Need A Recommendation

[jodietas]

Hi all

We joined this forum initially to find an igniter (ignitor, some people spell it differently), we found one today so now we are in need of some recommendations as to where to take my sons car to be fine tuned. Bit of a long story so please bare with me!

My 18 year old son purchased his first 'real' car about a month or two ago from Hobart, an R33 Skyline. People told us that it did have an issue with starting, ran perfectly once warm. They had taken it to GT Garage in Hobart but the issue still remained. Once he got it home it was an absolute horror to start - it was kind of like a fingers crossed as to whether it would start or not. Was fouling up a set of plugs pretty much at every start up.

Took it out to Confidyne in Ulverstone, asked them to take a look at the cold start issues and to see if they knew what the knocking sound was. Picked the car up around 5 days later, they had fixed a left hand rear tie rod end, replaced a couple of belts and told us that they had pretty much fixed the cold start issue - $870 later, son takes her home.

20 minutes after picking her up, car died. Called Confidyne, they sent out a couple of guys to get her going (they had left the terminal off the battery by accident as they had charged it the night before). We asked them about the knocking sound in the motor - they told my son that it was a piston, drive it gently or it would blow. Poor kid, after spending all the $$ buying it and so on it,was feeling pretty bad for him.

Hubby decided on the weekend to take a look at it, grabbed a piece of hose (sounds weird lol) to see if he could tell where the noise was coming from. He found the noise coming from the front of the motor. Took off the timing cover, metal shavings everywhere!

Timing belt idler had siezed and then had cleared itself, the HKS advance timing gear on the exhaust cam had come loose (bolts could be turned by hand), exhaust cam had jumped two teeth, inlet cam had jumped one tooth. Got a mechanic friend to come re-do the timing belt (purchased Gates Timing Kit).

Car refused to start, after a lot of hassle, found the issue to be the igniter, borrowed a mates, car started first go, no knock or any other funny noises, sounded pretty darn good! (finally)

Only problem now is that the timing needs to be set and a basic tune. The problem is we don't know anyone decent enough who actually know what the hell they are doing.

So, any advice and/or recommendations would be greatly appreciated. We are located on the NW Coast so someone down this end would be ideal but can travel if we have to.

Thanks guys!

[zoidbergmerc]

Hello, welcome to the forum!

If you're on the NW coast I'd be looking up David Dennis at Discotune, he's great. http://www.facebook.com/pages/Discotune/185732901480669

If you're keen to go to launnie, Brad at Boost Automotive is really good and he's got a dyno if you need it tuned. I've got a few things off him recently and he's a really nice bloke.

[Worked32]

Ring a bloke called to from turboworx great bloke very good at tuning and won't charge the world tuned my car and a few other things and went over the car being a mechanic myself and tge work was flawless highly recommended and he's in launceston 0402 985 475 that's his number

[Worked32]

Ring a bloke called rob from turboworx great bloke very good at tuning and won't charge the world tuned my car and a few other things and went over the car being a mechanic myself and tge work was flawless highly recommended and he's in launceston 0402 985 475 that's his number

[jodietas]

Thanks Zoidbergmerc, will give Discotune a call tomorrow.

Edit:

Must have posted just as I did Worked

That sounds good, poor kid has spent a small fortune on this car and is yet to have a half decent drive! Will also give Turboworx a call and have a chat.

Appreciate the recommendations guys, hubby and I are 'old school' cars (351's and so on) so these cars boggle us a bit lol.

Edited October 3, 2011 by jodietas

[zoidbergmerc]

Haha, good old Muscle vs Rice family conflict.

Who will have the last laugh? I'm hoping skyline

You don't need to tell us about spending small fortunes on our skylines It's worth it in the end though, right boys?

[jangles]

Haha, good old Muscle vs Rice family conflict.

Who will have the last laugh? I'm hoping skyline

You don't need to tell us about spending small fortunes on our skylines It's worth it in the end though, right boys?

yesssss..........

[WHITER33GTS-T]

I dont know about being worth it... lol But it is a expensive habbit

[trustr32]

Haha, good old Muscle vs Rice family conflict.

Who will have the last laugh? I'm hoping skyline

You don't need to tell us about spending small fortunes on our skylines It's worth it in the end though, right boys?

I really bloody hope so after spending the last 20 grand and not even having my engine in my car I'm starting to wonder.......

