7Rebel

I was dropping off the deposits at the bank for work .... After I left the drive through I stopped at the stop sign and seen smoke through the vents .... Stopped right away opened the hood and seen flames .... Slammed the hood .... Went back in my car and hit the fuel cut off switch .... Than grabbed the fire extinguisher I had behind the drivers seat .... Opened the hood and put out the fire! .... This all happened in about 30 seconds ... I was freaking soooooo bad.

There were a lot of flames but there was hardly any damage! I am sooooo glad I had a fire extinguisher.

Anyway i could use some advice .... After I replaced the starter the kid that lives in the room next to me complained to the land lord that I got Greece all over the bathroom ..... So I will need to bring it somewhere to get fixed ....

How much $$ an I looking at .... I am sure the only damage is the pulsation damper and maybe one rubber hose and part of the fuel line. Should I upgrade to the 89-92 PD or just have them replace it with the same part #? ..... If I go with the 89-92 would it be a lot more?

Thanks guys

Oh yah ... this just happend today around 11am and the car was running fine even though it was up in flames .... It only stopped running after I hit the fuel cut off switch. Than my work had it towed to my pad

SaabGuy

I cant believe you are talking about upgrades. You are lucky to be alive! Guess I should get myself a fire extinguisher.

Make sure everything related to fuel has new lines and hose clamps.

Yelow RX-7

what made it go up in flames????? dam im sorry to hear that...

7Rebel

The reason I am thinking about upgrading the PD was because I heard the ones from 86-88 were known for leaking fuel and starting engine fires ... My car has a lot of miles and I didn't know if the guy who owned the car before replaced it or not .... so I kept a fire extinguisher just to be safe

Node

iTrader: (1)

before i was so rudely interrupted by the forum going down
I typed up and almost posted this

The pulsation damper on the fuel rail on sereis 4 RX-7s are notorious for leaking on occassion and they leak right onto the headers, which ignites the fuel eventually. I think this is what happens. Anyways its awful

And I'm glad you were so prepared for this. Fuel cut off, extinguisher and you were there to notice. Good luck w/ your flamethrower..erm rex

7Rebel

I think it was the pulsation damper .... I have been kinda expecting it to start leaking

Node

iTrader: (1)

upgrade to a series 5 pulsation damper.
http://home.earthlink.net/~burntoast...iondamper.html

supergoat

You can and should upgrade to the 89+. However I believe you have to use a 89+ fuel rail as well. I'm sure someone will read this and comment on it.

Hope this helps.

HOZZMANRX7

iTrader: (43)

Had this happen to my '88 Vert. And, yes luckily I carry a fire extinguisher also. And, yes, I believe it was a leaking pulsation damper in my case also.

What I had to replace was the wiring harness to the ECU, one of the injectors, and all the vacume, fuel, and coolant hoses that run around the intake Plenum and anything else rubber or plastic the flame may have touched. You'll also need to replace one of the main fuses near the battery. I'll bet it blew before any damage hit your ECU from the harness wires shorting out together.

Also, you should be prepared to replace some or all of the switch's (ie TPS) on the intake/exhaust side of the engine in case the flame licked any of them too.

Did it pretty much with wrecking yard parts EXCEPT went new on the Pulsation damper and Hoses. Not a bad idea to upgrade to the '89-'91 fuel rail/damper set up. Also, I sent my injectors to RD Engineering to make sure they weren't damaged and have them back-flushed and tuned since you'll have everything apart anyway.

Actually, once I assembled all the parts, it only took about an afternoon to install and get everything running again.

Funny thing. I always carried the fire extinguisher in case someone else needed help. Never dawned on me I'd need it for myself. It was amazing how the flame went from small to big the moment I opened the hood.

I also learned that blowing on the flame doesn't help.

7Rebel

lol the same thing happened to me!
I will be riding my mountain bike to work for the next few weeks till I get paid ... maybe we can go cruising together!

You know a awful lot about the 7 for someone that hasn't owned one yet .... I'm sure when you get one you'll have no problem maintaining it!

Node

iTrader: (1)

hopefully ill have no problems. and i hope you can get her up and running safely and relatively cheaply.

HOZZMANRX7

iTrader: (43)

tsk tsk tsk

Fc3sracer

You have to upgrade to a whole series five fuel system.

HOZZMANRX7

iTrader: (43)

I think if its a decision to either replace your existing Pulsation Damper (PD) with a new one, OR replace with 100% use Series 5 set up.......... you're better off staying with a NEW Series 4 PD.

