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Woosh....(never mind):rofl:Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
Sure, guitars and banjos (not part of the viola family, but a "vulgar" instrument) have them as well...On mine the 5th string has a brass nut...and 24 stainless steel nuts around the head. Beat that! (All puns intended.)
Also back on topic: +1 Cherry cigars are much better.
If I ever have to do the smoke test again, I will be sure to ask for one!Quote:
Originally Posted by Ron
Farrar
Okay, I conducted the smoke test tonight!
I had to improvise a bit, because I expected to be able to pull the carburetor off without the adapter plate intact. Unfortunately, this proved not to be the case -- the adapter plate is held fast to the carburetor by the giant gasket atop it.
So there went the two vacuum ports I thought I had available to me. After removing the carburetor/plate, I was staring at a bare intake manifold with just the two plenums available.
My first thought was back to a repair I once saw a guy do on his vacuum cleaner: where the hose adapter had broken off, he had simply duct taped the hose on. I tried this method: I stuck a bit of vacuum tubing into one of the intake plenum holes, and taped around the hose and the manifold to make a good seal. Well, the seal wasn't quite so good, and I used my 99-cent cigar up trying to make the thing air-tight. No good.
So I removed the tape/hose assembly and thought: One source of vacuum leaks on K-Jet cars is at the injector ports! On Sparky's engine, I have those plugged with silicone taper plugs but they're easy enough to remove. Fortunately for me I have bits of hose in various sizes, and one of them happened to be just the right girth to fit into the injector ports with a little force and make a good seal. So this is the method I decided to go with. I taped off the plenums and stuck the vacuum hose in an injector port on each side. I lit a small cigar and blew smoke into the hose -- or I tried to. Although I could see the tape over the plenum move under the pressure, I couldn't actually force any smoke to come out anywhere, and as soon as I took my mouth off the hose, a puff of smoke came out that end. This happened on both sides.
I have now verified that my intake manifold is leak-free.
Farrar
You would need to do that smoke test at night with a flash light to get really sensitive results.
This was done at night.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEaVywxh62U
Farrar
Question for you. When you did the smoke test, did you consider the valve positions of each cylinder? If your injector plugs are the source of the leak (unlikely, I know) they likely wouldn't show any smoke unless the relevant valve was open.
I'm leaning towards a spark problem, myself. Have you tried advancing the base timing to see if it helps any? When I was tuning my car at low RPMs I would sometimes have to bump the timing all the way up to get it to idle smoothly. Maybe it got bumped or something?
I have assumed that my valves leak, since I've been finding dirty, smoky, congealed oil in the injector ports for a long time now. But you're right -- I hadn't taken that into account and I should probably have checked all three on each side instead of just one per bank. Well, fortunately I have plenty of small cigars handy (although I could swear I still stink from yesterday's test!) and will have a little time on my hands tomorrow evening. I suppose another way to do it would be to pull a vacuum from each of those ports.
At this point I am also thinking it's a spark problem. According to MSD, I can send full voltage into their ignition coil, but I have been using the stock resistor (bridged) anyway. I might bypass the resistor and see if it does anything to improve the situation. The timing has not been altered since 2008 -- the crud buildup on the adjustment screw by the distributor would seem to indicate that. :-\ Also I will reduce the gap in the spark plugs and see what that does.
Farrar
It just occurred to me that I still have no interior lights in my car. I was hoping to drive it this weekend, but that involves a Friday night excursion. Hmm. I guess I had better fix that problem before I get back to the rough idle problem.
Farrar
Something is definitely screwy with my courtesy lights: I unplugged the passenger side door switch and the lights stayed on. Plugged it back in and depressed the switch, and saw the lights dim but not shut off (even after the appropriate amount of delay). Unplugged the driver's side door switch and felt the leads to be warm to the touch! I pulled the fuse so now I have no lights at all, but at least the circuit isn't warm.
Note: I have no dome light or glove box light right now as both fixtures are missing.
Back when I had a dome light, it would only come on when the doors were open; I was unable to make it come on by tilting it like you're supposed to be able to.
Looks like I am going to have to simply start disassembling the courtesy light circuit. Maybe I will install an override switch while I am at it -- it would be nice to hit one of the rocker switches and have all of the interior lights come on like in a modern car. No doubt it will take me weeks to accomplish this... and I might as well start by removing the knee pads. (Easy enough to do, since the passenger side knee pad is falling off despite my many attempts to get it fixed.)
Farrar
...until next week. I figured out that the interior light fixture from a 1989 Porsche 911 is a cross-reference, so I ordered three online (free shipping on orders over $65 from this seller -- I ordered two more for some friends :))Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
Troubleshooting in earnest begins, I suppose, this weekend... if I have the time. I do have German and Biology mid-term exams next week, plus the fundraiser at the radio station which means 9am-7pm workdays, so I may or may not have any time at all to work on the car until after 21 October.
