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So I've had this thing since peak ignorance and it wasn't nice when I got it but I have it in my small shop and I'm working for myself so I've had time to tear it all apart with no exact plan and I'm wondering what I should do next. I have quite the list of things it needs but after getting down to the timing belt and nearly able to get the heads off (I think...) I'm wondering if I'm in over my head here. Can I even do all this without pulling the motor? The heads I was thinking should be cleaned up the rear is much worse and some slight play on some of the things. Front everything was good really but also there's a bunch of shit that's fallen into the valves now oops. But I think the bulk of its engine running issues was Fuel and battery grounds and well maybe the shot injectors too maybe some other things lol but didn't seem to have head gasket problems and I have no clue on timing belt and it's got like idk 210k miles oh and I broke an exhaust stud and so I'm quite sure I warped the hell out of two more but was going to try to heat and use cold pb blast throughout the days while I wonder what the hell I'm doing
I have quite the list of things it needsbut after getting down to the timing belt and nearly able to get the heads off (I think...) I'm wondering if I'm in over my head here.
Maybe if you specify said list and why they are needed, then...
Originally Posted by Nick_G
...with no exact plan
forum members can contribute ideas in regards too plan formulation?
In addition, don't be afraid to use a few ,'s & .'s in expressing yourself.
Lol sorry if I write/type/talk like an uneducated person, period. the things it really needs is: PS rack, injectors, fuel regulator i think, figured id do knock sensor while everything is apart, rebuild or replace trans, might as well do clutch at same time, I am in the same lot as a transmission shop though. Gaskets, I seen there was a kit with all gaskets and timing belt cheaper than a smaller gasket kit so made me think of doing more than I really need to. Needs oil filter housing Gaskets too. Needs battery and ground attention, figured id do an alternator too, and coils and plugs, and needs exhaust work so I figured replace the whole thing, and it needs Shocks too. Then it doesn't really need a lightweight Pulley or cai but might as well do those too.
I did say it was a pos in the title haha. It ran OK tho, had intermittent electrical issues such as it randomly shutting off but did something that made that a little better cant remember what but would still do it when wet. Its had quite some time of sitting around, drove it to the shop and twice it lost all electronics for a sec but never shut off , I've never had that happen before.
I did say it was a pos in the title haha. It ran OK tho, had intermittent electrical issues such as it randomly shutting off but did something that made that a little better cant remember what but would still do it when wet. Its had quite some time of sitting around, drove it to the shop and twice it lost all electronics for a sec but never shut off , I've never had that happen before.
Yeah, that definitely looks like it could use some work. Rear heads are always going to be dirtier since they're located in the back and are going to get hotter. Fronts will be cleaner. The top plate for the intake manifold is just built up carbon from the EGR valve. Just get a wire brush & clean out the top plate & the EGR path in the manifold.
You could probably just take the fuel pressure regulator off and take a wire brush or wire wheel to it and it'd be fine. As long as it works, no need to replace it. But it wouldn't be hard to just go down to a junkyard and pocket one.
The oil filter housing looks covered in oil. I wouldn't immediately say it needs a new gasket. Maybe it does, but I would check to make sure the valve cover gaskets are good first. It's not uncommon for them to go bad, and then start leaking oil; typically at the corners. Check to see if it's hard/brittle and breaks easily or if it has cracks. Even still, removing the oil filter housing is easy. Just 3 bolts.
Fuel injectors, yeah, definitely replace those. Or at least clean them up and replace the plastic tips.
OK, idk about valve cover gasket for oil on the filter housing it doesn't seem to have come from that, the front I can see where it would be much more likely the way there is some build up around the thermostat. The fuel regulator I really don't know if it's bad, I was just making assumptions by how shitty it looked and had fuel lines done in the past, everything is rusty as you can tell lol. Now I guess my question is should I just try to clean it up as it is now and not take anything else apart before I'm in over my head? Should the heads be cleaned? Maybe a little obvious but I've never had a car apart this much all on my own. If leaving heads on how should I go about cleaning the dust and shit that's gone on top of the valves, little air and vacuum?
OK, idk about valve cover gasket for oil on the filter housing it doesn't seem to have come from that, the front I can see where it would be much more likely the way there is some build up around the thermostat. The fuel regulator I really don't know if it's bad, I was just making assumptions by how shitty it looked and had fuel lines done in the past, everything is rusty as you can tell lol. Now I guess my question is should I just try to clean it up as it is now and not take anything else apart before I'm in over my head? Should the heads be cleaned? Maybe a little obvious but I've never had a car apart this much all on my own. If leaving heads on how should I go about cleaning the dust and shit that's gone on top of the valves, little air and vacuum?
