The Rebirth

Started by BigMike, May 27, 2010, 10:25:00 AM

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BigMike

#315
Hey guys,

I bought a little suction-cup camera mount and made this really quick video. I plan to start making some videos of driving up in the hills soon :driving:

For now I just wanted to share a little teaser on how the intake sounds. Just for reference, this is a stock SC12 with stock USDM pulleys and of course the ABV mod so that I can exceed 8psi. After I preformed the ABV mod, I had 8.5 psi -- which is the boost I dynoed the car with back on page 16. After the new Intake, you can see from the below video that my boost climbs to a solid 10psi in 3rd and 4th gears (see the 33-39 seconds mark of the video). So that is 10psi with my new intake and all remaining stock parts beginning with the stock SC12 inlet pipe. Don't forget this is with my C60 6-speed transaxle.

Also from the 45-second mark I'm showing the cool whistling sound I get around 2-3 PSI boost. The whistle is a bit louder under a steady load -- Ie. going up a long climb in 6th gear while holding steady at 3 PSI... and you get to play with the pitch by altering the throttle angle. I love it!

http://www.youtube.com/v/XLYj78Lxrvs&hl=en&fs=1

I just used my point-and-shoot Cannon PowerShot SX260 HS camera. The quality is better on my computer (1920x1080 at 30fps) but lost quality with Photobucket. I plan to make more videos and will begin using YouTube for them :driving:

Regards,
BigMike


EDIT: I finally uploaded the video to a new YouTube account!
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

Got a few updates here-

Feb 23, 2014: Discovered I had a plugged up Charcoal Canister

About a month ago I was sitting at my desk and I heard a small explosion sound from the parking lot and my car alarm immediately went off. I ran out front and couldn't find anything wrong. It was the sound of a thick rubber balloon exploding; something with pressure exploding. I opened my hood, everything seemed find, checked my fire extinguisher, it was fine, ... carried on about my day.

Since that day I have had gasoline fumes in my cab. It was a very strange issue. I would only smell the fumes if it was warm outside. The moment you got out of the car the smell was gone. Even in the engine compartment, I couldn't smell anything. All of my fuel lines, from what I could tell, looked fine. And beings this occurred during winter time, it would only get warm enough for this to occur about maybe once a week. So yes, it was a priority, but because of how intermittent & temperamental it was, I kept pushing it off. Finally I decided to drop the tank and see what happened under there.

So down came the tank and I couldn't find anything wrong. I even hooked up a smoke machine and pressurized my entire fuel system and found zero leaks. It was crazy. Then I started reading around on forums and found this thread: I smell gas.... It was suggested that the Charcoal canister is plugged. Out came my canister and sure enough, it's plugged. I slapped in one we had laying around and so far so good. We even had a warm day two days ago and the smell has not come back yet.

How did it get plugged up? Well, it's sat around for 6 years outside in the foothills so moisture could have gotten in and damaged it. Also, I really top off my tank, no, I mean I really top if off. I know it's bad, I know fuel can bleed into the canister, and that I shouldn't do it. So I'll stop doing it from now on :)

Pictures:
1: Lowered the tank to have a look-see
2: Everything looked good above the tank. Strange how the smell is only noticed inside the cabin and not in the engine compartment. That is why I figured it was something directly atop the tank but it wasn't so.
3: Out came the smoker machine and zero leaks were discovered.
4: So I tested the Charcoal canister (by following these instructions) and discovered it to be completely plugged up!
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

#317
Feb 23, 2014 (continued): Re-installed MSD Knock Alert

I had a long list of things to do but hunting down that fuel vapor issue took waaaay longer than expected and I was only able to tackle one other item on my list: Re-install my ol' MSD Knock Alert device.

I probably bought this thing back in 2002 and only used it for a few months. It's just been sitting around in my garage ever since. Because I am planning on increasing my boost and I have destroyed pistons before, I've already planned for much insurance before boost'n it up. This has been in queue along with the Water-Injection hook-up (see reply #299). Glad they are both now done before I start playing with more boost!

Pictures:
1. Found the only suitable place to install the system's standalone Knock Sensor, and here I am cleaning out the threads with a 8x1.25mm tap. It's not as high up on the block as I'd like, but it should be okay. There was another bolt hole on the exhaust side of the engine above the oil filter, but the sensor and plug is nearly touching the exhaust manifold and I don't want to take chances in ruining them. FYI this is right between the starter (at left) and S/C (at right) on the intake side of the engine block.

