Renner

Is your MAF positioned directly after the 90 degree bend? If it is close to it, then it is very possible that rotating it would make a difference. There is some fairly complicated fluid mechanics behind it, but basically, when you have non-turbulent air flowing through a straight round pipe, there is kind of a dome shaped velocity profile. Basically the center has the highest velocity, and thus the greatest mass flow rate, while the portions touching the wall are barely moving at all. When you have a bend, the highest velocity is no longer at the very center of the pipe radius, it will bias off towards the outside radius of the bend. Do you have a hot wire MAF, or vortex type? A hot wire will most likely have it's greatest sensitivity right at the center of the pipe, but with some blind spots along the sides, which are basically 180 degree opposite from each other. A vortex stle typically has the intake port off center to one side, with it's greatest accuracy for flow aimed at the intake port. So basically, what I am getting at with all this babble, is that how the MAF is oriented, can cause more of less of the air to "slip by" without being read by the MAF, since it does not have the same sensitivity across the whole 360 degree spectrum. smile.gif

I bet Hua can get you one.

Damn, I just typed up a nice long reply for setting up the EVC 4, which is definitly different then the new 5. Oh well. I am sure you still have to do the self learn though. If you didn't do that right, you need to reset the EVC, and run the self learn again to get it to work the best. My EVC reads in Bar, not KPa, but I am pretty sure the EVC 5 lets you choose between the two (they only differ by 2 decimal points). Just fyi: 1 bar = 14.50 psi, and 101.32 Kpa = 14.696 psi = 1 atm (atmosphere) So 15 psi = 1.03 bar or 103.4 KPa And 20 psi = 1.38 bar or 138.0 Kpa It doesn’t make much of a difference if you are off by just a bit, but just so you don’t wonder why the gauge numbers might not match up exactly with the EVC numbers after you get it working. If you guys still are having problems with it, let me know, and I should be able to help you out, it's just a matter of when. It would be easier to get it straightened out first hand anyway rather then try and trouble shoot over the web.

For a stealth, you only need one. The most common mounting place is on the Y-pipe, just before the throttle body. HKS and Greddy make good products, no matter which model you go with. If he hasn't already done it, upgrading the Y-pipe itself would be a good present, since the stock plastic ones tend to pop off easily. Hua can get you a blow off valve, just send him a PM, he is one of the mods on here.

Did you actually try the threads in the rotor hats or do they just look bad? It doesn't take much torque with one of those threaded screws to pop it loose. Find a bolt that threads in, hit the rusty threads with some WD-40, and try the holes. Unless the threads have actually been totally stripped from a previous removal, they will still be useful even with a thick coat of rust. If the threads are totally stripped, try one size bigger and see if it will thread. You would be surprised how much force one fine thread machine screw can produce, even if it's not perfectly threaded. Heating will help, but chances are the propane torch won't get things nearly hot enough to make much of a difference. You have a lot of mass there that you are trying to heat, and it will dissipate the heat very quickly, so you really need something like an Acetalene torch to really get shit moving. Can't hurt the try the propane though if you already have one. Otherwise a BFH will solve your problem.

True, the braided stainless isn't the cheapest. But it is much easier then solid steel line if you have more then a few bends to get from the oil feed source to the turbo. Also, with the braided steel, you will only have to do it once, because that shit lasts forever no matter how much you move it around. The sold steel line will fatigue very easily if you bend it more then a few times, like when removing or installing the turbo more then once. Last time I checked, the smallest size that the Aeroquip socketless came in was -6, and -6 will most likely be too big for the oil feed line. Too much oil pressure to the CHRA will cause seal failure, so the -4 is usually a perfect size. I'm pretty sure the shortest length they sell the socketless in is 10 ft, so the braided steel could turn out to be cheaper anyway since I doubt you need any more then 3 feet.

