I decided to bite the bullet, stop worrying, and sort my engine out. This thread should be a good one, pictures, progress and panic I should imagine. Before the month is out, the car will drive out of my friends garage purring.

 

Problem one, rough running. Solution PLENUM OFF! I did this in 10 short hours :biggrin: yesterday.

 

 

I am going to check all 6 cylinders have good injectors and good spark. Plus air leaks. And sort another bloody oil leak at the back.

 

So, the oil leak appears to be pcv related, dripping onto the turbo. More on that later.

 

The injectors and wiring are dreadful!

 

 

So with that and things like temperature sensors I may have to get new injectors and a new loom??? Or just a partial loom advice on re looming please, or just getting new ends or whatever.

 

My IACV thing is in a state.

 

I am going to auto sol the shit out of my plenum.

 

Finish the interior conversion.

 

Do my white LEDs.

 

You drove me to this you little red nightmare. It would have been more economical and less stressful to take up some other hobby, like crystal meth perhaps :lol:

 

Hope there is plenty for us all to learn in this thread :) comments and advice appreciated :thumbup1:

I wear a big hoodie (a castrol one :lol:) that covers my fly and I always watch out but I had a helper hauling the loom out while I was in the footwell poking it through the firewall. Think that tallys with the mark on the wing.

 

Any ideas on the boost solenoids?

 

yea...a Bastrd to polish once scratched:D

Might be in trouble here, my big box arrived this morning and I have been cracking on with all I can.

 

I removed the fuel rail and the injectors and have found that I have missed some "fuel rail insulators" off my shopping list. I bought new style OEM 370cc injectors and the kit to put them in a 1991 rail. I didn't realise there are 6 little rubber "insulators beneath the rail that I haven't replaced. I might be in trouble, what do people think?

 

Might be in trouble here, my big box arrived this morning and I have been cracking on with all I can.

 

I removed the fuel rail and the injectors and have found that I have missed some "fuel rail insulators" off my shopping list. I bought new style OEM 370cc injectors and the kit to put them in a 1991 rail. I didn't realise there are 6 little rubber "insulators beneath the rail that I haven't replaced. I might be in trouble, what do people think?

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]83511[/ATTACH]

 

Why did you get the later injectors iff you stayed with 370,s mate:confused:

Can you still buy early style injectors? Something in them makes them more prone to premature failure.

I decided to stay with 370cc injectors because the car is running well on 6 probably original ones already. So 6 good as new and slightly better designed ones should give another 24 years of service. I can't get the car mapped up here if I went bigger. Even on some postal chip I could fit, 500 miles to Noz' place for a proper map, would be daft and extortionate.

 

Ideally I'd have fitted 555s but the 450ish horsepower the car has is awesome and it will only be better for all this work. I was planning to stop at 500 anyway, I know the 370s can't make 500 but they can certainly make my last dyno (430 at the engine) which is lovely to drive.

It was all going so well. Reassembling the intake mainfold, closely following the service manual I tightened the throttle body bolts in order to 5 ft-lbs. Then a second lap, to 15 ft-lbs with a torque wrench. Click... next one Click... next one BANG! :hurl:

 

I sheared a bolt in the plenum. Today I took the plenum into work (in the boot of my mx5 haha) we managed to drill and extract it, without any obvious damage to the threads.

 

We then tested the tourque wrench on a very expensive looking Augusta Westland machine, found it to be very inconsistent and generally over torqueing by 10 foot pounds!

 

Do not buy tools off ebay.

So it snapped at 25ftlb? Seems a little low to sheer a bolt that big, your talking about the 4 bolts that hold each throttle body on right?

 

About that, 20 or so ft lbs, really strange, how I didn't strip the thread I don't know. I was being so very very careful. Just gonna do them tight ish by hand this time. :headvswal: Mark is getting me some new bolts.

Hello again, well the car is back together and runs. It wasn't an easy job, but all the same wasn't rocket science. Poor access and 2.5inch hard pipes with tricky nut/bolt and jubilee positions being the greatest obstacle.

 

And a loom designed to fit any car made ever, but none of them particularly well! Short and long in all the wrong places.

 

Anyway, photo deluge to follow but for now we must deal with the crocodile that is closest to the canoe. It is misfiring and running badly.

 

Symptoms,

Soot out the back.

Big miss and stumble as it comes on boost.

Awful bag of crisps noise arround 3500rpm

plugs that are clean bright white with deposits on the ground electrode and soot on the collar.

intermittent 5 cyl running after misfire if left to idle.

 

Good things

new injectors.

new fuel filter.

new plugs bcr8es @0.9mm.

no air leaks.

no error codes.

new loom.

drives beautifully (sometimes)

All the datascan readings appear good.

