RB26DETT into 240Z Beginner Progress

[StealthZ]

Sorry for the delay, but finally got the pic's downloaded - couldn't find my damn interface cable.

I have a pretty decent Fluke multimeter, so I took some temp and resistance readings at ambient, and then heated them up what would be approx operating temp,.

 

The first pic is at ambient temp 78.7 deg F.

Second pic is the KA sensor, which was around 381 ohms.

Third pic is the L28 which was 407 ohms, so a little split, but not bad. Except for working out the linearity, really not to concerned about the 'cold' readings being a little off.

Fourth pic is the RB sensor, at about 0.9597K, so it was waay out there.

 

Then we heated things up a bit.

Fifth pic - Got a pot of water going on the stove, and let it stabilize for about 10 min at about 195 deg F. I wanted to get a reading on the hot side of operating temp, because that is where I want the most accuracy.

Sixth pic - Keeping the probes out of the water, the KA sensor was pretty consistent around 30 ohms +- 1.5 ohms.

Didn't have enough hands to hold the probes and take a pic, but the L28 sensor was about 31 +- 1.5 ohms. So I would say that it's close enough for me.

 

I would eventually like to run it from ambient to around 240 deg, and record every 5 or 10 deg, just to see what the whole range would be, but that's for another time - too many other things I need to get done on the car.

 

Had the car out at the 1/4 mile drag strip last week, and again, temp was dead stable, and never moved off of it's spot just below half scale.

(FWIW I ran 13.4 at 105.8 with crappy tires and guessing when to shift - no working tach yet... at only 7 lbs of boost. Put the hurt on a supercharged Cobra mustang ).

[getoffmyinternet]

Yeah, I have no tach yet either. I'm thinking of trying that fix from the tach thread. I am in dire need of a new diff and wheels. Can't go past 75% throttle in any gear without completely losing traction.

 

I would think that the range of each sensor would be linear, so the only thing you need to find is the resistance at two temps to see how they match up. I did the same thing basically. Had two meters side by side and read off both sensors at the same time. Funny though, my temp gauge stays just above center. I recently put a 180/170 fan switch in because the 190 was faulty (opening at 210) and it's staying consistent now--I think it goes a little past the center before evening out when the fan kicks on. Where the switch is located on the radiator there is about a 20 degree loss so it's actually something like a 200/190 switch. I may just adapt it to the radiator hose in the future.

 

 

I'm also showing low oil pressure, but I'm not at all sure if the sender is working properly (using the old l6 one). I went to synthetic yesterday (10w30), perfect timing too as it was free bosch filter with royal purple purchase. Gauge reads the same as before, about 40 when cold, and like 10 at warm idle, topping off at 30 in high revs...

[getoffmyinternet]

look at the top of the pictures where it says "App. Model"

 

 

So's your face

[Careless]

lol. a woeyz goey, eh!? why I oughtta!

 

Fast swapped the numbers on me! LOOK AT THE TOP of the first pic!

HONEST!

 

When replacing the the oil pressure sender, use FAST and crossreferce, find local cars that use the same unit, and then buy a AFTERMARKET unit that will fit the same cars. Nissan units around the 90's don't seem to like Synthetic Oils for some reason.

 

As soon as I put synthetic, my pressure guage showed like 0-20psi.

 

and when my friend did the same in his Z32, it was constantly at 15psi, and no higher. it even hit 0psi at one point, and scared him. but it ran fine. he had them changed for aftermarket units and got a good 40-60psi if I recall, with AMS 10w40

 

Swapping the unit out for an aftermarket unit did the trick.

[StealthZ]

"I would think that the range of each sensor would be linear"

Yep, felt the same way. That's why I'm not too worried about it.

 

Hey, on the eng mount issue, I am using the ones from a S12 V6 . They are near indentical to the one's that came with my motor. I believe they are the silicone filled style, so I bought new from Nissan because I know over time the rubber cracks and lets the goo out. Think they were about $80 ea even with my Z-Club discount from Courtesy Nissan.

