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Post by Volktales on Oct 14, 2018 20:21:25 GMT -8
So a bit of an unusual situation happened with the black Civic today. I have been driving it daily for the last several weeks, and am getting ready to hand it over to the kid. While sitting at a traffic light today, I smelt a very strong whiff of raw gas. Pulling over just up the road revealed some fuel around the injector rail area, but not obvious where it came from. A gentle ride home and re-inspection revealed one of the two nuts the secures the fuel rail in place was missing. This is not good, as the fuel injectors are sealed via O-rings, and are only held in place by the fuel rail which "sandwiches" them in the correct location. The missing nut allowed the rail to tip slightly, and pressurized fuel was sneaking past the O-ring. Not a great thing, but simple to fix with a new nut. The fuel rail came attached to the used engine, and was installed along with it. I assume the guys that removed the engine from the car at the wrecking yard, removed the nut, then decided to leave the rail in place when taking out the engine. The moral is, look over used parts carefully before installing. And new parts too; especially vintage VW parts!!!
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Post by PICTUP on Oct 15, 2018 8:42:44 GMT -8
Good thing you are giving it the shake-down. I don't think Victor would like to be stranded...although we have to learn how to cope at some point
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Post by Volktales on Oct 15, 2018 11:16:12 GMT -8
Victor would have been stranded. He has not exactly tried very hard to learn much of anything about any car related stuff, unfortunately... Staring into smart phones all the time seem to make people dumber nowadays...
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Post by magikbus on Oct 15, 2018 19:00:00 GMT -8
Victor would have been stranded. He has not exactly tried very hard to learn much of anything about any car related stuff, unfortunately... Staring into smart phones all the time seem to make people dumber nowadays... You've got that right, "Cognitive capacity and overall brain power are significantly reduced when your smartphone is within glancing distance—even if it’s turned off and face down—according to a recent study. This new report from the University of Texas at Austin, “Brain Drain: The Mere Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity,” was published in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research." Stan
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Post by Volktales on Oct 18, 2018 21:52:18 GMT -8
Sooo, I have been making some room in my basement, and the old Civic engine with the knock had to go. But first I wanted to take a peak inside, to see if anything was salvageable... That is the oil pickup, inside of the oil pan. Those funky chunkys are the remains of the steel backing in the bearing material... On the left is a sample rod bearing insert. On the right is one of the main bearings. Both are good examples of absolutely shot bearings, worn down to the copper layer. All of them were like this, except #2 rod bearing. Which was the source of all those chunks of metal. The bearing had completely self destructed and the big end of the rod was rattling around the crank journal. So much material had been ground away, that the piston was lightly whacking the bottom of the cylinder head, and the "shoulders" of the big end where smacking the bottom of the bore in the engine block. Nasty. Was close to full destruction as the next step would be broken rod through the side of the block... Here is a contrast. The top is a piston and rod from my dead 1500cc Beetle engine. The bottom is from this 1600cc Civic. Look at those tiny pistons and spindly rods! The VW engine features a 85.8mm bore and 69mm stroke, while the Civic is a much smaller 75mm bore, but a much longer 90mm stroke. VW produced 53 gross horsepower for its engine while the Civic managed 106 net horsepower. Given the differences in these calculations, it hard to be sure what the true comparison is, but I have driven both, and the Civic is waaaay faster. Duh. In the end I was able to salvage the cylinder head from the Civic, but not much else of use. It may come in handy some day.... Now onto that Paseo tear-down...
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Post by PICTUP on Oct 19, 2018 18:09:55 GMT -8
Victor would have been stranded. He has not exactly tried very hard to learn much of anything about any car related stuff, unfortunately... Staring into smart phones all the time seem to make people dumber nowadays... You've got that right, "Cognitive capacity and overall brain power are significantly reduced when your smartphone is within glancing distance—even if it’s turned off and face down—according to a recent study. This new report from the University of Texas at Austin, “Brain Drain: The Mere Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity,” was published in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research." Stan Does this mean that our smartphones are sometimes smarter than us? Hardly. I still don't call my cell a f*cking 'smart'phone....Being able to store a lot of data doesn't make it 'smart' IMO.
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Post by PICTUP on Oct 19, 2018 18:13:17 GMT -8
But first I wanted to take a peak inside, to see if anything was salvageable... No you didn't...you just like taking stuff apart you know you won't have to put back together, lol! You m'boy are a true mechanic with an obsession for mechanical things Looks icky by the way....
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Post by Volktales on Oct 19, 2018 19:47:49 GMT -8
Other things I forgot to mention include this: When I had the engine turned upside down, I unbolted the rods and pushed the pistons and rods out of the block. Except I didn't really have to, as they just about fell out of the bores under the force of gravity! The oil control rings were stuck tightly in the pistons, and the compression rings had very little tension. It WAS running smoothly before pulling it out however...
Another thing to mention is this: When started, the oil pressure light went out as normal despite having no bearing material at all on one crank journal. I have seen this multiple times now on different engines. Probably why people keep driving even when hearing obvious rod knock. Hmmm.
