Here's how the fastest Stingers broke in their engines

[5tinger]

WAAAT? I'm at 400 miles and hitting 6000+ all the time.. Bounced off the rev limiter a few times just to see if it could be done..

Why do you abuse it like that? Where's the mechanical sympathy.

 

[turboAWD]

I paid good money in order to enjoy the car.. So I will!

 

[MerlintheMad]

"Enjoy" the car by all means. For as long as it lasts.

 

[Doel]

"Enjoy" the car by all means. For as long as it lasts.

10 years / 100,000 miles is a long time to enjoy it

 

[KingLamoni]

Interesting thread but as it seems we don't know the top 10-15 Stingers nor their drivers ....that would be the thing to find out for your question it seems to me.

 

[Hotrodfool]

I drove the thing like a maniac on my three test drives. Read tHe manual after I bought it and slowed down for the next 600 miles.

 

[Manaz]

I don't think you can do too much damage to be honest. The worst thing you can do is to glaze the cylinder walls with constant rpm and load. There's quite a few people who subscribe to the "drive it the way you'll drive it all its life" mentality.

I try not to go too hard on it, but I've certainly given the car a few squirts in its first 1,500km of life!

 

[MerlintheMad]

I drove the thing like a maniac on my three test drives. Read tHe manual after I bought it and slowed down for the next 600 miles.

I don't think you can do too much damage to be honest. The worst thing you can do is to glaze the cylinder walls with constant rpm and load. There's quite a few people who subscribe to the "drive it the way you'll drive it all its life" mentality.

I try not to go too hard on it, but I've certainly given the car a few squirts in its first 1,500km of life!

I think that this falls into the same category as using low octane fuel: the "injury" to the engine won't appear till near the end of its service life. "Breaking in" is good, but if you don't do it, you'll maybe shorten the engine life by a few thousand miles: I don't think you'll notice anything inimical in the performance or reliability of the engine per se until that day arrives.

 

[Manaz]

"Breaking in" is good, but if you don't do it, you'll maybe shorten the engine life by a few thousand miles

Generally, bad break-in will result in reduced power and increased oil consumption in the "middle age" of an engine. These days, engines are at least partially broken in at the factory, so the majority of potential damage is avoided.

Things that shorten overall engine life tend to occur over time - bad oil, low oil levels, bad fuel, detonation, etc.

 

[Nasscar]

I think that this falls into the same category as using low octane fuel: the "injury" to the engine won't appear till near the end of its service life. "Breaking in" is good, but if you don't do it, you'll maybe shorten the engine life by a few thousand miles: I don't think you'll notice anything inimical in the performance or reliability of the engine per se until that day arrives.

Inimical - tending to obstruct or harm
Whoa Merlin. What's with the big words. We are just simple folk on this here forum. Had to look that word up.

 

[Hotrodfool]

I had to look it up too.

 

[MerlintheMad]

Inimical - tending to obstruct or harm
Whoa Merlin. What's with the big words. We are just simple folk on this here forum. Had to look that word up.

I had to look it up too.

it's good for you.
I do it all the time. Keeps the little grey cells working.

 

[JoeMQ]

Launch controlled on the way home from the dealership lol. As long as you maintain it like the factory suggest, driving it hard or babying it doesn't make any difference. The only thing I watch out for is temperature. Don't stress it if it's still cold, don't shut it down if it's still hot.

 

[jsrob905]

This thread makes me feel better about how I broke in my car. I took it either real easy or pedal to the floor. Day two I had it used the highway on ramp at 430 in the morning as my personal drag strip

 

[WestCoastStinger]

Don’t mod your car from day one. The break in procedure is on the Stinger manual when you buy the car, follow that. After 1000 miles do an oil change this won’t be on the manual recommendation. Put in new filter and full synthetic oil. After 1,500 miles drive the car hard. Then start modding al your please. Simple as that. I personally did oil changes at 1000 miles and 3000 miles. You don’t have to do what I did but I did that for peace of mind and past experiences on building engines.

Well this isn’t prolly in the owners Manuel but I dog mines everyday for a nice run ‍ still no problem’s #stinger for the W

 

[Kimberly Lazarski]

Mine only has intakes so is only barely better than stock. I installed the intakes a week or so into ownership (I wanted to hear the turbines spool up). I tried engaging launch mode the first drive but did not actually launch it.

I did a lot of spirited driving in the first 300 miles; not much full throttle, not visiting the rev limiter (I probably kept it below 5000 in general) but just a lot of varying of rpm and speed with a few brief full throttle bursts. From 300 miles to about 600, I pushed it to about 75% of potential. After not having driven my Corvettes on years (tl;dr: parked them when building a business a hurricane decided to push a tree over on to the ZR1) the Stinger felt fast. Like, really fast, because out of the box it performs nearly as well as the ZR1 did when it was stock.

600 miles: full send up to 75mph or so. Maine doesn't have any faster roads. :-(

600 miles to 2000 miles: a LOT of full throttle pulls from the digs up to the limit, learning timing lifting of the throttle to stop accelerating at exactly the limit. I launch out of my driveway up to 25mph (my neighbor's kids love that, especially the teenager)

2000 - 3800 miles: some spirited driving, occasional full throttle runs, but avoiding launching when someone wants to race (I take off slowly when street racers try to bait me), but I am mostly exploring comfort mode, have added a Mando ECS10 and keep the suspension on Mando's sport mode even in the car's comfort mode, and just enjoying the luxury ride taking off only moderately quickly.

I haven't changed the oil yet; I want the dealer to do it (to maintain an ongoing and favorable relationship with them should I hit warranty issues).

 

[MerlintheMad]

(tl;dr: parked them when building a business a hurricane decided to push a tree over on to the ZR1)

It sounds like you only pushed the envelope of the proper break-in period a little bit.

How the heck do you "launch to 25 MPH"? Lol.

I love just knowing that the potential to do literally anything I want is at my toes and fingertips: so, I seldom do. Freedom and power are wonderful possessions. And I do make use of them in responsible ways. For instance, if I happen to have pole position I will either launch or at least hit it (the kickdown switch after a rolling start) if the speed limit is at least 45 MPH: and it doesn't matter if someone in a performance car is beside me: they might as well not be, because I am not racing anyone, just taking off fast: if they start something, though, I won't participate.

 

[Kimberly Lazarski]

What I mean is launch mode and cutting throttle to try to be at exactly 25mph.

 

[MerlintheMad]

What I mean is launch mode and cutting throttle to try to be at exactly 25mph.

Sounds tricky. Your car probably thinks you're schizophrenic. I would need a demonstration, because I can't picture what you're doing.

 

[5tinger]

It's kind of hard to exceed 2000rpm when you get fined for doing 1kph over the limit.