 

I will buy a timing light and check that first, even though it has not been disturbed, the cas is still where it was and the datascan reads 15 btdc.

 

Then plug gaps back to 0.6mm

 

Then I don't know please help me :lol:

Imagine the cool crisp air and the beautiful off beat warble of a 5 cylinder engine.

 

And here is a pic of the plugs, the clean one I wiped clean as it was exactly the same as the other 5.

Edited November 8, 201411 yr by tomfromthenorth

If all plugs look the same I would think something more general, than cylinder specific. So fuel pressure, air leak, timing, maf

That is the only silver lining at the minute, that it isn't, a ring, a valve, a piston...

 

I hope the map hasn't gone wibble after the ECU was disconnected, or that the injectors are somehow wrong. A mix up at czp and I got NA 270s or something.

 

1) Timing

2) Air leaks

3) Fuel filter even though it is nearly new

4) Reduce spark plug gaps from 0.9 to 0.6 which is where the last ones were

 

The MAFs both upset the engine's running when they are unpluuged, not to say they are fine but they certainly are working to some degree.

I found this really good guide for reading spark plugs.

http://honda-tech.com/forced-induction-16/***-basics-reading-spark-plug***-3063102/

I must get this sorted, I fly south on the 20th! I gave myself some headroom on the build for exactly this sort of thing but it's getting pretty close.

 

My plugs are all sorts of wrong! Soot on the ring indicates rich, I couldn't see signs of det but think the timing looked about right. I will take any and all advice guys.

Edited November 9, 201411 yr by tomfromthenorth

Do you have any idea on which cylinder is misbehaving? or is it a multiple cylinders?

 

Is there anyone near you with a known working PTU?

I have just fitted a second hand S2 ptu to a brand new loom. Looking at the plugs they are all the same. I think it will just be the weakest cylinder on a 'not new' engine that can't quite cope with the poor conditions before the others.

 

Keep the ideas coming please guys.

interesting read. Love watching things develop and see people take the plunge!! Nice One

I got it fixed by the way, then it blew up (exageration)

 

The issue was a small air leak I think making it run a bit rich and sooting up the engine. I found it needed a bit of a post assembly re torque having had a few heat cycles. I also cleaned and re gapped the plugs and put some fancy red ex through as it was chimney levels of sooty.

 

Then after 20 perfect miles the water pump bearing collapsed it threw the belt and overheated. My oil temp showed it go from 80 (when it threw the belt) to 116. This was in about 4 miles that were driven at minimum load, sort of 60mph in 5th min throttle then the car was immediately turned off. It dumped all it's water in about 2 miles.

 

It is probably fine but may be nadgered.

 

I promise I will put pics up some time, very bloody busy here trying to clear work and get to the Falklands.

Oh and an important warning.

 

If you get the battery light with no symptoms (I also got "anti lock" light) you may have lost a belt!

 

I realised after about 2 minutes of head scratching. In our game, we have flight reference cards to help us get to the bottom of things, in this case I think that they would have read...

 

Battery warning caption illuminated

Immediate actions

Reduce speed to min power, achieve safe flight.

Check for dangerous indications.

No other symptoms

Land as soon as practicable

 

Subsequent actions

If you have one or more of the following:

Rising oil/water temperature

No/cooling heater output

Steam

Heavy steering

Clattering from the engine bay

Land immediately

 

I updated my emmergency from "that is odd" to "maximum ****!" When I turned the heaters up to full because the oil temp hit 90 and they blew cold!

How long are you away for Tom?

Bloody hell, Tom! Your luck's not up to much at the minute, mate...!! :(

Haha, dunno Si, if the engine has taken the heat without leaving the head looking like a poppadom I will consider myself very lucky.

 

It isn't long Gary, back on the 10th of January.

Its going to be a cold Christmas Tom:) Stay in touch and send some pics of the penguins.

Haha, dunno Si, if the engine has taken the heat without leaving the head looking like a poppadom I will consider myself very lucky.

 

It isn't long Gary, back on the 10th of January.

 

Mine spat the coolant and it didn't die. So there's hope.

Cheers steve :clover: I think it's ok, it was running fine when I shut it off, so long as it didn't then warp sat hot.

 

I can't be on with an engine swap :pinch:

The worst thing you can do in that scenario is refill the system with cold water, the difference in thermal losses between the two materials as well as the rapid cooling is what causes the warp. So seeing as you couldn't do that it's cooled naturally and therefore less likely to be damaged in my mind.

Only one way to find out at the end of the day. Even if you do have to swap the block I'm sure you will figure it out, quitting is apparently not in your vocabulary haha.