Is the flange itself still intact? If so, you can cut off the remaining portion of the tube flush with the top of the flange, and then just drill out the center of the flange, and tap it with some threads. You can get an adaptor fitting from Jegs that will work fairly easily. You will most likely need either a –4 to 1/8” pipe thread or a –4 to 1/4” pipe thread fitting. Just see what size works best for the size of the flange, and then make sure that you have whatever tap size. If they have some other fittings that work better, go ahead and try one of those instead. This is just off the top of my head, and the guys there should be able to steer you in the right direction if you bring in the flange and tell them what you need to do with it. Then with the AN fitting you can use any kind of Aeroquip or Russell hose that you want, with a regular 90 degree –4 AN fitting on the hose, or whatever fitting works best for your setup, but it will prob be a 90. You will then have a solid fitting on the turbo that you know won’t back off or leak, and you can run braided steel line to it. I believe that 3 feet of the –4 braided steel Russell hose runs about $15.00, and the adaptor fitting should cost about $3, and the 90 is probably $5. Try to get the adaptor fitting in steel if you can, because it will be more durable, but the steel will be slightly more expensive and they probably won’t have it on hand. The regular anodized aluminum will still work fine, and will most likely be in stock. You will still have to do something for the other end of the feed line, but a normal hose clamp will prob work fine there as long as you double up. BTW: here is a pic of the adaptor fitting that I am talking about: http://www.jegs.com/photos/023FCM2178.jpg The right half is the pipe thread that will thread into the modified flange. The left half will be the normal –4 AN fitting.

1st, check your clutch adjustment. Make sure that the clutch is getting totally disengaged when you push the pedal all the way down, because if it is not, it will make the car harder to shift, and will actually cause your synchros to wear out faster, since they are having to work against more loads to speed up or slow down the next gear. Redline will definitely help your problem. I have put it in both of my TTZ's and it has made a noticeable improvement, as it has for many other Z’s according to tt.net. The 4th gear synchro is actually the weak point in the tranny, it normally wears before any other, just from normal use, but not usually until much higher mileages if the car wasn’t totally abused. You will usually notice a grind when downshifting from 5th to 4th if you have the worn 4th gear synchro prob, but most make it to 100K miles before having any probs. If you are not having any 4th gear probs, but you are having grinding in 2nd and 3rd, and it’s not from the clutch or crappy/low fluid, then your tranny was almost definitely abused. The 94+ trannies had some upgraded internal parts, and the J-spec models got another upgrade in 97 with some Nismo parts. So if you were going to try and find a used one, you would be downgrading to go any earlier then 94. Downgrading in terms of synchro strength, which is just related to synchro lifetime. The overall power handling strength of all of the transmissions is very good, and is pretty much the same throughout the years. If it were me, I would honestly have it rebuilt if you feel you have to do something, since you already have one of the better trannies in terms of stronger internals, and who knows what the condition would be of a used one that you bought. Just make sure that a reputable shop does the work, because getting the parts correct can be a bit of a bear. I can't think of anybody locally off the top of my head, but Z1 Motorsports in Georgia does a bunch of Z32 work, so they could prob help you out as long as you could ship it to them. I have rebuilt a few trannies, including the one in my old TTZ (91), and getting the correct parts for it is actually quite tricky compared to most other rebuilds. Since some of the parts were updated, the factory part numbers will reference a “service file” when you talk to a dealer parts guy, or basically reference to another part number for a newer/different part. Only problem is that not ALL of the parts will service file, and not all of the parts will match up, and there isn't a good system to figure out exactly which parts do match up. So you can get one part, such as an operating sleeve, which did get updated, and another part, such as the gear itself, that is not updated, or which may not work with your current input shaft if it is updated, and they could all be listed as the correct parts for a 96 TT. The mismatched updated/non-updated parts will cause huge shifting problems if not done correctly, since the engagement teeth will not be the same. Some of them use the traditional pentagon shaped teeth, where others used wedge shaped teeth. So I guess the moral of the story is, if you can, send it to a shop that has done a few Z trannies before, since they will already know what to do with yours in terms of getting the correct parts. You may have less issues with it then I did, since yours is newer, but I am sure that you will run into a few of the “service files”, so I figured I would give you a heads up, because not just any old tranny shop can do the rebuild correctly. BTW, if you would like me to take a quick test drive sometime when the weather gets nice, just to check it out and get a second opinion to see if it’s something severe or not, let me know, and I can help you out, since I am pretty familiar with the Z’s.