Farrar
Let us know if the new unit is an improvement in any way on the old one. One of mine is flaky and the contacts are so flimsy that it's no wonder they don't work any more after 30 years.
Will do. They ship today.Quote:
Originally Posted by AdmiralSenn
FWIW, the new dome light fixture looks exactly like the ones DMC Houston sells. I will post comparison pictures if you like.
Farrar
I have one for my front dome light and YES it is a huge improvement. It isn't flakey, it is built solid, and it works every time. I love it.Quote:
Originally Posted by AdmiralSenn
Honestly I was thinking about ordering the cross reference a while back but the cheapest I could find was $31 as well. I think DMCMW sells it for $35. I was just going to wait and order another from DMCMW with my order but I've made several orders since then and keep forgetting about it.
Farrar is hooking me up with some free shipping though. Yippie.
Well, now you can have one for the rear, as well (unless you still want me to do your rear parcel shelf lights like I did mine).Quote:
Originally Posted by stevedmc
Farrar
I thought your rear shelf mod was designed to supplement the existing light.Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
No, I replaced it with the same LED strips I use elsewhere on the rear trim strip, except since the opening is bigger I used three LED strips instead of just one. However, I did this because I still had the original light fixture which was cracking and foggy with age; the lights can be done the way you suggest. I might even figure out a way to make the whole light string come on when you tilt the light... that would be pretty hip, now that I think of it. Let me see if I can figure this out on my car before we go messing about with yours. ;-)Quote:
Originally Posted by stevedmc
Farrar
Thats how I thought yours currently is. I'd like to still have a way to flip the rear lights on and off when I am driving.Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
I just thought of something.
- rough-running engine
- courtesy/door lights won't turn off even with switches disconnected
- hot fuse block
Could ALL of these symptoms be from the same thing? What if I have lost a ganged ground somewhere?
I bought a floor jack not long ago to replace the one that was lost to a neighbor's five-finger discount plan. I think it's time for me to get up under the car and check those black wires!
Farrar
So... does my theory of a lost ground seem valid to anyone?
Of course. On these cars it's ALWAYS valid. I think we're all just waiting to see what you find.
:popcorn:
(note that I'm not being mean - Christine is evil enough that my own troubles are similar in their duration and absurdity. I just choose to be entertained by them.)
The bulbs for the doors are always powered 12v and are grounded to turn them on. Since you can't turn them off, the problem with them is that they 'found' ground rather than lost it...Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
What happens when you pull the delay module?
Adam: Yay, I still have a few readers. :) Thanks! I like the fact that your car is Christine. My car is Sparky and sure enough, with most problems being electrical it seems appropriate...
Ron: Good point. For a second I forgot that they switch ground. (I don't know how I could forget this with the wiring diagram on my computer. Duh.) I will pull the module this weekend and see what happens.
Farrar
Any luck with the relay work? Its gonna suck not seeing you tomorrow.
You're not going???...I must of missed that (Sucky Mods?).Quote:
Originally Posted by stevedmc
I was hoping you would hold Farrar's hand (literally) and pull a few plug wires to brave him up. :evilgrin:
I'm the host so yes, I'm not going anywhere until we leave for the cruise in.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ron
Farrar is worried his car might catch fire so he is staying home. I told him that only happens at 88 mph but he won't believe me.
Yeah, I was looking forward to swapping carbs with him.
No; I spent this morning study for a German exam, and this afternoon taking it. (My score is somewhere between 77 and 95. So at least I know I passed.) After that I had to do laundry, spend some time with my girlfriend before she leaves tomorrow for a 13-day trip to New York, and start studying for Monday's Biology exam.Quote:
Originally Posted by stevedmc
If I am lucky, I will be able to pull the delay module tomorrow and see what happens.
I still have the carburetor off the intake manifold and the intake plenums sealed up with tape. Also, the battery is disconnected. The car is not going anywhere any time soon...
Farrar
I think Sparky's torsion bars need a tweak. I have PJ Grady door struts, which are supposed to be the best; they're less than two years old. Today it was 72°F and the dew on the passenger door caused it to be so heavy that it hit me in the back when I was getting in the car -- the door wouldn't hang open more than a few inches on its own. But I suppose just to be safe I will buy a new set of door struts, since cool weather is coming. Maybe I will go back to Hervey's "soft lift" struts to prevent the doors from bouncing when the torsion bars are adjusted up a notch.
Farrar
Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
Pull the struts and let the doors hang, how much gap is left?
I think I did this test two summers ago when it was very hot outside; the doors hung open maybe an inch or two. I know they're supposed to hang open a little more than that, but I put Grady struts on and the problem seemed to go away (except in cool or cold weather).Quote:
Originally Posted by sean
I will do the test again this weekend when it should be about 80°F outside. If the doors don't hang open, I guess there's a roof panel problem; if the doors hang open the same amount as 18 months ago, I guess it's time to up the torsion a notch?
