your intake valves will be HORRIBLE, just a common issue with any DISI, Mazda, BMW, Audi, VW, etc.

Yes clean them before investing in a tune if feasible. It will run like a new car.

I personally bought Walnut media and a blaster on Amazon, made a plate out of 1x4 MDF using the IM gasket as a template, put two holes in each runner location (one for the blaster another for vacuum) and went to work with each cylinder at TDC. Just like the dealerships clean them.

Interested - about how much did the parts/media cost you, and how much time to do it?

I had this done at 100k miles, with great results. Been thinking of it again as I am at 206k.

let me amazon that for you

media..I got a larger bag but this lil guy would be plenty for a number of valve cleaning jobs.

Amazon.com : Frankford Arsenal 881538 Arsenal Brass Cleaning Walnut Media : Hunting Cleaning And Maintenance Products : Sports & Outdoors

Amazon.com: Campbell Hausfeld AT1226 Sandblasting Kit: Home Improvement

Amazon.com: Campbell Hausfeld AT1226 Sandblasting Kit: Home Improvement

Thanks - not bad. If A person was pulling the IM anyway, seems smart.

Well this wasn't exactly how I was hoping my first post would play out but here we are. I've been navigating around the forums just taking all the info in since buying the car last Novemberish, investing in an ap shortly after. Six months later I'm here with compression and leak down numbers..

Cyl 1: 175, 11% leakage
Cyl 2: 176, 6% leakage
Cyl 3: 155, 27% leakage past the rings
Cyl 4: 175, 7% leakage

Dont worry, I'll see myself over to the build diaries..

At least you're paying attention. Odds are good you can recoup with minimal expense since you've caught it early, just plan for .020 over with the parts and research reputable machine shops near you.

Do most end up needing to bore? I've been hoping to get away with just honing as I'm looking to stay away from forged pistons with what I'm looking to get out of the car reliability and power wise.

From what I've read it seems sticking with the stock rods is a bad idea though.

At these compression values I'm 100% sure you will not have to bore. However, expect to have cracked ring lands so do not buy just rings, get pistons and eventually (why not?!) rods as well.

Your rods aren't what got you into this situation - it's your ring lands (most likely, possibly a filthy valve not fully closing, didn't read the rest of this thread), and if you want more substantial ring lands, you will want forged pistons as well.

Your best bet if you want to get by on the cheap is a buy a reman from Edge and sell your long block. It's worth (a lot) more to the used market than it would be for the $450 core refund. They have a $50 option for a 3 year unlimited warranty, a no brainer if you go that route.

2013-56k miles

SRI (Stock size), Catless DP, CPe Triton CBE, Autotechs, Freek OTS+, Original Spark Plugs, Roughly 90% of miles highway. T6 for it's lifetime.

Cylinder 1- 180
Cylinder 2- 175
Cylinder 3- 180
Cylinder 4- 175

I started losing oil a few weeks back, seems the K04 is not liking the catless DP. CPe TMIC, JBR 3" Intake, BNR S3, and CPe Manifold are on the way. Gonna let Mr. Hypnotic do a full tune on it.

Cleaned the intake valves since my last compression test, and boy what a difference it made in performance and drivability!

I am currently on the first version of my pro tune with Stratified Automotive Controls, so decided to do another compression test today:

195
198
198
196

Once again, I'm thrilled with the results. All the while I was running the Cobb OTS map I never really saw any KR over 2, and trust me, I watched that shit like a hawk. There was only one exception when I got a bad tank of gas from a mom and pop station while traveling in the mountains, and my KR went up to 5.3, so I just took it easy until the next fill up, and sure enough, it went right back down.

Now that I'm running the first iteration of my stratified map, my KR has been below 0.8 so far. I know the tunes start out fairly conservative initially, but that is still pretty impressive, none the less. Kudos to Stan, @Lex; and everyone else at Stratified!

Within the past month or so I finally got around to upgrading my smoking K04 to a BNR s3. Prior to install we cleaned the intake valves and they were dirty as hell. Did the injector seals and all that jazz. Got it all back together and before I really started tuning I wanted to get a comp test since I have 87k miles on the car. Did the test and my numbers were pretty shit. 170,150,150,170. So I took it in for a Leakdown yesterday. His numbers were 160,150,135,160 with leaks coming from the intake valves. Said I need to have my head machines and reseat the valves. But after talking with some people here it's possible my valves are still dirty where they actually seat since you can only really clean when the valves are down. I'm just trying to figure out what to do exactly... On one hand is to start saving for rods and pistons and machine work. I have people here that will help me build, but the machine process and parts is $ I just don't have at the moment. That damn cylinder 3 is such a pain. Looking into what I can find about porting/machining the stock mani to try to avoid this issue in the future as well as meth. But that aquamist kit is looking pretty infeasible at the moment if I have to sell my first born to build this motor. But I guess the good news was it wasn't showing leak at the ringlands?

Edit: How can one safely clean intake valves while open to clean where they actually seat and from a seal?

Cylinder #3 being lower is quite consistent with what we've seen so far in these engines. The heat either indicates more wear in the rings on #2 and #3 or even leads to ring lands cracking for those two (usually starting with #3 ).