 

On the oil pressure front, I am using the sensor from my old eng, and I have very good oil pressure with the new motor. Sensor looks to be in good shape, but can't remember if it is factory or aftermarket.

Running 10W-30 (conventional oil), on a 70 deg day, with a cold eng, I show about 2/3 guage, coming back down to 1/4 guage at idle when warm.

I recently put in 20W-50 Valvoline Racing (conventional) oil in the car and now I have CRAZY oil pressure. With a little cooler air temp (50 deg), a cold eng at idle almost PEGS the guage. It will read 2 needle width's past the upper mark (so past 90 psi). I have been letting it idle until the temp comes up, but the pressure stays probably mid guage at idle when warm, and will still edge up twards the 90 psi range when rev'ed.

 

I plan to switch to synthetic this summer, but I wanted to run some conventional oil through it for a couple of changes to 'get the gunk out' since it was a used eng and sat for a bit.

 

You might want to try out an aftermarket one as Careless says, I have had 2 Nissan guages go out on me (in the 160K I have run the car, so I guess not too bad...). But both times, it would read low pressure.

 

Oh, if you get bored, I fiinally posted some pic's of the car on the "Lets see your RB Z..." thread. http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=97930&page=8

[getoffmyinternet]

Did you try again? I see the first pic but it doesn't have the trans specified so when it had you click one you may have just clicked the wrong one? Those europeans are always backwards anyway though.

 

Will do on the oil sender. Mine generally shows about 1/8 gauge at most, 20psi, and never gets to half way so yeah probably the same problem as yours, but I have no reason to believe the pressure is actually low.

 

Does synthetic corrode any metals or plastic? That's strange. I ran mineral for a hundred miles or so partly because the old oil never totally drained out and yeah it had been sitting a while, so I made sure it was nice and hot before draining it. I'm sure it's also a good practice to use mineral after disrupting the cylinders with new rings etc.

 

I'm gonna wash it today and get some pictures, I swear!

[Mike Rowe]

Regards this, on my 240Z wen I put the Crane (MSD) box on my L28 I also lost my tacho. Through a guy I know he took it to the Electrician who put a board in the back and an extra single wire coming out which attaches to the Crane and wo the tacho works again.

I will find out if the same can be done for my 260Z and RB26 motor and advise the result and what he has done.

[Mike Rowe]

Here is how they return from the electrician (see photo)

Green coiled wire is connected in this case to the Crane unit

[getoffmyinternet]

I put in the replacement oil sender the other day. So far at idle it's now reading about 60psi in the morning and 30psi once warm.

[getoffmyinternet]

I finally got datascan to work (thanks to jerryb)! First thing I noticed was that the o2 is not reading at all, even though there are no trouble codes. That said, there's no trouble code for the speed sensor, which is not even hooked up. Secondly, the panel says it is running lean? Thirdly, when I shut off cylinders one by one, #5 doesn't make that much of a difference. Unless it's just me, that one's not running right. I can't remember if it has a clean injector or not, I'll have to start all over troubleshooting.

 

I'm not real keen on what all the gauges should look like, here's a blurry picture for the hell of it, taken at a warm idle on a hot afternoon.

 

 

 

On a side note, it seems that with the ka temp sensor, 180F is dead center of the gauge. My fan doesn't kick on til about 200 because of a 20 deg loss between the engine and the sensor. Also, I flushed the fluid yesterday (it was pretty gross since I hadn't done it before, only filled it). and now it's running noticeably cooler. Doesn't hardly ever get above center gauge, and the fan only kicks on after sitting still for a few minutes. Before the temp would get up to 200 for short periods even on the highway.