Farrar
In an effort to help out someone who was having alternator troubles I looked up some wiring diagrams of charging circuits. I have always read that you can't put an LED bulb in your battery indicator socket because the circuit requires a certain amount of resistance to function and the bulb provides that whereas an LED unit would not; and also that if you lost the bulb the circuit would not charge because this would break the circuit.
Here's a thought: has anyone measured the resistance across a stock battery indicator bulb? Why not put a resistor of that strength in parallel with the bulb? That way your alternator would still charge if the bulb burned out. Would that also allow you to replace the bulb with an LED module? That would seem to kill two birds with one stone. I am no electrical engineer, so I'll need someone to explain to me why this will or won't work.
Farrar
Yes, a resistor would probably work for both a burned out bulb or use of an LED. The bulb should really never burn out since it's not lighted unless the alternator is bad. Maybe when I start doing my binical LED changes I will look into that posibility.Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
Well, now, this is totally weird.
As y'all know, I had trouble with the interior lights staying on even with both doors closed, so I removed the fuse from the circuit to stop the lights being on all the time.
Tonight, I needed to be inside the car with lights on to pick up a few lines of dialogue (picking up where the previous video left off), so I disconnected the battery, put the fuse back in its slot, and connected the battery again. The lights did not come on.
After a minute, I remembered that I had disconnected the door plunger switches, so I re-connected them, then disconnected the battery and connected it again. Still no lights. I pulled the fuse and checked that the terminals had not been pushed down, made sure the fuse was OK, and re-installed the fuse. Still no lights.
I did not have the time to get out my relay pliers and remove the module, but since I have Dave M's new dimming module I highly doubt it is at fault. So now I have to figure out what could cause my problem to reverse itself! This is all very odd indeed.
Ah, well. I suppose I will get to that another day.
Farrar
Random thought: is it bad that I am trying now to get my car ready for the trip to Orlando next year? I definitely need to get the air conditioning done by then. :lol:
Farrar
My new dome light fixtures arrived today! Brian and Steve, I will set yours aside in a safe place. They were so well-packed that even the bulbs they shipped with were 100% OK. :)
In other news, I hope this weekend to have a chance to put the carburetor back on top of the intake manifold with new gaskets and a spacer, then re-gap the plugs to .035", remove the ballast resistor, and see what happens.
Farrar
Here are some pictures of the new dome light fixture. It looks like a perfect fit for the front; not sure about
the rear yet.
Attachment 6162
Attachment 6163
I took a lot more pictures, but only two have managed to upload, so for now this is all I can share.
Farrar
Can you check how they fit and stay put, mounted in the car?
I like the lens on those more so then the new ones I got.
I will do this when I get home tonight.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bitsyncmaster
Here's a better view of the lens.
Attachment 6164
Farrar
Here are photos of my new lights. Note the clear center on the lens and also the lens is sunken below the black frame. Those may be good things or not but I will put these in and run them a while just to see.
Is that a plastic frame? Mine are metal, not that it matters electrically.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bitsyncmaster
Farrar
Black plastic just like originals.Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
Didn't get home until after 8pm, so not enough light to work with. If I'm not too wiped out from work tomorrow (so far I've put in 44 hours since 8am Monday) I will try to install it and get some pictures -- however, it's the exact same width and breadth as the old unit so if it's not too tall it should be a perfect fit.
If I can get power to the circuit, I should be able to see if it throws enough light, as well.
Farrar
New dome light fixture fits like a glove -- you can hear the tabs snap into place. It's quite secure.
I was able to get Bill's LED combo into it, but without power to the circuit I cannot verify that it will work in both forward-facing and rear-facing positions.
Attachment 6204
Attachment 6205
Attachment 6206
Farrar
They look good. Where did you get them? Think I will get a pair.
I got them from Euro Port Parts. Use their drill-down to select a 1978 Porsche 911 and select the interior light, part # POR023201.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bitsyncmaster
Farrar
Looks sharp.
Thanks, Sean.
Quick update: I forgot to mention earlier that I removed the diodes from the courtesy light circuit just in case one had failed and was causing the lights not to come on. No joy.
Since it's getting dark, I will troubleshoot the courtesy light circuit tomorrow. Now that I am inside for the night, I am going to be cutting sheets of cork into gaskets -- I am going to put a spacer under the carburetor when I re-install it tomorrow; this should make it easier for me to adjust the idle air screws with my big hammy hands.
Farrar
Most auto parts have something similar to these pretty cheap. Flexible and with the right end, you can easily use it with one hand.Quote:
Originally Posted by Farrar
http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/27...showimage.html