My new car!

VRx8 · Postby **VRx8** » Sat Apr 07, 2012 9:14

Glad you got the leaks figured out. I think is HAMMER time! lol.

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Thu Apr 12, 2012 9:14

Car is still running great and it looks like all major leaks are sorted...except for one, of course. I have a small drip from the turbo oil drain. When the engine is shut off it will drain the turbo, but eventually stop. At most there is a tablespoon puddle on the floor after running the engine for a while and the subframe is a little oily. I got under the FD while it was running and verified the leak, its slow, about 3-6 drips per minute.

I used a gasket, but it didn't fit perfectly, so I had to slot one of the sides to get it to line up with the bolts. I tried torquing the Allen head cap bolts more and it slowed the leak down some, but it's still dripping.

The problem is, the drain fitting adapter is in a very difficult to access location, between the turbine housing/manifold and the compressor housing, and made further inaccessible by my turbo coolant hoses and a heater hose directly underneath it. The -10AN drain fitting it also on tightly due to the shape of the hose and how I had to route it. Basically, I'm seriously dreading removing it to regasket it haha.

I tried smearing some RTV externally on the flange area but it doesn't seemed to have helped any. So hopefully I can tackle this tonight, using only RTV to seal the drain flange adapter and pray it holds. Otherwise, it's not a major leak, just annoying.

In other news, I got my car registered today so emissions is a thing of the past, thanks to Eric

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Sat Apr 14, 2012 9:14

Forgot to update this, but I drove the FD for the first time two days ago. Felt really nice, although I was mostly concerned about something failing and it leaving me stranded haha. I put some gas in it and putted around for 7 miles or so. I got into some boost by accident...well, more intentional haha. The turbo sounds awesome, I love it.

Parked it and overnight it drained some coolant, looks like its coming from the lower radiator hose. I tightened the clamps and it looks better now. Of course, still leaking oil for the turbo drain since I haven't fixed it yet haha.

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Wed Apr 18, 2012 9:14

Finally fixed the turbo oil drain last night. Removed the drain fitting and hose and put some new RTV sealant on it and the -10AN NTP fitting side that threads into the adapter piece (not on the AN side). The job wasn't as bad as originally anticipated, but still not fun. Just no room, so I had to do everything basically blind and with one hand. Tons of fun haha.

I let it cure overnight and so far, no leak, but it hasn't seen any oil pressure yet. I plan on firing her up in a minute here to check for leaks.

After this, the only issue currently is the intermittently leaking lower radiator hose, thanks to Defined sending a non straight cut hose. I think I might get one of the flexible metal hoses since it is kind of an odd angle. That way I can bend it into the exact shape and make sure it won't leak.

Other on-going issue is the downpipe, which fits like shit. Ideally, I would drop it off at my fabricators shop so he can custom fit a downpipe for me, but he has no room. I just don't want to be removing and test fitting the piece 10 times over and over again.

I'm going to try a quick fix by cutting 90% through the pipe near the flex so it can flex into the position it needs to be in and get that welded. Maybe even the ATP v-band adapter piece so I can convert the downpipe to a v-band connection to make it easier to install.

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Thu Apr 19, 2012 9:14

Confirmed the turbo oil drain is now fixed, no more puddles or anything under the car! Finally! Now I just need to get this downpipe sorted and I'll be golden.

I plan on putting some miles on her tomorrow, around 50, then slowly getting into boost. My wg is set for around 10psi and that's all I plan on running for now. Anymore and I'll likely get ignition breakup since I'm running only stock coils until I can source an HKS Twin Power or some CDI ignition system.

VRx8 · Postby **VRx8** » Fri Apr 20, 2012 9:14

chickenwafer wrote:Confirmed the turbo oil drain is now fixed, no more puddles or anything under the car! Finally! Now I just need to get this downpipe sorted and I'll be golden.

I plan on putting some miles on her tomorrow, around 50, then slowly getting into boost. My wg is set for around 10psi and that's all I plan on running for now. Anymore and I'll likely get ignition breakup since I'm running only stock coils until I can source an HKS Twin Power or some CDI ignition system.

You can always come visit us down here in the springs. Lol

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Fri Apr 20, 2012 9:14

^ I would if I could!

Took the FD to the car wash today to get her cleaned up. Still having some hot start problems like its too lean, going to take some adjustments on the pfc to fix. Other than she was running great and did some boost pulls...man my open wg dump pipe is LOUD!! Haha. Held 10psi solid through 3rd to about 6500rpm when I let off, and then promptly had a cop follow me :rolleyes:

She's running pretty quick, but I'm taking it easy making sure everything is working good. Just need to stop being lazy and fix my downpipe haha.

No more leaks either, so I'm happy. Also quick waxed her and snapped some pics I'll post here about lunch.

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Fri Apr 20, 2012 9:14

Quick pics...and before anyone says anything, no, the bumper isn't fully bolted on.

Also took these two to show the color change in the factory Montego Blue ( MB ) Paint, the first is how it looks in direct sunlight, basically green:

And then this picture is in the shadow, and it's a deep blue. Pretty cool.

Still thinking I might paint the charge pipes wrinkle black and leave the v-mount aluminum, trying to decide. But for now, I'm going to fix the stupid downpipe and then enjoy it for a while.

Operator · Postby **Operator** » Fri Apr 20, 2012 9:14

Sooo NOICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Once my car is finished, I want to do a shoot with your ride. Though I doubt people would even notice my car...................

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Fri Apr 20, 2012 9:14

Haha thanks Dave, a photo shoot would be awesome! Plenty of people will notice your Audi, I love the style of it.