7Rebel

I have wire harness on the way that I purchased last week from another forum member .... I'm glad i didn't install that first!
For the most part the hoses and wires look ok ... I really would like to wait on the injectors because I plan on putting TII injectors as soon as I can afford them ... I have a used Plentum ... TB ....TPS ... and I think lower(or mid?)intake in storrage if needed. I have been keeping it in storrage till I could get them all ported and pollished ....
The fire really didn't look like it did much outer damage at all .... but you do have me a little worried about the injectors


I'm glad you said it did not take that long to get it running again. It was almost like I have been waiting for this to happen .... so many people have told me DO NOT drive till you fix your PD .... buuuuuttttt something always came up and I would say to myself I can drive a few more weeks ....

tesla042

er..I just tossed the rail on.


Here's what you need to do:
*Get a 89-91 fuel rail.. I bought two of them for under 30$ each recently.. www.thepartstrader.com and here. If you can get the 89-91 mounting bolts, that will be helpful. You'll probably also want the plastic spacer--I'm sure it's melted.

*Get the extention manifold->dynamic chamber gasket
*Get the lower manifold->extention manifold gasket
*Get about 2 or 3 feet of 5/16" *FUEL INJECTION* hose..prolly some new clamps, too

*Take off your intake down to where you have good access to the fuel rail. Take the old fuel rail off, as well as all the hoses.

*Coat the injector o-rings with oil. It would be a good idea to actually replace the o-rings, but you "can" slide. Put them in the rail, then mount the rail back on the block. Remember the plastic spacer! You could also send the injectors off to have them cleaned... not a bad idea, and they would change the o-rings anyway

*Put the hoses back on, and pressure test the system. Fix any leaks *NOW*.

*put the manifolds back on, have fun.

Did i forget something?

-Tesla

7Rebel

Right now I'm thinking of just replacing the old one because it will be a lot cheeper but upgrade to a whole series five fuel system seems like it will be much better for long term.

7Rebel

Thanks ... this helps a lot!!

HOZZMANRX7

iTrader: (43)

I thought so too. But, when I actually pulled them they were hard and brittle. The Fuel and vacume hose's are cheap, just cut from a roll. But, the coolant hoses are a factory molded item.

Trust me, plan on replacing the hoses. Those flames licked them for sure.

Also, it only costs about $20 each to have the injectors tested, backflushed, and tuned. Cheap as you have expert confirmation that the injectors are good, you'll probably notice seat of the pants improvement right away, and takes care of leaky flooding issues.

Once you get your T2 injectors, you can probably recapture your investment on e-bay if you mention they were redone by RC Engineering in your item description.

AE Turbo

Damn, that sucks man. I remebr when my first AE went up in smoke. I saw smoke comming out of the hood scoop and from the sides of the car. Some passer by yelled,"YOUR CAR IS ON FIRE!!" then pulled in to the first place I saw...a gas station hehe. As soon I got off the road, I turned the fuel pump off and let the car roll to the very back of the gas station. I got outta the car and there was a poof of flames from around where the precat was. I got a fire extinguisher popped the hood to put out the flames. After the flames were gone, some parts of the engine were glowing red for 10 minutes after. That was on New Years day of 2001. Burned engine bay + previously bad oil seals + previous frame damage = Junk. I sold it to some guy for $300, RIP.

I blew the engine on my second AE in September. Damn these cars; they leave me broke but I still keep coming back for more!

Mazda2ndgen

there is another option that no one has posted yet. You can just replace the PD with a banjo bolt and just get rid of the thing. Unfortunatly i do not remember the correct size of the bolt. Ted told me a long time ago, but i have since forgotten. Im sure if you post about it, or search for it you can find it. Personaly, when mine went bad (i found out about the banjo bolt thing a few days after i ordred the new pd, doh!) i just replaced it with the 86-88 one again. I figured it took it 12 years to go bad, so i'll have another 12 years of serivce. just somthing to think aobut

Node

iTrader: (1)

good point about the 12 years, and we'll just wait for ted to reply to this thread :-D

Gene

iTrader: (1)

I'm betting that ted will actually gripe that the PD is supposed to be there, because it prevents weird harmonics in the fuel system which are caused by the injectors clicking on and off

Dyre

You know you could probably do all the work yourself without anyone knowing.

Im still trying to find a decent price on a series 5 rails so i can swap out mine before the damper goes bad... until then i'll just carry the fire extinguisher and hope nothing goes wrong.

closing the hood while grabing the extinguisher was a VERY good idea btw... starve the fire of air and it wont do as much damage.

7Rebel

hey ... I was just looking through some of my old papers that I printed out about the PD from 1999. One was a post that you started .... at the time you were a Cool Newbie with 7 posts

I new I heard about the banjo bolt before from someone lol