This is only if you wanted to put a little extra work into it, but save yourself some money. I do not think that finding an early car with a bad 5-speed will be hard at all, and chances are you will be able to get it nice and cheap. The block, and therefore the bell housing on the tranny, on the pre and post 95 cars are exactly the same. The only difference engine wise between the 1st and 2nd gen cars was the 2nd gens ran slightly higher stock boost levels, and had different exhaust, to get the higher hp numbers. I am pretty sure that the mounting points for the tranny in the engine bay are exactly the same too, but I will have to look at one of each again just to be 100% sure, which is just a matter of stopping by Jeff's house, since he always has a bunch of cars just sitting around over there. tongue.gif So then it is a matter of finding a 6-speed from a salvage yard, or finding a 95+ car that is wrecked or has a blown motor, but still with a good drivetrain. The 6-speed will of course not be cheap, but getting an early car with a weak or bad tranny will easily offset the cost if you don't pay a shop to do the swap. You will have to drop the tranny to put a clutch in it anyway, so might as well put the better tranny back in. Or you could find an entire powertrain, engine, tranny and all, from a 2nd gen car, and swap the whole thing into a 1st gen. I am sure you could dig up an engine/6-speed combo for under $4K. So, if you manage to find an early 2nd gen with a bad motor or tranny or both, for under $6K, which shouldn't be hard, then you have a cheaper car, with the better drivetrain, and some extra cash left over, since you stayed well under $10K if you do the work yourself. Here you go, 92 VR4 in Tennesse, 225K miles, on ebay at $3250 right now. Has a rebuilt motor/tranny, but it doesn't say how many miles since the work, and I really don't trust other peoples work, but at least you can actually drive it home. Sounds like a good canditate for a 95+ drivetrain swap when you are ready to have fun with it. http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2403973123&category=6350

Check out www.3si.org The main weak point in the car is the transfer case, since it sees the most abuse during the oh so popular 6 grand clutch dumps. There is a factory recall on the transfer cases now, which allows you I believe one get out of jail free card, and upgrades a few of the weak components, making it a more reliable unit. The 95+ cars got a much stronger 6-speed instead of a 5-speed for all previous years. The tranny would probably be the second weak point in the car, seeing the second most loading after the transfer case. The 6-speed will definitly stand up to a decent amount of abuse before having any problems though. So if you can, find a 95+ car to get the 6-speed, or find an early car with a busted tranny, and drop the 6-speed in it. Bone stock, the cars have tiny ass 360cc injectors, and 9B turbos, which have problems holding higher boost levels to redline. So prepare to upgrade both to have some real fun. Timing belt jobs, and clutch jobs are a real pain in the ass. The upper plenum has to come off to access the rear 3 spark plugs. But unlike my car, you don't have to pull the engine to swap turbos, which is definitly an advantage. Other then that, they are pretty solid cars, with a ton of potential. AEM offers a complete plug and play standalone unit for the car, so you can upgrade to a standalone once and be done with it without having to rewire the entire car. There are also a bunch of different big turbo kits nearing the end of development for this car right now as well, so I am sure we will see the current 1/4 mile record dropping even more before long. Oh ya, and a guy over on 3si did a bunch of engine dyno tests comparing a bone stock VR4 engine with a bone stock 2JZ engine. Assuming the turbo(s), intercooler, injectors, engine management, etc were all the same, the VR4 engine made more power with the same a/f on the same boost.

A bad 02 sensor will cause you to get much worse gas milage, since the ECU relies on it for closed loop operation during normal cruising conditions. Closed loop is how the ECU tries to keep the air/fuel ratio as close to stoichiometric as possible, within certain safty limits. As an 02 sensor goes bad, it reads leaner then it should, so the ECU tries to add more fuel to compensate, and get things back to stoich. It is actually a design safty factor that governs it to work that way. Better to run too rich and have bad gas milage, then run too lean and have detonation and possibly a melted piston, just from a bad 02 sensor.