Oil filter housing gasket doesn't tend to fail, or else you'd have a bigger problem on your hands. Consider the fact that it's dealing with oil pressure, combine that with a failing gasket, it'd be shooting oil out, a lot of it, quickly. I say just give it a good cleaning.
If the car starts & runs, yeah, the pressure regulator is more than fine. Wouldn't hurt to do a fuel pressure test if you have a gauge though. So I'd say that scrub it with a wire brush, or a wire wheel, polish it with a microfiber towel, then maybe give it a quick touch up with paint or clear coat to prevent it from rusting again. The painting is optional though, but it'll rust again with out it more than likely.
Heads don't really need to be cleaned; no. I guess you could take the rocker assembly off and get at any clumps of carbon build up, but then you'd have to go through the pain of a valve adjustment. It's not hard, just tedious, especially on the rear head. Maybe just throw a little bit of seafoam into the oil, drive it for a little bit, then change the oil. But over all, the heads look clean & fine. I'd leave them be.
I would highly recommend not to remove the heads. Only reason you would do that is if there is something seriously wrong with the motor, or if you plan on doing upgrades to it. If you take the heads off, you're going to be looking at doing some bigger work. You'll have to check the deck for flatness, then while you're there, you might as well check the valves. That means removing the valve, taking measurements of the valves & valve seats, etc. You can either do some of the work yourself, or have a machine shop do everything for you. Just an FYI, a machine shop isn't cheap. It was $300 for each head to be completely rebuilt for me, so $600 and some change total. Not to mention, you'll have to reinstall the heads, and hope you did everything right, including the timing belt.
TL;DR: leave the heads on or you'll have a lot more work to do, and less money.
As for cleaning out the tops of the valves in the port, if you have an air compressor, just blow it out. If it's metal, get a magnet in there. Trust me, getting metal in your cylinders is bad. I have a whole J35 swap thread where I killed two motors because there was metal in my intake manifold from my original J32 motor getting a hole banged through the piston. Sucks, but I learned a lot. But if it's plastic, and it gets into your cylinders, you'll probably be fine. It's not that big of a deal. It'll just burn up quickly when driving.
As for your electrical issue, I'm curious as to what was going on with that. That sounds like a bigger issue than what you're dealing with now. Electrical sucks, because it's hard to figure out where the issue is.
Last edited by Thefireball; Nov 26, 2022 at 12:49 PM.
Thank you for the info, very helpful. Yeah I'm not sure what the build up on the filter housing is then. Definitely sounds like a lot more work than I imagined as far as heads and timing belt go, I figured id be able to just pull them off and send them out and throw them back on, lol. I'll have to just clean everything up and order a couple things and put it back together and move on to the bigger issues of transmission and power steering, I'll let the next door shop handle those. As far as electrical, I'm curious as well. I remember researching back when I was driving it and concluded it was grounding issues , I think i might have just replaced one negative battery cable or something and made it a little better but after taking this shit apart I've seen some more grounds that are either rusty or worn, two I'm thinking of specifically, one I'm not even sure it's a ground but it sure seemed like it, I think it was on top of the alternator. That one I figured could just clean up with steel brush. Another I seen under the battery is the different type of cable that is, idk, exposed cable? Here is a picture of the one under the battery, clearly seen better days.
Considering how rusty under the hood is, you probably have bad ground connections due to the rust. That's just my guess though.
yeah the photo I sent with the one under the battery, upon further investigation (leaning in a little more) I can see that cable literally broke in half from the decay haha. Gotta love salt.
About a mounth ago I looked into getting one of those #15; 32610-S3M-A00 sub-ground cables for my CL-S6 & it was on national back order.
I was going to opt for the one on the CL-P 32610-S3R-000 instead.
About a mounth ago I looked into getting one of those #15; 32610-S3M-A00 sub-ground cables for my CL-S6 & it was on national back order.
I was going to opt for the one on the CL-P 32610-S3R-000 instead.
I can't imagine it'd be hard to make yourself. Just need a thick gauge wire, and solder/splice the ends on and you're good.