2. MSD uses a GM knock sensor which as you may know uses an American Pipe thread pitch. This won't fit on my Japanese engine block. Therefore, more than a decade ago I machined down and re-tapped a metric pitch directly onto the GM sensor converting it for I believe a 12x1.50mm hole. So what I did here was I welded a 12x1.50mm nut atop a 8x1.25mm bolt and simply threaded the bolt into the block. Done.

3. Now I can mount the GM Knock Sensor to the available 8mm engine block bolt hole :thumbs:

4. Here is the control unit mounted in the cab. I have future plans for the radio bay so I didn't want to mount it there, and I don't want to be too flashy by mounting it right up in the instrumentation area. I decided to mount it here which may only be a temporary place for now. I only had to drill one small hole to mount it here, so if I later decide to move it, I won't regret having done this.

5. I understand that mounting it up high is a good thing because you need to see it in your peripheral to know that you are detonating, but there is a built-in speaker (little hole in the flat white plastic area) which has a clear unobstructed area in this position to project to.

Updated notes after having driven with the device installed for a few days:
After driving around a bit I've been able to tune it in using it's built in sensitivity dial and everything looks to be working great so far. No unusual spikes. The LEDs light from from Green, to Orange, to Red. You don't want Red. Red means "get off the gas you a-hole". It's currently configured to activate the first green light by about 4,000 rpm, and then hits the orange lights by redline. So it's set to never see any red lights. So if red lights suddenly appear, then I know for sure something is wrong -- like I've got bad gas, or a spark plug wire just bought the farm, or an electrode broke off from a spark plug, or, what happened to me in the past, the Intercooler is suddenly no longer able to maintain safe intake temps.  :nerv:

One thing that DOES SUCK is that with my awesome sounding intake, I CAN'T HEAR THE DANG THING  :snare: So come to find out this probably isn't the best location. I'm thinking about moving it up high to my visor next to my Radar dector, which would be perfect for my peripheral vision, and I can mount it upside down so the speaker is not obstructed and ought to blast right into my face ... but I don't want to draw attention to my radar detector so I am considering disassembling the plastic housings to dye them black. I do like the idea of it way up high by my visor. It will give me more of that Nightrider feel :burnout:
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

#318
Feb 25, 2014: I finally replaced my broken phone mount!

Yes, I know, it's a silly thing to work on, but let me tell you. Because I drive 5 hours to the Bay Area and back (most) every weekend, being able to watch Movies and TV shows has been a true godsend. TV shows are great because each episode is ~25 mins which happens to be almost the same durations that I like to mentally break my commute into: ~30mins from Fresno to hwy152, ~30mins from there to Los Banos, ~40mins from there to Gilroy, and finally ~30mins from there to San Jose. Movies are good because an hour and a half movie gets me from Fresno almost to highway 101. Then I just enjoy silence for the remaining half hour to my apartment.

All in all it just helps me unwind. It seems I work non-stop over here and driving to and from SJ every week has really become my sanctuary of downtime with my car that I've found mentally nourishing.

If you recall from reply #270 I broke my phone mount. I don't even remember when this happened. Probably last June or July. So I am very happy to finally have this back! Tomorrow night will be my first road trip back to SJ with a working phone mount. Can't wait!

Here is a picture I took from my drive home last night. This is what it looks like to be in command of one bad-to-the-bone MR2 :yupyup:
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

That's it for now. I've begun work on making my old 120mm JDM SC12 pulley smaller (shooting for 106mm, which will take my pulley ratio from the stock USDM 1.16:1 up to 1.37:1) and hopefully will have it done within the next couple of weeks!!

Regards,
BigMike
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

Quote from: BigMike on February 16, 2014, 04:15:55 PM
My brake pads are about 13 years old and are getting really thin. Now with the improved system it's about bloody time I get some new pads and get the rotors turned.
After reading a number of reviews on MR2OC, such as this one, I've decided to go with Porterfield R4-S Street/Autocross pads. They are priced within my budget also. See http://twosrus.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=21_66&products_id=242

I don't have any concrete plans for when I'll be getting the pads and turning my rotors, but at least for now I've decided on what pads to go with.



