I should have posted a long time ago but I never did. My RL was feeling lonely this past year because my brother the other RL... I figured she needed a little sister. She's a unicorn, no one really sees it except when I drive it around town. So what'd I purchase?



It's been a great 10 months... but two months ago shit hit the fan. The crazy alarm system that the owner installed shorted and went crazy. It ended up locking me in the car, rolling the windows up, and the alarm was blaring both inside from the speakers, and the actual alarm speaker. I was trapped in the car until my friend pulled the positive terminal and saved my ass. Since then, the car's been dead. The alarm system is so complex a few of my friends have given up... the rest of us are still trying to figure out the crazy wiring. Anyways onto more of the fun stuff...

Here's the engine shot:


Its current state of guts:






While it's under work I decided to pick up another toy earlier tonight...


Yeah that's right, a pocketbike!!! I have to say, this shit's fun! It's great for getting rid of my pent up frustration from this pos wiring in the s14!

I only made this post because i'm a bit buzzed and bored. I'll keep everyone updated though!

 

Nice ride!

 

Although I already knew about it through fb haha

Good luck with that alarm!

 

Hey Eric!
nice s14 and hope you get her running soon!

 

dam eric. lol


didn't know it was that serious. lol

 

Sounds like it's Christine!

 

Nice S14! I had a '95 240SX. Loved that car.

 

 

Love the Kouki. Wish those damn cars were more durable.

 

sweet car

 

In for moar!

 

Alarm through the internal speakers and disabling the locks? he went all out if anyone tried to steel it that would of been a nice surprise




Nice car though they are pretty had to find in good shape for a good price

 

sorry man to all people.


why would i expect this from you.

that sucks the car doesnt run anymore

 

I completely forgot about this thread.... sorry guys! Welll this is going to be a juicy post about what's been going on.


Remember my wiring monstrosity? This here is 95% of it...

For reference, that's a size 11.5 shoe.


but the point of this post is this.....
here's my 1.5 year update.




For a long time I drove my car with some odd problem. I could mash the gas and the car would go strong, but right when boost started to build, the engine completely gave up.I could drive it as hard as I wanted, up to 3000RPM. We had no clue what it was, thinking it was just a melted exhaust valve guide or something. The car seemed fine as long as I didn't awaken the turbo. Well, I finally saved enough money to bring the car in to get the head rebuilt, and what was going to be a 1.5K top end build... well I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves.






As you guys can see, the car has been running super rich.... that's carbon build up everywhere! I'm not sure if it's the tune, but I need to solve that still.






Here I have the head resurfaced, ready for the cometic headgasket. ARP headstuds go in too! Got some awesome copper valve guides as well.



Timing chain parts kit installed too. I was getting some slack on the timing chain, so might as well change it out while everything's out.




This is when shit hit the fan. After the top end was rebuilt, my friend and I slapped the head back together. We did a quick compression test and found this. 90% leakage in cyl4. Cyl 1-3 were perfect at 155psi. So now... we have to dig deeper to find out the problems with the motor.




So when we took the top end off and took the pistons out.... this is what we saw.

This is a comparison between piston #1 and piston #4. Check out that damage on piston #4!! Piston wasn't getting oil to cool and went boom.







Even more bad news, the crank is scratched. Besides that, in cyl 4 I feel some scratches towards the bottom of the cylinder walls. At this point in time, I said fuck it, time to build the bottom end. Got some oversized cp pistons, acl bearings, and eagle rods for the bottom end. Hopefully the scratches are gone when I get the cylinders bored a bit.






Then last week, we ran into more complications. My friend was moving to a smaller shop, and needed me to bring my car home. The half rebuild turned into an entire rebuild, and parts didn't arrive in time to finish anyways. I had a huge mess trying to get it towed home, and eventually I ended up getting it towed to another friend's repair shop less than a mile from my place:



Here we see my friends at the shop pushing my car a block backwards on the street for me. I ended up using a tow strap on the Land Cruiser to tow the car home.


This engine bay is quite sad.


At this point, I am pissed off, frustrated, and just about at that point to give up. I know I can't stop now, because I'm already invested really deep into this project. I've lost interest in this car because of this whole situation. Even though I've asked my friend for a worst case scenario every step of the way, I can't believe so far EVERYTHING has been worst case scenario. If the block is machined and the scratches on the cylinder don't come out, I'd be at my wits end. I'll probably end up selling the car without a motor, and selling the motor separately if it comes down to it. Such a shame....

