archaphil

iTrader: (1)

Well I have a video from yesterday, then my today got very interesting, very quickly.

Video:

Ah yes, then this brings us to today. I did exactly as I said and took the car out for a rip snot. brought it down to the lake for a shitty cellphone photo shoot that even grabbed a picture of a *******:







I then decide to drive across town to my step fathers and see how it does. The car at this point is behaving like a well trained dog and I have no reason to suspect it of treasonous behavour. It Brakes like a champ, runs through the gears like a champ, needs an alignment like a champ, and really really needs tires like a champ. Go Team!

Get to his place with no issue, pop the hood to check for leaks and or my own mechanical inability. No leaks, still purring like a kitten. So my step dad suggests that I take it to a car show this evening. I had planned on driving his other Camaro up there and leaving this girl in the garage. but NOPE.

Detailed the **** out of it for 5 hours and it is looking like pure Japanese sex metal. So he and his MINT 67 ss camaro embarked to our car club friends house to get a pack of 5 cars together to roll in at the same time.

We embark to the car show, and as all v8 muscle cars love to do, peel around corners, burnouts etc. Well, Step dad lines up next to another buddy in his classic and I am right behind my step dad... ugh I cannot think of the model at this point... Any ways, Step dad Launches and buddy is barely holding. Meanwhile, I had some kind of god damn superman launch because my car ******* hooked up and just launched like a son of a bitch (This new PBM stuff is amazing btw). I was right on stepdads nuts into third gear when my throttle decided to stick WOT. Something needs some attention. I had to key off the ignition over 70mph in neutral and coast to a side street to investigate. Sure as ****, stuck throttle linkage...

Any who, Fiddled with that for a moment and all is well.

So, I made it into the show ( They stole $10 from me, bastards)

Here I am, eying potential drive-train swaps:





jk jk.

Around 100 cars. not a bad turn out for an apple-bees meet that I had not even heard about. A few people respected my hard work. 2 people in general really loved what I had done with the car and **** there britches once I told them to look at the odometer. Guess what they drive? A speed6 and a miata undergoing a sr20det swap. Either way, good stuff. The one guy is interested in buying my red car, so I may have wheel/tire money soon! YAY!.

I pooped on some Audi something or other non turbo v6 on my way home as well. Was hilarious. Punk *** teen in a red Audi A4 body, with blacked out wheels. I did not catch the engine size on the trunk as I never saw it. But by my guess, non turbo for certain.

I have now officially put 70 miles on the car. I drove the hell out of it today to try and see if I have serious long term issues. I can not stress how happy I am right now. This thing is a treat, and a privilege to drive. I shall respect it in all of its glory. I am stunned, for how long it sat, that it behaves so well.

Cheers, guys. I will try and get some quality photos at some point.

clokker

iTrader: (2)

Well, good on you, mate.
I'll blow a bowl (or ten) in your honor.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

[IMG][/IMG]

Red one has been resurrected once more, and I liked the shot, however my phone camera failed to capture the emotion. Needs more Michael Bay, or lens flare....idk.

Pulled a muscle in my back at work yesterday and took today off to catch up on things and relax a bit and catch up on life stuff. The white car is now permanently parked until I get new tires at the very least. I drove it to work fine, and decided to go home for lunch. It was at this point the dry rotted cracked tires finally showed there ugly face. The rear end was like a ice rink, and kept walking out randomly. It was quite weird and a tad scary at first. Luckily I work close to home and took back roads/babied it back to the garage.

I have a guy interested in buying my red car, but flaked on me tonight.

clokker

iTrader: (2)

The (mismatched) wheels and tires Sigfrid drove the Z home on were the worst I've ever seen.
Fortunately, he only had to go ten miles or so and within an hour the car was up on stands and we'd begun stripping her down.
We rolled the wheels to the side of the garage where a few days later, one tire exploded spontaneously (probably heated up by the sun).

That was exciting.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

I bet it was. They go "boom" quite nicely. This actually reminds me that I need to top off the air in them again. A fruitless cause I know..