That's cool, so who are you planning on having do the work?

This would be a fun car to have. So are you doing the swap yourself or having it done someplace? Just out of curiosity, is anybody making a rebuild kit for them now, or are they still considered a non-serviceable item? I remember talking to someone that said there were a few people working on rebuild/upgrade kits for them, but that they weren’t out yet.

Some more opinions/observations for anybody who cares to read them: I know a few guys have run the Profec in their Z's successfully, but I questioned the durability of their control solenoid, and wanted a bit more programmability. I have never used the Blitz, so I can’t really compare anything about it, looks like Kyle should be your resource on any questions with that one. I know some people with TTZ's have had some issues with the Apexi unit having some overboost issues. I have not had any problems with it in any other cars that I have installed one in, so it could just be an issue with the length of the lines needed for an install on a Z, which are probably longer then any of the other typical installs. They definitely do look cool, being able to see a datalogged 2D map of your boost curve could be useful, and they have a few other neat options in terms of visualization that the EVC 4 does not, but they take up a bunch more space then the HKS EVC 4 or EVC EZ units, and are more expensive as well. The EVC 4 (and 5) also has an overboost protection limit, that you can set at whatever value you want. So if you overboost past your set safe limit, the EVC sees it instantly, and you go into a temporary base boost safe mode with an audible alarm, so nothing gets melted if you weren’t staring at your gauge the whole time. Switching between your off, high, low, and scramble boost settings is much easier for the EVC 4 compared to the Apexi as well, since it is a matter of pushing one button for any of them, which is a good thing if you want to do it on the fly. The Apexi you have to go through a few screens to change from high to low. Looks like HKS gave it the cool display like the Apexi for the EVC 5. Ultimately, having a very accurate boost level, with 2 or more presets, were the most important factors on my list. They seem to have the most reliable control solenoid as well, which is typically the weak spot due to being exposed to engine bay heat. Here is how I have it set up, I have basically 4 preset options I can run at with a single push of any of the 4 bottons: 1. When the car is cold, or the roads are shitty, I turn it off, and run a base 6 psi. 2. For normal driving around, on the Low setting I run 12 psi. 3. For my max boost I can run right now on pump gas, I hit the High button, and hit 15.5 psi. 4. For a tank of 100 Octane, I just hit the scramble button, which is set for 30 second durations, and run exactly 17 psi. For anything else that I might want to be at, I just turn the knob to increase or decrease any of the settings. Hope this helped, sorry if it was kinda long, as usual. These are just some of the things I looked at over time as I was deciding on which one was right for what I needed. I just happen to be a fan of the functionality of HKS electronics, from having worked with some of their stuff in the past.

I have the HKS EVC 4 Silver (limited edition), it rocks: http://www.hksusa.com/images_products/1381.jpg http://images.cardomain.com/installs/160000-160999/160293_133_full.jpg Never spikes, never creeps, just goes to whatever boost level I set it at and stays there, it has a few useful options too. It does actually make a noticeable difference over a MBC in helping the car spool as well, since it holds the wastegates completely closed until just the point when your preset boost level is reached. They aren’t making them anymore though, but I am sure you can find one for a good deal at a store that still has a few in stock. It does require you to run a “self learn” program on it when you first install it though. It maps your stock boost curve, and then makes adjustments on it from there for your target boost. Only problem is that the self learn requires a few all out 4th gear polls all the way to redline, which in my car is 140. There is a backup that doesn’t require the self learn, but then it doesn’t use as active of control over the boost level. It has recently been replaced by the EVC 5: http://www.hksusa.com/images_products/1652.jpg They are still pretty expensive though since they are still new, but it uses the same fuzzy logic technology as the EVC 4 for very precise boost control.

