decided not to reinstall the ac, I didn't use it much, and after a re-gas it wasn't as effective as it used to be. Ive cleared all the lines from the bay, and the condenser is gone. I also had to make up a small infill where the bracket used to be, the bracket leaves a hole between the front covers and the block, and direct access to the timing belt sprocket.
Started it up about an hour ago, had a high idle about 1450rpm which didn't drop when it warmed to operating temp, instead it hunted up and down, A small amount of smoke started to appear from the driver's side turbo area, I inspected all the turbo oil and water fittings, from under the car and from the bay with my depstech scope, nothing is leaking from the turbo fittings, or anywhere else in that area, and nothing dripping on the floor, so ill pay some more attention to that area next time I start it. I didn't have the tail shaft in and fk it, the gearbox lost about 500ml of new mt90 on the floor even though it was in neutral. The high idle ended up being an open port on a six port tree, now closed.
"The high idle ended up being an open port on a six port tree, now closed" and I found another on the balance tube small pipe the one in front of the vvt and o2 connectors. the open port on the vacuum tree and the open port on the balance tube, were supposed to be connected by a hose, they are now and the engine runs a just like it should, I'm really happy with the outcome so far.
Looks good Geoff! Will we see you at ZedFest? It's in your neck of the woods for a change.... www.zedfest.com.au
Thanks, Rob. Yes I want to show up at some point, just to say hello and check out the crews' zeds. I'm hoping to have the car road worthy and registered before then, getting a road worthy maybe tricky.
Thanks zytram, it was a journey, with a fair bit of second guessing going on, for instance. When I removed the rods and pistons, the rod bolts were tight, much tighter than the 38-44nm called for in the 1990 fsm, so I checked out the 1992 fsm and the 1994fsm, 92 was the same spec, but 94 was 59-65nm for the rod bolts, my car is registered as a 94 model, I dough that, I think it's a 93 model, so I stuck to the 90-92 fsm and the higher end torque setting for that year. Before I pulled the engine, I did cold compression and leak down tests, compression was excellent over 170psi on 5 pots but cylinder 1 was 20psi down, the leak down test showed 15% loss at on all 6 cylinders 90psi, I decided the valves needed to be ground, although they looked alright, I did it. Now at 90psi there is a global 5% loss, so that worked out. I brought a new .5 over piston to go into cylinder 1, It fitted the bore but was tight, I measured the piston with a micrometer and the bore with a dial bore gauge, it became clear that without a hone cut it was never going to work, so I looked at the old piston and the damage it had on the top of it, and decided that with a bit of smoothing it would be alright, and it is, because now compression in cylinder 1 is only 2-3psi down on the other 5. There were a couple tricks I learned along the way, like rebuilding the lifters, I pulled a few lifters apart, they looked clean, and this is a slow process, so if figured that if I soaked them in fuel and cycled them, (pushed down on the inside cap while they were submerged in fuel)maybe that would purge out any crap inside, that worked out to, all the old oil came out no problem. After only clean fuel came out, I pumped them dry outside my shed left them in the sun to dry inside then submerged them in fresh engine oil and pumped them full of fresh oil, it works they are quiet. Not everything worked out though, the camshafts leaked oil, because I didn't seal the front edges of the caps with rtv, like the fsm says to. That is now repaired with the rtv and new nissan seals, and just for good measure a new timing belt. I have to say that before I turned key for the first time after putting the engine back into the car, I had no expectation that it would run or even start, I was actually dreading turning the key, I had given it my best and if it didn't run then it was off to someone who could repair it. To my amazement not only does it run well, but it has also exceeded by miles any low expectations I had. The engine is strong, pulls hard at stock wastegate pressure, reeves out quickly, is quieter than it ever was, and in the end all the stress I went through, and the above does not quite cover it, was worth it.
