some of you may remember I posted several threads here about oil leak. After taking suggestions here and doing the test, it's narrowed down to some internal leak.
Today I took the car to a mechanic, he did the following:
put trans in P and step on gas until rpm hit 4k, and then release gas immediately, I can see black smoke jet out when the rpm reached 4k and dropped down. The mechanic told me that the pistons were worn out and oil leak from there into the firebox and that caused the black smoke.
Even sadly, he said there is no cheap way to fix it, i'd better off to replace the engine if I want to pass the emission test. man, that will cost $3200 !!!!

Do I have to replace the engine? is there a cheaper way to do it? I heard of engine swap, what is that? any input is greatly appreciated!

 

replacing the engine is the same as an engine swap bud. either way it sucks. save $2800 and do it yourself. just my $.02.

 

omg, replacing engine by myself, that's mission impossible!

 

your one funny guy,lol, but go get a used engine for around $300 and have it put in for another $300 so in total $600 and you have a working engine

by the way where was the black smoke coming from and how many miles on your engine?

 

Between this and your CV boots, lack of tools, garage and mechanical ability maybe it's time to find another car or alot of friends with mechanical knowledge.

Also, did the mechanic do a compression test or tell you that the black smoke was a sure sign your rings are bad? Black smoke is an indication of running rich not burning oil which would be blue smoke.

 

Agreed. Pony up the cash and get it fixed or use said cash to buy tools and parts to do it yourself.

 

Another reason (IMHO) to do regular oil changes and use synthetic oil. Unless this engine already had a zillion miles on it when it started burning oil.

 

i have no mechanical ability either, and i'll tell you that any engine for 300.00 is going to be crap unless you get lucky. i know where to find decent engine's starting at 650.00 and up. and a swap and no 2 cent job either. 500.00 and up for that as well, i've been quoted 1,300.00 for a swap and i thought that was cheap!!! they've gotta swap any usable parts onto the new block, and make sure it seats into the tranny at a certain degree, it aint easy. the gear heads in here make it sound like anybody should be able to do it, not everybody has tools, a garage, and time to work on their rides, i know i dont!!!! get help from a friend, or look into a garage that does engine swaps, tranny;s etc, also, how many miles are on the max??? i have 194,000 and my maxy rides pretty damn good!!!

 

black smoke is fuel related, not oil. Blue smoke is engine oil, I would know.
So much for it being diagnosed....

 

I agree with Dave, take it somewhere else, he doesnt seem to know what he's doing. its got 120k miles from what I remember. That's like...barely breaking in, should be breaking down yet. Go to a reputable shop or try to contact a member on here who lives in your same state and knows about cars.

 

You need to do a compression test on this engine before you go do anything drastic like pay $3200 (wayy too much btw) to replace the engine.

Compression tester will cost you $25, and it will take you like half an hour as a first timer. Read the million writeups on the .org or google on how to run a compression test, it's easy.

If you really can't do this yourself, post in the regional forums to find a max owner willing to help you, you live in a large metro area I see, there should be a million of them on here that are willing to help you out.

$3200 to replace the engine in a car that may not even be worth that much would be obviously a stupid thing to pay, but that's an extremely high estimate. As stated you can get an engine from $300-500 all day long, and the swap can be done in like 12 hours or less by someone with good mechanical knowledge and tools. Buy an engine for $400 and pay a .org member a few hundred to spend a day swapping your engine and be done with it. Don't pay that ridiculous amount that you were quoted.

 

Wait, you didnt know an engine swap and replacing the engine are the same thing?

oh boy...

 

The black smoke comes from the emission tip, when RPM hit 4K and release the gas, you see the black smoke and water drops jet out from the emission tip, with bad smell. my car has 120k.

how come it can be $300 +$300? Please let me know how. the cheapest price I got is: a remanufactured engine costs at least $1200, and labor fee is around $800. The used engine? where can I get a good used engine with a good price?

 

The reason I don't want to drop off the car is that, other parts of the car is good and looks good, as for CV boots, I can have it replaced for $300, not too bad. It also has Bose system, quite comfortable.

The mechanic didn't do a pressure test, he said if the oil leak from the valve, it's blue smoke, if leak to combustion room, it's black. And the smoke dosen't smell like gas, it stinks.

 

you get an engine from the junkyard.... for the last time you don't need a rebuilt engine unless you are just looking to waste money.

 

Blanket statements like that just lead to misinformation.

First of all, chances are that 99% of the VQs you find are going to be in decent running condition.

Second, price doesn't mean a damn thing to determine the value of an engine. I can get them for $100 around here, any make/model/year/whatever. Does that mean that they are all 'crap'?

 

I did ask a mechanics here about finding a good engine from junk yard, they said if junk yard doesn't guarantee if it can work.

 

thanks for these advices. I'll do some research on compression test. as I remember, this test costs around $180 at dealers and some AAA approved repair shop for $130. I'll do it by myself when I get time


You guys are talking about $400 good engine, but where can I find them? I did some search, only ebay has some engines around $600-1000.

 

Have you not looked at http://car-part.com/ ?

Or looked at local yards?

What do you mean 'they said if junk yard doesn't guarantee if it can work'?

 

just looked at car-part.com, just found 2, one is $1000 the other is $950, in GA.

are the Local yards junk yards? but junk yard doesn't guarantee it can work. Sorry for the mistake in my previous reply.

by the way, what's the difference between the engine type (3.0L, VIN C, 4th digit), exc. Calif and (3.0L, VIN C, 4th digit), Calif ? thanks

 

The difference is that one is Cali spec, the other is Fed/Canada spec.

You only found 2 engines? I just searched with over 90 pages of results Most yards will ship (especially if they're on car-part), so you don't have to limit yourself to a local place.

You don't need to get the exact same year/trim/emissions spec/trans engine, you can swap over everything you need from your old one.

So you're saying not a single junkyard in your area has any sort of warranty available for engines? Have you actually checked with them, or are you going by what your shop said?

Most will do some sort of limited warranty by default (30 days, something like that), though at many places you can purchase a warranty separately.

 

Yeah check car-part.com they should have some pretty cheap. I bought my engine for a 2002 max for $500 and it runs fine.

 

thanks for the answers, so exc. Calif is the one I should look for my Infiniti I30?

Thanks for reminding, I found many pages of results from car-part.com. It seems to be a good website. I called 2 of them, they have 30 days warranty, (doesn't cover labor). thanks

I think I misunderstood the mechanics's words about warranty. I think they mean warranty that covers labor, for instance, if you get a bad engine, they will replace another one, but they don't cover the labor cost you paid to mechanics.

So it doens't sound horrible even the engine is going to go away. Spending $1500 to get a good engine makes sense to me. better than buy another car.

 

Depends on what your emissions spec is, check the stickies. The engines are identical internally, but you'll probably be charged more if they have to swap over a bunch of stuff to match your current configuration.

 

Some (may be 85%) of mechanics are god damn stupid

 

+1, apparently "the maxima comes with a SOHC variant, as denoted by the black valve cover, the red valve cover on a 4th gen means it's DOHC"

I tried to enlighten him, but he just laughed at me like I was some confused teenager....

My car will never grace his driveway again.

 

I got 95 Maxima and the engine died just a few days ago. I am in Seattle area. I think I can find pretty good engines at local yard. Can anyone recommend a technician/shop in Seattle area who can do the engine swap at a good price?

Thanks!
Mike

 

You need to check in your regional section, not here.