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Need to go back and fault trace your ignition setup. The fact that car stalls when disconnecting trailing ignition proves you do not have functional leading ignition. Also responsible for all your above complaints. Car will run fine on leading ignition only,trailing ignition is for cleaning up combustion leftovers for emissions. As you have seen,will run on trailing but not well. Suggest leaving trailing disconnected while diagnosing leading ignition issues. Check your wiring from pick ups to module and module to coil- before you start replacing parts. You can substitute the trailing module for the leading-as you know it works to eliminate possibility of bad leading module. Post back what you find.
Dug through the ignition problem a bit more Saturday, checking the firing with the timing light. Used a couple different coils, switched plug wires, checked the coil harness, wired ignition modules to opposite coils. Common denominator: the brand new ignition module. The module doesn't even heat up significantly.
Either it is a bad module, or there is a very strange interference problem because I used that module's bracket as a ground collection point before running a main ground to the strut tower ground.
How did you mount the HEI? Did you make sure to add a ground to the one screw hole through the HEI with the metal collar on it? You have to ground it at that point or it will have issues.
How did you mount the HEI? Did you make sure to add a ground to the one screw hole through the HEI with the metal collar on it? You have to ground it at that point or it will have issues.
Yep, have a ring connector attached to the collared hole, wired to ground. I think I'm going to have to switch the module out for the junkyard part I originally planned to use. I only didn't use it because it's a goofy Canadian version with small tabs. (Think small distributor 7 pin module with 3 pins missing.)
In 1st post you stated disconnecting trailing ignition caused car to shut off =no leading ignition. You further stated you found the problem,rear plug firing 1/2 the time-which plug,leading or trailing? Need to systematically eliminate causes of problem,don't want to be chasing your tail...
Some suggestions: put everything back to the way you initially had it,pull all plugs,insert plugs back into coil wires and lay all plugs on the keg to ground them. Have someone crank car for you so you can watch the plugs firing and determine which aren't(likely leading) and focus on that part of the system. Another route if you have no assistant... remove dist. cap,mark position of rotor on distributor body & position of distributor body on front cover so you can reinstall dist.in same position when done diagnosis. Remove dist,pop cap back on,turn key to run position and spin the gear on bottom of dist. and look at the plugs to see which are firing. This is actually my preferred method for extended testing of ignition system(i use a spare dist.). You don't need a 2nd person,you're not loading up the engine with fuel from repeated cranking and you don't run the battery down from repeated cranking with the starter. Note; be sure not to crank the engine over with dist. out-this way you can slip dist back in and line up your marks and be good to go. Stuff a rag in dist. hole in front cover so nothing gets dropped in unnoticed.
Last edited by GSLSEforme; Aug 14, 2017 at 02:34 PM.
So by now you've determined what you have and don't have for spark. In reading your post you've done a bit of switching around of components to no effect. Assuming your wiring is correct,new components are good. Whichever system is firing consistently, switch the W&G wires from that module and hook them to the other module. Spin dist.shaft and see if the other ignition system is now working. If it is,fault trace the wiring from the pick up coil that's not firing ignition coil/plugs. Pay particular attention to your connections to the pick up coil, often in these conversions,problems can be traced back to here. The pick up is a signal generator and correct polarity must be observed when hooking trigger harness to module. W gets green wire,G gets red wire,best to use a lighter (18)gauge wire and twist the wires so signal is not corrupted between dist. and module. If the problem is not in the trigger circuit, switch pick up wiring back to module it was originally working with,verify it still is,then switch one component at a time into the functioning system. Module/coil,plug wire(s) til functioning system fails. Verify system works again by swapping known good part back in,determines for sure faulty part if there is one.
I made A/C lines for my car.... I don't think Mazda intended for this car to have a front mount intercooler and an A/C condenser. THEIR IS NOT ENOUGH ROOM UP THERE!!!!
was missing one of the backing shims form teh sets of 4pots I purchased.. 1 set came with rear shims minus 1 and no end shims, and 2nd set came with end shims and no backing ones.. hmmm...
what do you do when hours of searching for kits online comes up fruitless... take a stock on, measure, redraw in solidworks, send to google drive, go to work the next day, download file, change to dxf, send thru flowjet software and make your own.. yay.. I bent the tabs at work at a guess and was wrong so I had to straighten and rebend in a vice.. but it fits... (no pic )
Swapped spark plugs and polished/waxed and detailed all day. At 32 years old (the car not me) it seems you never really finish the details. Maybe it's just me but I think good old fashioned pure cotton old worn out soft bath towels are way better than these microfiber rags their trying to convince us are better. I'm not buying it.
