Valkyrie

Well, I spent the last two days (I drove home Friday night and just got back a while ago) taking off my LIM so I could free my apparently stuck 5/6th ports (strangely, as soon as I pulled the manifold off, they were suddenly able to move...). It wouldn't have taken so long except for me spending about 2-3 hours chipping the OOOOOOLLLLD gasket off the LIM that I had never bothered to remove, and I had to go by some more copper washers for the OMP lines (strangely, one of them didn't have gaskets, and it was barely screwed on...silly me), and new hoses (brake vacuum hose on the manifold side was dry-rotted to hell and back), etc...

While I was working on it, I noticed there was a vacuum hose undone (I already replaced that one before because it was oily and loose, now it's oily again... I need to ziptie it on or get a clamp), which sort of explains why my idle was slightly wonky (it still almost stalls sometimes after decelerating when it's cold though...), and a few lose ground bolts, so it runs a bit better, and I think I could tell the ports are working now when I passed someone in 2nd gear from 40 ends up at 80 REAL fast (in a 40...lol... I was just feeling impatient). But I need to confirm

I was also able to set the idle properly now, and the BAC seems to have a more more prominent effect with the vacuum leak gone (before it wouldn't drop the idle when it was unplugged), and since the idle was a bit stronger, I was able to retard the timing back to stock settings (a little quiter, but it still runs well enough) .

The ironic part is that now when I shift at redline, it doesn't backfire any more, but instead it makes small pop noise every damn time I let it to zero throttle and then give it throttle again (probably leading to a nice hot muffer). I know this means I need to adjust my TPS... the settings were correct in terms of resistance, but the green test plug had voltage out of both ends, so I assume that means I need to get a test light to test it properly (neither of them wanted to turn off).

Valkyrie

I'm still dealing with this problem... it's starting to get very annoying. It afterburns like clockwork.

At this point I'd take the backfire at every redline shift over a small (and sometimes not so small) backfire every time I shift.

I fiddled with the timing a bit (advanced it like it used to be), and it actually made things worse. I got that annoying popping sound that the car had when I first got it running... so I changed it back, although I can't set it for sure since I don't have my timing gun with me, and for that matter, I don't really trust the marks on my pulleys anyway, since I can't even tell which one is the original yellow mark. Perhaps I should re-stab the CAS again to just be sure...

I also checked the TPS about a bajillion times, and it's set dead on, but it still afterburns like a maniac...

Maybe I should check the sparkplugs for fouling? They're one of the things I never really changed on the car, since they looked new when I got it.

I'm not sure, but it feels like I might have lost some power from messing with the timing...

Anyway, does anyone know what could be causing it, or how I could fix it?

The ECU is only throwing a code for the split air solenoid, and my dashpot is FUBAR'ed, but it was just as bad around the time I had the one big backfire and not the bajillion small ones.

Valkyrie

I cleaned my spark plugs... they seemed normal (tan deposits with just a little bit of carbon) I think my front leading lead wasn't plugged in all the way!

I hope it drives better now, anyway...

I'll probably need to get a dashpot to get rid of ALL the popping, since it keeps the throttle from closing shut so much (it only pops when the throttle is closed completely and then opened again). Maybe the anti-afterburn valve in the AVC isn't working right... it's too much of a pain to test it (you have to unplug the hose that goes between the air pump and the AVC), though.

Maybe the vacuum leak I had caused it to run lean, correcting the problem? Now that I have no leaks, it may be running rich again...

I wish I had my timing gun, at least.