GTSBoy

But in a good way this time, right?

I wasn't going to say anything about that.

Generally, yes. But there are no "rules" here, as different things can happen to any engine. But I simply cannot think of anything that would cause all 6 cylinders to drop compression by about the same amount while sitting doing nothing. The sort of sludge hardening stuff I mentioned earlier seldom occurs evenly across an engine. I am going to put $10 on it being something else. Maybe something messed up by the workshop.

You can spooge the thermostat gasket, but it will seal with just a paper gasket. After all, cars have all done that for the last 100+ years. Cam seal corners and half moons all much the same. Not required, but a little can prevent later weeps developing.

Yes. Gold standard for OG COVID-19 turns out to simply be not good enough for Delta. Given the civil disobedience quotient of Sydney appears to be even worse than the more bogan infested parts of SEQLD, just plain dumb luck does seem to cover it for last year. Too many households in SW Syd full of people with inherent distrust of any government, coupled with many illegal visa overstayers causing unwillingness to expose households to inspection by any level of authority, etc etc = recipe for Delta strain explosion. The cases that make the news, like the 3 (different!!) sets of removealists doing the wrong thing, and in some cases not having enough English to make it believable that they're able to drive around the country unsupervised, the stupid hotel room and beach parties etc etc, all make me glad to live where I do. I was in several Teams meetings with clients and suppliers from QLD, VIC and NSW during the week. In all of them it was brought up by the other parties that we were in SA and how lucky we were. I made quips like "yeah, we're in the promised land" and in all cases There were pained grimaces from the other end. I suspect it Gladys B hadn't spent the last 18 months climing up Morrison's arse crack, maybe the eastern states wouldn't be in quite the shitstorm that they're in now. Oh well, you live and learn, right? Or maybe you don't. We're yet to see. WA and SA may also have been lucky. But then, luck is usually associated with other good things too. Our lockdown approaches are basically "take no prisoners" and so they only have to last a week.

The rest of the country is currently discussing digging a trench around the NSW border and towing the whole f**king mess out into the Pacific to drown.

I'd also like to point out that ~120 psi comp readings, like your first set, if accurate, are quite low and probably low enough to explain the low power on their own. My 25Neo measures ~175-180 psi (with only slightly higher stock compression than a 26)

I would leave it forever.

This is bullshit of the very finest sort. Take the car to a more intelligent workshop. Compressions may decrease while a car is sitting if some grunge built up somewhere hardens and perhaps stops valves from seating properly. Or the rings might get sticky in the grooves. But that sort of thing isn't usually permanent. It should come good after a brief run. It is far more likely that the compression tester is reading low. Even if it is the same compression tester. There are so many "mechanics" that simply have no f**king idea that the performance of their test gear can change and that they need to keep it calibrated if they are going to trust their measurements. This aligns with what I just said, although I would hope and expect it to be much faster than a couple of weeks. One good drive should do it.

Corners of cam seals under the cam covers. Little squidge of goo there helps to prevent leaks. That's about it.

So measure the resistance of the bulb. If it's only like a 1W or 2W globe (surely they can't be more than that!) then it would want to have a resistance of ~100 ohms. If it's really low resistance (like single digits or less), then it will flow too much current and blow the 15A fuse. The lamp or its holder would then be suspect.

I suspect that if your knitting is providing catharsis then you might be doing it wrong. But if it's working for you......

Well, next, what do you mean by "shorting"? What actually happens? Does it blow the fuse?

How sure am I? As sure as I can be from here. Have you got the wiring diagram? Get it out** and look to see that the wiring for the light is part of the lighting circuit anyway, has separate wires that don't connect with the lighter socket itself, so the problem you describe sounds more and more like a f**ked up wiring situation. ** This is snipped from the R32 wiring diagram. I don't have the R34 drawing here. Separate plugs, from separate places. The light has just one wire coming from the lighting circuit. The ciggy lighter has power from the ciggy fuse and earth from somewhere logical.

Unlikely. That globe will draw 3/5ths of f**k all current. The problem is more likely to be that the current (added onto) wiring is f**ked up or your attempt to reinstate the light is f**ked up in some way. You could do that. There's plenty of power there to run something as small as a boost controller - although keep in mind that the power for the solenoid passes through the controller and is not a negligible amount for some solenoids. Unless you have lots of other stuff running off there or a massive amp in the headunit, it should be fine.

Not related to the squish pads. Different things. If that's in reference to what Dose said about thicker head gaskets, then also missing the point. 'Twere me, I'd be looking to increase the amount of squish in a modern engine build. Not decrease it.

Squish pads produce; A required (read as "desirable") amount of turbulence in the mix right at the end of the compression stroke. This greatly improves mixture distribution and mixing at the point where it is getting ignited, leading to obvious desirable improvement of pretty much all the combustion parameters of interest. A reduction in the surface area of the head and piston facing the flame at and near the moment of ignition. The tiny little volume of mixture trapped in there is a better compromise than the otherwise exposed but narrow corners all the way around the rest of the combustion chamber where it meets the edge of the piston. Small combustion chamber volumes and decreased surface area should cause improved resistance to detonation, rather than the commonly held opinion as expressed by R32-25t above. Which is not to say that once the usage of the engine is pushed waaay beyond where the OEM engineers expected it to be, that perhaps the hot edges of the squish pads do trigger detonation. I'd be willing to believe the improvements in ignition triggering, ECU accuracy/speed and fuels (ie E85) have probably exposed the old belief as being more of a band-aid for problems with real causes elsewhere.

Take the compressor to a Nissan dealer and speak to the service manager about seeing if he can help identify a similar unit from another late 90s/early 2000s car. Ditto at an automotive airconditioning workshop.

You don't need an LSD oil for the front diff. You can use one, but normal diff oil will do the job fine and more cheaply. You do need an LSD oil for the rear diff. Assuming that it is the stock LSD, then you don't likely need anything particularly pricey/special. Again, any normal (ie Castrol, etc) LSD diff oil will do the job. The Cusco (and other) "special" diff oils are usually designed with all sorts of additives to help tame the shitful clunking and chatter that many of those aftermarket clutch diffs exhibit.

There's not really anything you can do to upgrade the internals of what is already a pretty strong and quite rare gearbox. Once you exceed what the Getrag is good for, you're firmly into the aftermarket boxes.

There's no more tensioner visible in that photo that in your original photos. See my reply to your other thread.

could cause lean. almost never fail in any meaningful way. My 25DET Neo will cruise at ~400°, pre-turbo. Literally in the turbine inlet. Max load is ~900°C.

Yes, but they still look concerning. Viz the circled examples..... All of this looks very unimpressive. Got some closeups?

Yes it is correct. Whenever a cylinder is on compression/firing stroke (ie, #1 in this case) then the other cylinder that is also at TDC will be on the exhaust/induction overlap.

Could be cam timing, as above, ignition timing (too retarded) or lean. All are bad.