mws

Installing headers knowing at least a couple bolts are broken? Based on my experience: If I was doing it and assuming Thorleys, I would quote you $200 to $600 for labor.... Add $100 for Pacesetters. Removing broken studs is a crap shoot. Some are much more accessible than others, and some screw right out while others will fight you every inch of the way. Did 2 on little grey last month. First one took well over 2 hours. Second one took 5 minutes.

Just in case anyone else is interested in being able to do simple, reliable, and highly accurate DIY alignments for moderate investment, what you will need includes: To do accurate and easy camber checks (no math required to check, only req'd to simplify shim selection): An angle finder: http://store.summitracing.com/partdetail.a...15&autoview=sku And this adapter makes toe-in MUCH easier and accurate to measure (only a little math): http://store.summitracing.com/partdetail.a...+0&autoview=sku And then to do caster, a set of pivot plates like MichiganAve showed us. And some math skills! And a tape measure. And a level surface to park. Yes, there are many other ways to do this, including some lower cost, creative, and very accurate (if done correctly) techniques using straight edges, string, protractors, greasy tiles, and patience. There are also lower cost (and much higher cost!) versions of the angle finder. I just concluded these were the best value for our needs. For my nephew's and my family's fleets (8 vehicles), we are easily able to cost justify the the full monty. This year we'll be getting the camber gauge and toe in adapters. Caster rarely varies (except by damage) so the pivot plates will be an addition when we find a rippin' deal on them.

Funny you mention these... Last week while I was getting my WD aligned, I was chatting with the technician. He admitted that in his opinion (based on 20 years of doing alignments on race cars), doing a manual alignment is far more accurate than the flash bang computerized laser systems he used in the shop. The real advantages of the laser systems are speed (at least 10x faster) and they allow even stupid knuckle draggers to do a pretty decent job. None of that annoying math or geometry to do - the computer does it all. But he did a repeatability study on his race car on the laser system and found errors as much as 1/2 degree from check to check. Doing it the manual way, his repeatability error was less than 1/10 degree. Soooo, if you took the time to learn how to do it and did it very carefully, the manual method is better.

Crapp, that is stuck to a level I've never heard of... I'm with Simon - pull the knuckle, clamp in a vice, try pushing throughwith BFH and large drift punch. If that doesn't cut it, time for a new knuckle.... I can pull one off little black (assuming an '87 will fit yours) and send it to you for the cost of shipping and a six pack... But I will need your old one back as well so I can keep little black mobile. I'm in Chico, CA.

My technique for really stuck taper studs: 1) Quadruple check to make sure the clamping nut is loose, and that the suspension and springs are not working against agains you. Loosen T-bar if necessary. Leave the nut on so it doesn't fly apart when it breaks loose. 2) PB Blast. 3) Hammer the pickle fork in there. Make sure the pickle fork is the right size and is applying the force in the right place! Too narrow and you can beat all day without actually applying separating force as the fork is jamming against the shaft, trying to spread the fork tines rather than separating the joint. Remember, the shaft is tapered and is quite a bit larger in diameter where the fork is fitting than where the threads are. Test fit the fork on the new joint to assure it fits. 4) Leave the fork in there so the joint is under heavy load. 5) Break out the propane torch, heat the spindle end (the part that the taper bolt of the ball joint is going into) for about 5 minutes. Not glowing hot, but smoky stinky hot. 6) Give the pickle fork another rap to assure it is firmly in there. 7) Now give the side of the spindle end several sharp raps with a hammer. 8) If it hasn't popped yet, alternate hitting pickle fork and side of spindle. I have never had this method fail - except when I was using the wrong size pickle fork!

"Peak power" ratings are absolutely meaningless marketing tripe. RMS power is worth comparing IF (and only if) both manufacturers are using the exact same protocol and measuring method - which is more rare than it ought to be. Bottom line: Unless the unit is using FET output transistors, all head units are limited to about 12-14 watts of "musical" output. In other words, they are pretty much all the same these days - except for the FET equipped units. These cost more but will put out a lot more volume. Just make sure there is plenty of venting on the backside of the unit! More power = more heat.

Don't even say that after I spent 2 hours cutting, welding, grinding, and hammering to make new ones from scratch....

