onnetz

What are some good ways to check the compression?
and what are signs to look for to tell if an engine is on its last leg?

thanks..

SlobbaTech

If your engine is tuned right when it's new and broken in then later down the road you notice you have to turn your idle speed up then you can get like 1-2 days of running out of it usually before it gives problems. Once at that point or beyond and engine doesn't idle at all or stalls on track if stuck against board or something and is very or impossible to restart until it cools down some then stick a fork in it and get a new p/s or engine. As far as checking compression, I think there might be a guage out there that can thread into the button/head and give you a numeric number but unless if you know how low is too low or whatnot that info isn't going to do much good. So what most people do is guage how worn the engine is by turning the flywheel over by hand, the easier it is to turn over the less life it has left in it, best to do that after engine has been run and hot. I like to just run the engine until you notice the idle problems b/c sometimes they still run great and still have a good seal even thought really easy to tunr over by hand.