i gotta ask, how much are you looking at all said and done??? any ideas

I'm betting on the pre-ignition event trying to spin the assembly backwards, I didn't have any knock and I blew at super low boost (1 or 2 psi) - but I'm a noob so what do I know ? just my edjewcaded guess

wow man, you and I are in the same boat , only DCR is building my motor. I'm trying to control $$$ and it is not easy.
What are you doin for clutch and flywheel ? You stayin stock turbo ?

FYI...my balance shaft was in the motor when it blew

Ok, so with my my new motor getting it's forge on..... and my stock turbo exhibiting QUITE a bit of shaft end play, I must decide on a new turbo. Originally I was thinking an SST..... but now i'm thinking GT3071R. Seems like that would still be an acceptable spooling, daily driver type turbo. Any thoughts from anyone that's gone down this road?

If your going BT get the 3076 or 3582, anything smaller and your going to want to upgrade again later..

Well, I finally stopped dragging my ass, and dropped the motor out of the car. Now to tear it apart. Took some shots of the lovely holes.

I Have to say I love the way you framed the pictures man.......the flying M through the hole was a touch of genius..........LMAO

That last pic is pure art!

Quote from Real Genius "There's a complete hole."

holy shit dude....it looks like someone put a grenade under your engine with those big holes...One thing for sure your gonna have a great engine when you are done...as well as great rims....my son could not stand the stockers anymore so we picked up another set of a "cheaper" brand...and what a difference in quality...the look nice but build wise on a totally different level......good luck bro....

Call me, we can tell you all about our motors. There are reasons people are burning up the forged units from company x and brand x. DI motors require different clearances that cost us $3500 to figure out self:owned:. We now have it figured out and have 2 motors getting built now, and another 3 sitting right behind those. I will have a ton of pictures up for you guys when we finally release them.

Sooooo I tore her apart tonight. And well.... it was messy. The oil pump chain drive unit tried to eat a piece of the block.. that was the first thing I noticed... then when I popped the head off, number one piston just didn't look right for some reason ;) It had a slight ... misalignment to it.

Does it look like the rod letting go tore apart the bore enough for the piston to fall into that position or that the piston seized causing the rod to snap?

It's late.... I didn't get a chance to pop the oil pan off yet, I'll take a look at the condition of the cylinder once I do that, and get back to you.

Also if you want to part with the broken rod pieces and/or piston I would gladly pay shipping to have you send them my way. PM me and let me know.

Looks like part of the ring on top of the piston, but i'm not sure if there's any signs of detonation.

Send your parts to lex, he's got quite the collection going.

subbing ...

engine went boom leaving the dealer too ...

my condolences....

any mods or tune on that sucker??

Dropped the oil pan, and removed number 1 piston from the cylinder.

One thing I'm wondering is how the metal particles got into the other three cylinders. It would have had to travel back through the number 1 intake runner... then back into the other 3 cylinders, which I guess is possible. Just seemed strange.

Wondering if anyone else found this with their similarly blown engines.

Those are great pictures! Is it possible for you to get a head on shot of the fracture on the rod with full focus on that and the oil wiped from the fracture point? It looks like it was a brittle break from what I can see in these pics.

And honestly - this looks like the piston literally seized in the bore and the rod twisted and snapped. There are no detonation marks on the piston from what I can see. Are there seize marks in the bore itself? (A picture would be great).

I am starting to think more and more that the strength of the stock rods has nothing to do with these blow-ups.

Please consider my offer to ship the above piece my way - I can pay for your troubles.

I also very much appreciate the documentation you're doing. Thank you!

carnage...pure carnage. I didn't realize the block was stamped FoMoCo....

well on the engine only intake, bpv, and motor mounts ... which is kind of sad.

only 27k on odo. I think a rod bent a few weeks before it exploded. Car hesitated and stuttered on part throttle in boost in 4th and threw a random misfire code, after that had a vibration in the pedal and slight knocking noise. But the knocking noise didn't sound like other engine knock i heard. Took it to the dealer and they diagnosed it as a clutch noise or bearing and wanted to charge me $720 for a tear down. They were just trying to get me to go away because i was bugging them to check out my engine. They kept saying that mazda will deny and i will have to pay full price for the tear down. One of the techs was even like "im positive that it is a clutch issue". A few weeks later (didn't drive much between the time) i went back to the dealer to get the trunk switch replaced and only going a few blocks .. boom. Week later mazda deny.

key words, part throttle in boost lol

Ok, took some more pics for Lex. And yeah, I have to agree that from what I can tell... I think the piston cracked/ broke the skirt off... got cock eyed in the cylinder... stuck, caused the rod to elongate and snap. That's my basic CSI break down

mmmmm.... Plastic deformation...

That clicking noise/vibrating in the clutch pedal has been seen many times, thought the concensus was that it was a rod on it's way out, most likely already a bit deformed from that event in 4th.

Thanks again for the great pics.