So I'd say, if the car runs good currently leave it as is and don't do any more work to it as you can invite more problems in the game. Save for pistons and rods and have the head cleaned up when you pull the engine for the rebuild.

70k on the clock mine tested out to be 180, 180, 178, 180. Funny enough it's #3 that's misfiring as well. Only problem is I can't remember if the 178 was on 2 or 3. Numbers are dry, didn't test wet.

Might have the valves cleaned at the dealer once I salve up some cash, no time to do it myself.

Now that I've finally got around to tearing the motor down after seeing 27% leakage past cylinder 3, I don't notice anything too dramatic. I was expecting a cracked ringland but it doesn't look to be the case (at least without a closer look).

Is that kind of leakage possible with just bad rings? Being my first go at a rebuild I'm not sure if there's anything I'd be able to see that would be a telltale sign for the bad compression.

Was the car running funny at all? It could just be a worn engine if you don't find anything suspect. Maybe check ring end gap if you feel like it, check if the cylinder is out of round.

Everything was running fine, I wouldn't have even known there was a problem if I didn't do a compression and leakdown test. I did start getting some knock at higher rpms shortly after, though it could be unrelated as I didn't see any knock prior to running the tests. I guess I just figured with the usual cylinder 3 issues I'd see something obvious.

Was it all leaking down through the crank case? Could injector seals have been a cause? Even at 30%, I probably wouldn't rebuild unless there were other problems. Did it burn oil?

Yeah there was a swift breeze coming from the oil cap haha. Injector seals looked fine but I'm replacing them regardless so we shall see. It didn't really burn oil, just needed topped off once between changes. As far as it really needing to be rebuilt I'm not sure, but it needed the timing components, valve cleaning, and downpipe so pulling the head was convenient enough with the extra pistons and rods I have.

Addin' to the madness finally.

Mods are in Sig.

Cyl 1: 180
Cyl 2: 170
Cyl 3: 180
Cyl 4: 185

Ran immediately after getting the vehicle up to temperature. I'm thinking about doing a leakdown.

Did another tonight after an oil change (and another warm up)
Got:
Cyl 1: 182
Cyl 2: 175/178 (2 tries)
Cyl 3: 182
Cyl 4: 185

I did a couple extra cranks on all of these this time. Interesting.

You are golden. How many miles on your engine?

There's about 40-45k on the engine build. 60k on the whole car.

Edit; I want your bumper, in and around my mouth. lol done jacked mine up on the track.

AND Also going to do a leakdown once I get it from @maisonvi; I'll report back.

Whaaaa??

You saying WHAAA to the length of the build or that I want to lick your non-jacked up bumper?

1 month ago:

1: 155 / 10%
2: 155 / 10%
3: 150 / 10%
4: 155 / 10%

Compression numbers are obviously low due to not engaging the gas pedal during startup. :facepalm:

Tested this morning. 60500 miles. Engine was completely cold.

1 - 181
2 - 180
3 - 180
4 - 180

Crazy, I've only driven 3000 miles in the last 5 months.

One update on mine - still getting oil consumption despite strong numbers. We're pretty sure it's worn oil control rings.

Stock motor at 145k miles. I retired it at 161.5k and it had seen 22psi from a 5858 from 124k to the day it was pulled out. (still ran great)http://i1298.photobucket.com/albums/...psdbnybyp4.jpg


Built motor at 3k miles
http://i1298.photobucket.com/albums/...psjpwzrnhv.jpg

Stock motor, simple bolt ons with hpfp internals and Catless dp. 75k currently on motor. Had dp and internals on car for about 5k miles. Did my compression test yesterday while car was still warm. Pulled necessary fuses and all Spark plugs. Held down Clutch and gas while cranking.

1 - 188
2 - 190
3 - 189
4 - 188

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Stock motor and turbo @ 95k. Hpfp internals, gutted cats, Cai and tip,


Dry: (130) (120) (110) (130)
Wet: (150) (150) (140) (140)

Leak down results
Cylinder 1 = 28%
Cylinder 2 = 33%
Cylinder 3 = 36%
Cylinder 4 = 32%

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Damn

Just did mine it april and had
1-180
2-180
3-180
4-180

Car has 77k with all bolt ons and meth

I'm sure the last guy that owned this car raped the shit out of it. It's all good though.... "We will rebuild".

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Is that motor leak or valve leak?

It was leaking into the crank case.

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2010 with 81k mods in sig. Stage 2 since 65k and bnr since 75k. First time testing.
Looks pretty consistent around 190 in every cylinder. Performed the test at operating temp.

Sitting at 46 k drivin hard highway miles. Tuned at 9k on e85.
196,197,200,200

http://images.tapatalk-cdn.com/16/01...e7097d6a8e.jpg
Did this today.
GTX2871, CPE TMIC, 3.5 intake, UR catless TBE, and EGR Delete. I'm switching to an S4 within the next month.


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With 157K miles

#1 = 180
#2 = 150
#3 = 125
#4 = 180

2010 speed3 stock at 85k km..
Dry
cyl 1 - 170
cyl 2 - 150
cyl 3 - 160
cy 4 - 190

wet
cyl 1 - 185
cyl 2 - 180
cyl 3 - 190
cy 4 - 190