Need to detail and wax the red car and attempt to grit my teeth with using craigslist to sell it.
I may try my luck on here, but... probably not. I figure I am including tons of spare parts with it and it runs with me being the second owner for $800 is a good deal. I did the math, and I have over $2k in part out value sitting there. Pretty good deal in my eyes, but all in the eyes of the beholder. The car is destined to be a track car now as it has seen its beauty years come and gone.

trickster

I dont know why I never thought to see if you had a build thread. I gotta read through this when I get some time

trickster

Well I went through the whole thing and I admit I didn't watch the first few videos because I was on my phone but I started watching after you showed the underbody coating that you did. I cant believe you did a video progress along the way, I was considering it but I dont have enough gopro batteries to record the whole thing and I ended up opting for just the 30 second photo lapse. Nice work putting in the effort to actually record the steps.

Thoughts along the way:

that underbody is so clean! I feel stupid for not taking more care and getting new bushings and bolts as I did my swap but I am really rushing to get it done and I try just push on with that in mind. But that will mean I have to do double the work later. But really, my underbody is so **** compared to yours. My jacking points are messed up and I use the rocker rails always for jacking, but throughout the project its starting to get weaker and weaker so now I just jack from the subframes. This makes me really wary to ever have to go to a shop though because I won't want them to lift the car up. So I'm super jealous.

Also painting of the diff and control arms was a nice touch looks so shiny now. Also I feel the same way that after all this work I dont even know how long the engine will run, and it could just be a few months before it conks out? I totally feel your pain getting that subframe in I was rewatching my gopro photos and im just rolling around struggling haha.

One way however that our cars arent twins is that Ive got the blue interior but I really prefer the red.

Haha your first start went great! The first time I started was the first fire Ive ever had to deal with haha.

Oh man! you got your electrical figured out and a great 750rpm idle.

wow thats a sweet setup for checking for leaks. I see what you mean now. I dont know where I can even get smoke bombs in canada. I'll have to figure out some alternative. I was planning to go with the brake booster line, might have to just smoke into it or something.

Where did you measure from to adjust the ride height? My rear quarter was repaired so I dont want to measure from the body, and the underbody is all lumpy so I dont really want to measure from there either??

Well it took a couple hours but I went through it all. Great work man the car looks awesome and you even managed to get it out to a meet!

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

Thanks Trickster. I have been watching your progress as well.

For Ride height I "assumed" my garage floor is level. Then I measured from the ground to the top of the fender arches on the outside of the car. So the middle of the fender arch.

I started with the rear as a baseline and then I adjusted the perch's of the coil over the difference in inches - Centimeters etc. Not sure if that is the right way to do it, but it worked for me. Once I get new wheels I will probably end up having to adjust them again.

As for the smoke machine, you could use a charcoal briquette and some card board scraps. Heat the charcoal up with a torch or your stove, and plop it in the can with the scraps. Just make sure you bag off the intake or anywhere the air can escape. Not entirely sure how I would go about this, as I do not have a turbo engine in front of me to look at. I have an S5 Turbo II engine in the garage. but it is the bare keg.

All in all though I am happy I restored this car from sitting 20+ years

trickster

Thanks for the tips I'll try and make something like that. And yeah you did a great job, i dont know if youve done it before but now you can say you've restored a car.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

I was going to upload a video, but kept choking up, Red car is sold and gone now. Already miss the old bastard.

But, this does free up my wallet now to purchase some rubber for the ol' whitey. Truth be told, I am trying to buy a set of bbs LM's at the moment.. A tad out of my budget, But I am willing to eat ramen for a month to have them.

clokker

iTrader: (2)

The less you weigh the longer your tires will last.

That's why Ethiopians are so dominant at LeMans.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

I am already 6'3" and 150lbs man!

clokker

iTrader: (2)

A femur resection should eliminate the unwanted height and shed some poundage at the same time.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

well I am now stumped.

Car sat for a month while I saved some money to put tires on the car. New tires, and a new air filter are the only things that I have touched on the car in a month. But now I have a lack of power when accelerating.

It is boggy WOT, and feels similar to how a slipping clutch feels without it actually slipping if that makes sense. It is like having half throttle open at WOT. I have a video but it is more me just being an incoherent whiner then actually being productive.

I had a couple thoughts to hunt this thing down:

Tires rubbing? checked, and no.
Air filter installed wrong? Checked, and no. (can't possibly **** that up)
Coil wires loose? Checked, all good.

The only thing I have yet to touch is the TPS, and I am not entirely sure that this issue would be a result of this. The car idles a hair below 750rpm and still purrs like a kitten. It is able to reach redline, but just feels gutless getting there.

My step dad noted an "exhaust leak" when I drove the car to his house yesterday, and I thought nothing of it because the car is inherently loud with my exhaust setup. But... I kinda think there is an exhaust leak now.