Your choices are to press one of the bushing shells out of the UCA, or burn out the rubber. I tried to press. My 12 ton arbor press wouldn't budge it. So... 1) Remove nuts and washers 2) Clamp a arm in vice with spindle vertical 3) Open doors for lots of ventilation 4) MOVE ALL FLAMMABLES! Including stuff on floor 5) Put on gloves, pick up propane torch, fire it off 6) Light cigar 7) Start heating the upper bushing innards. Aim the flame at the rubber and the inner bushing shell. 8) Keep heat on for about 3-4 minutes. Eventually, the steel will get so hot you can push the inner bushing shell and spindle right through. If you heated the upper bushing, you are pushing the spindle upward. NO touchy for several minutes unless you're really foolish...

Kinda arbitrary, but not really... Send me the pieces and pm your mailing address and the strap fairies may just leave a surprise on your doorstep! I'll pm my address to you... :type:

Oh.... sorry! Thought it was connected to body. So, try looking around up by the transistor module/coil. Bet you find an exposed terminal up there somewhere.! Unfortunately, I have '88 so can't compare.

In this schematic, he is using the fan as a single speed.

Buy a gallon and dilute per their instructions. At 5 to 1 with hot water, it cleaned my intake and heads right up! Spray, let soak a few minutes, rinse. Repeat if necessary. A little brushing for thick crusty areas. I keep several spray bottles at various ratios on the shelf.

That is a braided and bare copper ground strap, right? The simple answer: Probably not, but try to reattach somewhere on the engine block. The not so simple answer (Technophobes, RUN AWAY!) There are a lot of what appear to be "redundant" ground straps on modern computerized automobiles to assure various devices all see as close to 0 volts as possible on their ground legs, and far more importantly, that all sensors see as close to the exact same voltage at ground as possible. Nothing is ever exactly 0.00 volts except the ground plate in the battery. Everything before that is ever so slightly higher, due to the resistance in the conductors. The longer the path and the higher the resistivity of the path, the higher the "ground" voltage will be. If one component really close to the battery is seeing, say, 0.01 volts as ground, and another sees, say, 0.5 volts due to a long, high resistance ground path, things can start to malfunction due to sensors sending funky signals and currents flowing in abnormal ways. Maybe even frying transistors and other sensitive components. This is a very difficult problem to diagnose and repair. The solution? Try to avoid it! Hence, lots of ground straps from various components to a common "reference ground". This reference ground will be close to 0.00 due to the big cable to battery terminal, but will never be exactly 0.00. That is acceptable as long as all sensors see the same voltage as ground. In my techno world, that is called the reference ground. Not truly 0.00 volts, but a common reference of say, 0.020 volts. In the Pathy, the engine block is treated as the "reference" ground, and all sensitive electronics and sensors have the shortest possible and highest conducting ground paths to this common ground. Since copper has much less resistance than steel and the path is shorter, it causes less ground voltage variability than relying on the steel of the chassis as the ground conductor. So, is it problem if one or two come loose? Maybe, maybe not. But it could lead to some funky glitches. I suspect the other end of strap you see there is connected near the transistor module to give it a nice reference ground. Those are not too cheap to replace, so I would try to reconnect it somewhere on the engine block to minimize risk of it stressing the transistor and causing premature failure. And if a strap breaks or looks corroded, I replace it with a LARGER copper braid, solder the braid to the ring, clean the mounting surface, and seal up with dielectric grease to reduce resistance and risk of problems even more. Most would call that overkill. But guess how many times I've been stranded on the side of the road for "phantom" electrical glitches and failures?

Good luck! I order mine direct from POR as I couldn't find it anywhere locally. The Castrol purple stuff is pretty good as well - kinda like Simple Green on steroids. If you do find the Marine Clean, or if you use the purple, wear gloves. Both are very effective grease cutters - effective enough that it will leach the fat out of your skin leaving it a bit worse for wear.

Just did little greys a couple weekends ago. To clean grease and dirt and mild carbon deposits, my favorite is Marine Clean from Por-15. Kicks serious A and quite economical when purchased by the gallon. But to remove the thick black crusty carbon deposits inside the EGR passages, the fastest approach is a brass (or stiff nylon) bristle brush. Once all loose is gone, use spray on carb cleaner or Marine Clean to remove last film and expose aluminum.