[toffy]

Who took it to gt garage? , usually they're pretty good . Anyways gt garage and pro automotive in sunderland street would be my first 2 choices in hobart , not that you'd want to have to bring the car back down here . So (judging by '351' ) what kind of fords do you guys own?

p.s anything modified = $$$

[zoidbergmerc]

Everytime I hit boost in my 33 it makes it worth it

[XRATED]

I'll personally vouch for Nick at GT Garage for tuning, as in actual tuning/ecu programing. Kutzie at Pro Automotive has a really good workshop and is a good tuner. I also have had most my mechanical work done(when I've been overseas) by Marty at Mobile mechanics, top guy and knows modified imports very well.

As for your issues: Buying anything modified, especially when you arn't familier with the particular style of car is a risky buisness. Not to mention you did buy it with unknown problems.

Common skyline ignition faults/issues are well documented, do some research on this site to find the details. You'll just keep fouling plugs untill you fix it properly.

As for your timing issues.... if the cam gears (are they genuine hks) were as loose as you say and the belt was super loose, you may have knocked the valve or 12 against the pistons. If so, you'll have bent the valves and damaged the pistons... thus you'll need a new engine. A new timing belt isn't going to fix it.

What kind of ecu is installed in the car? Is it programable? If it's stock, you can't make changes to the cold start program anyway... How modified is the car? Unless it has some crazy cams of serious head work, the stock cold start map should be pretty good. If there's been no change of injectors, afm, turbo etc.. then the car shouldn't need a tune either.

Personally it sounds like you need to get back to basics with the car, test and adjust everything factory first to get it starting, idling and running correctly before you take it to a workshop for a tune.. In most cases, the workshop won't tune your car untill everything functions properly anyway.

Cheers

Justin

PS If I lived up north, I'd make the trip to see Brad Sherriff to get things sorted out.

Edited October 3, 2011 by XRATED

[pipster11]

I'll personally vouch for Nick at GT Garage for tuning, as in actual tuning/ecu programing. Kutzie at Pro Automotive has a really good workshop and is a good tuner. I also have had most my mechanical work done(when I've been overseas) by Marty at Mobile mechanics, top guy and knows modified imports very well.

As for your issues: Buying anything modified, especially when you arn't familier with the particular style of car is a risky buisness. Not to mention you did buy it with unknown problems.

Common skyline ignition faults/issues are well documented, do some research on this site to find the details. You'll just keep fouling plugs untill you fix it properly.

As for your timing issues.... if the cam gears (are they genuine hks) were as loose as you say and the belt was super loose, you may have knocked the valve or 12 against the pistons. If so, you'll have bent the valves and damaged the pistons... thus you'll need a new engine. A new timing belt isn't going to fix it.

What kind of ecu is installed in the car? Is it programable? If it's stock, you can't make changes to the cold start program anyway... How modified is the car? Unless it has some crazy cams of serious head work, the stock cold start map should be pretty good. If there's been no change of injectors, afm, turbo etc.. then the car shouldn't need a tune either.

Personally it sounds like you need to get back to basics with the car, test and adjust everything factory first to get it starting, idling and running correctly before you take it to a workshop for a tune.. In most cases, the workshop won't tune your car untill everything functions properly anyway.

Cheers

Justin

PS If I lived up north, I'd make the trip to see Brad Sherriff to get things sorted out.

sounds like it was the previous issues that were causing the cold start issues

is it all ok now?

tell him to start looking at a nistune daughterboard for his ecu (will need a z32 300zx ecu and a nistune board but its about as cheap as you can get but will handle most mods)

[jodietas]

sounds like it was the previous issues that were causing the cold start issues

is it all ok now?

tell him to start looking at a nistune daughterboard for his ecu (will need a z32 300zx ecu and a nistune board but its about as cheap as you can get but will handle most mods)

Yes thats correct pipster, all seems to be ok now. No more nasty knocking sounds coming from the front of the engine, idling up and down when cold has gone, plugs seem to be keeping clear. Only problem he is seeing now is it doesn't want to idle when cold, hubby said something about needing a 'tickle' in the timing (lol men have crazy ways of putting things!).

We were in contact with Rob from Turboworx last night and asked him where the air to fuel pressure ratio should be sitting at start up as hubby didn't believe it was right- currently sitting on 19. Was told that this was way too lean.

XRATED- yes they are genuine HKS, we have photos of where everything was sitting when the timing cover was taken off. I really think it was seriously just damn luck it didn't do any damage. The belt itself wasn't loose but as I said above, it had jumped a few teeth. (would go into more detail but hubby is at work and don't want to give the wrong info)

I can only tell you what I know about the car (which isn't a great deal), it's far from standard, custom plenum, forged pistons, can now hear the cams lumping over, large ball bearing turbo (I'm not sure of size sorry), Has a MicroTech computer (have been told these can be an issue) hand controller, ford throttle body.

