The head gasket slayer! - Page 4

spyhunter · 09-23-2010, 03:37 AM

Reminds me of my old setup.....NOSTALGIA! <3, you still have a helluva a lot more stuff under the hood than i had. :-x

looking good.

Quote:

Originally Posted by [ion] C2

Back up and running. Cometic sealed and leak-free. Only thing left to do is install a gasket between the wastegate and dump tube because I forgot to and it leaks noise, and the turbocharger oil feed fitting leaks oil a little still, so new fitting for that.

-Alero- · 09-23-2010, 06:18 AM

Ion - has the turbo givin any issue with the heat shielding on the firewall? also I wonder what this setup would look like with a battery relocate. Just a thought, other than that some good work on the head. Also enjoy that new reservoir while it lasts heh

[ion] C2 · 09-23-2010, 10:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spyhunter

Reminds me of my old setup.....NOSTALGIA! <3, you still have a helluva a lot more stuff under the hood than i had. :-x

looking good.

Ha yeah being that it's a top mount manifold I figured why not have everything visible. It's like bam turbo, intake manifold, BOV, hoshit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by -Alero-

Ion - has the turbo givin any issue with the heat shielding on the firewall?

Yeah as you can see it killed it, the fiberglass is all exposed as the black covering has fallen apart. I planned on covering the firewall with that shiny silver DEI heat shield during this process but time got short and so did money. I'll probably do it though very soon, I hate touching that fiberglass with my arms when I work around there.

Quote:

Originally Posted by -Alero-

also I wonder what this setup would look like with a battery relocate. Just a thought, other than that some good work on the head. Also enjoy that new reservoir while it lasts heh

I plan on having a carbon fiber battery cover for it, plus I likethe way things are laid out in my bay. The new reservoir is nice, the cap goes on properly on this one. My old reservoir's threads were messed up and it was very tight putting any cap on. After breaking 3 of them in half, I finally got a new unit. The old 3's spring loaded center pieces flew out at me when taking off the cap when they broke. lol

Cooling system fully operational. Car runs just a HAIR above what it used to "back in the day" as far as I remember. Gauge sticks right around half and the highest it goes is where you can see a little bit of the middle tick mark underneath the needle. (AKA 190-200 degrees) which is well within safe and normal ranges. Even after some wide open pulls and hard driving, it won't go above that point, so that's good.

I turned the boost to 20 psi. There's a boost leak though, fixing that today then possibly getting a video.

[ion] C2 · 09-23-2010, 06:02 PM

Wasn't a boost leak. At least, not in the way I thought.

I've got a feeling my #1 spark plug shouldn't look like this:

I noticed it seemed at higher boost pressures 10+, the car doesn't seem as quick, and even when at 20 psi, it feels like 10, car doesn't seem to pull any harder whatsoever. Today on my way to work after tightening and re-doing all of my clamps ultra-tight and checking hoses for boost leaks, I did a short 30-70 pull, resulting in a flashing SES light. Immediately drove slowly, pulled into work and scanned the code and of course a P0300, random/multiple misfires. After work I pulled the spark plugs, #1 looked like above, the rest were just relatively normal looking, but gapped at like .050. I gapped the new plugs to .030 like I used to have them (figured maybe getting blowout).

I have a feeling though that I have a vacuum/boost leak where the #1 port is, so it's leaning out while the others seem fine. I'm going to do a boost leak test ASAP to verify this. I only used black RTV, a coat on the intake manifold and on the head to seal the intake to the head, rather than the paper intake manifold gasket AND RTV on both surfaces.

I'm hoping that is all it is, and it would explain my "hair above normal" temperature condition if that cylinder is getting hotter than it should. I regret doing those pulls last night and questioning why it didn't feel as quick as it should be. Hope everything's still alright. If there is a vacuum leak (let's hope so), and I fix it, I'm definitely not driving it around hard whatsoever until I get it re-tuned and safely straightened out.

-Alero- · 09-23-2010, 06:11 PM

jesus one little thing after another, gotta love turbo headaches, that plug looks seriously nasty, you dont think its another head problem do you?

[ion] C2 · 09-23-2010, 06:48 PM

No. The surfaces were prepped properly and the head was torqued down very well. It also has a multi-layer stainless steel gasket..

Going to do a compression test and a boost/vacuum leak test though. I guess the sound I heard was detonation. If cylinder 1 is lean and the rest are decent, that will throw off the AFR readings and the closed loop operation so things may seem somewhat fine, but in cylinder 1, it's not. When I listen to the exhaust I can hear it, sounds just like when I had a vacuum leak at the head before.

pimpalero2003 · 09-23-2010, 07:10 PM

Glad new car is already boosted lol seems like one headache after another lol but good luck getting it perfect.