I think you're right I seen the second wasn't a ground and figured at the battery it was the same I couldn't really tell with the light thought it was kinda like on top of the alternator....which is a ground spot right? I have pic above already of that. Also I was wondering about the cam position sensors and duralast coilpacks...I had engine light on and maintenance req. Lights on the whole time I've had the car and started to flash towards the end of me driving it and had p1399 code among others but it always ran strong just would randomly die that's kinda when I stopped driving it. I'm thinking the misfiring was the injectors but in reading a little could be my questionable coil packs or cam sensors? I seen they don't make one of sensors anymore... I just really don't want to take shit apart again after I get it all back together. Coil packs I seen could just unplug with car running to see if bad, and those are easier to do anyway. Still not exactly sure what was making it die randomly and drove it to the shop (lol), never did this before but twice for second or two it lost literally all electronics but was still running...thing just doesn't want to die biggest mistake I ever made was selling my first one
I think you're right I seen the second wasn't a ground and figured at the battery it was the same I couldn't really tell with the light thought it was kinda like on top of the alternator....which is a ground spot right? I have pic above already of that. Also I was wondering about the cam position sensors and duralast coilpacks...I had engine light on and maintenance req. Lights on the whole time I've had the car and started to flash towards the end of me driving it and had p1399 code among others but it always ran strong just would randomly die that's kinda when I stopped driving it. I'm thinking the misfiring was the injectors but in reading a little could be my questionable coil packs or cam sensors? I seen they don't make one of sensors anymore... I just really don't want to take shit apart again after I get it all back together. Coil packs I seen could just unplug with car running to see if bad, and those are easier to do anyway. Still not exactly sure what was making it die randomly and drove it to the shop (lol), never did this before but twice for second or two it lost literally all electronics but was still running...thing just doesn't want to die biggest mistake I ever made was selling my first one
Maint required, is essentially an oil change reminder. The p1399 is random misfire, meaning not specific to one cylinder. I don't suggest shot-gunning parts. But, have you ever replaced the spark plugs? Can use ngk coppers if you're trying to save money. They actually conduct better than iridium, the trade off is they don't last as long. Also, have you checked that the timing marks line up as they should? The rear cam on these motors seems to be particularly tricky to get just right. Coil packs shouldn't all die at once. Even if you had one or two bad, it should yield a code for a particular cylinder, not random misfire.
When you say you lost all electronics what shut off, the dash & radio? The most common thing on these cars that causes stalling is the main relay. But, that basically cuts off the fuel. I once had a car that used to loose all power randomly. Wasn't the fuel pump or main relay. Basically, everything would shut off, and after a while work again. Ended up selling it, but pretty sure it was the ignition switch contacts being worn out.
Clogged egr, should get a different code if its stuck.
If I remember correctly it showed a code for each cylinder separately, and then also had the random misfire(p1339) and I think there was one or two more, this was years ago, there was like 10 codes. But could never really feel any misfiring, my truck will misfire when the spark plug(s) gets loose, that is a misfire you can definitely feel. Hard to say if it sounded right at idle too everyone thought it was a v8 lol (tractor supply straight pipe). I did replace plugs and coils not too long before parking it, I don't recall that making anything noticeably better. And only checked one plug here while it's apart and looked damn near new. I had seen somewhere someone said everyone will say go ngk or denso for the coils cus the duralast ones are "finicky"
For the random shut downs it seemed to not like one very busy road at a very busy time lol luckily I managed to get off the road just rolling (except once) but it would cut everything, whole car off, dead. Didn't do it too often but made me change routes for work lol. Then it did in the rain thought maybe something got wet but same thing as before whole car just shuts off no power anything and then try to start it it'll just crank and crank, sit for little while, starts right up no problem. Now, when I drove it to my shop maybe 10 miles, i didn't lose the engine and I had power steering still, but all gauges and lights etc went out but came right back in a second. Did that twice in the ~10 miles
These engines love to misfire. I get it on my 3G TL. One day a CEL comes on for a single misfire, but I can't seem to figure out what it is. Then it just goes away. Same thing happened on my CL, but since the swap, I've been good.
When you have the car together again & running, if it's still misfiring, just unplug each coil pack one by one to figure out which one has no change. One by one as in unplug one, then plug it back in, then move onto the next coil pack.
Maybe that road has a large machine creating some sort of EMP? Who knows..
I'm going to guess that the car was just failing to make a ground connection as to why everything would shut off randomly.
That looks like a special little slice of hell to work on, my goodness. Were you a bad person in your previous life?
I would definitely start with replacing grounds and work your way back. I had bad grounds on my TL-S in the past
and it caused all sorts of problems for me, one at a time. Keep us posted, you do seem tenacious at least.
