Here we have a 2013 Nissan NV2500 V8 that has suffered what we call “catastrophic failure”. Upon inspection, our tech Jay found that multiple connecting rods blew a hole clear through the oil pan sending shrapnel and oil all over the road, and cracking a couple of the pistons. The connecting rod links the crankshaft and the piston together, and takes the abuse of every single explosion the combustion chamber brings. These rods push the crankshaft and cause it to spin, which spins everything else in the motor as well.
Now, this is not a normal issue that we run into every day, but unfortunately, we have seen it many times in the past. This kind of failure happens due to a lack of lubrication. Without proper lubrication, there is more friction which causes things to wear faster or fail. A couple of reasons why you might run into lubrication problems could be from old oil that has lost its viscosity, water in the oil, a bad oil pump, clogged oil ports, oil burning, or not enough oil in general.
We were able to resurrect this NV2500 by replacing the old block with a brand new short block from Nissan as well as brand new fully built cylinder heads. While we had the motor out, we recommended that the customer go the extra mile to replace some of the parts that were going to need future maintenance and/or replacement. The customer took our recommendations, and we replaced timing chains, guides, tensioners, the water pump, spark plugs, variable valve timing solenoids, and many other parts that were much easier to access with the engine out. Now the NV2500 is back together and running like a champ with all of its new parts!