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Broke my forged crank in half..... pics inside

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Old 04-11-2009, 05:40 PM
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Default Broke my forged crank in half..... pics inside

Dont really know what to say.... went from thinking i spun a main bearing to a holy F*** how did that happen situation. motor had about 25k miles on it. car has been sprayed a few times but not for months upon months before the engine let loose.


The engine is a Erik Koneigg 408 CI stroker. I purchased it from HPE a few years ago. Eagle crank, Eagle H beam rods, Wiseco -8CC pistons with a LQ9 iron block.

This is the second problem i have had with this crank. I went through 2 clutches before it was made aware to me that the eagle cranks had the problem leaking oil out of the rear of the crank snout. Now this....


I have to admit, what made the motor actually go was a spun bearing thanks to my wonderful pickup tube bolt coming out, but in my opinion, the crank should have NEVER failed like this. The car was shut down and not run again as soon as i could get it to a safe spot to pull over. it literally turned catastrophic the second the main bearing spun.



I will NEVER buy another eagle crank in my life. I am not even going to entertain the idea of them fixing the situation for me. This is flat out rediculous for a very mild setup that made just over 500 RWHP all motor. The car has never had more than a 200 shot through it and only a few times.



Eagle = FOR THE LOSS.




















Old 04-11-2009, 05:43 PM
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Damn, that sucks
Old 04-11-2009, 05:43 PM
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dam that sucks big one
Old 04-11-2009, 05:47 PM
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yea thats a shame, eagle has made great products in the past. idk what the deal with your whole crank situation was about..... sorry to hear about ur luck!
Old 04-11-2009, 05:52 PM
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****!
Old 04-11-2009, 06:50 PM
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The only times I've seen LSx cranks "just break on their own" up there was on Blowers on two Lunatis but never on an NA car so far. We have had another Eagle that had a crack up there and an old old Lunati that had major road race track time on it with a bad balancer that was all messed up.

Those cracks were found on freshens when magnafluxed so they didn't break but they could of otherwise. At the school on the circle track stuff we had it tested a lot and some cranks had to be junked or repaired on the reg old SBC 18 degree circle track stuff but they buzzed 8000 rpm forever.

The ATI balancers seem to be the best at protecting stuff but I can't say what happened here or what led up to this crank breaking 100%? It does look from the pictures like that journal ran out of oil and turned blue so it can and will definitely crack if that happens but again I can't see it in person right now.

90 percent of those deals we only built the shortblocks and others (HPE) put everything else on them. We always use loctite on the oil pump pickup bolt when we do them ourselves as we've seen that happen several times. Like you said it looks like it was sucking air from that bad pickup O-ring and missing bolt and that probably caused this.
Old 04-11-2009, 07:54 PM
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wow... crazy to see a forged crank do that!
Old 04-11-2009, 08:05 PM
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That last pic... was the o-ring broke before you pulled it? Have you pulled any main caps yet?

Russ
Old 04-11-2009, 08:15 PM
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ive never been a fan of eagle myself. but i guess there new stuf is supposed to be good. i dunno but i went with callies and i dont loss any sleep.
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Old 04-11-2009, 08:48 PM
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Originally Posted by Sammyboy
****!
Hahaha.. What this guy said!!
Old 04-11-2009, 08:49 PM
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What about Scat? Any good?
Old 04-12-2009, 10:09 AM
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the O ring was in the bottom of the pan with the bolt, the pickup tube had fallen off.



the only thing that i can think of is that the bearing went south long before i noticed anything was wrong.


