"Strength" MA10 V's MA12: Fact or Fiction

SammoHung

SammoHung

It has been mentionned loosely in a few threads over the months that the MA10 is 'tougher/stronger' than the MA12.... but I haven't been able to find any real solid evidence of this anywhere....just oppinions and heresay

Does anyone have any solid technical evidence that explains WHY and WHERE the MA10 is tougher/stronger than the MA12?

Or are they infact about tht same?

As far as I can see the same materials are used and the main difference is the bore and stroke of the pistons.

Cheers ALL,
 
this has been mentioned many times over the 5 years ive been here, commonly the ma12 does blow head gaskets more often, ive never known an ma10 to blow a head gasket in the club at least.

the ma12 is more likely to blow as in basic terms there is less gasket due to it being 1235cc as opposed to 988cc. although having owened both ma10 and ma12 they both seem up to taking huge amounts of abuse, but i always kept the revs down on the 12 due to fears of it going pop :p

so basically yes the ma12 is more likely to blow gaskets and it does i've known a few 12's go pop in my time here but never a 10

its down to how you drive i guess
 
my car has got a ma10 and i have given a lot of stick and hammering and it is still going strong i have had it 4 about 5 years all it is doing now is burning oil not a lot just a bit but a very good strong engine
 
I've seen MA12s throw rods, never a MA10. However, I have never seen either engine break due to ant thing other than external influence or abuse.

I also know of MA12 bottom ends used on the March ST so its safe to say you can rely on either. But I would look for a better hg on the 1.2 if you plan to do anything special.
 
no matter who answers its still all going to be hear say and opinions and peoples expriences

engines are only strong if they are serviced regularly and any problems get changed as soon as you know of them and that the engine generally is looked after.

dont think that you cant go all the way to 6k on the revs, as you can rev the engine all the way to 6k as long as you let it warm up properly
 
Conclusion: "MYTH"

Great quick responses there, Cheers!!

all-in-all then ...I conclude: "MYTH"

....that's great for all K10's. The MA's are all tough-enough if looked after and properly prepped before beefing.

(hmmm..now that my handling mods are virtually all done....does this mean I should look for a 1.2 with a good service history before I move onto my performance mods?)
 
people generally think a complete and correct service history is the be all and end all which in true fact the service history is only 1 factor of many things.

generally a low milage with a complete service history would be the best to get but super super low milage means the car has been sat for most of its life and only driven on sort journeys or it means the speedo has been clocked
 
SammoHung, I definately wouldn't say myth. As a ratio of people on here with K10s its probably 20 or 30+ :1 with 1.0 Vs 1.2. As Matt has said in all that time perhaps one or two at most 1.0s have blown a headgasket, where as by comparison I know of many 1.2s both on the MSC and friends of mine over the years that have had problems. Since there are so few relative compared to the 1.0s its a sensible conclusion to make that overall the 1.2s have a far higher faiure rate than the 1.0s. Bringing into service as a reason, its safe to say that the 1.0s and 1.2s all have equally bad servicing and so you would expect a much higher 1.0 failure rate but we dont get that!
 
In my experience the ma10 also seems little bit tougher than the ma12. Although I've seen quite some ma10's with blown headgaskets too. Yet this doesn't make the ma12 a 'bad' engine at all.
There is logic in why a ma12 might blow a headgasket faster than a ma10. On another note the ma10 can do more revs than the ma12 too (looking at where Nissan put the redline) which might also increase this feeling too.

But as far as I've gathered local garages say that they see more ma12s with faulty headgaskets than ma10's where the ma12's come from relatively newer cars.
 
Interesting thought on the ammount of gasket material between the cylinder and the outside edge of the block...even then, there is only a reduction of 1.5mm in the ammount of material between a cylinder and its neerest item
 
Work it out as a percentage. Its much less. Even looking at it you can see. I am sure that a decent headgasket would solve all the probs.
 
