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Tech / General EngineIs your car making a strange sound or won't start? Thinking of adding power with a new combination? Need other technical information or engine specific advice? Don't see another board for your problem? Post it here!
Took off the intake manifold to "look around". Didn't look like anything wrong in there. We will see if runs better. Everything checked out- EGR system, block grounds, etc.
Sorta wrapped up my HID retrofit. I went with some cheap ~$25 projectors off Amazon since this is my first time doing it. I will probably do them over again at some point with Morimoto MH1's and better quality bulbs and ballasts. The bulbs are 4300K but they're a bit bluer than I thought they'd be, but that might just be because they were cheap. They seem to flicker slightly too, but they've been doing it less the more I use them. Not turning off or anything, just like little flares of light. Could probably improve the light output with some more attentive bulb shimming as well.
finally corrected my click of death. it was wheel bearings. im glad it was because I have replaced everything else. the bearing that was in it was plastic. no joke..plastic. took it for a multi turn multi circle. multi U-turn and never had any clicking. im calling this fixed. the grease in the rotor was a consistency id never seen. it almost looked like rubber. got that all cleaned out and regreased properly. I can now move on to all the other thinks that are broken. WIN
cleaned my garage from the messy job yesterday. bearing grease gets on everything. its all spick and span now. I have everything laid out for rear springs, shocks, trans mount, and if I have time a 80 series flowmaster. im going to lube all the bushings really well while im under there. that's not as good as replacing them with new bushings but I don't have new bushings so that's as good as its going to get.
spent a couple hours under the car today. I changed the original springs out for some voitland 1.25 inch lowering springs and the original shocks for kyb adjustable. my new flowmaster 80 series came in today but I didn't install it. tomorrow will be muffler and maybe trans mount. good day.
got under the race car today and installed a flowmaster series muffler. by my calculation it should ave been about an hour job. of course it took 3 times that. going from the 2 inch exhaust to the 2.5 inch inlet was the first hurdle. the second was that the stock tailpipe didn't fit. the third was that the 80 series has 2 outlets and the final was that the subframe doesn't have a lot of places to install exhaust hangers. its in now and everything works great. sounds awesome too. im pleased with how everything turned out. it has more drone in the car than the stock had but its not loud.
Decided to drive my '89 to work today. While working, I had a delivery on my street. As I drive past my house, I see a stack of 4 wheel boxes peeking out from behind a column. I turn around at the dead end & stop at my house. Take the wheels into the garage. They are a day early. 17x9 reproduction Iroc Z wheels. '88-'90 style. Got them from Hawks. https://www.hawksmotorsports.com/88-...-free-shipping
I haven't done anything in months except buy parts and clean the garage so I can have some work space smh. Hopefully taking out my stock kmember and a-arms this Wednesday for the tubular swap. Ya'll are giving me some motivation, though!
I changed my transmission mount tonight. I thought it was bad based on the noise and vibration I was getting. once I started removing it I was SURE it was bad. its a really easy satisfying job. I then started changing the bulbs on my passenger side marker lights. the passenger side is fine. the bulbs were clearly burned out but when I changed the bulbs only the rear came on. I noticed some corrosion on the front plug. im going to try and clean it out to see if its a connecting issue caused by that corrosion. im not sure what the best was to clean the plug out is though. will have to check google.
put a power light in the front marker light socket. wasn't getting a light but I scratched the terminal with the probe and got a light. took a tiny screw driver and scraped off as much of the corrosion as I could. put in the new light bulb " and there was light". so two jobs done in a pretty short work session.
last night since I was on a roll of completing simple but im portant jobs I thought I would try another. my high beams don't come on. when you pull the switch it doesn't click. I read up and knew I needed to adjust the white switch on the Colum that has the rod through it. I removed the under dash cover and found the switch pretty quickly. pulled the lever and saw it moving but not enough to make the thing "click" and switch to hi beams. that's about as far as I got. it was late and I ran into a couple of issues that I didn't feel like dealing with at midnight. 1) I know im supposed to loosen the 2 bolts on the switch and slide it towards the steering wheel as far as I can and tighten them. I didn't see any screws. so that's issue 1. 2) when I reached in and clicked the switch with my hand the headlights switched from low to nothing. the high beams didn't light up but the low beams did go off. so there is that. its chilly today and im feeling lazy. im not sure if im going to finish this today or not.