Could an exhaust leak cause a dramatic loss of power?

Again, I am without ideas presently. My garage has "new tire" scent though presently.. so that is pleasant enough in of itself.

cluosborne

13B 6-port non-turbo engines have auxiliary port actuators that turn sleeves located in the engine block that provide extra air above 3800 RPM and are driven by exhaust back pressure from the air tube on the catalytic converter. Check the actuators to make sure that they turn by hand, and also disconnect and run low-pressure (below 10psi, you could also use your breath) air through to see if the actuators move.

If the actuators move by hand and when running air through, then check the hose connecting the actuators to the split air tube. If the actuators themselves don't move, it could be carbon buildup causing the sleeves to stick. Or, the air passages could be clogged and just need to be cleaned out (too much sealant can cause this).

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

^ All been cleaned and brand new. They are moving freely. Picture a 34k mile engine that has had everything gone through and torn apart down to the rotating assembly. That is what I have. It ran perfect and not one single issue when parked a month ago. I have only put 100 miles on it since I finished restoring it. Unless one of the apex seals decided to get stuck on me, I am running out of ideas. I will double check the secondarys for giggles.


Things I am going to do soon:

- pull the plugs and see how they look
- double check exhaust gaskets and bolt torque on the entire exhaust system.

Things worth noting: It free revs just fine, you would be non the wiser that anything is wrong with it. Under load and acceleration is where it feels like water in the gas tank syndrome.

cluosborne

The actuators will only activate when the engine is under load.

If there's an exhaust leak, then the lack of back-pressure would mean the actuators aren't getting the pressure it needs for them to open.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

Well, I hooked my mighty vac up to the hose connected to the Aux ports, and they are indeed functioning. I then proceeded to give the exhaust a look over.

I found my leak, but it is waaaaay at the back where the muffler bolts to the Y-pipe. I am having a hard time believing that a leak that far back is killing my power in the manner that it is.

I got a cool burn out of the adventure though:

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

Losing my mind boys...

SO, I went ahead and replaced some exhaust gaskets and got out my grinder and made sure everything noise related is coming out of the muffler tips. Drove it to work today and no change (as I expected).

I did notice that I am having what appears to be the dreaded 3800rpm hesitation. The car operates fine after 5k rpm, and below 2200ish rpm. This is frustrating because I know damn well that I cleaned and torqued every single ground while the engine was apart. ESPECIALLY the ecu ground on the top of the keg.

All I can come up with at this point is a stuck seal of some sort in the rotating assembly (runs to good to be this though) or an air/fuel delivery issue. Which is also frustrating because everything is brand new and or rebuilt.

My turbo engine in the corner is starting to look more and more appealing at this point. ugh

EDIT:

doing homework and adding this as my project for this weekend:

https://www.rx7club.com/2nd-generati...tation-689183/

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

Well. Took the upper intake manifold off this morning and realized I mounted the ECU ground to the bracket that supports the UIM at the backside. While this is not really a bad thing, I like my grounds grounded. I moved it an inch over to the proper mounting location as well as added a ground to the boost/pressure sensor that now bolts to the same location as well.

This seems to have solved the issue. At first it ever so slightly hesitated kicking over to the secondary's, but then it did not repeat. I made sure to do a few pulls and run the the rev range gentle to see if all was well. Everything seems green light again.

I then took a 2 hour road trip with it and reveled in all the stares I got.

clokker

iTrader: (2)

Quit driving naked.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

Small updates I suppose.

Here is a quick look at what I have been up to lately as well as what I was up to today:


And here is a look at some headaches:


Took it out for a spirited drive after everything and I still had a small gallop that went away... I suspect something ever so small is sucking air into the system and over time develops a decent sized air pocket to do what it was doing. Time to buy another tool kit..

Broke_A_Baller

iTrader: (26)

your coolant isn't getting oil in it is it?

TonyD89

iTrader: (10)

I was thinking the same thing.

archaphil

iTrader: (1)

nope. was stored 20 years with coolant in it. I am lucky the thing runs honestly. Well, I can not say 20 years solid. The PO had the engine out at one point. Not sure when, But I do know prior to that it sat for a LONG time. I Had the car out after everything today and it goes like stink on **** again. It started to gallop slightly, but went away... I am going to pressure test the system and see where the EFF air is getting in. Nothing leaks, Oil is always clear, Nothing EVER appears a miss. I am going to guess a clamp or something simple that builds up over time.