DWNUNDR, I made my brake shims out of a pizza pan. If anyone calls me a dweeb, explain first how a RX-7 can tell the difference between OEM metal brake disc brake backing shims and pizza pan metal.
Reason I bring this up, is that I was once slammed here for punching a hole in a thermostat so it would function like the thermostat that I was supposed to use. Believe it or not there are people out there that think every part has to be ordered out of a catalog, come in a nice box, and used exactly the way it was purchased.
Installed el cheapo eBay miata short throw. Feels a lot smoother I'm sure thats just from replacing bushings and turret fluid. Now we wait until the thing catastrophically shears in two
Same here. Usually makes it easier to burp the system.
That hole is essential. On a rx7. I just installed a new tstat on mine. Got it from Mazdatrix and it was oem. Not only a hole but the tiny piece of wire that's crimped on both ends (I call it the jiggler) that's suspended in the hole. Gotta have it!!
In case anyone else got the curiosity bug with all this talk of thermostats and holes therein. It's an RX3 related description but explains the concept.
Installed el cheapo eBay miata short throw. Feels a lot smoother I'm sure thats just from replacing bushings and turret fluid. Now we wait until the thing catastrophically shears in two
I'm right there with ya, cheapy eBay Miata short throw in mine for this year.
That hole is essential. On a rx7. I just installed a new tstat on mine. Got it from Mazdatrix and it was oem. Not only a hole but the tiny piece of wire that's crimped on both ends (I call it the jiggler) that's suspended in the hole. Gotta have it!!
Close Paul!,actually referred to as a jiggle valve. Another bit of terminology to plug into your brain...
While everyone did more complex things, this and that, I finally got to replace my crumpled driver side fender last Friday! My donor fender has some surface rust and the paint looks like absolute sh*t!!! But I've got plans for a respray coming up, as well as for my other front bumper and header panel.
Tomorrow I'm picking up some Kosei K1s (4x110, 15x7 I think), which I'm pretty excited about (need new tires anyways, my current ones are belting and I drive on the highway to work every day :/) Since one tire is a 195 and the other three are 185s, I'll go for 195s in the back and 185s in the front. Or, taking the speedo into thought, maybe 185s will be more accurate (and cheaper!).
I finally gave her a much needed wash and interior clean/vacuum. God it looks so much better inside.
I replaced all of the clutch hydraulics after what was likely the original slave blew up, and learned a few things:
Rockauto sells a master cylinder advertised with the correct thread pitch for an early SA. It may not actually have that thread pitch. Same goes for the slave cylinder.
Autozone not only carries a master cylinder with that thread pitch, they had one in stock locally.
Threading the clutch hard line into the wrong pitch master cylinder is a bad idea.
Rethreading dies are amazingly useful, because you can't get a formed hardline anywhere, and hardly anyone sells m10x1.25 brake line nuts.
Also, the top bolt for the master cylinder is a lot easier to get to if you take out the seat and put your head right under the clutch pedal.
I replaced all of the clutch hydraulics after what was likely the original slave blew up, and learned a few things:
Rockauto sells a master cylinder advertised with the correct thread pitch for an early SA. It may not actually have that thread pitch. Same goes for the slave cylinder.
Autozone not only carries a master cylinder with that thread pitch, they had one in stock locally.
Threading the clutch hard line into the wrong pitch master cylinder is a bad idea.
Rethreading dies are amazingly useful, because you can't get a formed hardline anywhere, and hardly anyone sells m10x1.25 brake line nuts.
Also, the top bolt for the master cylinder is a lot easier to get to if you take out the seat and put your head right under the clutch pedal.
WOW!! You had a few head aches there! There is also a difference in the brass fitting that mates between the master cylinder and the hard line. Luckily the parts "LADY" caught it. Actually she was a hot twenty something.....who would of thought!
I want to flag your useful post for future reference.
I replaced all of the clutch hydraulics after what was likely the original slave blew up, and learned a few things:
Rockauto sells a master cylinder advertised with the correct thread pitch for an early SA. It may not actually have that thread pitch. Same goes for the slave cylinder.
Autozone not only carries a master cylinder with that thread pitch, they had one in stock locally.
Threading the clutch hard line into the wrong pitch master cylinder is a bad idea.
Rethreading dies are amazingly useful, because you can't get a formed hardline anywhere, and hardly anyone sells m10x1.25 brake line nuts.
Also, the top bolt for the master cylinder is a lot easier to get to if you take out the seat and put your head right under the clutch pedal.
Why not just make a new hardline? Not hard, at all, right? (One of my coworkers spent I think doing a line for at least an hour, looked like a pain in the ***!!)
(One of my coworkers spent I think doing a line for at least an hour, looked like a pain in the ***!!)