ive been robbed. some jerk stole most of my lug nuts. I don't know when this happened but I discovered it yesterday due to catastrophic failure. I was driving and I heard a crack and the car started making a bump bump bump. I pulled over thinking a spring or shock had broken. they looked fine but as I sat up I saw there was only 1 lug nut on the rear wheel and a missing / broken stud. the wheel was sitting wrong. I was pissed. I decided I would take 1 off each of the other wheels to get me home. each of the other wheels was missing 2 or 3 lug nuts as well. it was total bullshit. what is wrong with people?
my car has been squeaking badly. I thought it was the rear springs because when I put them in the old ones didn't have an isolator and it didn't occur to me to add one. the squeaking was ridiculous. it got bad enough that it would squeak with the vibration from idling. it was pretty loud in the car as well. I pulled the rear springs and added an isolator this weekend. took it for a test drive still squeaking. I was annoyed. I crawled under it and pushed on everything trying to find what was doing it. I finally called in the big guns. I had my wife shakes come out and listen when I made it squeak. she walked right to the rear driver wheel and said its coming from right here. I said I thought so to but the springs weren't the issue. she laid under the car while it squeaked and in what seemed like 5 seconds but was probably more like a minute said " its this red thing". without even looking I knew she meant the kyb shocks. I have had these installed for 3 weeks. I installed them at the same time as the springs. ive never heard of a shock making noise but put a wrench on the top mount . gave it about 1/8 turn and the squeak immediately stopped. its not just the sweet rack that makes me love shakes. its that big ole brain.
I messed with the flywheel weights to try to get it smoother and somehow managed to do so. Still not perfect, but now it's smooth enough that you only notice a vibration if you're looking for it, have the windows up, radio off, and rip through the gears. Kind of seems like maybe a 3rd high end flywheel and pressure plate combo would fix it now that I'm pretty confident it's not something odd with my engine or trans, but I don't want to go through all that crap again right now. Still need to pull the engine and swap the oil pan and pump out for a Canton road race setup at some point anyways.
Also improved the drivability in the tune over the last week. I redid the injector pulse width correction table (hard to figure out which ones are correct for the particular injectors I have) and was able to add more timing advance at lower RPMs/LV8 and idle without it bucking at very low load and speeds. Sounds happier and is a lot nicer to drive now.
Dropped the fuel tank and installed a new Bosch pump. It's much quieter and so far it sounds more consistent when it primes. The old one would randomly sound sickly. No idea when it was installed, but the old one was a Carter and still had the pulsator doohickey. I was debating getting a Walbro 255, but I felt it was overkill.
Getting the tank out wasn't all that that bad. While it was out, I added some extra insulator strips because even with new tank straps it could move around. And the rubber insulator for the 4 hard lines was gone too so I slipped some split fuel line over them to get rid of that racket.
door froze shut this past Tuesday. I broke the door handle trying to open it. ordered new one from classic industries. will be my next weekend plan
I just had to do the same thing but for a different reason. My passenger side handle was hanging on by one speed nut and it was down to the last thread. I had purchased the handle , painted it and it sat on my self for about a year. I had a day off during the week, it rained all day!, and thought this was the perfect day to finally tackle this project. Just take your time and make sure you use the tool to pop those plastic plugs that hold the door panel on. If you just pull on it those plugs could rip out of the cardboard panel. HF had a interior tool kit for $8 A couple other tips, get some small 1/4" screws and put a few in the inner window sweep and screw it to the upper plastic door panel, Those are held on by it just fitting in a plastic "nipple" Mine were all popped out and the plastic worn so they would not stay on. I also used a good heat resistant quality duck tape and a ran it along the seem where the plastic upper door panel is attached to the cardboard lower panel, Mine were all "wollered" out and the rear one was pulled through completely. I also had to glue one of the clips on the top plastic part as one broke during removal. you have to push in an pull up to remove the panel and those sometime don't want to move. JB weld makes the BEST plastic weld period. You may want to have some of this on hand when you start.
Finally got my nasty, warped T-top drip edge moldings replaced.