Regards,
BigMike
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

It's about time I posted some updates. :gap:

Sometime in late spring I noticed I was slowly loosing water. I didn't think much of it at first, figured it had always been low and I was just lazy with my service intervals. Then I was driving at night on the 101 entering south San Jose while playing with a fixed up Miata and pile of crap Boxer (sorry, ever since Toyota tried to "go after" the Boxer with the MR-S I lost all respect for this model Porsche). I got off the freeway and while idling at the first long red light I started smelling antifreeze. I looked at my temp and it was normal, 40% gauge. I drove another mile and got to my wife's work, and when I turned the car off I instantly heard the overflow reservoir bubbling over. Picked up my wife and began heading to our apartment and my temps start climbing. I thought more airflow would help so I got on the freeway but they kept going up, and about 80% gauge I decided to call it, shut off the engine and coasted to a stop on the side of highway 87.

It turns out I was nearly 2 liters of water low, and the insuring return drive to Fresno took 1 liter of water.

June 23, 2014

So I pulled my plus to see which cylinder was getting washed out with water and surprisingly they all looked great. The strange thing was that the idle was perfect, start-up and run-off were good, power felt as great as ever, and in the city I would not loose any water. But once I got out on the highway it would start drinking water and the temps would start climbing. I narrowed it down to water-refill-intervals of every 120 highway miles. So it was some sort of slow leak. I checked all my hoses and lines, never found any visible leaks.

Here is a pic of my plugs, June 23. Plugs are Denso Iridium IK22 and have right around 60,000 miles on them. Summer time is very busy with events here at work so I knew I wouldn't have much time to investigate into this for a while so I continued driving and refilling water on long road trips for a few months...
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

#322
I continued to drive the car week-in week-out, taking my usual trips to San Jose and carrying extra water for refills. Twice per week I would make stops in Madera, Los Banos, and Casa de Fruita to refill my engine's water. As stated earlier, the car was still running great, smooth idle, fired right up every morning, and I was still making my usual 30-32 MPG.

So I was still thinking that it must be a hose leaking or something that I hadn't discovered ... so I just kept driving it through the busy summer months.

Then sometime around late August I finally had some time to work on the car so I ran a compression check and here are the results:
Cylinder 1: 156 PSI
Cylinder 2: 146 PSI
Cylinder 3:   93 PSI
Cylinder 4: 107 PSI


So, yup, it's confirmed, got a blown head gasket. It was just crazy that this didn't seem to have any impact on the engine's driveability or performance, just loosing a lot of water. So after our large annual Marlin Crawler Round-Up event, I scheduled about a month to work on my baby! :hyper:

Sept 5, 2014: Pulled engine

I know it's only a head gasket, but I had other leaks and things I've been wanting to take care of so I just decided it would be best to pull out the engine. I'm really glad I did this because it gave me a lot of time and freedom for other projects to get completed :eyebrow: More on this later :eyebrow:

On to some pictures!

Picture 1 Drove it straight to the shop, running great. I even did a full 9.5 PSI redline 1st & 2nd gear pulls getting onto the freeway and man it just rips it. Love this engine.... hard to believe that it's not running at full potential.

Pic 4 You can see some of my intake setup here. It has been working GREAT and gained me nearly 5 MPG straight-up with the single mod alone. See posts on pages 19 (started new intake) & 21 (finished it) for more pics/details.

Pic 5 is my upper oil cooler line. I knew that something was leaking from that side of the engine and was just blaming it on the distributor. It was a very slow leak that I could wipe with a rag and it would be 4 or 5 days until it would start leaving small oil drops on my driveway. Another reason why it was great I removed the entire engine. I am done with these silly factory lines with the large, non-flexible shielding. I will replace both oil cooler lines with standard 3/8" hose once this goes back together.

Pic 7 check out all the debris from my clutch! Will discuss more about my old clutch kit later.

Pic 8 Day #1 comes to a close and my precious engine is at rest awaiting surgery :bandit:
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

#323
Sept 7, 2014: Disassembled Engine

Not too much to discuss other than that at this time it wasn't clear where the head gasket leak was. Usually you can pull a head and instantly see the leaking area, but only a few areas had very faint signs of leaks ... or not. But for now it wasn't so clear. More to come on this shortly...
On to some random pics!!

Pics 1 & 2: I cut out these inner supports on my driver's side vent but not the passenger's (stock) side. Finally got it done.
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

continued...


The pics of the headgasket thicknesses are comparing the stock (used) HG of 1.5mm ? to Bill's TRD MLS HG that I intend to install of 1mm. So half a milimeter thinner HG. Bill thinks this will raise my compression by as much as two tenths! :booya:

The pic of my 6-speed transaxle is it after running through our hot tank. I covered up all holes and it turned our REALLY clean.

