Slartibartfast

Overfilled fluid could do it. The fluid level rises as the transmission warms up, so if the fluid's on the high side normally, a little extra heat could get it high enough to get air whipped into it and make the hydraulics act funny, which makes the computer think the sky is falling. Make sure you check it with the transmission warmed up, otherwise it'll read wrong. I overfilled mine by about a quart by believing the dipstick when it was cold.

I doubt the oil leaks are related. Any codes? If you can't get transmission codes through the OBDII, there is a workaround using the old blinky-lights OBD. The diagnostics for that start on AT-48 in the '03 manual. I don't know if they're like the WD21 where they only store the code for one drive cycle, hopefully not. The "judgement flicker" setup is a bit of a PITA, might be worth a try, though. Once you know what it's upset about, you can track down why. Any issues with the engine temp?

Worth a shot, I guess. Let us know if it feels different afterwards.

You're in for the same job as a body lift, minus the supporting mods to the fan shroud and fuel filler (though you may want to loosen those so you're not yanking anything when you jack up the body). I haven't done one, but from what I've read here, there's not much to it. Given how little you'll need to lift the body to slip the mounts out, you may not need to remove the front bumper brackets. The steering shaft may still put up a fight. It would be a good idea to have new bolts on hand, or at least have a plan for where to get them, in case the old ones do not come out politely or are otherwise not good enough to reuse. Are the existing mounts collapsed?

I do like that gen of patrols! You can keep the mud, though.

Frenchy, I believe you are confusing our early fuel injection with more sophisticated modern systems. Modern vehicles use wideband oxygen sensors, which allow their computers to dial in any air/fuel mixture they want, so they can stay in closed loop all the time (once the sensors are warm, anyway). These older rigs use narrowband oxygen sensors, which are useless* for any mixture but stoich (around 14.7:1). The narrowband can't even see stoich--it can only report rich or lean, so the computer bounces the mixture back and forth between them in a zigzag that averages out to stoich. This means these rigs can only run in closed loop for light acceleration and cruising. In any other conditions, they fall back to open loop, and run on stored values. A while back I added LEDs to my dash that mirror those on the back of the computer, and running the computer in one of the first two test modes lets me monitor the operation of the oxygen sensor while I'm driving. The green light flashes with the oxygen sensor when the system is in closed loop. I only ever see the green light flash under light-to-moderate throttle. Under heavy throttle or engine braking, the light does not flash. The light does not flash at idle, either, though I have seen it continue to flash briefly after the engine has returned to idle following closed-loop operation. I assume idle (even warm idle) is set a little on the rich side, and as such cannot be monitored with a narrowband sensor. (*There may be a little more going on here than I'm giving the system credit for. One of the test modes is supposed to tell you if the mixture is more than a certain percentage rich or lean in closed loop, and hell if I know how it's working that out from a sensor that only reads 0 or 1. Nissan may have done something clever to squeeze a little more data out of these primitive sensors, but clearly they were not able to get wideband performance out of a narrowband sensor.) Anyway, Teesetz, good to hear it's back on good behavior, and good luck tracking down any residual gremlins.

Wrong fuel pressure, unmetered air, and 30-year-old EFI that doesn't monitor the mixture at idle. Yeah, that makes sense.

I would never have called that being the problem! I'm guessing the incorrect fuel pressure was throwing off the idle mixture, which threw off the idle speed, and the computer ran out of adjustment trying to fix this and went to high idle. Still not sure why electrical loads calmed it down. In any case, good work finding it! Hopefully the issue stays gone.

If it's not isolated to the headlights, then tracing the headlight circuit might be less useful than I hoped. I would expect the alt to struggle more with the lights on than it does with them off, but I'd be curious to see battery voltage at idle, loaded and unloaded, when it's acting up vs when it's not. Was your defroster on when you heard it idle up on its own? The auto HVAC system kicks in the aircon when the defroster's running to dehumidify the air. Could be the compressor cycled and that's what made it idle up. It's been a while since I had working aircon in mine, so I don't remember how much it's supposed to idle up for that, but I don't think it was that high. I don't think the manual HVAC does that.

That's a weird one. I've had low idle/stalling issues with mine when the MAF connector was acting up, but I've never had it stick on high idle. And the headlights playing into it is bizarre. There is an adjustment on the IACV, and the procedure to adjust it is in the service manual. If you think it's acting up because the last guy messed with it, it might be worth ruling out. The crosstalk with the headlights tells me something else is wrong. Adjusting it to mask the current issue may complicate your diagnosis of what's actually wrong, or give you other issues. For some damn reason, these have two idle control valves. The IACV-AAC (the one under the back of the intake, with the adjustment screw) has a solenoid that's pulsed by the computer to fine-tune the idle. The IACV Air Regulator (the tall one behind the EGR, with the plug on top) is wired to the fuel pump relay and acts like the electric choke on a carburetor, except backwards (starts wide open for high idle on cold starts and slowly closes as it heats up). Test info for the two valves is on EF&EC 117 and 119 of the '95 manual. I suspect the valves themselves are alright, but a weak connection in the headlight circuit is confusing one of the sensors that tells the computer when it needs to raise the idle. The computer controls the IACV-AAC according to input from the sensor in the dizzy (which tells it the engine speed--you'd have other symptoms if this was bad), coolant temp sensor (idles up when it's cold--check the sensor and its connector), ignition switch (start signal, doubt that's got anything to do with it), throttle position (presumably so it's not thinking about idling when it's not idling--it is idling, so I doubt it's this, though it wouldn't hurt to check its adjustment), neutral position switch if it's an automatic, aircon switch (idles up when the aircon is on), power steering pressure switch (idles up when the power steering is working hard), battery voltage (I assume so it can idle up if the alty needs more RPM to hit its voltage target), and the vehicle speed sensor (I assume this is so it can work out if you're coasting or engine braking). If the valves themselves check out, I would go to the EL section, work out which fuse link and ground point the headlights use, and check them both. If any of those points are shared with other equipment, and are poorly connected, power could be backfeeding all over the place. Make sure the connections are clean and tight and the fuse links are in good shape. If that doesn't get you anywhere, I would check the sensors that tell the computer to raise the idle (EF&EC should have test info for each) and their connectors. Failing that, check the battery voltage at idle (with the headlights on and off), check the engine grounding (voltage from the engine to the negative post on the battery should be pretty low), check the other fuse links, and check whatever other ground points you can find. Look for any obvious harness damage. Wiggle stuff with it running, see if you can find something that changes the idle. Hell, check the vacuum lines, if you haven't, though I doubt they have anything to do with this. The '95 manual also has some basic troubleshooting, including various idle issues, starting on EF&EC-50. When it's at low idle (with the headlights on), does engaging the aircon or the steering switch (turn full against the stop and hold it) bump the idle back up? Does it idle down for just the parking lights, only low beams, only high beams, some combination thereof? And finally, does loading the electrical system with something else (rear defroster, blower motor, something like that) have the same effect?

