Two S2000's were at the Car Guys track event at VIR this weekend, as was future S2000 owner Sexton. My S2000 ran great all weekend, but Brian's had lots of blue smoke coming out of the tail pipe at one section. The section of track was the infamous Roller Coaster at VIR. (see www.virclub.com )

It's a series of corners most reminiscent of the corkscrew at Laguna Seca. The car is rolled left and right and left through esses on the approach, then hard on the brakes, hard right and dive DOWN under acceleration while turning, dive down and turn and down more.

It was during this dive down the hill that the huge blue oil clouds appeared out the tailpipe, enough to generate black flags for Brian's car in most sessions.

At first we thought the car had been overfilled with oil, but my car had more oil and had no problems. Then it was suggested that the valve guide seals had gone.

I don't think you'd ever get the Honda techs to reproduce the problem though, because turns like that are not found on your everyday streets.

[This message has been edited by Mikey (edited October 31, 2000).]

 

Hard gees with deceleration seems to do it.. see at least one S2K do it at the track every event. At the last event I attended I tried to explain to the course marshal that it is not a problem, but he black flagged the guy anyway. I think someone here posted a small mod that can eliminate the problem, but I didn't retain it since I have not had the problem.

 

This is caused by oil being splashed up and being sucked into the PCV valve and then into the intake manifold where it is burned and produces the blue smoke. The PCV valve is attached to the rubber hose that is in the middle of the valve cover. The other end of the rubber hose goes into the intake manifold. The hose at the front of the valve cover is also part of the system.

Here is a home-made oil-recovery system that was on a Japanese S2000 club site. It consists of two replacement hoses that join in a 'Y' and then go to a can which is located in front of the left strut:


Several autocrossers here in San Diego have experienced this problem. It is usually seen with very hard braking at the end of a straight before a hairpin turn.

 

So I guess there's nothing for Honda to fix, it's just a design flaw.

Though I have to say, I would be pissed if I had the problem on my car.

 

I suspect the problem you mention is due to overfilling the car with oil.

Now, as for that catch can system you pictured, DO NOT SET UP A CATCH CAN LIKE THAT!!!!! It is very important for proper crankcase ventilation to allow flow into the valve cover via the vent at the front and out from the middle via the pcv system (which vents the crank). This is a delicate in/out system where you need to have proper vacuum pressure and slash cuts to make everything work as planned. Otherwise, you do not get proper crankcase ventilation nor valve cover ventilation for that matter. This CAN LEAD TO YOU BLOWING YOUR MOTOR! Ok, if you want to set up a catch can - you will want a baffled oil catch can (I suggest Moroso part number 85470). If you use the moroso can, you will also need a FORD (NOT Honda) PCV valve and grommet to fit into the top of the can. DO NOT VENT IT TO THE ATMOSPHERE! Not only is this illegal, it will not work properly. You run the PCV line from the middle of the head into the side of the catch can. Then you run a line from the pcv valve at the top of the catch can back into the intake manifold. You can try and find a piece to replace either the stock pcv valve or the ford pcv valve so that you only have one PCV valve in the system. It will still work fine with two valves (that's how I had it), but for better performance, you want less resistance (also, try to keep the lines to and from the catch can as short as possible). What this will do is catch the oil vapors that go from the pcv into the intake manifold and clean up the intake charge a little. It's really not necessary unless you're running boost. I had this setup on my car for about 4000 miles and only collected a couple tablespoons of oil.

DO NOT use a little K&N filter on the valve cover! This will not allow the system to work properly. Not only that, it does nothing to clean up the intake as the line from the intake tube to the front of the valve cover flows INTO the valve cover, not out from it.

If you need more information, email me. Anyway, this is not where the problem was with the cars you saw on the track. I strongly believe those cars were overfilled with oil and as it sloshed around under harsh conditions, it spilled onto areas where it was allowed into the engine to burn off.

 

Ahh, now I see another way these cars can "burn" oil besides leaking around piston rings. I noticed in the pictures someone had of their engine being taken apart to fix the porous block that the intake side seemed sort of sooty; perhaps this was from oil/cc ventilation. My intake also was a little dirty which I noticed when I pulled the throttle body to get the rebore done. Soot may be from piston blowby &/or oil.

 

Could be, there were a number of us that braked as hard and pushed as hard through the same turn without smoking. But maybe it just takes the right timing to get all the oil forward and then cut hard to the right.

 

Motor magazine (in Australia) did a roadster shootout (roadster a trois) between the S, Z3, and MX-5 (our name for Miata) in the November 1999 issue.

After some spirited mountain road driving they reported the same plumes of smoke.

Didn't stop them ranking the S first in the line-up (no surprise to us!). The real surprise was that they ranked the MX-5 second and the Z3 last (what, but it's got a BMW badge on it!).

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by The Reverend:
[B]I suspect the problem you mention is due to overfilling the car with oil.
...
Anyway, this is not where the problem was with the cars you saw on the track.

 

Mikey:

Whether it is a design flaw or not, the problem should be addressed and fixed by Honda --- especially since all their S2000 literature promotes "spirited" driving, including heavy braking, cornering, and acceleration.

We need a simple way to reproduce the problem for Honda.

Has anyone reported this problem to Honda????

This problem is clearly a malfunction or improper operation of the emission control system.

I climbed up to Roller Coaster and watched Brian's car coming round and it did _not_ emit the blue smoke every time, just under some combinations of braking and cornering.

It would have been useful to repeat his runs but with less aggressive driving at the entry to Roller Coaster to see if the problem would disappear.

Anyway, I had a good time at VIR!

See you next time at VIR or maybe Summit Point.

I am counting the minutes before my car arrives!!!!