Yep that's what I'll do I think I just need injectors,I tried looking into better ones but decided just order set from acura for like $90, still haven't ordered yet tho. And I still need to clean all the intake stuff bought 3 cans of shit on sale...the 1 other can I got did better than all 3 of those worthless others combined lol. Also should I get new coil pack o rings? I haven't cleaned those two pieces yet wasn't sure. I had the belt covers off belt looked OK idk when it was done if ever lmao I'd assume it was done at some point. I didn't check timing and put the covers back on don't feel like taking off again lol. Was considering having the transmission shop do the belt tho, they'll need to replace or repair the trans and power steering and hopefully be able to weld some headers from xs power to my tractor supply pipe. Without breaking the bank
Probably was a government program.
Yeah I'm a little worried about all the grounds lol where are all the ones I can't see?
We've all been a little bad, no? :smitler:
A little tenacious haha I want to be able to drive it through summer and sell my s60r which I just hit a tree with
Also I was wondering about the cam position sensors and duralast coilpacks...I had engine light on and maintenance req. Lights on the whole time I've had the car and started to flash towards the end of me driving it and had p1399 code among others but it always ran strong just would randomly die that's kinda when I stopped driving it. I'm thinking the misfiring was the injectors but in reading a little could be my questionable coil packs or cam sensors? I seen they don't make one of sensors anymore...
Awesome, thank you! I'd say majority are OK but wow there is a lot of them
Nice find, think that is something related to any of my issues? I believe where I seen that mentioned it was likely something else...do those sensors usually go bad? Little bit more pricey than I would have expected
When it comes to sensors, Honda / Acura OEM are the best.
This is what I do when I need a part, first I ALWAYS find the appropriate Acura OEM part # on one of the Acura OEM vendor websites, I'll take that part number and then cross-check a Honda parts website, they are usually a little cheaper and its the same part.
If I'm not satisfied with the result or it's to expensive, then straight to rockauto it is using said part number on their 'Part Number Search' page:
Most of the time, there you can find cheaper aftermarket 'choices' to decide upon, many are OEM like Denso etc.
If I have to absolutely (which is never) go to the local Advanced Auto / Autozone / O'reilly's et. al., always provide them with the OEM part # YOU have found, to search their system on. NEVER, depend on them to find it (part #) for you or bad things may / will happen as a result.
That's what I do as well...
Rockauto is like my bible...and a lot of time I will actually order from them for that reason. They sell oem equivalent.
You can keep the S60 but holler at me when you stumble on a V70R with a manual. That's the girl that got away from me.
I will have it though one day.
RockAuto is the best. I like it's simple web design. Plus, they always come out cheaper. Can't tell you the amount of times I need a part asap, go to the auto store nearby, only to walk away in shock that the part is twice the price. Fuck that.
As for the Volvo, girl had '97 S70 T5. That thing was fun as fuck, until I got to rowdy with it and blew the head gasket. Ended up selling it due to the horrible misfire, mind you, I didn't know crap about cars at the time. Plus the key cylinder was an absolute mess. The key would just spin forever and not start the car. Had to smack it with whatever was nearby until it would catch. Tried to replace the cylinder, but gave up drilling out that bolt.
Fun car though. Would love another 5 cylinder, but I'm thinking a 3 cylinder Geo Metro is in my future..
Volvos can be great or a huge pain lol, I've had 3, my dad has had like 15... all p2 chassis. He had a geo metro back in the day too said it was his favorite
When I get a v70r, I'm hacking the rear off so I can load up my dirt bike
I saw a clean V70R today for 15K on cargurus...fuckin automatic.
WILD the prices on them now.
I'll have to settle for regular V70 if I'm going Auto.
I did have an XC90...wasn't super hard to work on but there were definitely "quirks"
I ended up with an E320 Wagon instead which has been pretty cool to own.
15k sounds about right nowadays....there's an s60 and v70 around here asking 15 each.... even the CLS is getting insane last 6 spd I seen listed buddy wanted 8k... and I kid you not the body was rougher than mine. I paid 1700 for mine and drove it home
Dude, that's how I ended up with my old TL-S. I had made a fair deal to my buddy I sold it too and he was cool enough to make me the same deal back.
People are nuts.
the things it really needs is: PS rack, injectors, fuel regulator i think, figured id do knock sensor while everything is apart, rebuild or replace trans, might as well do clutch at same time, I am in the same lot as a transmission shop though. Gaskets, I seen there was a kit with all gaskets and timing belt cheaper than a smaller gasket kit so made me think of doing more than I really need to. Needs oil filter housing Gaskets too. Needs battery and ground attention, figured id do an alternator too, and coils and plugs, and needs exhaust work so I figured replace the whole thing, and it needs Shocks too. Then it doesn't really need a lightweight Pulley or cai but might as well do those too.