[ion] C2 · 09-23-2010, 11:19 PM

Taking my fuel injectors to Kinsler Fuel Injection tomorrow for cleaning and flowtesting. It would make perfect sense that that injector is clogged.

guiguilandry · 09-23-2010, 11:47 PM

true, it could be that for sure, because you clearly have not enough if no fuel at all to burn a plug like this fast... anychance that a particle of dirt got stock in the fuel rail ?? maybe

Quote:

Originally Posted by [ion] C2

Taking my fuel injectors to Kinsler Fuel Injection tomorrow for cleaning and flowtesting. It would make perfect sense that that injector is clogged.

[ion] C2 · 09-24-2010, 12:24 AM

The injectors stayed in the fuel rail pretty much the entire time the engine was torn down, but the fuel rail was moved around and away and the injectors rested on a towel over the engine bay components. The injector may have gotten damaged, who knows. They were used when I bought them.

I'm hoping that injector is messed up. It would explain my "just slightly above what I would call normal" coolant temperature since that cylinder would be running a lot hotter too. If that cylinder had little to no fuel it would also throw off the balance and power overall significantly. I'm basically missing 80-100 HP lol.

spyhunter · 09-24-2010, 05:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by -Alero-

Ion - has the turbo givin any issue with the heat shielding on the firewall? also I wonder what this setup would look like with a battery relocate. Just a thought, other than that some good work on the head. Also enjoy that new reservoir while it lasts heh

with the power of SHAZAM!

[ion] C2 · 09-27-2010, 03:37 PM

Injectors tested out perfectly.

At 45 psi they flow 60 lb/hr and at 60 psi they flow 75 lb/hr, interesting note.

Got a few other ideas I'm checking in to.

JLw7123 · 09-27-2010, 04:10 PM

oh that sucks well do you have any leaks or is anything clogged like any of the hoses. Does the turbo spool up. how about a worn out boost controller.

[ion] C2 · 09-27-2010, 06:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JLw7123

oh that sucks well do you have any leaks or is anything clogged like any of the hoses. Does the turbo spool up. how about a worn out boost controller.

That doesn't even make sense lol.

I'm going to reinstall the fuel injectors tonight (boost is turned back down to like 13 or 14, not sure yet), and then do a boost/vacuum leak test tomorrow as well as install an intake manifold gasket if there's a leak there (right now it's just RTV, no actual gasket). Tomorrow I will also install NGK TR7 spark plugs, which are one more step colder than what I have, to help eliminate any detonation.

It MAY just be because I'm running 23 degrees of advance on a poor fuel tune and 18-20 PSI on 93 octane, who knows. I'll know more after tomorrow and I drive it.

JLw7123 · 09-27-2010, 06:38 PM

well good luck finding the problem.

Chris2000 · 09-27-2010, 07:04 PM

Your problem is RTV man. It is not meant to be used as a gasket replacement especially in high heat areas. Check the label.

[ion] C2 · 09-27-2010, 07:10 PM

Last time I used the laser cut fiber gasket I had to use RTV on both the manifold and the head to seal it properly. This time I solely used RTV. I have a couple intake gaskets that just were delivered so I will boost leak test it tomorrow and if it leaks there I'll redo the manifold install with the proper gasket + RTV to ensure a solid seal.

I doubt it's that but it would be nice. I'm just thinking plugs are too hot and spark is too high for the amount of boost pressure. Here's hoping.

guiguilandry · 09-27-2010, 09:25 PM

Good luck finding the gremlin of the melting plug.... but did you noticed some knock... checked with a scanner ???anyway it cannot hurt running colder spark plus I run 4 steps colder on my L67 than the stock ones... and it's fine even at 16 psi on 91 octane without intercooling with methanol i do get a little knock but not much

[ion] C2 · 09-27-2010, 09:41 PM

HPTuners is not with me, it's with XanderWifi, so I have no way to log or analyze any data. I increased the spark advance by like 3 degrees, and somewhat disabled knock retard... like a retard. So I have to take it easy until I can retune.

[ion] C2 · 09-28-2010, 02:07 PM

So I put the injectors back in, and my colder spark plugs. Car has a little bit of stumbling and the exhaust has the vacuum leak pop still. I can also still hear a unique whistling when I drive, the idle takes a while to go down at stops, the vacuum level seems weaker than udual... so I assume it's just a vacuum leak. Doing the boost/vacuum leak test tomorrow and fixing wherever it's seeping through. Likely intake to head as described above.