[Mike Rowe]

This is pretty amazing. What does the software cost? And does it come with a cable that plugs into the cars computer or similar? Can it be used with Apexi?

regards

[getoffmyinternet]

I'm not sure about the software being compatible with apexi, but the cable is designed to plug into the odb1 for these cars. The cable and softwares from blazt are $128.50 from their website, but ask jerryb, he's a distributor of sorts. Blazt also says their cable works with other software and they list a few, so if you're apexi has an odb1 style cable, it might work with the appropriate software.

[getoffmyinternet]

In case anyone was curious, with the red cog on the speedo and the stock 3.364 it's pretty much reading 20% low. When It reads 40mph I'm actually going 50. Also, my last tank of gas averaged me 23mpg, which I'm fairly happy about. My friends maxima gets him about 16, and so did my last car, plus this is on par with my dads tacoma I was used to driving before, only twice the horsepower.

[zilvia_gt]

In case anyone was curious, with the red cog on the speedo and the stock 3.364 it's pretty much reading 20% low. When It reads 40mph I'm actually going 50. Also, my last tank of gas averaged me 23mpg, which I'm fairly happy about. My friends maxima gets him about 16, and so did my last car, plus this is on par with my dads tacoma I was used to driving before, only twice the horsepower.

 

If I recall correctly you're using a modified rb25 speed sensor that is cable driven right or are you using a z32 electric one?

[getoffmyinternet]

I hacked off the end of the rb one and stuck my mechanical fitting onto it. However getting the two pieces to stay together was a challenge because it's some sort of pot metal. If I had a better lathe, I would have tapped them and screwed them together or something.

 

All in all, since my mechanical gauge is off and I'm having trouble getting the tach to work, I may just have to eventually spring for new digital gauges, in which case I'll have to go back to an electronic sensor. I think a z32 one would work, and be cheaper than getting a new rb sensor. In retrospect I believe certain rb26 sensors where mechanical, so there's one alternative. I only modified the rb25 sensor because it was broken anyway and I thought I might as well try and save a few bucks.

[zilvia_gt]

I'm not sure about the rb, but when I did my swap with the sr into a s13. I had to swap the sr tranny speed sensor with the ka tranny speed sensor. Reason is the sr speed sensor was reading in KMH, so you need the ka speen sensor which reads in MPH to correct the speedometer reading. Could this account for why your speedometer was off? I'm sure that if you decide to run a digital sensor, you'll need a z32 to get correct speedometer reading. I'm not sure though because with aftermarket units, you can usually calibrate them.

 

I hacked off the end of the rb one and stuck my mechanical fitting onto it. However getting the two pieces to stay together was a challenge because it's some sort of pot metal. If I had a better lathe, I would have tapped them and screwed them together or something.

 

All in all, since my mechanical gauge is off and I'm having trouble getting the tach to work, I may just have to eventually spring for new digital gauges, in which case I'll have to go back to an electronic sensor. I think a z32 one would work, and be cheaper than getting a new rb sensor. In retrospect I believe certain rb26 sensors where mechanical, so there's one alternative. I only modified the rb25 sensor because it was broken anyway and I thought I might as well try and save a few bucks.

[getoffmyinternet]

Yeah aftermarket digital ones are calibrated in a snap, and priced accordingly. Well, the trans doesn't know the difference between kph and mph, but I assume you mean that the foreign speedos had a different range? What I mean is, if the domestic ones go up to 160mph, I would think that the foreign ones would go up to 260kph and would thus be interchangeable because the only difference is what the face has written on it. That's interesting though if not true. When all else fails, using the old speedo is a good start so long as the trans speedo drive is designed the same way. Using the old temp and oil sensors works too if they are compatible with the new engine, but unfortunately mine weren't.

 

My speedo was bound to be off, I'm surprised it's not off more than it is. The wheels are smaller, the final drive is way lower, and my gauge undoubtedly doesn't go as high as the skyline ones. Plus I'm seeing that even the skyline gauges have a lot of flexibility. At first I thought the three different size cogs were just for different final gears, but now I'm seeing that there were different gauge cluster options that seem to have had a variety of speed ranges.

