I bought a new motorcycle today (brand new, odometer read 0) and about 3 hours into a VERY cold ride home, my numb extremities failed me. I missed a shift and redlined it pretty hard.
While everything seems fine, it got me wondering: apart from the obvious risk of instant catastrophic failure, what are the “later in life” repercussions of such abuse during the break in period, and how do they differ from abusing an engine later in its life?
In: 44
So when a car is brand new everything fits tightly and parrts haven’t had a chance to be worked to be thoroughly lubricated and to have parts settle into place.
Breaking in a car is driving the car gently and delicately until those parts have been properly lubricated and settled into place. Being gentle with the car during this stage helps prevents parts from violently settling into place or causing unnecessary stress on parts not properly lubricated.
It also gives people a chance to find out if there are any manufacturer defects. Usually there is a brief window of time where if a part is defective, it will break in those first few miles. After the break in period it’s generally assumed that the part will last it’s effective service life.
During a break-in period, you treat the vehicle gently and try to maintain steady speeds to avoid straining the engine and transmission.
The reason for this is that all the parts need to shift and even sometimes change shape a bit to fit together well. If you do this slowly, everything just settles down. If you do this quickly, then parts may be strained by being forced to adjust too fast. They probably will not break, but they do come out of the break-in as well and this can cause repairs or even failures down the road.
Think of it as the difference between gently taping something with a hammer repeatedly until it fits where it belongs and whacking it hard once to get the same result.
During a break-in period, you treat the vehicle gently and try to maintain steady speeds to avoid straining the engine and transmission.
The reason for this is that all the parts need to shift and even sometimes change shape a bit to fit together well. If you do this slowly, everything just settles down. If you do this quickly, then parts may be strained by being forced to adjust too fast. They probably will not break, but they do come out of the break-in as well and this can cause repairs or even failures down the road.
Think of it as the difference between gently taping something with a hammer repeatedly until it fits where it belongs and whacking it hard once to get the same result.
During a break-in period, you treat the vehicle gently and try to maintain steady speeds to avoid straining the engine and transmission.
The reason for this is that all the parts need to shift and even sometimes change shape a bit to fit together well. If you do this slowly, everything just settles down. If you do this quickly, then parts may be strained by being forced to adjust too fast. They probably will not break, but they do come out of the break-in as well and this can cause repairs or even failures down the road.
Think of it as the difference between gently taping something with a hammer repeatedly until it fits where it belongs and whacking it hard once to get the same result.
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