Tweet
Edit: sold car, but still have some stuff fs as mentioned here.
Did a little work fixing leaks. Knew the intake was leaking oil. & Had a coolant leak... (about once a year, I had to add about 6-8 ounces of coolant) thought was a HG, but AFTER pulling the heads, discovered the little plug on the side by the exhaust ports (pass side)... it turned out with hardly any torque at all (by the way it was a 5/16 square, which nobody had a tool for... found some 5/16 square stock to use). I think that had been weeping for years, and actually think it affected the HG on that side, because when I took the HG off, it looked etched RIGHT UNDER the area of that plug.
Anyhow, had the heads looked at by Steve at Total Flow, I put new FP 1074s, ARP bolts (figured out my '95 originally had torque to yield bolts), and of course new gaskets topside. Did a new cap and rotor on the opti (got the ACDelco kit from Brown & Sons in Flint... the honor GM Employee price on parts... got the kit for $170 ish), since the original ones terminals were a little scale-y. Also did a bunch of cleaning and painting (the obvious parts are the intake & valve covers and less obvious is the alternator, accessory bracket, and throttle mechanism.) Removed the air pump and that dumb U-shaped tube that ran under the front of the motor (got it out in one piece).... that had been disabled since I did the headers, but I didn't bother removing, since the U-tube looked hard to remove (it was!!). Lastly, I did a relocation on of the ASM (traction control) motor... I modified the bracket that had kept it over the driver side of the engine, and put it on the strut tower.
As many projects go, it took longer than I wanted... Ended up spending too much time getting tools. Bought a 1/2" breaker bar... dang head bolts were tight as sh!t. Got that 5/16" stock. Ended up buying a balancer puller since all the rentals didn't have slots big enough for the stupid 7/16 bolts on the car. Bought a used balancer/hub installer (from the local parts store... it was old and he didn't want to rent it out anymore)... the problem with it was that insert with the right threads was not long enough to reach the threads on the crank snout... ended up going to Mid-States Bolt and bought a high strength threaded rod, along with some nuts and washers. I was able to use the thrust washer from the installer kit- it worked nice with the rod. Had to find something to work with the E4 bolt head on the opti... ended up using a screw with a T20 head, and some nuts to lock. AFTER... I found a nice deepwell E4 socket at AutoValue on M59... woulda bought it. Had to buy a set of offset box end wrenches, to take off the accessory bracket bolt that hides behind the PS pump (couldnt get any of my sockets in there with a ratchet).
What I've got left is a cap and rotor that still work (if anyone wants it for a few bucks).... have some extra high strength 7/16" fine thd. threaded rod (again if anyone wants it for a few bucks)... some 5/16" square stock, (again if anyone wants it for a buck)
Started it 1st time on Wednesday... only to hear clatter clatter from the rockers... shut er down after 20 seconds... pulled the covers, realized I forgot to tighten the poly locks on 2 of the valves... herp durp... reset the lash on those 2... tightened them this time... and 2nd start was perfect!
Still thinking about fuel line reloc/ wire tuck/ hood latch cable reloc. But not now... sick of working on it for a while.
Did a little work fixing leaks. Knew the intake was leaking oil. & Had a coolant leak... (about once a year, I had to add about 6-8 ounces of coolant) thought was a HG, but AFTER pulling the heads, discovered the little plug on the side by the exhaust ports (pass side)... it turned out with hardly any torque at all (by the way it was a 5/16 square, which nobody had a tool for... found some 5/16 square stock to use). I think that had been weeping for years, and actually think it affected the HG on that side, because when I took the HG off, it looked etched RIGHT UNDER the area of that plug.
Anyhow, had the heads looked at by Steve at Total Flow, I put new FP 1074s, ARP bolts (figured out my '95 originally had torque to yield bolts), and of course new gaskets topside. Did a new cap and rotor on the opti (got the ACDelco kit from Brown & Sons in Flint... the honor GM Employee price on parts... got the kit for $170 ish), since the original ones terminals were a little scale-y. Also did a bunch of cleaning and painting (the obvious parts are the intake & valve covers and less obvious is the alternator, accessory bracket, and throttle mechanism.) Removed the air pump and that dumb U-shaped tube that ran under the front of the motor (got it out in one piece).... that had been disabled since I did the headers, but I didn't bother removing, since the U-tube looked hard to remove (it was!!). Lastly, I did a relocation on of the ASM (traction control) motor... I modified the bracket that had kept it over the driver side of the engine, and put it on the strut tower.
As many projects go, it took longer than I wanted... Ended up spending too much time getting tools. Bought a 1/2" breaker bar... dang head bolts were tight as sh!t. Got that 5/16" stock. Ended up buying a balancer puller since all the rentals didn't have slots big enough for the stupid 7/16 bolts on the car. Bought a used balancer/hub installer (from the local parts store... it was old and he didn't want to rent it out anymore)... the problem with it was that insert with the right threads was not long enough to reach the threads on the crank snout... ended up going to Mid-States Bolt and bought a high strength threaded rod, along with some nuts and washers. I was able to use the thrust washer from the installer kit- it worked nice with the rod. Had to find something to work with the E4 bolt head on the opti... ended up using a screw with a T20 head, and some nuts to lock. AFTER... I found a nice deepwell E4 socket at AutoValue on M59... woulda bought it. Had to buy a set of offset box end wrenches, to take off the accessory bracket bolt that hides behind the PS pump (couldnt get any of my sockets in there with a ratchet).
What I've got left is a cap and rotor that still work (if anyone wants it for a few bucks).... have some extra high strength 7/16" fine thd. threaded rod (again if anyone wants it for a few bucks)... some 5/16" square stock, (again if anyone wants it for a buck)
Started it 1st time on Wednesday... only to hear clatter clatter from the rockers... shut er down after 20 seconds... pulled the covers, realized I forgot to tighten the poly locks on 2 of the valves... herp durp... reset the lash on those 2... tightened them this time... and 2nd start was perfect!
Still thinking about fuel line reloc/ wire tuck/ hood latch cable reloc. But not now... sick of working on it for a while.
Comment