This looks sound and is somewhat similar to what I did, but my use of the Flex-a-lite Variable Speed Controller on the low speed side caused additional complications as it is a ground switch. I also added more complexity by adding a switch (and indicator light) to allow me to manually disconnect the A/C compressor sense line. When traveling over 30 mph, there is no need to have the fan on when the A/C is on. So when I hit the freeway, I flip that switch to shut it down and turn on a bright LED as a reminder. I figure that gives me another .25 mpg on the freeway.... and since the parts to do were about $3.00, it was worth it. Plus, being an engineer, I actually enjoy the challenge of figuring out the logic of things like that... If you want to use both speeds, this is a much simpler solution!

Nice! And a nice link... Thank you!

Unfortunately, I threw my list away.... Snagging the Taurus relay would be a great idea. If you can find it! Maybe, just maybe, there will be one with some kind of cover that lists what all the relays are... But you may be stuck fabricating your own mating connector. Let us know what you find!

I guarantee there is. What it is and what vehicle to pull from in a JY? I spent an hour going through the NAPA catalog. There are literally hundreds (if not thousands) of factory relays with all kinds of switching options, current ratings, and pin shapes and configurations. The catalog listed rating and PN, but not where they were used. And the factory relays have PN markings, but not ratings. So it was not easy to ID a donor. And buying new was a bit spendy. You could write down PN of all known 50+ amp relays and then wander JY checking all vehicles until you find one of the PN's on the list and snag it. Make sure you snag the harness that it plugs into as well as it will almost certainly be custom as well.

Correct. The Flex-a-lite controller has a "switch" on board. I believe it uses a FET so it should be very long lived - MUCH longer than a relay - should be for a lifetime. On the down side, if it did blow, changing just the FET would not be easy for average person (would require disassemblyand re-soldering) so they would need to replace entire controller. Have never heard of it happening, but FETs can fail. Also, the controller is designed for a single speed fan so you would only be using one of the fan inputs. The smart person would set it up where you could easily plug either the low or the high into the controller. The low would be fine 99% of the time. And if you're going to be crawling in the middle of summer, then plug in the high. :cool2: The controller comes with very detailed instructions, and has an input for the A/C fan so the fan comes on whenever the A/C is on. Very slick. It also has optional inputs to have a remote switch controlled ON (in case you want to turn it on whenever you want) or a remote switch controlled OFF (to assure it stays off during water crossings). It is a pretty well thought out little device.

There is validity in that thought! I do recommend sticking to the Bosch 50 amp I mentioned earlier for this application. Some of the generic Chinese knock off relays look the same on the outside, but verrrry different on the inside. Really, really cheesy and wouldn't last long with any load, let alone 40 amps! A true example of getting what you pay for.

Simple, easy, effective... What's not to like? A suggestion: Replace the nuts with nylon insert style, and then tighten just enough to hold in place during driving but not super tight. Then when you hit a branch (or a kamikaze bird), the brackets will be able to rotate and maybe prevent tearing off or otherwise destroying the light! Then your method becomes arguably BETTER than welded tabs...

BTW, the R134a will never cool as well as the old R12. It just doesn't have the cooling ability. If you want to learn more, there are some interesting technical papers on this website: http://www.autofrost.com/

**** Warning bells sounding! **** How much did the conversion cost him? If it was one of the under $100 "change the o-rings, dump in the special snake oil, and re-fill" jobs, then your compressor is probably now dying. As do 90%+ of R12 compressors after being "converted" to R134a. Fortunately for the companies selling them, they usually die several months after the conversion so they can't be held liable. There are some fundamental incompatibilities between R12 oils, R134a oils, R-12 and R134a. A system that is not fully cleaned before filling wtih R134a will die. Sooner rather than later. Now that your compressor is fried, it is time to do it right. You MUST completely evacuate and clean the system and get every last trace of R-12 and mineral oils out of there before replacing the compressor and hoping for the best. Most advise to replace accumulator and other parts as well. I know you hate to hear this, but you will be better off to take it to a very knowledgable automotive A/C specialist to be properly diagnosed and repaired. Yeah, they are expensive, but will save you in the long run. The cheap ones will just throw parts at it and bills at you until you go away.