Challenger Posted August 6, 2009 Share Posted August 6, 2009 Car its going into... my 78 2+2, slowly emerging from 7 years of restoration/storage. Project since I was 11. Donor car, purchased about 6 months or so ago. Drove it to school for awhile, was a ton of fun to actually drive a sports car since Ive never really gotten to drive my 78. It got me a couple tickets and got me into some trouble where I wasnt allowed to drive it.... its just been sitting for most of the summer and I was tired of not getting to drive it (and I didnt really ever see me getting to drive it again) so I pulled the engine. What can I say, Ive sold quite a few parts off of it, selling it for $250, got a nice engine from it, my insurance went down when I drove it, blah, blah, blah, it was well worth the $550 + $300 in tickets. Engine bay as of now, engine runs great and it will be driven this way atleast until sometime next summer permitting I get the car on the road. Basically what the engine looked like before it was pulled out. Most of yesterday was spent cleaning the block with it all still together, minus manifolds. Got alot of the grease off, made it nice on dissassembly. Its a turbo kit in a box. Pretty much everything that was detachable from the block, manifolds, wiring, afm, intake etc. Got it down to the bare block today. Cool photo... Crank is out. Cylinders dont look great in the picture but are actually quite nice. It looks as if its been honed recently. The rustly looking stuff you see will all come off with a hone. Should come out really nice. Thats all I have for now. Im trying to do all the stuff I can without spending money so I can still work on prepping my n42 intake, cleaning up the turbo/manifold, dissassemble the head and clean it up. Probably wont replace much on it, but well see. Anyways, goal is to basically clean the block up, hone it, replace all the gaskets, bearings, maybe rings, n42 intake, aluminum fuel rail, 60mm TB (not that it does anything, looks better), MSA downpipe, deck the head if needed, maybe recut the valve seats, intercooler setup that runs under the oil pan, some sort of recirculation valve, stock turbo electronics, fuel injectors, running at 10-12 psi. Basically a refreshed stock l28et with minor cosmetic and perforance modifications. At some point down the line I would love to raise the boost up to somewhere in the 15+ range, standalone ECU, holset, something in the 300 hp range. But I doubt any of that will happen till Im out of school. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Challenger Posted June 2, 2010 Author Share Posted June 2, 2010 Update. I sold the engine parts from the black 81 and bought a silver 81 turbo. I did basically all the same things to the engine as on the black car but a little nicer. Heres the plan... Ive removed the engine from the 78 already and have began cleaning the engine bay. I removed most everything from the engine bay except the master cylinders, and the fuel injection harness. I got the main harness out for cleaning. I was planning on repainting the engine bay the grey my car is but after cleaning everything up the original silver will work pretty well. Some touch ups here and there and itll look good. As for the 81 Im trying to sort out the windshield wipers in order to reregister the car and be legal (thank you mom and dad )I am also sorting out a few issues with the car as it runs now but its hard to test stuff when you cant drive the car... at the point I get it on the road and its running good I will be installing an intercooler, new fuel pump, FMU, manual boost controller as well a good set of gauges so I know what all is going on. I will at that point bump up the fuel pressure and boost. 15 psi for boost and I believe it was around 60 for the fuel. I am still looking into it and it will for sure be a slow process and a very tedious one... Stay tuned for more. Im gonna get a older mechanic friend to help me sort out the 81 within the next week hopefully and we can start to make some progress on prepping my turbo engine!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Challenger Posted June 10, 2010 Author Share Posted June 10, 2010 (edited) Alright little update... 78 280z: Pulled everything out of the engine bay and have begun to weld up the holes and smooth out everything. I currently have all the holes on the passenger side welded, skimmed with a little bit of jb weld and a layer of bondo that I will sand smooth in the morning. Plan is to try and get the engine bay all finished up this weekend. I didnt want to have to remove the master cylinders and everything on the drivers side of the engine bay where the paint is pretty good so I will be looking for a similar silver to repaint the area behind the radiator support. Everything forward of that will be sprayed with the color of the car. Ill add some pictures tomorrow hopefully of the passenger side of the engine bay all nice and smooth. 81 280zx: Alright, when I first bought the car when getting on boost it would make a venting noise. I never was able to find out what it was and I didnt think it was the pop off valve.. Since parking the car last fall I havent really driven it much, just quick stuff around the block. Anways, I finally got to trying to get it running better and installed a boost gauge... Couple runs and I noticed it was running at 20 psi!!! Sadly the pop off valve had been replaced with a pipe plug so there wasnt any failsafe. I quickly parked the car and removed the wastegate and found that someone has plugged it with silicone not allowing it to get a boost signal from the outlet of the turbo. I cleared it out and reinstalled it to find it now boosts a nice consistent 6-7 psi. I did a compression test and everything was 110ish, very consistent across the board so Im not concerned that anything was damaged, I attribute that to me rarely getting to drive it wide open in boost. Either way it is now running at the proper boost level but loosing power in the upper rpm range. I installed a fuel pressure gauge (will get pictures soon) and it is reading 40 psi before starting the car and while idleing. Hopefully Ill be able to narrow down the issue and get it running at its full potential for stock boost levels. Ill also add that parts are ordered and on there way... 24x12x3 inch intercooler (2.5 inch in/outlet) from member coldfusion- Not here yet Manual boost controller- Recieved Walbro GSL392 255lph Fuel Pump with install kit- Not here yet Begi FMU #2025- Not here yet Boost gauge- Installed Fuel Pressure Gauge- Installed Edited June 10, 2010 by Challenger Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.