Around the injector/injector seal of cylinder #1, do you see any weird marks? Like residue from fuel leaking?

There are a lot of dark scuff marks on the wall of the cylinder. Do any of the other cylinders have these scuff marks?

Are there any signs of detonation or pitting on the piston itself?

Were there any signs the car was not running right before this happened? Noises, harder to start, less responsive, knock, smoke, anything?

The rod did not break in one shot. It at first bent and deformed and eventually broke. Look at the centre of the break and you see a jagged brittle fracture. Near the outside edges you see a smooth fracture (ductile) which is due to prolonged or repetitive strain.

The gauging you see in the bore (above where the bottom section of the rod broke through) are due to the wrist pin coming loose once the piston cracked and embedding itself into the bore (several times)

This is not a weak rod issue folks.

We are left with a couple of questions:
1. Did the piston crack before or after it seized? (I am going to assume it was after)
2. Why did the piston seize?
- It could seize due to hydrolock or due to a mechanical issue. Hydrolock can only be fuel or oil.
- The large amount of scuffing on the cylinder wall indicates the piston was not happy in its bore for some time.

Was it poor oiling? Oil being washed off because an injector was stuck open? Was it overheating and piston expansion/clearances. Was it a retaining clip for the wrist pin letting go?

jesus that looks gory.

I think he should send that one to Mazda Corporate Headquarters. :)

I completely agree with Lex. DCR says the rods are good for 500+ HP. People think that because a rod broke the rods are weak, the rod broke because of some other anomaly that caused either a) lot more force on it (detonation) or b) force that was off-axis (this was the case here). Thanks for the great pics.......

Ok, so took a pic of the top of the piston.... which besides the cracks... is in great shape, no signs of detonation (the weirdness to the north west is carbon build up, that scratches off with my fingernail)

On another note, my car started smoking like a bastard maybe 4 days before she blew (it had never smoked before this, and i'm talking blue oil smoke) It did it the first time, while idling at a red light, pointing down hill.... and this corresponded with others tales of pcv fuckery. So I just figured it was that.... and the day it blew I was picking up the components for an OCC :(

Another thing, when I removed my intake manifold, the bottom was full of oil.... to the level where it was coming out the TB. (this could have been thrown there after the explosion... or maybe it came through via the PCV connection.

I have to go eat, I'll post more later

Oh, yeah, and I had just logged that my Fuel pressure was dwindling under WOT... a couple of nights before this event. I saw dips as low as 1300 psi. I was going to order internals the night it blew up...... fuck... I was going to do alot that day.

its awesome to see such detailed pictures of the feared carnage. thanks for the pictures man, but im sorry for your loss. on the bright side, the car will be stronger than ever when its all done. and most importantly this information may be utilized in the future to help the community out to make all of our cars stronger.

Also sorry for your loss!
Is there any chance you could get some pics of the bearings? Expecially for that cyl?
As Lex posted, it really looks like the rod bent well before your engine popped.
Also, is the oil in the intake look fresh? IE: or are there stains from oil being there for a while. Can you check the PCV inlet and EGR inlet for any unusual signs.
Your piston top looked dry so I'm guessing it wasnt hydrolock.

Great info.

Can you get pics of the other 3 bores? Also pictures of the remaining sideskirt (the coated side) of the blown piston? Just want to see if the wear in #1 is more pronounced

I am not sure if your oil burning/smoking was a cause or a result of the blow-up.

Were the other bores full of oil or just #1 and the intake manifold?

Also, just for shits, pull off the PCV valve and check if it closes/opens as it should or if it's stuck closed/open.

- Number 1 cylinder and the intake manifold were the only things full of oil, 2,3,4 were dry, with some metal particles on the pistons.

- I'll check the PCV tomorrow night.

- Here's the best pic I have of the 4 cylinders

Hmm, reason I wanted to see a pic of the bearing was to check for crank walk. At least there I see no signs. If you see any of the other bearings with weird signs please let us know.

I also want to thank you for all the pics and as said earlyier, hopefully someone will figure this problem out!

are the oiling holes in the messed up piston clear or plugged up ?

How was the exhaust manifold? Full of oil? Or was it just the intake manny?

See all the chunks from cyl 1 that flew all around and ended up in all other cylinders? If there was enough oil from the explosion to fill up the intake manny, it would have also ended up in all the other cylinders just like the debris did.

The oil was probably there prior to the blowup.

Ok, took some pics of the combustion chambers. I also noticed that I think injector 3 had a bad seal, see pic below.

PCV valve is functioning properly.

Looks like you may be able to save the head.

Was there oil in the exh manny? How do the intake ports look? Are they dry except #1?

Thanks again for all the pics.

Exhaust manifold is free of oil (i'm thinking it would have burned off pretty quickly...) But there are metal particles in the collector of the exhaust manifold.

The intake ports on the intake manifold actually look fairly clean. If anything, intake 3 looks the nastiest. However there are many metal chunks laying in the intake manifold, just behind the throttle body.