I was driving home one night going up a big hill. decided to mash it, took it up to about 5k rpms and all of a sudden i hear pop and my engine RPM's plummet. throw it in 6th gear and limp it up the hill. (maybe a quarter mile) Finally find a safe pulloff and pull over, car shuts off. tow it home and havent touched it since. this was about 3 months ago.


only thing i can think of is that bearing let go ealier in the week and somehow, miraculously, the engine didnt knock and the rest of the bearings took the force and supported the crank. Then, that night, it finally got so hot that the crank split, and thats what finally created the horrible knocking.




hell if i know... all i know is forged cranks are not supposed to break. Since when is a forged 4340 steel crank weaker than a main bearing? how in the hell did the crank break before some of the other bearings let loose? so far i know my cam looks great, the lobes look perfect, its also sitting tight with no signs of play from any bearings. The rest of my crank is also solid, which makes me believe the rest of the bearings are still ok.



guess we will find out when i take it apart.
Old 04-12-2009, 09:55 PM
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update....



no spun bearings.... they are definately hammered but still intact.....



this crank broke with the bearings still intact....... does anybody else find this very odd????


ill get more pictures tomorrow.
Old 04-12-2009, 10:01 PM
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just curious, have you tried contacting Eagle and seeing what they had to say about it? If I were you I'd forward them the link to this thread at least...
Old 04-12-2009, 10:07 PM
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Man, I'm sorry to hear/see your problems. I'm glad you posted all of this information on here....cuz this just confirms my personal belief that eagle products are crap. I spent the big money on a Callies crank, and Oliver I-beams for the engine I'm currently building. For a while, I was kinda having "buyer's remorse" due to the fact that so many people seem to favor Eagle stuff...but after seeing all of this, I'm thinking it was cash well spent. I realize that there is a certain level of defects with ANY manufacturer, but the place that yours seems to have broken appears to be a ridiculous place to break. It should have just spun the hell out of the bearing, not broke the whole damn crank.

Again....sorry to hear about your engine, but thanks for posting here!
Old 04-12-2009, 10:16 PM
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Old 04-12-2009, 10:17 PM
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I don't know about Eagle. I've never used there products so i can't say first hand. BUT...a engine builder told me that he does not recommend using Eagle cranks because he says their quality is not as good as the others. He always told me, just spend a few hundred more and get a better crank. It's cheap insurance. Now i know what he was talking about.
Old 04-12-2009, 10:32 PM
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ok, your going up a hill(heavy load on engine) at 5,ooo rpms,,, here a pop,(probably no oil pressure at this time) then continue to drive up the hill most likely without oil pressure.... and your pissed off at the crank???? a heavy load on the engine and no oil caused extream heat that basically welded the bearing to the crank or at least took all clearence out of it and the heavy load on the engine from the drivetrain snapped the crank. no need to be pissed at anything except that oil tube bolt.....
Old 04-12-2009, 10:43 PM
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Originally Posted by LostCauseZ06
update....



no spun bearings.... they are definately hammered but still intact.....



this crank broke with the bearings still intact....... does anybody else find this very odd????


ill get more pictures tomorrow.
So your block is still good then maybe? That would be good at least!

Number one rod looks dark blue from heat in these pictures which is from lack of oil. As long as only a rod spun or burned up then at least the block is possibly still good.

If the crank just broke on it's own and you didn't also have the oil pump o-ring gone bad and also have the pickup come off I might think it was odd but not when that same number one journal is the last to get oil and you can see a blue rod on it as well.

Eagle cranks are certainly not the very best for sure but still never saw any just crack or break on their own. If I thought that way then I have seen two cracked Lunati's but they are very good cranks and these both had extenuating circumstances as well.

I sent a Winberg 2800.00 crank in to Mile High Cranks for inspection and it had 4 cracks in it from an oil starvation and thrust issue when brought to us. They said junk it or it will split. It was only somewhat discolored from heat but it was already junk as well and it only had two passes on it!
Old 04-12-2009, 10:55 PM
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I hate that for you man,and I agree. I wouldn't put an eagle crank in my weedeater. Who is to say what is really at fault, but I know I've culled their products before. I had a crank on a buildup I did for a guy that had .001" RUNOUT on one of the main journals. I told him to ship it back and cuss them. Their crap along with scat should all be shipped back to China and melted back down to make garden tools out of.


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