On the plus side, if everything goes smoothly, I'll have a fully built motor... and then it'd be time to get a standalone. I'm probably getting the AEM Series 2, wideband uego, and doing a MAF to MAP conversion. But then... I still don't know if I'd end up keeping the car, or just selling it.

Maybe it's in my best interests to let go of it.

 

"you got to know when to fold them, know when to hold them..."

 

holy shit, what an ordeal

I know that feeling, when you've lost all interest. But then it's not so simple to just get rid of it...

 

LS1 swap?

 

Sorry to hear you got such a shitty deal on this car. If the engine was that poorly maintained you can bank on everything else being wrong with the car. I would cut my losses if I were you.

 

Any guesses as to why piston #4 wasn't getting the proper amount of oil?

 

As someone that went deeper into the crevasse, I agree. I would put a limit on what else to spend and if the car isn't fixed by then to just cut bait. It's an expensive lesson but it'll save further bloodletting.

 

Wow, so sorry to see

+1 for LS1 swap

 

Looks like LSx swap kits are around $3k plus the source engine.

 

But after everything I will have a completely fresh motor... at that point we will see I guess.

Yeah, I kind of don't want to because it has such low miles, straight body, and still great oem paint. Really rare example..


I've thought of doing a e-rod ls1 swap but that would set me back even more money.


The engine was running fine for a long time. I think it was a combination of wear and tear from age being compounded by boosting high... like a dance with the devil when you push 18psi on a stock motor. The first things to go when you boost high on the stock KA motor is the headgasket. Mines didn't lift and was in perfect condition. Really confused on what happened to piston 4 still.


Seems like there was a oil leak somewhere and the tune is way too rich leading to carbon buildup. I have a reflashed ECU by JWT but I guess it's more like a baseline... learned my lesson, go standalone if you're pushing big power. Piston 4 wasn't getting enough lubricity is my guess.


Yeah, I should have probably stopped after the head rebuild but at that point I just wanted to get the car back and running so I went through with the rebuild. I needed some more time to think. I probably wouldn't have been able to sell it for much though..


I could have swapped in a RB26 for the price of my built motor...

It'd cost me around 11k + labor I don't want to do lol. I'd rather buy a LS swapped FD for the price after everything.

 

That's why those cars are in the junkyards and not the streets anymore. I remember seeing those everywhere in NJ and a few years later nothing.

 

You gotta be shitting me, Brock Lesnar.

 

Lol they're rare to find now!

But I think it's more of kids thinking they could drift, but end up slamming into poles, cars, houses, guardrails, etc.

 

LS1 swap FTW!

 

Rare? Not really. Maybe in your neck of the woods. Just like the guy looking for that Integra GSR for 8 months and couldn't find one and said how rare they were. I sent him links to 8 of them for sale within 25 miles of me. He ended up buying one I guess.

 

Is there a oil cooling spray under each piston? Porsche puts them in some of their turbo motors to keep the pistons cool.

#4 look pretty F'ed up, at least not holed but the rings are really gone. How hard and much to find a decent bottom end or salvaged motor?

Sorry for your situation.

 

Thanks. Yeah, the motor comes factory with piston oil squirters which is pretty cool. I bet they're all gummed up though. They'll be fully functional after the build is done. Yea, the ringlands were completely shot on #4. I could not get it to move at all, and carbon was coated on it everywhere.

A used bottom end would be around $1500. It used to be $300- $500 because no one wanted the KA... they wanted to SR swap. Those days are over now


Not sure how it is where you are, but here it's almost non existent. Sorry, I should rephrase. It's rare as hell to find a 97/98 clean body, no rust, low milage, and stock interior with no cracks. If you can find one please let me know! I know a few other people who have been searching to no avail.


The torque from the LS will snap you in half, twiggie!!!

 

Damn. I probably would have thrown in the towel a long time ago.

 

Must... resist... F&F... reference...

Seriously though, sorry to hear you go through this ordeal. Seeing a car without its engine can be pretty demoralizing.

But it seems like you're almost done with the teardown. I think once the engine starts coming together you might find your enthusiasm for it again.

 

 

 

Nice....your garage just got more crowded!

 

I swear,
Nothing's looking good.

 

That's some bs Eric

 

A local guy here had a LS powered 240 and it was a scary beast. Awesome car.

 

just find a good condition RB and be done with it....

 

Dang dude... that sucks. Nice car but what a nightmare.

And I thought the starting issues on my 997 were bad.