Man, my back is killing me now, but Phase One of my winter project is now complete. I removed the plenum, runners and fuel rail. It took me a total of about 4 hours.

The injectors are getting sent to Cruzin Performance hopefully by Wednesday to get cleaned up. In the mean time, over the next week in a half, I'll be painting the fuel rail, porting and polishing and painting the plenum and runners. I'll have some pics posted withing the next couple weeks. And stayed tuned for the next phase.

 

you're painting everything? To each their own I guess... but I've seen painted TPI's.. and they're not the best looking.. I would just clean it up nice, if you don't want to polish the exterior of the plenum and runners. Although.. the fuel rails turn out nice just by running them on a 2 stage high speed buffer. Before you paint... let me get a picture of my rails... and my half finished runners and plenum. Then maybe get an idea. Warn ya though... it takes a lot of time to sand and polish those buggers.

Where abouts are you?

 

I'm in Brampton. Orginally the plan was to polish everything. But I decided against it for two reasons:

1) I don't have any other chrome in my engine compartment so it would stand out way too much. I thought it might look like to much of a work in progress.

2) The maintainance of keeping it shiny as opposed to wiping off a painted surface...Easier to keep clean over the long run I think.

I still may polish the fuel rail however since the AFPR that I ordered is the nice Holley billet piece. Undecided. But here's is the current plan...The plenum, runners and TB will be sanded smooth. The runners will be painted silver. The plenum will be painted silver, with the indents between the fins painted red. The body of the TB will be painted silver, and the TB plate will be painted red with the raised lettering polished silver. The fuel rail will be polished, with the hard fuel lines painted red and the injectors painted red as well.

 

IMHO:
I can get my injectors reverse flow cleaned locally for $30 CDN apiece at KW INjectors. They are a specialty shop that only does injectors and seem to know of what they speak. I asked them about 'balancing and blueprinting' injectors and got the impression that injectors either test for factory voltage (ok) or don't (junk) and either respond to reverse flow (ok) or don't (junk). My injectors now flow within 2% of factory spec and are at factory spec for voltage. Not sure what else can be done so avoided the cost of shipping my injectors to Cruzin Perf, border checks and all the other frustrations of shipping to and fro to the U.S. (no knock on Rick at Cruzin Performance -- I hear he does great work). Got them serviced locally instead and the car runs better than ever.


RP.

 

Not to be a party pooper here, but Rich does them for $10USD a piece which translates into just over $16CDN. How am I saving money by doing them locally? Even with shipping, it's still cheaper. I don't anything about KW Injectors so I can't say anything for the company. If you say they did a good job then I will certainly believe you. I just know that Cruzin has a good rep and many people have went to him with great success so I figure why chance it. Just my opinion of course.

 

No Contest:

$10USD is a good deal. Shipping shouldn't be too much either (not much weight or bulk). I had a couple of useful conversations with Rick @ Cruzin -- I initially called him because he supports the 3rd gen site and alot guys on it have said very positive things about doing biz with him. No doubt if I was going to get a particular kind of work done I would opt for his services.


The plot thickens:

That said, injector work gets a little complicated with 89 - 92 TPI systems. I have the dreaded 'Multec' style injectors ('91 Formula) so Rich wouldn't even work on them other than cleaning -- he just replaces them if they won't clean. Say for instance the voltage reads low which was the case on my number 2 & 4 injectors, they head for the garbage bin and I fork out for replacements. I don't think this is the case for the older 85-88 units ? So I would be better off sourcing my own replacements because I could find a better deal (which I did).

I ended up buying 8 used 19lb Multec injectors ($50 USD no less !) off a guy on the 3rd gen site who was upgrading to 24lb'ers. I took them to KW Injector to have them flowed and cleaned up, installed the replacements myself and have been smiling ever since (the car really ran like crap with two bad injectors).

Multec units are as I found out, have limited serviceability so I had to take a different route that Cruzin Performance -- which turned out to be the 3rd gen classifieds (will they ever be up again ?) and KW Injectors.

