Project "Fiat V-Spec" (page 5) |
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- - - 5/11/03 - - - IT RUNS! Ron fired it up for the first time on 5/10! It idles and revs fine. There are a few minor bugs to be taken care of before it moves under its own power, but we're basically there. As of 5/10 there's a very short list of items to take care of: New water pump :
Current one leaks This very short list however, is IT as far as what's needed before driving it and seeing if there are other issues (namely cooling nearly 400HP with a stock Volkswagen VR-6 radiator) - - - 5/21/03 - - - We're getting closer. I replaced the leaky water pump last night which, in spite of the tight engine bay is pretty straightforward, although I did remove the radiator to make it easier. Ron hooked up the water temp gauge last night as well. The remaining gauges to be installed are oil press, oil temperature, fuel pressure (yes, in cabin monitoring, it's an expensive gauge!) boost and tachometer. The exhaust parts get ordered today, and we're going with square tubing instead of round to gain additional ground clearance. The brakes and clutch also need to be bled - in fact, that's really the only thing preventing any kind of test drive, but I will behave myself and wait until the other things are done first. The first test drive should be this weekend in any case as we're very, very close!! - - - 5/22/03 - - - Gauges are done. Oil leak is fixed. One item I forgot to mention was the Profec-B boost controller - it's not hooked up but will be by the end of today. This leaves....um....bleeding the brakes and clutch and...that's it before I can drive it down the block? Then exhaust and....hmm...surely there's SOMETHING else...??? - - - 5/25/03 - - - IT LIVES! Today I fired it up and let it idle long enough to let the temps come up in the engine. Below is a shot of the gauges while running:
It runs real rough - idles like a V8 race car with monstrous camshaft, but it also has zero exhaust system aft the turbos - just downpipes. No leaks, no apparent death sounds, although the exhaust is very loud! I'm not willing to drive it with it being so loud, so I'll wait until the exhaust is finished this week to see where it stands and how she runs. Pictures and further data can be found HERE. - - - 5/31/03 - - - It's dead. At idle there's very little vacuum and as I stated before it runs very rich. We did compression and leak down tests on it, and while we found the cause of low vacuum and running rich, it has to come apart. Here are the results:
So the motor has to come out and be taken apart or replaced. That's the way things go sometimes. Where have I been? Six weeks later and we have a good DETT coming up, it should be here tomorrow! Timeframe for reinstall is fuzzy, as I will probably have the injectors gone through while they're off. I attended the 2003 Mt. Shasta All Datsun Meet and prep for that had taken quite a chunk of my "free" time. There's a show in Canada in Sept. that I want to take the car to, so that's the next deadline I'm shooting to have the car sorted by. Stay tuned... - - - 8/13/03 - - - I have the replacement (again, used but leak down tests show OK) engine here, and tonight I started moving over the good stuff from the other engine. Tonight I removed the old turbos and put the good ones (I had them rebuilt for the other engine). I have the rest of this week off to try and get this car running again, so tomorrow will be finishing up the turbo plumbing - at least what can be done before dropping the engine in the car). Here are some before and after shots of today's progress. Note I removed the intake plenum, A/C compressor, power steering pump and replaced the turbos. If you've never worked on a DETT you should know work progresses SLOOOOWLY...
- - - 8/14/03 - - - I took the injectors in to be serviced "just to be safe" so I didn't have to pull any of them out right after getting the engine installed. Turns out ALL SIX of them leak and are bad! he soonest they can get me replacements is Monday which really puts a crimp in my schedule as you can't get the injectors in with the intake plenum on - and there's no way I'm going to put the motor in and THEN try and remove the plenum, so the vast majority of work left is waiting on the injectors.. - - - 8/18/03 - - - Injectors are bad and need to be rebuilt. The shop rebuilding them has some doubts that they are even 555cc injectors, so they will also flow test them as well. If they're not 555cc injectors this project will go on hold until I can afford new, real 555cc injectors ($1000 + !) - - - 8/20/03 - - - I have the injectors, but I still have no clue if they're really 555cc injectors! The flow results are here: http://www.datsuns.com/Tech/zcar/injectorflow.gif but being injector illiterate I don't know the conversion. The injector itself is colored the same as a Nismo 555cc unit (mine here, Nismo here), but the apparent part number on my injectors are 0011 8414D 1 (at least that's what's on the top) |