In all my time of racing ma12 i have never blow any up as such,never even had to have a crank reground when the shells have worn out and started rattling,never had any rods let go.
the engine's i have come across that have let go were not a chase of high milage engine but porely servised ones ie slugde up inside and blocked the oilways or water leaking getting hot and seizeing up that way which i still put this down to lack of regular servises.
The head gasket problems you hear about are more to do with the engine being 15+years old and 80+k on the clock and then you moan about the original one that was fitted to the engine when new start leaking only down to age and water corrosion.
I think they probly the best small engine out there you hardly have any problems with them at all unlike other make's

kristian said:
ive seen 2 MA10's go.. and 1 ma12
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what was that down to,high milage, cam belt snap,crap old oil,???
 
Bobs experience with the MA12 is an important one for us to take note of since he races these and probably knows others who race these engines on a regular basis :)
 
12's do tenbd to blow gaskets, however, 10's always seem to smoke more commonly and have rumbly bottom ends.

thats my tuppence worth.

in any respect, the 12 is far more usuable, just doesnt rev as well.
 
I had an oil problem with my 1.0

Although it wasnt like I expected it go bang at any time, im sure it'll run and run for years.
 
I like my ma12... I've been redlining 80% of my shifts for 5k km now and there's no signs of wear or loss of power... I'm certainly keeping an eye on my oil though considering it soils much quicker :wasntme: I've never driven a micra with an ma10, so I personally can't say it's good or bad!
 
I've driven both. No complaints about the MA10, you can really push it and you know it wont give up with whatever's thrown at it! but, thats how it has to be driven to get the most out of it, or the power to overtake on motorways etc. Never had any problems with the engine block, at 105000 miles, just the usual bits like carbs, dizzy's, coils etc.

The MA12 felt more responsive under foot until you hit the high gears, then you struggle to get anything out of it. Didnt drive it or have it long enough to test its relibility. The gearbox dropped gears after 300 miles of owning it though but thats probably down to the seller not telling me it was nackered
 
Arnold said:
The MA12 felt more responsive under foot until you hit the high gears, then you struggle to get anything out of it. Didnt drive it or have it long enough to test its relibility.
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Oh man, 5th gear is horrible for accelarating or even just going uphill. Fine for cruising along straight and level at the speed limit though.
 
My car cruises uphill in 5th, can't say it struggles in any gear!! It might have somethin to do with the fact that it's still only got the original 1.0 gear box tho!! I dunno!!

From what arnold was sayin tho he was obv reffering to the super s, and i have to say that was poo!!! Dunno what other supers s' are like tho, but this one was slllllllloooooooow!!! The ecc stuff slows them down so much!!
 
Or the lack of oil in the gearbox!!!!

I guess speedles seemed fast when we went to boxhill (?)
 
Ems said:
I guess speedles seemed fast when we went to boxhill (?)
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There was a strong tailwind :p

Speedle's didnt have the ECC, it was removed, which is why its as quick as yours. ECC one i believe has 6bhp less, (just a fraction more than the 1.0). With the crappier gearbox, it wont seem like there's more BHP to play with.. Just what i think anyway
 
The super s is the better of all the n/a k10's. I have driven three supers and many 1l and 1.2l without the ecc. The standard supers had much more go in them. I know it's got cats and egr etc but it also has the larger ports and the mapped ignition etc. my gut feeling is that they put down more power than the handbook claims. Incidentally i have had no reliability problems with the 1.2l but I have had a h/g let go on a 1l.
 
Where should one see if there are larger ports? If it's at the exhaust or inlet it makes no difference because there is only one set of gaskets available afaik (usuable for both ma10 and ma12, if we are talking about those inlet/outlet ports that is :D ).
Also I'm using a MA12 from an ECC one and haven't noticed anything bigger than the other MA12 I have here.

But if you have more information about this subject I'd go and take a look more closely because I haven't noticed any of those differences yet didn't took a good look with that in mind :D Could be the larger ports are inside the head and the ports at the flanges are the same. Something tells me though that they've kept that the same.
 
What has your head got cast on the side? Perhaps not all ecc heads are the same? All the ecc supers I've worked on have been a different cast to the non ecc heads. The ports are a different shape alltogether. I think the regular heads are stamped b16? and the large ported heads are b18. Check yours just behing the cam gear.
 
