on lol. So it was easier removing the trunk.
*Here is another piece of info most don't know. The dealer makes no call or decision on the GT350 or Raptor engine when it comes to replacing. All they can do run a few tests to determine if there's indeed an engine fault. All info is then submitted to the Ford hotline where a "specialist" makes the call. The tech ran a compression test and noted #8 was way way under the 20% minimum average between all others. He checked with a borescope and saw damage. Info was submitted and the hotline which came back with a "more info request". They wanted pictures of the engine bay. At that point they noticed my stock intake elbow was "cleaner" than the rest of the engine. They suspected it was swapped out for an aftermarket one. They asked the tech to take a picture of the diagnostic screen when plugged into the ECU for some data.
The smoking gun was the ignition cycles of the car. It was showing a count of 5 or 6 cycles in it's lifetime. A red flag stating the car has been tuned. How do they know? When you flash or remove a tune, the ignition cycles are reset. So when you have a low cycle relative to a car that had 5000mls, it does not add up. At that point, they denied the claim. Understandable, but I know the problem wasn't tune related, but they didn't care to prove it.
It's easier to deny a claim by looking at something else to blame. The dealer didn't want to give up. They suggested I take the car back and try to turn on and off the car 100 or so times, then bring it back. They wanted to try a different angle to see if I can get a replacement. I'm not the first tuned car they've dealt with that got denied at first. But they have had some success of a replacements after months of trying.
I made the decision to not waste time on that. There are cases of stock engines blowing a rod, bearing or otherwise.. so I highly doubt a tune caused my issue after 5k miles and many track sessions in place. It looks like heat was the problem for #8 which appears to be a common theme for these modular engines. I will say there are more working voodoo engines than those with issues. But to ignore there is an actual problem is just ignorant towards the many cases of proof affecting stock engines.
That being said, I have been on this site since I've gotten my car. It's provided me with so much insight and knowledge about the voodoo platform. Although, I have read some members comments on here about me..good ones..and a lot of bad ones, but I'm not here for opinions. One thing about being on YT..I can't take those comments and move on. I will say there are some members on here that I've spoken to and have helped guide me. I thank them for that and will mention them in my technical posts.
I'm here to provide information that anyone can look for and hopefully use. Which brings me to my point. I could not find a detailed thread about how to drop this particular engine and all of the small annoying things that get in the way. So I will upload all the pictures I took, along with the tools and methods to drop this engine. If there is, then let me know and I can save space on the servers by not uploading redundant info ;)
Following that will be a complete detailed break down of all the engine components, along with inspection. I do plan to build this up myself. Which means upgraded parts and the process\steps involving that. This is my first time doing so, so expect delays as I figure things out and leverage the community for any questions and help I will need.
I apologize for the abnormally long intro. I wanted provide some clarity in relation to my GT350 and the direction of this thread.
Thank you all,
-Doris
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