Piston rings: replacement and selection

When and why it is necessary to replace piston rings

Averagely, service life of these components is no less than 150 000 operational kilometers. But service life of the piston rings can be significantly reduced at violation of car operation conditions. New rings are installed prematurely in case of deformation of old ones as a result of elasticity loss (if details adhere the cylinder non-tightly). Moreover, broken rings are necessarily to be replaced. In addition, installation of new components can be presupposed at performing works on repair or tuning of the engine.

Premature details wear-out often becomes the result of low-quality fuel or oil use, as well as intensive engine exploitation. Moreover, the rings lose their elasticity because of heavy carbon deposit inside of piston head grooves. This happens, for example, if the car was not used for long which led to motor oil thickening.

The following signs point at elements breakdown: engine power decrease, increase of fuel or motor oil consumption, unusual colour of exhaust gases. Moreover, there is deposit or greasing material found on spark plugs threads during their inspection which is performed at every oil replacement. It also can be a sign of piston rings defect.

If you don’t have appropriate skills, then components installation should be entrusted to service station specialists. The case is that rings are replaced together with pistons. Moreover, boring and honing operations of cylinders are performed. Using the piston rings kit it is important to correctly define the type of each of them and take into account location in relation to each other.