Engine: Has anyone had this break befor?

[jbassman84]

Today I finally got around to start changing the motor mounts on my lark (rears already done) and found something very interesting and a little scary. I pulled out and replaced the driver side one with no problem, when started on the passenger side I could see that the engine side tab but bend up and at steep angle. After the nut on the bottom of the mount was removed the whole top side of the mount started moving freely (before I lifted the motor). I removed the motor side mount bracket to find the problem and after the first front bolt was removed the entire mount came out, it had sheared off right through the back mount hole making the brace on the back useless. Basically the mount was no longer holding that side of the engine and for the past year or so im guessing the engine oil pan was sitting on the steering arm and holding half of the weight of the engine. After some welding today I have it back together and tomorrow ill see if it still fits in and hold. Has anyone seen, heard or had this happen before? Thanks everyone!

[(S)]

I've seen this in a crash and the start of cracks in high miles cars...... You got lucky this did not do some major damage to the oil pan or steering while driving. I'd look for a new mount bracket. Not a hard thing to find.

[bezhawk]

That usually happens when a bolt or two is loose. I havent had problems even with R3 power. Use new bolts and lock washers.

[jbassman84]

The car has never been in a crash and it has about 120,000 miles on it. I do know that at some point in the cars past the motor was pulled and rebuilt, but ive been finding a lot of poorly assembles bits related to the motor coming out. The bolt on the single hole side was loose (also the bolt that hold the block the frame ground strap, this fixed some of my electrical issues) but the two on the double side were tight. Its still a little twisted but after a lot of welding and grinding I am not to worried about it breaking again, I will however try to source some down at some point for when I plan to pull the motor next year. The oil pan had a fairly good dent in it but I'm actually surprised it wasn't much worse.

[WCP]

I discovered an identical fracture on a 70,000 mile R1 Avanti with a 4.09 rear axle many years ago - probably "torque" fatigue.