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daeron

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Everything posted by daeron

  1. did you try a wet test? I didnt really see much evidence of a bad headgasket when i tore my engine down, but I had no doubts; MY car was bubbling compression into the radiator. The overflow was bubbling within 45 seconds of turning on the engine. No water in the oil, but it was making my coolant into a rusty nasty oily goopy mess. speaking of which, I am overdue for another water flush through my block, and after that I need to do a chemical flush and fill with proper coolant. Dont wanna mess up my nice new radiator....
  2. Are we diseased? last time I went to the boneyard I saw the two isuzus I always get confused (an I-mark and a stylus, I used to own a geo storm and I always forget which was the same car) SEVERAL six cylinder volvos, a turbo diesel volvo, an AMC eagle, an alfa romeo, there was a peugeot in the parking lot, a 280Z (s30 Z's have become SUPER rare down here) my ideal GL wagon (d/r, checker interior, it was loaded with options so it may have even had an LSD but i didnt look) a dodge stealth AND two mitsu 3000GTs... and more cars i cant even recall. The yards where i live have a rapid turnover rate, three weeks is pushing it...
  3. good luck, knock on wood, happy thoughts and all that jazz.
  4. I was just inserting the obligatory camshaft disclaimer, is all. Good luck, sounds like you're approaching this the right way.
  5. they make what are essentially C-clamps designed for this purpose. A few small bolts as "studs" to hold it in place laterally, and say three c clamps on either side should hold it perfectly fine.
  6. do that to a (supposedly) good running engine and you should have essentially a brand new runner. I say go for it, I don't know the specifics on the cam grind BUT the SPFI *was* designed for slightly higher compression, so maybe a bit more cam would be well suited to it. Don't go hog wild, though.. radical (even "mild") cams are for use in places where you either have good carbs that you can use to tweak the fuel and air flow to complement the cam, or GOOD FI/spark management that you can do the same with. You would be best taken care of by being realistic; many cam purchasers wind up with the buyers remorse because they thought the cam was all they needed to open up an extra 20, 30, 40 horses. Just some advice; others who know this engine better would be better suited to weigh the pros and cons of a specific grind.
  7. thanks for the illustration. Skipped sleep last night, I just couldnt visualize how that would help... blonde moment. Somewhere I think my uncle has a nice stainless steel tow bar; its just a V with a hitch mounted at the apex, and a flange on either extermity to bolt onto a tow hook.. is this the U haul bar mentioned? The thing weighs a TON and has, in fact, been painted u-haul red at some point in its long past.. its beat up and scratched, and alot of the paint is wearing off, but it is DEFINITELY stainless underneath all that. Neat piece, but like i said, it weighs about 60-80 lbs IIRC. Tow rope == not fun. I smoked the hubcaps on my geo the first time I ever got my car towed via rope; because I didn't know better, I rode the brakes most of the way, and I was being towed by a crew cab dually chevy full ton
  8. a nice gentleman here on the Forum by the name of McBrat has been known to reproduce those BRAT decals, although I am not sure how easy/cheap they are...
  9. +1, but why the pipe? thats a new one on me... I was also thinking that tightening the clutch cable might get you fixed up... but pay cash, and get a signed title before you fix ANYTHING or else you might find the price going up.
  10. ay, me grandpa was an old hand.. Poor old SOB fell off a diving board and into an empty swimming pool when he was middle aged, and was never the same after that.. BUT he still managed to teach top notch welding, as well as help build half my town. West Palm Beach, and the County on the whole, have grown TREMENDOUSLY in the past 60 years.. off the top of my head, something like 200,000 people in the fifties to 1.2 million now countywide, and in a town like this (especially when a great deal of the "natives" have packed up and headed north) it really is something else to have someone bring in their dogs to the vet you work for, and find out that they knew your grandpa back when they sold him the supplies to ply his trade. Anyhow, welding is in my blood. Perfectionism in my work is in my blood. I have barely picked up a welder, but I am already pretty decent at laying a bead; a bit of experience beyond BS practice on scrap metal and I bet cash money I'll be laying smooth beads with the best of em. in the meantime, the subaru is nowhere near as important as my teeth. Got a welder to fix them?
  11. My family's shop is in a VERY seedy area of town (there is a neighborhood less than a quarter mile away with the quaint name "Federal Gardens" ) so I am somewhat familiar with the "disappearing Metal phenomenon..." but NOTHING like any of this. For some reason, the Meth isnt so big down here..... For that, I must be grateful. We've got losers and junkies, but this "meth problem" that seems to have the PNW in a stranglehold (so to speak) is simply non existent down here.. I have said something about this before, but anytime it comes up it fascinates me. I just can't figure out why; most "dope" takes off here as well as other parts of the country, if not moreso: Miami??!? "Smuggler's Blues?!" anyhow, I am NOT complaining! *shudder*
  12. nah, his point was that "physics and all be damned, just TRY it in real life and you will rapidly discover that it is utterly impractical to even discuss."
  13. + a billion. With ANY foreign automobile, there are always parts that you do not want to buy aftermarket. You CAN, but there are too many situations to list where it is foolish. That is one of the greatest benefits of having forums like this to find and join upon purchasing a "new-to-me" car.. discovering which bits are "Dealer-only" parts.