@toffy, an XY Falcon, 4V 351,crazy (actually super crazy) amount of $$$$ spent, at 'mates rates' engine build 10k+ without anything else. Oh and to top off our family, I drive a Commodore lmao

[ripitup]

Yes thats correct pipster, all seems to be ok now. No more nasty knocking sounds coming from the front of the engine, idling up and down when cold has gone, plugs seem to be keeping clear. Only problem he is seeing now is it doesn't want to idle when cold, hubby said something about needing a 'tickle' in the timing (lol men have crazy ways of putting things!).

We were in contact with Rob from Turboworx last night and asked him where the air to fuel pressure ratio should be sitting at start up as hubby didn't believe it was right- currently sitting on 19. Was told that this was way too lean.

XRATED- yes they are genuine HKS, we have photos of where everything was sitting when the timing cover was taken off. I really think it was seriously just damn luck it didn't do any damage. The belt itself wasn't loose but as I said above, it had jumped a few teeth. (would go into more detail but hubby is at work and don't want to give the wrong info)

I can only tell you what I know about the car (which isn't a great deal), it's far from standard, custom plenum, forged pistons, can now hear the cams lumping over, large ball bearing turbo (I'm not sure of size sorry), Has a MicroTech computer (have been told these can be an issue) hand controller, ford throttle body.

@toffy, an XY Falcon, 4V 351,crazy (actually super crazy) amount of $$$$ spent, at 'mates rates' engine build 10k+ without anything else. Oh and to top off our family, I drive a Commodore lmao

Microtech = Poor Cold Start

[zoidbergmerc]

I too have been told that the microtech ECUs are hard to get a good cold start and cruise maps on them.

[XRATED]

Yes thats correct pipster, all seems to be ok now. No more nasty knocking sounds coming from the front of the engine, idling up and down when cold has gone, plugs seem to be keeping clear. Only problem he is seeing now is it doesn't want to idle when cold, hubby said something about needing a 'tickle' in the timing (lol men have crazy ways of putting things!).

We were in contact with Rob from Turboworx last night and asked him where the air to fuel pressure ratio should be sitting at start up as hubby didn't believe it was right- currently sitting on 19. Was told that this was way too lean.

XRATED- yes they are genuine HKS, we have photos of where everything was sitting when the timing cover was taken off. I really think it was seriously just damn luck it didn't do any damage. The belt itself wasn't loose but as I said above, it had jumped a few teeth. (would go into more detail but hubby is at work and don't want to give the wrong info)

I can only tell you what I know about the car (which isn't a great deal), it's far from standard, custom plenum, forged pistons, can now hear the cams lumping over, large ball bearing turbo (I'm not sure of size sorry), Has a MicroTech computer (have been told these can be an issue) hand controller, ford throttle body.

@toffy, an XY Falcon, 4V 351,crazy (actually super crazy) amount of $$$$ spent, at 'mates rates' engine build 10k+ without anything else. Oh and to top off our family, I drive a Commodore lmao

If your running unusually lean and it has a 'lump' to the idle coupled with odd cold idle... sound like a vacume leak to me. I'd pressure test the intake when the motor is cold.

It would have to have pretty huge cams (duration AND lift) in it to get a real cam throbb from an RB. Do you know what size they are?

Also as said above, your current ecu have know issues running RB's idle controll and have crappy cold start base maps. If you want to get the car running more like a standard car, maybe have a look at swapping the microtech for a Z32 300ZX turbo, manual ecu and get a nistune board (can be purchased from Marty at Mobile Mechanics Moonah) installed. The ecu would be around $100 and nistune board around $500. A nistune board will run the standard idle controll better, be able to adjust for cold start and also has a 'knock' map. I run a nistune board with a forged rb30, large trust turbo, 700cc inj and all the gear over 300rwkwk.

'Far from standard' is going to make the whole deal a little harder.

As a side note, when the car is cold there will be a bit of a knock/rattle as the forged pistons need some time to heat up and expand in the bores... depending on the build clearances it may blow a little smoke too.

Good luck

Justin

[Worked32]

I no a bloke with a nistune ecu pretty sure it's just tuned to pod filter intercooler standed afm and 15 psi of boost if you were gunna go that option ad is on gumtree and if you offered him 350 I rekon he will take it

[djbugg]

Hmmm interesting user name you have there....

[zoidbergmerc]

Obvious troll is obvious.