The job itself was pretty easy and straightforward, but I have to say I'm not impressed with the Fairchild plastic replacement parts. They fit fine, but the bottom edges are really ugly. I'm guessing that this edge is where the mold parting line is located and the parts weren't cleanly deflashed. I ended up trimming off some jagged spots and wet sanding them with 800 grit paper.
Looks like they came out nice, after a little rework. A job I need to do someday.
Kind of surprised by the quality...their T-top weatherstrips always seem to have good reviews.
Yeah, they look much better than those old warped ones. The drivers side would get caught behind the window when I shut the door. Ugh.
I should have taken some closeup pictures of the new ones before I cleaned them up. Pretty ragged.
I just replaced the outer window sweeps and used Fairchild parts there as well. They were really nice except one end of the passengers side, which has a little deformation- no big deal. I was actually pretty happy with the sweeps.
Hey Tootie, you asked about a subwoofer in another thread of yours. Have you ever heard of a center channel speaker?
You connect a speaker (woofer, subwoofer) between the 2 positives of the L & R channels.
In MONO mode, there is no sound difference, so you don't hear anything out of that speaker.
In STEREO mode, where each channel has different sounds, that difference plays on that center channel speaker.
Just thought you might like to experiment. Be careful with the impedance, if you went too low, then the amp might see that as a short!
I noticed Monday that my heater wasn't warm. I checked the coolant and it was very low. I filled it up and watched as it started dripping out. I replaced my radiator about 1.5 years ago. it was leaking. I was told not to buy the cheap $40 plastic tank radiator and instead get a $300 aluminum replacement. I bought the cheaper one. I have the radiator pulled and will start testing it for leaks in a few minutes. If its leaking I will epoxy it and then order another $40 replacement.
yep. driver side tank is leaking at the bottom. I covered it in epoxy. its drying now. im going to give it about 15 more minutes and then install it. im hoping it holds for a week while the cheap Chinese replacement gets here. im going to keep some coolant in the car for the time being. wish me luck on my MacGyver fix.
Found my gas tank full of coffee (relatively speaking..) So yeah lets replace that.. while we're at it, the old muffler is rotting... Hmm.. ok... Hooker catback on order! I mean.. if we're gonna do catback, we might as well do headers too.... Pics once it all arrives and I put it together.
my "repair" slowed the leak but didn't stop it. its leaking from under the tanks where you cant reach. I was able to find an aluminum replacement for $145. that's on the way now. im still driving the car with the small leak. its losing about 1/8 of the fluid to go back and forth to work each day. as long as I keep it topped off I should be fine until next weekend when the new one can be installed. ive been pretty down about the car the last few weeks. I LOVE the 91-92 firbirds. I'm just tired of mine being so trashy. its not the faded paint its all the squeaks! I spent good money on quality shocks and they squeak worse than any cheap ones ive ever used. its time to get a plan set up and start being more methodical like I am on my other projects.
I drained the break in oil out of my freshly rebuilt 383 and put in mobil1 full synthetic. The break in oil didn’t have any alarming amounts of metal in it at all which was a big relief.
I also noticed my braided stainless steel transmission cooler lines were awfully close to the passenger side header so I used an electrical conduit strap to hold it against the engine block by bolting it to one of those 5/16-18 holes under the spark plugs used for plug wire holders. Worked well.
finally I removed the brand new vogtland lowering springs and replaced them with factory height springs due to the spohn torque arm coming in close contact with the floor pan. If anyone wants to buy them, I’ll be listing them in the classifieds soon. Only the back springs were installed and they have under 10 miles on them
Finally got my nasty, warped T-top drip edge moldings replaced.
The job itself was pretty easy and straightforward, but I have to say I'm not impressed with the Fairchild plastic replacement parts. They fit fine, but the bottom edges are really ugly. I'm guessing that this edge is where the mold parting line is located and the parts weren't cleanly deflashed. I ended up trimming off some jagged spots and wet sanding them with 800 grit paper.
Here are some before and after pics.
Even the NOS hard plastic parts I've installed on the ttops have that sharp parting line on the edge. Just use a fine file or some sand paper to smooth that out.