  14. its starting to peel already because the uneven, rusty surface beneath is NOT the ideal surface to adhere to... ..SO, I took the magnetic back piece from an old name tag and plopped that down on the leading edge on one side
  15. THAT is the important thing. I agree that it was a worthy purchase, but when you suddenly mentioned a four month old and family responsibilities, it was like someone screeching the needle across a record that was playing.. "...What?!? hang on a sec..." That's all. If you read and considered all that, then the choice was yours to make; I don't think anyone here wants to look DOWN on you for buying it.. we just wanted to make sure you were weighing everything properly and NOT getting a false idea on the reliability of these cars.. because ALL of them DO break down. Suspension bits wear out, seals go bad, radiators get clogged.. As with ANY used Subaru (use CAR) purchase a THOROUGH inspection is called for, along with some hefty preventative maintenance. You also need to accept NOW that, in the future, something will break and you will need to give it some time. As long as you aren't going to come hollering at us "YOU JERKWADS TOLD ME THIS THING WASN'T GONNA BREAK!!" then everything is all gravy.
  16. I say again: Horsepower is a function of torque; torque is the rating of the work capacity that the engine can do. In other words, yes, you DO NEED a certain, minimum amount of power to move a certain mass at a given speed. It is elementary physics; I don't choose that phrase to condescend, it is touched on as early as elementary school science text books. "Work." Force acting upon mass. Pulleys and levers and such. Granted, elementary science texts don't explain anything automotive, but the principles are the same from Isaac Newton on.
  17. open the radiator cap. start the engine. watch for bubbles. You probably have a blown headgasket. I never saw water in my oil, either, and I ran for six months and about 10K miles like that. (Didn't have much choice, I got fired when I eventually tried to get a few days off in a row to work on the bloody thing.)
  18. my understanding was that to get maximum power, you want to detonate as close to TDC as possible; the more degrees advanced you are, the further away from TDC you are, and the more of your explosion gets routed out the exhaust valve instead of imparting downward force on the piston. Higher octane fuel is more resistant to detonation from compression. In other words, you can wait longer before you have to spark it. the higher the static compression ratio of the engine, the more detonation prone; thus, either high octane or more ignition advance is required. Am I wrong in these statements? If so then I have some serious hunting to do, because these misconceptions (if such they are) sure make a hell of a lot of sense to me, and I want to find where I was steered wrong.... I am going on a brief search and re read of some of my bookmarked articles to see what I can find before bed, but if I AM wrong someone please steer me right.
  19. I just re read the previous posts about this BRAT, and I can't say that I found that information in any of it.... It DOES kind of cast a different light on the situation. "can't afford to have a daily driver break on me" are STRONG words... One of the reasons this is such an acceptable deal is the inclusion of the spare parts, which adds to the "reliability" factor somewhat but user maintenance and occasional repair ARE taken as granted in that scenario... So how strongly did you MEAN the statement that I quoted above? It wouldn't be too far out of the ballpark to say that if you REALLY feel this way, you are DEFINITELY looking in the wrong decade; at least the wrong END of that decade. Especially with almost 200 on the clock. It IS an appealing prospect and I don't want to dishearten you; I would feel the same way about the car. But if it isn't too late to re consider, then IMHO at least, you need to weigh your meaning in the above quote.
  20. I have to admit, I was blinded by my desire to see the engine bay, and how good IT looked, and I didnt notice how nice that thing really is the first time through. that *IS* a Nice score!! now, about those engine bay pics...
  21. No they aren't; they control things to a much more precise degree than a Toilet tank :-p (no offense intended, you know my feelings about YOUR vehicles.. LPG FTW) Besides, if you have electronic ignition then you have a solid state computer in your car anyhow; may as well have a computer that controls fuel and spark together. Some systems are far better than others; give me the soob hitachi SPFI or good ol Bosch L-Jetronic style any day. Actually, the "two contact" TPS is a much SIMPLER critter to deal with.. but it is a MUCH More primitive beast, and allows much less computer control of fuel mixture. As far as coping with failures, though, it can only be in one of three states: Idling, cruising, or WOT.. :headbang: :headbang: Daniel-san paint fence. Paint fence good, Mister Miyagi?
  22. are you spending extra money on high octane race fuel in a vehicle that normally sees daily driver status? If so, what octane fuel do you normally run on the street? Did you make any timing adjustments to take advantage of the high octane? The entire purpose of high octane race fuel is to dial back your timing and run less advance. The high octane fuel merely has a higher anti-detonation rating, and can tolerate less advance before pinging. All things being equal, Less advance = more power. However, without high octane race fuel you cannot retard your timing very far from stock settings before you get major pinging. It also takes careful adjustment, and good info on your engine (ie, knock sensors and wideband O2) to do it properly. In other words, if you just plunked $6-8/gallon race fuel into your DD that normally sees 91 octane and runs fine on it, you wasted $3-5/gallon on race fuel. My brothers own a fully ITS prepped 71 240Z. They run standard pump 93 octane in it, because they haven't yet gotten the wideband O2 sensor and mixture gauge to put in the thing. It runs like a champ.
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