Chilled111

To be honest I don`t really know what happened this morning as I was accelerating hard from a standing position and had my eyes firmly on the road (for obvious reasons) but it felt like the car jumped out of third gear on its own or as I was changing up from second to third. Lots of over revving then happened felt like the accelerator pedal was stuck as the car was revving even though by then I had taken my foot off of the pedal? There were other cars around me so I was ensuring that I wasn`t ruining their day (the road had a 60 mph limit)so didn`t want to cause an accident, as by now I had reduced speed to about 20 mph. Becuase of all this going on I never had a chance to see what the rev counter was doing but didn`t feel like I had hit the limit to be honest, as was changing gear at approx 5,000 rpm I think?? Was a slight smell of buring afterwards but not major. Also drove the car home from work tonight (approx 20 miles) and no problems. Any idea what this could be, or was it simply user error i.e. my fault although again don`t really know what I did unless I didn`t engage the gear correctly in my haste of changing up????? Any thoughts welcome please. Mark

lower

You won't have damaged the engine even if you'd nailed the accelerator in neutral as the ecu won't allow it to overrev.

You can only really over rev by changing into the wrong gear on a downshift when the drivetrain forces the engine to over rev.

Dembo

Sounds like you may have just missed third. If you do that changing up, and go hard on the power it's going to bounce off the limiter and take a second or so for the revs to die down once you react, so may seem like it's revving by itself. The noise and sudden lack of acceleration tend to be a bit startling - I've done this a few times at The Ring.

I hope you didn't misshift into 1st instead of 3rd, but I'm not sure you can.

If it really was revving by itself a few seconds after you'd taken your foot off the pedal, then your throttle is sticking.

Chilled111

Thanks both for your replies. I was definitely changing up and sure I didn`t go into 1st instead of 3rd. Thank you for putting my mind at rest re engine damage, I had visions of a big bill in my head after it happened!!

I am hoping it is just user error and it popping out of gear rather than anything more sinister. Quick question how can you check for a sticking throttle just to be on the safe side given the rapid speed a S2000 can reach quickly???!!!! Mark

richmc

Realy sounds like you went down instead of up, I've done 3 to 2 instead of 4, and was exactly as you describe, right down to the clutch burn, no harm done. And you can convince yourself you didn't do it as you are worrying more about the revs.

GavB

I’d say couple of options depending on what you felt:

If accompanied by sudden deceleration from engine breaking and high revs then you could have shifted to 1st. If this had happened you’d probably have known about it. Good news is that if you were only at 5000rpm in second then you will not have over-revved in 1st.

Other option is that if you got on full throttle to early when changing to 3rd and the clutch slipped, this will cause revving to the limiter until you back off the throttle. Vehicle speed tends to stay the same with no sudden deceleration.

Second option doesn’t explain why the revs would stay high after taking your foot of the throttle, so depends how sure you are this happened. The clutch slip thing when changing gear can be unnerving if you have not felt it before.

Nick Graves

Flywheel momentum @ WOT will carry the RPM well past the red, even if the fuel cuts off @ the limiter.

Don't do it again; it exacerbates metal fatigue on the valvestems & eventually one of your heads will fall off when you least expect it. The result can be impressive.

Chilled111

Thanks all for your help, support and guidance. I never cease to be amazed at how friendley and helpful everybody is on here.

From reading everybodys comments it feels like it was a clutch slip that took place and yes it was fairly unnerving at the time!! Havent driven to work today as out for a few sunshine beers shortly but am hoping no long term damage done and Nick I have no plans to make a habit of it!!! I take it that impressive means expensive or new engine?

Thanks again all.

Mark

MAC57

Just to put your mind even further at ease.

First day I got my S , showing off, with my son in the car , was changing from 2nd to 3rd max revs, hit 1st in error, back wheels started to lock up, just managed to catch it before I fully engaged the clutch, god knows what the engine revved up to. That was 10000 miles ago. Cars fine, well at least I hope it is????

Nick Graves

Well, I was waiting to overtake when it went 'tinkle', lost power & a conrod exited stage right. Big Bang, loads of black smoke, took out a droplink too.

I'd hit the rev limiter on trackdays/overtakes a bit, well quite a lot, but never seriously mis-shifted (5th to 2nd is I believe popular in EP3 circles) AFAIK. Quite a few people have had valve heads drop off unexpectedly, due to fatigue. Probably over-enthusistic driving.

On NSXs, hitting the rev limiter causes the oil pump rotor to crack, due to metal fatigue. And that can be hideously expensive at 8,000.

So the right Rev. Limiter is best avoided. I don't care for his sermons.