What are you guys doing with your old worn out or retired nitro engines??

Adam Drake can rebuild them.. bearings, seals, pinch. Very reasonable pricing. Thedrakeracing.com.

So, you have another thread asking for engines...

Looking for worn out .21 engines

So if your friend is learning to do some mods then he also must learn how to pinch and replace rods and bearings.....

Yeah, so that's why I'm asking....... I'm wondering if you guys are just holding on to them as old collectibles, spares or what? My friend is very capable of re-pinching, replacing bearings, Rods, etc.... He's already done a few dozen engines for people. The issue is, it doesn't seem like people are selling off old engines they have laying around. I posted the other thread "Looking for worn out .21 engines" because he's looking for used engines to mess with, rebuild and re-sell to guys looking to get into the hobby on a budget. If anyone has anything for sale, go ahead and PM me or reply to my other thread.

So basically you are dubble posting, also coming here to beg for used engines.

The why people do not want to sell old worn motors has a simple answer. Even if you tell the buyer the engine is not OK anymore he still will complain. Have seen it many times.... Beside that, there is no market for bad running engines.

To me, I save all the stuff. Sometimes when I am in a mood I select stuff to make a practise engine but I also save parts as spares.

No, not really a double post and I apologize if I come off sounding like I begging. That's not the case at all. The purpose for this thread was to ask "what are you guys doing with your old engines"? I'm just trying to figure out if people hold on to them, collect them, sell them, or just think they have no value and throw them away. I was just surprised nobody has really replied to my other thread in the WTB so I though I would ask in here for some advise where to look or what people are actually doing with them. Hopefully that makes sense.....

What Roelof is getting at is just the same with Lipos - a used motor is pretty much a liability i.e. someone buys a motor, and even if they listen to what the seller stated, they will more than likely not get the motor to run or tune, and in the process they adjust it without having even replaced needed parts, or serviced it. And when this happens 98% of the Time on RCtech, they end up in our engine forum, or worse, just posting randomly without going to the correct thread (and not even reading it) to complain about the motor.

9 out of 10 used Engine buyers, are buying because they are expecting New Engine Performance at a cheaper attainable price - kinda like the people that buy used LiPos.

The other 1 out of 10 are buying the motor for parts, i.e. they need a crank, case or head - thats it.

So take it with a grain of salt, we see this type of scenario over and over through the years.

As for Me, my old motors get re- pinched usually a new rod and piston and go into loaner buggies or on road at our local club.

That makes a lot of sense. I think it matters how the engine for sale is presented though. Most guys are selling them saying "less than a gallon" or "barely broken-in". To me I take that as total BS. If it was either of those, why are you selling it other than you are getting out of the hobby? Just be honest with the condition and put a declaimer such as, "as is, no refunds" or "due to the nature of the hobby, seller is no longer responsible once delivered". In any case, I'll keep looking around. My buddy is just a nice, decent person that likes helping people out get started in the hobby by providing them with a decent starter engine cheap. In fact, I've personally seen him give motors away for free to kids and not charge anything to others that really can't afford much.

First of all, I completely agree with your assessment of used nitro engines for sale -- they are generally beaten half to death and then sold as "lightly used". Used-engine salesmen are bigger liars than used-car salesmen. I've bought a few used engines over the years and only one of them was actually "lightly used". Most of them were significantly worn, and several of them were so badly worn they were damaging themselves. I remember one Losi 3.4 engine I bought that had bearings so badly worn the crankshaft was wobbling and scraping against the inside of the crankcase. I wonder if someone leaned-out the fuel mixture and intentionally ran the engine at full throttle until it ground-off enough chrome bits from the sleeve that they got into the bearings and destroyed the bearing races in a matter of seconds. I can't imagine any other way the engine could've actually been running under its own power for long enough to damage itself that badly. Then, to add insult to injury, the seller disputed my claim on the grounds that I had damaged the engine by opening the backplate to see why the crankshaft was wobbling. Fortunately eBay sided with me; if I'd bought the engine anywhere else I would've been screwed out of my money.

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Having said that, replacing pistons, sleeves, conrods, wrist pins, retaining clips, crankshafts, and rubber seals is easy work that requires no skill or special tools. Rebuilding a carburetor requires attention to detail (specifically noticing tiny bits of debris that might interfere with the fuel feed and cause infuriating tuning problems), but again no skill or special tools. Replacing bearings requires a small toaster-oven to heat the crankcase to about 300°F, but again it requires no skill. The only part of rebuilding a nitro engine that requires skill and special tools is re-pinching old sleeves, but that isn't worth the money unless the sleeve is significantly modified (or severely overpriced from the manufacturer to increase the buyer's perception of value).

Nitro engines are easy to rebuild, because their designs have been refined for optimal use by hobbyists for about 70 years now. Unless someone has an exceptionally expensive engine, possibly with modified parts that would cost a lot of money to replace, it isn't worthwhile to send the engine to someone else for rebuilding.

If your friend wants to get anywhere at all with his fledgling business, I'd suggest learning to repair small appliance gasoline engines instead. Conveniently, 1:5-scale RC engines are functionally identical to small appliance gasoline engines.

I appreciate the insight. I think I had mentioned a while back, my buddy is actually a machinist and has a very nice shop. Mulit axis CNC's, lathes and other machines. He makes all of his own tools and all of his stuff is top notch. He enjoys racing as a hobby just as the rest of us do and likes to help others out since he's pretty well off. He just tasked me with looking around for used stuff he can tinker with, rebuild and pretty much give away to people less fortunate that want to have a hobby they can enjoy. So yeah..... if anyone comes across anything, PM me or post on my other WTB thread.

If he's got all that equipment to work with, he should look into manufacturing replacement sleeves and pistons for popular engines that are discontinued. He would only need to get one piston and sleeve for each model of engine to measure and design replacement parts.

I have an old blue head spec 1 XZ-B with a spec 1 speed case (switched speed crank into my spec 1 blue head engine so this engine s basically a speed with a regular rather new stock crank and a blue head. Black speed case) I was quite impressed how good it ran last time I used it but it was absurdly gone on compression. Forget (It) checking compression by tilting the engine on its side with the flywheel u would think theres no glowplug in. Would be totally perfect for you. 50$ shipped

LOL @ asking $50 for an engine with no compression left.

I've got some broken A-arms for sale, $5 each. Anyone interested?

lmao reread it with sarcasm on. He wants a WORN OUT ENGINE well he ain’t getting anymore worn out while still running as this engine gets. Tho I will admit I thought this engine would just obliterate itself being this old idk I personally don’t think u could run this engine to death cause the rod gets no pressure it has no compression lol. Anyways it runs fine I wouldn’t send the guy n engine that doesn’t work, he’s gonna get it started right up n it won’t flame out unless he expects it to idle for a minute without any throttle inputs.

and I totally expect this guy to pinch the sleeve (yes i know about that trick) I don’t run pinched engines, so if he pinches it it will be the first time, if he likes pinching engines to get a few gallons out of almost dead engines then good for him to get life from something someone else can’t, it’s useless to me, if he wanted the dam engine he can have it, I’ve expected to give this to someone soon that needed it, thought it would be my neighbor but he’s picky after seeing how picky I am. I have boxes of engines I never used from 6 years ago and I’m not hurting for engines.