AMY said:
What has your head got cast on the side? Perhaps not all ecc heads are the same? All the ecc supers I've worked on have been a different cast to the non ecc heads. The ports are a different shape alltogether. I think the regular heads are stamped b16? and the large ported heads are b18. Check yours just behing the cam gear.
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they were bigger ported to keep the power up with the normal 1.2 as the cats sapped power
 
paul_k10_Lx said:
they were bigger ported to keep the power up with the normal 1.2 as the cats sapped power
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Thank you Paul, it's good to see that some people know what they are talking about, unlike Slim. I'm sure a lot of valuable information is lost on these forums due to people being so hostile towards one another. I have modified a lot of k10's and learnt a lot about the ma engines yet it seems that everytime I post something people are quicker to try to prove their percieved knowledge rather than find out real answers.
 
all the inlet and exhaust manifolds are same shape and use the same gaskets so there is no such thing as larger port heads.
there's 4 different shapes of inlet ports..
engine, head casting..
ma10 84/92 01b
ma12 88/92 31b higher compression
ma12 92ecc 18b
ma9ert 21b ive been told same as the 31b but with a larger combustion chainber (lower compression)

ive tried both the 31b and 18b on my racecar on the rollers and there's no differents in power at all apart from torque ,but if i had a 1.0 i would fit the ma12 31b head on the top of the ma10 and you would see a gain because the 01b are very restricked.
 
Yeah, I was thinking the same thing with the gaskets. If the ports would be bigger, bigger gaskets specially for those engines should be available. But they don't.

Interesting info bob about those different heads.

If the 31b is the one with higher compression, wouldn't you see a small gain there? You say you didn't so it's safe to assume the 31b and 18b are actually the same then? Or.. the higher compression doesn't make much of a difference on a ma12.
Only thing what I'm wondering about now :D
 
the 31b has higher compression than the 18b,and also i found the 31b produced more torque on the rollers probly because of its curved shape inlet track and that would start the swirl effect into the cylinder for a better combustion.
 
Slim said:
cheers amy. i know so little, i built the fastest proven N/A K10 here.
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You know so much that you feel it necessary to interupt and state that all ma12 heads are the same when clearly they are not. Why bother to come out with such a comment when you don't actually know the answer? It just confuses people. I apologise if I caused you offence, there is sometimes misleading information posted here, it just bugs me. We all need to work together as a community to keep things evolving. Anyway which k10 have you built I would be interested to know about it? I thought Pietro currently had the quickest proven k10 Built by Bob?

Bob, out of curiosity did you run both heads at standard compression? Or the same compression? When I was having my heads ported I had both the heads flow tested after they were ported. I don't know what the cfm's were but I was told that the 18b was the one to go with as it flowed slightly better. I know better flow doesn't allways mean more power in reality but it's a fairly reliable indicator.

Raptor, the face of the ports are around the same size, all the manifolds I have seen have the same sized ports, so there would be no gain in enlarging this area, however the port down through the throat and into the bowl is larger. i'm really curious to find out more about this as i'm sure that Nissan would have made these changes for a reason.

The other ma12 head I had ported and ''processed'' was used on Mulbers's otherwise standard car (bar a backbox and 15's) to run his recent 1/4 time, not bad for a car still running the standard carb, manifolds and even air filter. There is a lot to be gained from these heads.

I have a new head on the way from Japan, when it gets here I'll tell you a bit more about it, but until then I'm interested to see more developments.
 
Hmm, I'll be having a good look then next time I'm removing the inlet manifold.
It seems like I have a 31b and 18b here. I'll be doing some manifold+carb work soon so I can see if no one already peeked at it.
Should be interesting enough to check out at least! :)
 
in the past ive had the both ma12's done to the spec that we are aloud in the class i race in with an 18b and 31b and they both came out with about the same bhp but the 31b had more torque.and they both were skimmed off by 40thou.
 
Canadian K10 Engines

Hey gang,
Being the owner and builder of one 1990 K10 Micra with MA10 ET Engine, truthfully I can say that we here in Canada only have the MA12 engine designation and I have two pristine MA12's sitting in my shop one is a 1990 the other is a 1986 There are a few diferences between the two MA12's due to the year of manufacture but nonetheless they are just as reliable as any MA10 versions.
As this has been stated before its really all about the maintanace we do. and I for one do believe regular oil changes and tune ups are a must for a small engine does tend to work harder(Y)
 

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