[getoffmyinternet]

So the ignition on the o2 sensors was bunk for whatever reason, didn't want to tear apart the entire loom to find out. The plugs were installed pretty janky like, as with many of the wires from the stock loom, soldered and taped over. Anyway, I knew that 45 went right by there because I had to tap it for something else down the line, so I just T'ed it and now the o2 sensors "work." The rear one may not be working though, when I unplug it the reading doesn't seem to change, whereas if I unplug the front, it pretty much goes dead.

 

The engine still has that slight miss and runs about the same, however.

 

Does the o2 reading normally spike on closing the throttle? It seems like the reading would normaly be more like 10, but I don't know much about that stuff. It generally bounces around 5 or so, but when I let off, it jumps all over and pegs the gauge. Observe.

 

[getoffmyinternet]

The tacho, I tried to resistor up and I couldn't get it to read from the ecu #7. Which one is supposed to be the tach signal here? There's a white wire that doesn't even look connected, just screwed on and loops around, black band on one side, red on the other. Then there's two wires hard mounted to a little terminal block. And of course the 4 instrument lights around the sides... The 4 main wires go to a plug just downstream of the tach and all change color, but none of the colors seem to line up with the z diagram.

 

 

 

 

Also, a picture of the torn trans mount. It's easy to mis unless you put pressure on it. My dad couldn't even find the tear after I removed it.

 

 

The isolators installed on the fuel pump. Other than being in the garage and before ignition, I can't even hear it anymore. If they don't last, I'll have to make the holes larger and upgrade to the 1/4" size, which is the next up from these 8-32s

 

 

 

The o2 sensor wiring. It still doesn't make sense that the wires on the o2 sensors themselves (red, white, black) would go to different things. I might try cutting the wires from the one that doesn't seem to work and rearranging them to match the other in case they were just a mismatch. Does anyone else have access to their wires to see what the order is? It seems that the engine runs smoothest the first 10-15 seconds after starting, which is probably the closed loop time since these sensors are heated and should go open loop rather quickly. It doesn't struggle to idle when cold like it did before, and there's no significant power loss when trying to drive when it's cold, so it has definitely improved, but I'm not quite there.

 

[getoffmyinternet]

Tomorrow if all goes as planned I'm going to get some aftermarket o2 sensors and see if I can get them to work. Plus I started an injector cleaner fuel additive, I have no idea if these things work, but what the heck. When that doesn't work, I'll take my injectors in to be checked and cleaned. If after all that, the engine still doesn't run smooth, I'm going to have to do some serious testing of the ignition system I guess. Coil pack tests, ignitor check if there is a way to do so, etc. Hope it doesn't get to that.

 

 

Anyway, the reason I'm here is because I got the door panels on (if anyone is interested). If you're just now tuning in, Ray makes glass and cf door panel skins for these boys, tend to be cheaper than buying new cardboard doors, albeit a lot more work. I planned to eventually have them covered (if and when I have the interior reupholstered) but for the heck of it I thought I'd try just painting them semi black. It wasn't easy because the resin came fairly porous and I don't have a whole lot of experience with bondo and filler. Anyway, I riveted the old metal trim onto the skin and riveted on new window fuzzies to that. It snaps in with plastic rivets (not the best fit I'll admit because I eyeballed the holes to be drilled and it was hell getting the latch hole that came with the skin to line up with the latch bezel. It would all look nicer if I sprung for new door hardware, especially the armrest. The downside however, is that it will probably be soon to show scratches etc. and look dusty much more readily than if it were texture vinyl covered like the originals. Plus the latch bezel won't go flush unless the mount is flattened down since the skins are thinner now. But oh well, it was kinda fun making them, and they look cool for now if'n you don't look real close like.

 

 

 

 

Edit: Incidentally, you can also see one of my new mirrors, an oem driver side mirror flipped over. I know they're not symmetrical, but it's hard to tell.