Last pics are of the cylinder head taken apart and awaiting a Marlin valve job!
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

Sept 8, 2014: Opened up Exhaust Ports and ground valves

Marlin did some port work and opened up the exhaust side. I told him not to both with the intake since it's under pressure, ...and that I have some very special plans to address any lack of back pressure :eyebrow: Much more to come with this later :eyebrow:

Pic of where my car is to sit for a few weeks!

Pic of an exhaust port: Before & After

Last pic is looking down into the exhaust port. It's hard to see but it has opened up quite a bit. Again, not too worried about back pressure. More to come on this later!
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

Sept 26, 2014: Cleaned block deck and pistons, resurfaced flywheel

I took a one week trip to Florida and made use of the downtime to get the head surfaced. I then cleaned the deck of the block and also the pistons. Got the flywheel resurfaced also, this time I did a 0.025" step instead of a 0.023" step. More on this later-

On to some pics

Check out how clean I got the pistons. I used a semi-soft wire wheel and they turned out nice. After cleaning them you could read the 1/2mm oversized markings, so sure enough, this engine has been rebuilt as told by the guy I got it from.

Then, look what I found! AH HA! We thought it might be leaking from the back corner behind cylinder #4 and SURE ENOUGH look at this!! This block has been welded!! WOW! Someone spent some serious time with this. Pretty hard to believe they would weld it (why not just get another block?). So now without a doubt we know why I was loosing water as this is right between cylinder 4 and the block's water jacket.

Finally, got my TODA Chromoly flywheel resurfaced yet again!
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

Sept 28, 2014: Cylinder Head & Cams Installed

I didn't want to take the entire block apart to deck the block so I spent a good 4 hours straight hand decking the block. It was a lot of work! In the end I admit I should have just taken it all apart but it turned out good and I'm moving forward! I really had to sand it down to get past the welds, and of course the welds being annealed, took a long time to flatten down.

ARP head studs installed, TRD Head Gasket (P/N 00643-11115-000) installed (THANK YOU BILL!), Stock 7.5mm lift cams installed for now with aspirations to get some Webcam 294s in (wanted to start with stock cams so I can get a baseline and everything tuned and dialed in first), spent some time doing some final valve adjusting, and lastly I got the CULPRIT THAT DESTROYED MY STAGE 2.5 ENGINE GROUND DOWN AND CLEARANCED :maddest: Stupid ARP studs. Had to learn the hard way with these things but glad to have them in this engine.
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

Sept 29, 2014: Assembled Intake Side of Engine

The next day I got the intake, fuel rail assembly, and EGR components all back together. Not much to discuss, everything went together quite nicely. I replaced the two manifold inlet pipe (No. 2 air duct) 6mm bolts with 6mm studs so that the entire inlet pipe is connected by all studs. This is important for me since every 2 years I'll need to install my stock inlet to reconfigure my car to a less efficient & higher pollution configuration that is approved by the State of California in order to pass smog. SO STUPID. Stock configuration makes 27 MPG, my new efficient intake is netting 32 MPG ... but it is considered a smog illegal modification. :thud: Go figure!!

I also replaced the used metal gaskets of the two aluminum water port pieces with Toyota Black silicone. Not gonna take any chances.

Bill, thank you for these nicer valve covers. They look great!
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2

BigMike

#329
Oct 1, 2014: Flywheel & New Clutch Installed, Cut down JDM S/C Pulley

Decided I'd weigh my flywheel. Compare this to when I bought it. Back in 1999? it weighed 9.5 pounds. So with all the resurfacing over the years it has become nearly half a pound lighter! :o

Installed the previous clutch 12/19/2010 (back on page 15) with 247,048 miles on the clock. Got nearly 4 years and
50,166 miles out of that ceramic clutch kit with my car's mileage now at 297,214. I am pretty amazed at this, remember this is NOT a Supercharger clutch kit. This is a 212mm clutch kit designed for a 112 HP 4A-GE. :thumbs:

I was of course so satisfied with this clutch I had to get the exact same thing. Here is the old one next to the new one. Six ceramic plucks without urethane bushings.

Check out how much my SC engine abused the old clutch disc. Wow!

You can see this was replaced not a moment too soon. Starting to wear into a few rivets, this one being the worst (and the one to the right hardly touched).

Decided to compare thicknesses of worn out to new disc. Interesting that 50k miles only consumed 0.69mm on each side. I was thinking it would be much more.

New disc with resurfaced (0.025") TODA Chromoly flywheel ready to go!
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     My 1987 Supercharged 4A-powered 6-speed MR2