Slick 50, or any oil additives using PTFE (Teflon) are a very very bad idea, they have the potential to cause more damage then good, especially considering they don't do any good. Did you know that PTFE is in fact a solid substance? It does not stick to any internal engine parts, "smoothing out the surfaces" as some have claimed. In fact, it is now placing small solid particles in the thin film layer of oil that your engine uses for lubrication of close tolerance parts. So now when you shut your car off, you have a bunch of small solid particles settling in your oil pan and clogging up your oil filter and oil passages. Did it by chance say "shake well" on your bottle? Only about half of the ones using PTFE even use small enough particles that they don't settle out immediately after the engine is shut off, they still settle, just not as quickly. That may be why you noticed a slight oil pressure increase, due to decreased oil passage cross sectional area from all the nice PTFE you have in your passages now.

I have a garage, but it's not very warm. The tiny ass heater I have only heats up things that are about a foot directly in front of it.

Just fyi, some bov's do cause a fluttering noise even when they are not causing compressor surge. You will hear this a lot on some true race cars using a bov with a large displacement spring mounted very close to the throttle body(s). If you have ever watched the Top Gear movie where he test drives the Porsche GT1 around the track, you will hear a perfect example of this. I am pretty sure that Shepard still uses a crushed 1G bov on his race car too, since he says he has no problems with it holding boost correctly. The Greddy R-type is one of the aftermaket ones that will continue to flutter even after the boost has dropped way down, just due to the valve design. Personally, I think it sounds pretty cool. smile.gif

So that's the last bolt you can't get off in order to clock it the way you need to? Is the bolt siezed or is it just too difficult to get a wrench on it? If you are honestly going to have to get rid of it because of this, you could bring it by sometime and I will see if I can do anything with it. Send me a pm if you want a hand and I will let you know when I have some time. -Brett

It's called a scavenge pump. Flat-6 Porsches use them since they use a dry sump oiling system, and have no true oil pan for the oil return to drain into. The ones they use are driven off of one of the cams though, and aftermarket versions are well over $500. If you tried to use something electric, the motor would need to be speed controlled based on rpm, since oil pressure isn't exactly constant over the rpm range. So you would probably have oil starved bearings at low rpms, and you would have too high of an oil pressure in the center cartridge (CHRA), in the top rpm range, causing seal leakage, if you used a constant speed scavenge pump. Save yourself some time and money, and just clock the CHRA correctly, using a few extra fittings to get it to work if necessary. Why wouldn't you be able to spin it 180 from it's current position while still keeping the compressor and turbine housings clocked the way that you need them? If you post a pic of what the problem is, I could probably give you a better idea of what you needed to use.

Isn't Force Fed closed now? I thought they were going out of business.

315 northbound, coming from downtown. The cop was actually sitting up on the overpass, where there is construction for 670, shooting cars coming down 315 with the laser. I have seen cops along that strip plenty, because it is only 55, but I have never seen them hiding in that spot. It was very hard to see him because he was so far off the road, I only caught it out of the corner of my eye.

jesus christ. NEVER EVER NEVER put a FRAM filter on your car. They are ABSOLUTE shit, I know 3 people who have had engine falures related to fram filters.</font>What kind of engine failure, and how were they able to prove 100% beyond a reasonable doubt that it was from the fram filter? What types of engines were they on also?

LOL, uh, not the only one. I like the Electromotive TEC3 system, mostly because of the flexibility in ignition timing it gives you with it's crank fire distributorless system. If your car wasn't originally a distributorless system (which yours is), then this can be a big advantage over other systems. If you really want to break your wallet, try playing around with one of these: www.efitechnology.com The 2.1 ECU is the system used in this car: http://images.cardomain.com/installs/160000-160999/160293_94_full.jpg It’s badass, but probably a bit more then you would need.

Close, but not quite. The ones used on Porsche's actually spray water mist into the cooling duct leading to the brakes, just like water/alcohol injection for your engine. It just cools the air before it gets to the rotor, since water evaporation is an endothermic process. Spraying cold water directly onto a hot rotor would definitely cause it to crack. The cars that I have seen use it were mid to late 80's 930 turbos that were making huge power, before bigger and better brake upgrades were available, especially since they had to fit them under the wheels, which weren't available in 18" sizes with the proper offsets for a street car at those times.