Dropped the fuel tank and installed a new Bosch pump. It's much quieter and so far it sounds more consistent when it primes. The old one would randomly sound sickly. No idea when it was installed, but the old one was a Carter and still had the pulsator doohickey. I was debating getting a Walbro 255, but I felt it was overkill.
Getting the tank out wasn't all that that bad. While it was out, I added some extra insulator strips because even with new tank straps it could move around. And the rubber insulator for the 4 hard lines was gone too so I slipped some split fuel line over them to get rid of that racket.
Been a while now and I can say for sure that it starts much more easily after sitting all day or overnight with the new pump. It's barely audible when listening for it when it primes and it sounds the same every time.
aaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!! it doesn't fit! wtf do I have to do here? its so stupid that a company makes a freaking part and doesnt test fit them in that vehicle. stupid stupid.. the radiator fits . the fittings for the trans lines are not the correct thread pitch or something. so annoyed.
I sent the radiator seller a stern email about the piece of crap they sent me.. I did my best to re-seal the radiator. its got to last at least a week. I replaced my missing fan switch pigtail. the original plug crumbled when i changed the fan switch. I like to solder so that was pretty fun for me. while I had the radiator out of the way I replaced the original idler arm with an acdelco replacement. I have two more small jobs to do tomorrow. I NEED an alignment badly. ive been putting it off until I had the idler arm replaced. now I have no excuse. im closing on my new house next week so I will be buried in trying to move for the next few weeks. so this has got to get done soon.
This is an awesome thread, really long if you start out late (5 years late) but instead of a mumbo jumbo I found a whole bunch of great ideas, examples of things other people can do. I guess that's what the original idea was, right? Today I finished the splash panels inside my front wheel wells, tires rubbed when the airbag pressure dropped to lower the car.....
I drained the break in oil out of my freshly rebuilt 383 and put in mobil1 full synthetic. The break in oil didn’t have any alarming amounts of metal in it at all which was a big relief.
I also noticed my braided stainless steel transmission cooler lines were awfully close to the passenger side header so I used an electrical conduit strap to hold it against the engine block by bolting it to one of those 5/16-18 holes under the spark plugs used for plug wire holders. Worked well.
finally I removed the brand new vogtland lowering springs and replaced them with factory height springs due to the spohn torque arm coming in close contact with the floor pan. If anyone wants to buy them, I’ll be listing them in the classifieds soon. Only the back springs were installed and they have under 10 miles on them
I might be interested in the springs. Hit me up before you list them.
the fan switch still didn't work. I ran it up to temp today and the fan never came on. for now im going to have to keep using the manual switch to turn the fan on. I checked the fuse and its fine. the manual shows the system is just the temp switch in the block, the plug, the wire, the fuse, the light on the dash. the fan switch in the block is new. I hope it works but who knows. the pigtail/plug is new and I know its soldered well. the fuse is good. that really only leaves the wire. its possible the switch is bad but they are pretty simple things. the wire was kind of crumbly when I soldered. its not out of the scope to think its broken somewhere along its route from the switch to the fuse panel. im going to get a power light out and test it before I decide if im going to trace the wire or figure out how to test the switch itself. I also removed and lubed up the squeaking kyb shocks. it made a huge improvement. im going to have to drive a couple of days before I call that one fixed but it seems legit.
I am SO ready for spring. Charged the battery and let her idle in the driveway tonight, then went for a quick spin around the block. I figure I'll be ready to officially bring her out of hibernation in a few weeks!
I have a few projects that I need a warm day to finish up. Can't wait!
Bought a newer BMW 328i with a 6 speed manual earlier this week as a daily driver so I've been having too much fun with that car and not enough time in the garage working on my Trans am, I did grind down a rust bubble on one of the doors and am getting ready to patch with new metal. My next project on the car is the door hinge bushings so I wanna fix all the rust on the doors and make sure they're even worth putting back on the car with the new hinges. I've owned the car for over 5 years now and I have yet to examine the underside of the doors, I know there's rust but don't know how bad it is.
took it to the alignment shop today. they couldn't align it. got it up on the rack but the machine kept hitting the quarter panels. so that was a waste of time. called another shop that said they have two different styles of "heads" and shouldn't have an issue. been a rough week. first radiator didn't fit and now not aligned. lame.
12-21-2018, 10:57 PM
