Caterham R500 - engine rebuilds??
Discussion
I recently popped into Caterham to test drive a second hand Superlight R. The sales guy was trying to persuade me to go the whole hog and get an R500. It seemed like a great idea unti he mentioned engine rebuilds. He seemed to think that an engine rebuild every 5000 miles was about par for the course. Any PH'ers with experience of this as it might influence my purchase...!
No direct experience, but that is my understanding as well. Try www.blatchat.com for an informed bunch of owners.
Stick with the Superlight R/R400
: almost the same performance but should be less hassle on the maintenance front. If you're going to use it a lot on the track make sure you get a dry sumped one.
Stick with the Superlight R/R400
: almost the same performance but should be less hassle on the maintenance front. If you're going to use it a lot on the track make sure you get a dry sumped one. 
only r500 ive seen at a track day was 6 sec per lap faster than my locost round oulton park.then it threw a rod and went home on a tow truck,i finished my trackday and drove home.
you can buy 6 of my car for the cost of 1 r500.
the new engine was going to cost about 2 to 3 locosts.
lot of money to piss away.
it was bloody quick though
you can buy 6 of my car for the cost of 1 r500.
the new engine was going to cost about 2 to 3 locosts.
lot of money to piss away.
it was bloody quick though
All R500's are dry sumped and newer ones may have an additional anti-cav. tank for a full belt and braces approach.
www.blatchat.com is a good source of info but be warned there are a few people out there who have heard one scare story and repeat ad infinitum. Very few R500's have actually expired and of those that have a significant number were due to owner error (ie missing 5th to 3rd change and getting 1st).
If you join the owners club you can get the magazine LOw FLying (edited by Roger Green from evo). THis month they have a story on a maintenance re-build of an R500 done by the club chairman.
www.blatchat.com is a good source of info but be warned there are a few people out there who have heard one scare story and repeat ad infinitum. Very few R500's have actually expired and of those that have a significant number were due to owner error (ie missing 5th to 3rd change and getting 1st).
If you join the owners club you can get the magazine LOw FLying (edited by Roger Green from evo). THis month they have a story on a maintenance re-build of an R500 done by the club chairman.
[quote]only r500 ive seen at a track day was 6 sec per lap faster than my locost round oulton park.then it threw a rod and went home on a tow truck,i finished my trackday and drove home. [/quote]
If this was an orange one then I know the car you mean. This one had just had a rebuild and, due to an error in re-assembly, had a catastophic failure putting three holes through the block and taking the head with it. After analysing the ecu (was not being overreved) Caterham took the engine back, checked it out and replaced it FOC. Very good of them I thought.
However it is still a HOOGE amount of money to have tied up in an engine (I supose that's relative to your disposable income). They're in the order of £12k to replace and as such the guy in question was a little paranoid about it when he got it back. Saying that I was after I had mine rebuilt after a big end failure and that only cost a couple of grand to re build...
Saying that I've also seen a SLR die due to oil starvation and an SL go though 3 heads before the whole engine was finally swapped... Basically they're all nails. I can't think of a single type of engine that is commonly fitted to a Caterfield that I haven't seen pop at a trackday. Zetec, Cosworth, Vauxhall, X-Flow, K-Series, all manner of BEC's (particulaly Blackbirds), etc. All gone pop. So you can't really say that one type of engine is really going to outlast another as they are all dependent on so many other factors.
All you can do is make sure that your oil system is up to the job and that it's all put together properly. Or use a cheap engine so if the worst happens, it wont cost you much to get going again.
Oh and timing at a trackday; *slaps wrist* tut, tut!
If this was an orange one then I know the car you mean. This one had just had a rebuild and, due to an error in re-assembly, had a catastophic failure putting three holes through the block and taking the head with it. After analysing the ecu (was not being overreved) Caterham took the engine back, checked it out and replaced it FOC. Very good of them I thought.
However it is still a HOOGE amount of money to have tied up in an engine (I supose that's relative to your disposable income). They're in the order of £12k to replace and as such the guy in question was a little paranoid about it when he got it back. Saying that I was after I had mine rebuilt after a big end failure and that only cost a couple of grand to re build...
Saying that I've also seen a SLR die due to oil starvation and an SL go though 3 heads before the whole engine was finally swapped... Basically they're all nails. I can't think of a single type of engine that is commonly fitted to a Caterfield that I haven't seen pop at a trackday. Zetec, Cosworth, Vauxhall, X-Flow, K-Series, all manner of BEC's (particulaly Blackbirds), etc. All gone pop. So you can't really say that one type of engine is really going to outlast another as they are all dependent on so many other factors.
All you can do is make sure that your oil system is up to the job and that it's all put together properly. Or use a cheap engine so if the worst happens, it wont cost you much to get going again.
Oh and timing at a trackday; *slaps wrist* tut, tut!
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