I need some help from you guys as I am posting for a friend with a 2005 completely stock STi. Yes, I have already posted on IWSTI. The story: He didn't change his engine oil for 8,000 miles and drove it like he stole it and his motor blew. Motor blew as in there's a hole in the block now. Maybe he ran so low on oil the engine seized and threw a rod? I'm trying to fix it for him but need to know generally what parts fail if you don't change the oil. I'm getting all kinds of quotes from different shops and dealerships and they all seem shady. All of them quote be something cheap and then jack up the price substantially when I ask them if they would like to buy the car off of my friend. I had one guy quote me 10K to install a used short block...
To my understanding if you don't change the oil, all of the moving parts fail due to friction since oil will lose its lubrication properties AND after 8K i'm sure he burned off some oil below the min. amount needed to run properly. Thanks for your time.

 

8k miles isn't really that grueling for modern oils. Unless he ran it low on oil I'd look elsewhere such as a poor tune, excessive knock, etc. Subaru engines/ECUs don't deal with knock as well as ours do, especially once the car is modded.

 

length of change wasnt his problem as mentioned above.
8k miles isnt all that bad. I been driving my daily's on like 15k-20k oil changes cuz I forget and beat the living **** out of them.
i would never do this to my modded cars, but i spend all my attention on them, i neglect my daily's

 

I forgot to mention his car is completely stock.

 

tear it down and check. regardless of whatever failed you should replace all bearings and such due to lack of lubrication and scoring to parts.

 

What kind of oil? Subaru boxer engines generally do not seem to agree with Mobil 1 and have fairly regular rod bearing failures. Also, what kind of gas was he using? Subaru requires 93 octane.

 

1. change the oil on time, no matter if YOU can drive it for 15k without oil change.
2. dont drive it like you stole it ALL THE TIME, bc no matter what these are 4 bangers and they will break, promise.

no matter what, i hope he's got some cash saved up for this mistake

 

cyl amount makes zero difference in the matter.

 

If the heads are in good condition still, you can reuse them. Just have them checked out and cleaned up by a machine shop.

You can buy a brand new short block from the dealership for ~$1700. Then buy an engine rebuild kit for ~$350. Timing belt and tensioner are ~$300 I think. If it spun the bearings, you will want to get a new oil cooler too. I forget what these cost. If you can do the work yourself, he can be back up and running for less than $3000. Just make sure to clean, clean, clean....and then clean everything again.

I've built more than my fair share of Subaru engines, so PM me if you have any questions.

 

in regards to the suby motor vs. oil, I know they had a problem with oil deprivation. Idk exactly what caused the issue but i know a few pp; who popped thier motors due to a very similar issue. Look into it more on the Suby boards. If I can get any better info I'll PM you

 

As a former Subaru perfromance shop tech, I've seen this happen a few times. It's very important to check the oil level on any EJ motor. When you beat on them hard they tend to use oil. 8000 miles is way to long to not check your oil on a Subaru.

I have yet to see an undamaged head when a rod let go, so depending on how bad it is, he might need a new head or have his repaired. If there are chunks of the head missing you're going to want to check the turbo for damage as well.

10k for a used block installed is retarded.

I would be very careful buying a used engine as well. You really need to see compression test numbers to have any idea if the engine is good, or if it's missing chunks of #4 ring land like they love to do.