Also the fuel rail leak reappeared with a vengeance yesterday. Turned out one of the injectors was actually cracked, something I have not seen before. I bet it happened when the engine was lifted out with a chain at the wrecking yard. Fortunately I had spares and used the complete fuel rail off the original engine... So tomorrow it may be hand-over day to the kid; but he was not happy as his red Civic will be going into storage that he has to pay for... Time to call the "Waaaaambulance"...
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Post by magikbus on Oct 20, 2018 19:04:04 GMT -8
You've got that right, "Cognitive capacity and overall brain power are significantly reduced when your smartphone is within glancing distance—even if it’s turned off and face down—according to a recent study. This new report from the University of Texas at Austin, “Brain Drain: The Mere Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity,” was published in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research." Stan Does this mean that our smartphones are sometimes smarter than us? Hardly. I still don't call my cell a f*cking 'smart'phone....Being able to store a lot of data doesn't make it 'smart' IMO. Nope not at all. Phones cannot be "smart" until they can extrapolate new data from information that isn't related. Only humans can do that. We call it hunches, or sometimes imagination or creativity. What the "cognitive capacity....." quote means is that when people's phones are within reach, they are constantly distracted thinking there might be something on the phone for them. These distractions causes decreased cognitive capabilities in our brains. eg: the young girl in the phone booth at the mall the other day told me she gets a "hit" from her phone about every 2 minutes. In order for her to get anything done in her booth, she has to "airplane mode" her phone for most of the day so she can concentrate on her work. I can't even image how long it takes her to "catch up" when she gets home. Stan
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Post by Volktales on Feb 11, 2019 20:48:16 GMT -8
Soooo, the kid returned from hockey around 5 on Saturday night. I strongly suggested to him that he back his car in the driveway, as snow was forecast and it would be easier to get the car out. But what does Dad know??? This was the view out the front window on Sunday morning... Despite many attempts the next day, he wasn't going anywhere... His Mom had to eventually shovel the car out for him... Kids these days...
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Post by PICTUP on Feb 12, 2019 8:24:49 GMT -8
Why didn't he shovel the car out...saving his arms for hockey???
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Post by Volktales on Mar 17, 2019 21:22:26 GMT -8
Sooo, the black Honda has been continuing to provide the kid transport without complaint. The car hasn't complained, but the kid sure has. He is bugging me bigtime to extract his red Civic out of storage and get the noisy machine back on the road. It has been away for almost six months now, and he can't wait to get back behind the wheel. At least he is showing SOME interest in cars... Meanwhile the mighty Acura has continued to roll on. It has thrown one minor wobbly this year, however... This circuit board is for the daytime running light relay/module. These are a very common failure point on all Honda's of this era. The lights stop working, and a "DRL" warning lamp stays lit all the time on the dash. The fix is very simple however, and just requires the solder to be re-flowed on the circuit board for the relays. I have repaired many of these on cars through work, and it only takes a few minutes once the module is extracted from deep under the dash... And finally, I told myself that I will NOT buy any more cars this year. None. Nada. Not going to happen. And then this followed me home... Yet another older Civic that I certainly don't need. This one does not count however, as I did not actually pay anything for it. Yup. Free cars don't count! I am one of those people that just can't turn down free stuff, even if I really don't need it at all. So why was this one free? A customer at the shop stuffed it into something concrete during the last major snowstorm and destroyed the left rear suspension. The force of the impact also ruined the back bumper, the inner bumper bar itself, and distorted the trunk floor enough to affect they way the trunk closes (which it won't anymore). The customer, unfortunately had no collision coverage, and the damage would have exceeded the value of the 19 year old car. They elected to not fix it, and I was later able to acquire it for parts or repair. I have already replaced the rear suspension and rim and tire with used parts, and will locate a replacement bumper and internal pieces. Fixing the body damage will require some creativity and use of a porta-power, but I think it can be saved. Otherwise the car was pretty decent before the crash, so it is destined to be a very short term project. Once complete, we will see if the kid likes this one better, and we will sell the black Civic instead. Or something like that... And just so you know, There is currently 9 VWs at home, and 2 Civics, 1 Acura, and 3 Toyotas, and one Chevy. No wonder it takes me forever to get stuff accomplished...
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Post by magikbus on Mar 18, 2019 18:33:45 GMT -8
Don't worry Russ, it took about 250 years to build up the Roman empire which then last another 250. In other words, Rome wasn't built in a day. Relax, take a load off, put your feet up and just chill. Stan
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Post by Volktales on Apr 7, 2019 21:13:55 GMT -8
So I spent most of the day cleaning the garage out so I could get this "quicky" job done. The damaged rear bumper had mostly removed itself, so took only minutes to detach. The reinforcement bar and aftermarket tow hitch came off without drama. They damage to the body did not look too bad, so I had a go at bashing things with hammers. This did not produce the desired effect, so I may have to rethink how I am going to make that trunk close properly... As usual, I am in too deep already, so somehow this will be overcome...
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Post by tony on Apr 8, 2019 13:42:32 GMT -8
If you can access the trunk via the rear seats , you could just weld the trunk shut!
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