Right. I seriously hope that you didn't think that I was serious. I doubt it too. But when someone says,
" I will stay old school. No offense, but I like the insurance of the old ways. "
It implies that they AREN'T "thinking", and that they're just doing what they've always done because that's the way they've always done it. Everyone has a right to their opinion, but hopefully their opinion is backed up by more than, "...because that's how I've always done it."

 

It implies nothing. You imply that he is doing it because "that's what they've always done it" and nothing else. It could be because his experiences doing it his way have produced acceptable results and he has no reason to go against his previous experiences, which have been successful by the way. Maybe, just maybe, he IS thinking.

 

I was relatively easy on my car for the first 400-500 miles. If it was an M7 car, I'd have given the clutch more time to properly seat.
S.

 

Yes, I assumed you were using exaggeration to make a valid point, that doing it “the way it used to be done” is not necessarily correct.

As I said a sample of one isn’t too meaningful. In my small sample, I once sold a very pristine 82 Mustang GT. People who bought it turned it over to their teenage boy. Last it was seen it was blowing lots of blue smoke. When I had it, it never used oil. Kid must have horsewhipped it. Don

 

I horse whipped my VW from the time I bought it used to the day I got rid of it and it never burned oil but, I also know how to rev match to the next gear and never over rev'd the engine. Never used the engine as a brake either, thats what brakes are for. From one wheel burnouts to red lining every gear to banging the next gear and chirping tires, that car never skipped a beat through its 10000 mile oil changes. Was a fun car to "horse whip"
Lift throttle over steer XD so much fun

There is a difference to banging gears and shifting a little slower to sync engine and transmission speed to have a smooth and positive shift.

 

Bet your brake pads and rotors loved that! My C6 Z07 wouldn't stop in a city block from 60 mph until I bedded the brakes -- Properly.

 

Right. The brake pads. Look again....closer;

 

So the Z07's used race pads?
S.

 

Same carbon rotors and pads as the ZR1. The GM break-in calls for 50 accelerations to 60+ mph with hard stops, then a steady speed cooling period. It keeps the pads from "outgassing" later when used on the track. There was a significant increase in braking action after the break-in.

 

Even with a tachometer that shows a redline of 4400 rpm for the first 500 miles, we still have the same "know it alls" claiming you don't need to break in the engine. The engineers couldn't have made this any more obvious short of putting the words "DUNCE" in the redline area.

Michael

 

Some of the keyboard legends come up with the most ridiculous and unfounded baloney. How the "drive it like you stole it" break-in procedure came about is beyond my comprehension. I think some of this junk must be juvenile babble from latch key kids!

 

Anybody notice that the recent posts in this forum from both the Bondurant and Ron Fellows Schools mentioned that their C7s were or would be ready for courses "after they got them broken in"? Dang, guess GM forgot to tell them they were wasting their time.

 

FYI Brake pads haven't had any "outgassing" problems since the 50s. Modern brake pad materials are metal, carbon and ceramic based and will never outgas.
Bedding in brakes has to do with transferring brake pad material to the rotor and burnishing the surfaces of both.

 

The break in procedure in the owner's manual is good to follow but keep in mind two things...first, the procedure is for the whole car and not the engine; second, it's fairly conservative which is ok.

The tires take about 200 miles for the mold release to come off, this is true any time you get new tires. The brakes and manual/auto transmission clutches take about 200 miles to burnish in to their steel mating surfaces. The gears in manual/auto transmissions are involute helical cut gears with pure rolling at the pitch line and don't require any break in. The ring and pinion gears in the differential are the biggest concern which is why they don't want you going full throttle or above a certain speed and want you to vary your speed. There is a lot of sliding action at the gear tooth interface of a hypoid gear set and excess force (full throttle) or force applied over a long period (high speeds) generates a lot of heat at the high spots on the gears which changes the molecular structure of the metal resulting in an early failure. Varying your speed allows load to be removed from the gears for a slight cooling affect.

For the engine...it's already broken in before you get it. In the old days ('60s) when cast iron rings were used and oil technology was nowhere close to what it is today, there was a break in period for the rings to seat and a good reason for the first oil change to be at 500 miles. Today, GM uses moly rings on a cylinder wall with a plateau finish hone...the rings seat instantly and the plateau finish closely resembles the surface finish desired for seated rings. You're not much older than me and I've been using moly rings/plateau finishes for 30 years so you should be familiar with them. As far as the rest of the engine goes, the main/rod/cam bearing have hydrodynamic lubrication...they won't touch except during starting with zero oil pressure. There are roller bearings at the lifters and rocker arms. The pistons are installed with a negative piston to cylinder wall clearance...yes, the measured piston diameter is larger than the bore. How do they do it??? There is an anti-friction coating applied to the piston skirt in the barrel area that abrades away in the first 200 or so revolutions. So what major parts have I missed? There is nothing in the engine requiring a break in...drive it hard or easy, you're not going to hurt the engine.

Oils today are lightyears ahead of yesteryear and so are oil filters. Good quality oil filters today have a Beta 7 rating of 75 which means they are 98.7% effective at removing particles 7 microns and larger on a multi-pass test. You can change your oil as often as you want, all you're doing is wasting money but if it makes you feel better rock on.

 

Bingo. Someone "gets it".

 

Actually I agree with you completely. The burnishing procedures heats the pads to their adherent operating temperature and allows the material to transfer to the rotor -- obviously a pretty high temperature for the carbon ceramic brakes, based on the aggressive burnishing procedure GM specifies. The process is not nearly as aggresssive with my StopTechs. There are still quite a few "expert engineers" who write about outgassing -- probably slept at a Holiday Inn last night. Thanks for the correction.

Pappy

 

I have 700 miles on my Z51 6 speed auto. I like to put the petal on the floor and go like a Bat-out-of-hell. Is this bad?????????? I bought this car to go fast.

Thanks

Al