By his own admission Rick says he can't do much with Multecs. I was pretty dissapointed -- NOT at Rick but at GM for using these Multecs to begin with. So my point was pretty much based on my recent experience. I suppose I could have swapped out all 8 Multecs for Rochester type design but that would be $400 min through after-market sources. (BTW: GM wanted about $1800 for 8 injectors -- ha,ha). Instead I found cheap Multec replacements that hopefully will last awhile.

thx, RP.

 

As far as I know, the Bosch ones that I have work great with the cleaning. I guess we'll find out in the spring when everything's back together and I can drive my car again.

 

I bought a set of LT-1 injectors for a great price and then had them cleaned and matched at LPE. I will admit it cost a heck of a lot more than $10 USD a piece. Ah well, live and learn. I painted my SuperRam with black wrinkle paint. I think it looks good but what do I know. I only did it because it looked like they didn't get the soda cans melted enough when they cast the plenum so it looked terrible.

 

Does anyone know how to (effectively) clean the metal surface on the plenum ? I have some kind of stains right behind the TB that I cannot get out.

Three dark circles about the size of a quarter. It looks like crap and solvent type cleaners haven't touched it.

thx.

 

Not a clue man...that's why I'm painting it all to freshen it up a bit. I don't ahve any stains, but it's just looking dull.

 

You might want to try the wheel cleaner that is meant for cast finish wheels. It may do the trick. I think it's made by Meguairs and CT should have it. It's nasty stuff.

 

I picked up a can of VHT spray paint yesterday and it suggested cleaning metal parts with acetone solvent...maybe try that, but I don't guarantee it will work though. Just thought I would relay the info.

 

Could someone please explaine to me how you can have your injectors "flow matched"? Injectors work on a resistance not voltage. The voltage comes from the computer telling the injector how longe to open for useing 12volts to open and close it. the 12volts dose not vary only the time the injector stays open. You can not controle the flow like a tap they only flow max or nothing. Now saying that this year i changer mine because they were bad (they had changed resistance over the years causeing them to flow at different rates.)
because the injector is sealed and there is no way to adjust the resistance on outside of them how are they match to each other WITHOUT swapping them for other injectors that are closer to the rest
Has anyone sent out injectors for matching and got all of the ones you sent out back and if so hopw did they adjust them?
I dont meen to sound like a jerk about this i would just hate to see someone waste money and time over something like this and see no real gains from it. Most shops like KW injectors will test them for free. KW will even flow test to make sure they are clean for you at no charge. You can test the resistance your self with out even taking them out. All you have to do is mesure the resistance with a ohm meter.Just take off the conector and go across the two leads of the injector. you should see 12 ohms +- 0.2 the more they are out the more uneven your flow will be.( I had some that were up to 17 all the way down to 9.)

Keep in mind that the time the injector is open is mesured in milliseconds (not much more than 2.5 at max flow) So as long as you are not running super high hp a 2% difference would be fine and you wold never be able to tell the difference.
just my 2 cens if i am wrong please someone correct me.

 

Well... for one... injectors are usually around 16 ohms normally. As for matching, swapping another injector into the set is exactly how they match the sets. My injectors were actually decent, flowing with in 2% of each other. I was concerned with a couple bad injectors, thats why I sent mine away. Oh, and BTW, injectors can come apart... well according to cruizin' performance, they come apart... cause he told me they take them apart and clean them throughly. Unless I misunderstood him.

 

thank you for correcting me. they are 16 and not 12

 

trigger: Your points may be valid. I had tested my injectors for resistance and they all came back around 16.9 I think...give or take a bit. But I've been having starting problems with my car and I'm trying to eliminate all the possibilities. Now that I've heard back from Rich say my injectors were ok and within 2%, and they pressure tested fine (no leaks), I can eliminate the injectors as a possible source for my problem.

As far as flow matching, Rich will take your existing set and any injectors with bad resistance readings will be swapped out with one of the others that he has in stock. So no, they don't actually adjust the injector when matching. I hope that's what you were asking. Please correct if I misunderstood.