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Sat Apr 21, 2012 9:14

My RX-7 is acting like, well, an RX-7 now haha. Being a fickle b!tch!!!

I decided to try to tune out the hot starting issue (or at the least figure out if it's running lean, rich, flooding, etc). I was making some progress until I was trying to restart it and once the motor lit I had a good loud POP! out the exhaust (backfire) and then it started surging around at idle, between 1100-1500rpm. I feathered the throttle around but all it would either do is surge or idle solid at 1500rpm...my idle is set for 975 in the PFC.

I reloaded the tune I started with and nothing, so at least I knew wasn't a parameter change I made. I shut it off and let it cool down a little bit...restart and same thing; either surging or stuck at 1500rpm. Finally, I revved it up to 4k or so it settled back down to 1000rpm idle. WTF?? It was running perfectly at idle before, responding to all changes I wanted and everything, and now it's acting like Eric's car LOL. I'm going to have to retest is to see if it's a consistent problem or not. I don't think the backfire had anything to do with it, I highly doubt any engine damage can occur at such as low RPM.

To make things worse, I have a small oil leak from the cooler, but I can't pinpoint where. I saw a very small amount of oil on one of the fittings and some oil on top of the cooler, but that's it. When I let the car idle again for the last time I took out the parking light and visually inspected the hoses and cooler while it ran and saw nothing strange, or any leaks.

Lastly, I had a rather large puddle (maybe close to a quart or so?) or very cold water under the passenger side of the car, around the tire. There isn't really coolant-related stuff over there, and why the hell would it be cold? Like ice cold. I initially thought my car purged some coolant (since my coolant overflow is just a hose running straight to the ground, no catch tank, but I'm getting one soon) but it wouldn't be cold, and if I purged that much coolant, the level would be low, which it isn't. Maybe a pocket of water from the car wash that got in through the brake duct and stayed in the wheel well for a while? Who knows, but that's my best hypothesis.

The exhaust leak from the turbo to the downpipe is also getting worse, I REALLY need to get that fixed before I drive the car much more. And the weirdest thing I noticed is I have some exhaust getting pulled back into rear trunk/hatch area, and I can't tell where from? I didn't really do any work there except mount the battery in the spare tire well but the exhaust gas is coming in from the other side (driver side). So that will take some investigation.

/rambling post haha

VRx8 · Postby **VRx8** » Sat Apr 21, 2012 9:14

Sounds like something my car would do! as well. Sometimes i wonder if the PFC is the reason of that, I havn't senn a lot of Microtech, Haltech guys having weird problems like this. Like Angel's 12A the idle is so solid is amazing, my car on the other hand will idle different every time I start the car up lol.

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Sat Apr 21, 2012 9:14

Yeah, the pfc doesn't control idle very well IMO. It tries to dynamically adjust timing in order to control idle, which isn't the best way to do it.

Im not a fan of Microtechs, and Haltechs are cool but they do have some weird CAS issues, although I think that is limited to older ECUs. If I were swap ECUs I would probably spring for a Link G4 or Vipec V88. Both have a metric shit ton of features and work extremely well.

In another note, I pulled the bumper to inspect the oil cooler and noticed a small ding on the outside near the front drivers side wheel, but it looks clean. I saw some oil seeping out of one of the fittings and tried to tightening it. Good thing I did, I got about a full turn out of it, so I think that as the problem. Put the bumper back on and called it good. For now haha.

I also double checked all the worm drive coolant system clamps and almost all were at least a full turn loose! The upper radiator hose clamp was nearly 3 full turns loose! I can't believe it wasn't leaking. So I double checked all the worm drive clamps and torqued them, also checked the fuel line clamps which were good, but one -6an fitting on the FPR had a half turn in it to make it foot tightened.

Kind of annoying, I wish i would have kept the factory spring style clamps haha. Although I have a plan to replace the radiator hoses with -16an hose and weld on fittings.

yoojeankim · Postby **yoojeankim** » Tue Apr 24, 2012 9:14

damn ur engine bay is looking good!

chickenwafer · Postby **chickenwafer** » Wed Apr 25, 2012 9:14

Tried to update this 2 days ago but kept getting that "internal sever error" crashing page so I gave up haha.

Anyways, I drove the car around and it's feeling great. I did some quick 10psi boost runs and took Matt for a spin. I parked the FD and popped the hood, and my jaw dropped...the ENTIRE driver side of the engine bay was COVERED in oil! Shittttt

Well, turns out it's wasn't a failure of anything, actually, it was something functioning properly. I guess I had too much oil in the engine so it puked the extra out...filled a half quart into my catch can which completely filled it, but it still had MORE to expel, so it overflowed out of the catch can filter. It sprayed a minimum of half a quart. Luckily, no damage done and I was able to mop up most of it and then pressure washed off the subframe.

Something more concerning, however, was the wire I used to get power to my fuel pump relay. I didn't think about upgrading it to a larger gauge wire when dropping in twin Supra TT fuel pumps...bad choice haha. The car was idling and I noticed the wire (which is red) was discolored and really dark in some areas...I touched it and wow it was hot! There was even some areas where it was bubbling up and the plastic coating was peeling. Great.

So I quickly got to work replacing that, using heavier gauge wire to the relay, and now putting in a 30amp fuse in-line as well. I also decided to pull the fuel pumps to check the power wire in the tank, and great thing I did! The power wire inside the tank was in just as bad shape, so I replaced it with some 4-gauge wire and dropped it all back in.

Pictures in the next post.

My new car!

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