I think you're overestimating the current draw of the aircon clutch. I can't find a spec for yours specifically, but it looks like aircon clutches generally take less than 5A. If your relay was happy switching two 55W halogen fog lights, it should have no trouble with the compressor clutch. If some blue relays were heavier-duty than others, and would cause issues if switched, I would expect the service manual to call that out somewhere. It doesn't, at least not that I've found. It just calls them Type 1M. Looks like there are at least three different pin layouts (two in the '03 manual, one in the '95), so that may explain a few of the different part numbers. Other than that, could be different suppliers, slight revisions, something along those lines. Hopefully an R50 owner can get you the PN off of theirs to put your mind at ease.

I don't have an R50 to check, but nissanpartsdeal shows the aircon relay as 25230-79915 or 25230-79945 for an '03. Both say they were replaced by 25230-79917.

No more binding! I didn't have to remove much, basically just chamfered the upper edge of the hole on the bench grinder. It took longer to clean the grit out of the sockets afterwards than it did to modify them. RE the springs, I have a set in my parts truck that I'm going to try first. I thought they were lift springs, but I'm beginning to suspect they're just new stock springs, which look like lift springs in comparison. If I decide I need more, I may have to check out those OMEs, thanks for the PN. I'm only 6'3 or so, maybe 6'4" with my shoes on, but yeah, being tall is overrated. Lots of crap to walk into up here.

Now that you mention back-seat passengers, I do vaguely remember hearing something scrape on a "shortcut" I took, followed by my friend in the back complaining that he'd hit the headliner. Collapsed springs may explain a few things about this truck. Speaking of hitting heads on things, I installed the new struts today, and I'm loving the difference. The bottom corner is up by 7 3/8", and I can walk under the hatch without hitting my head on anything. I am well clear of that damn corner, which is worth the cost on its own. I only clear the plastic trim by an inch or two, but if I get another 2-3" from fixing the suspension, that'll be plenty. The only problem I've run into is that the ends on the struts have a little less range of motion than the old ones, and I guess the angles are a little funny on the upper ball stud mounts, because the top joints ran out of travel before the bottoms were in position. I was able push them the rest of the way without obviously bending anything, but, yeah, that ain't right. I'll go in later and see if I can file a little clearance into them. If that doesn't work, the ends are just screwed onto the struts, so they should be easy to swap out. Maybe the plastic ends have more range of motion. That would make sense--I ordered the metal ends thinking they couldn't go wrong, so of course they'd be the one thing that did. I used SE244P110S10-W (x2) from liftsupportsdepot.com. Side note, that rear hatch is a heavy bastard.

IIRC Nefarious (Ekim Naelcm on the FB page) had to screw around with timing on his TD27. Might drop him a line, though I can't say I've seen him post in a while. I tried to find his post (to make sure I was remembering properly) but of course Facebook is a steaming pile of algorithm and couldn't find its own ass if it had one.

Those look simple enough to build, and pretty solid, too.

Wrecking yard, or maybe someone has their old one on the shelf.

No worries, hope it's actually that simple once you get into it!

Control arm bushings would explain the wobbly feeling. Bottoming out sounds like shocks or springs. If the ride height is OK, I'd start with shocks. I put KYB Excel-G shocks on mine and they haven't given me trouble.

I think I've found a winner! They're 1.3" taller than the ones I've got now, which doesn't sound like much until you factor in the leverage. If my math is correct, that should bring the bottom of the hatch up another 7.8", plus whatever I get from fixing the suspension. When all's said and done I might be able to walk under this thing with a hat on. That's probably a weird thing to be excited about, but here we are. I've ordered a set and will post the part number if they work as well as I hope they will.

That's a good question. I haven't heard mine bottom out, but I had a look under it, and I'm guessing it's supposed to have more than 1" between the rear axle and the bumpstop. The parts truck has more like 3.5". I need to get that thing stripped before snow anyway, and those should be easy enough to snag. And yeah, I've got the aftermarket clip-on struts on mine already, so most struts should just pop on. I looked through what Princess had online, and, again, found just larger and just smaller than what I'm after--thanks for the idea though. I'll keep poking around, maybe some manufacturer's got the oddball I'm looking for.

Has anyone found a longer lift strut for the rear hatch of a WD21? I'm fairly tall, Rat Trap's rear springs are stock/original, and I work out of the back a lot, so I hit my head on the rear hatch regularly. Usually it's just the plastic part, but once or twice I've caught my temple on that bottom corner, and I do not want to do that again. My current solution involves walking around like Marty Feldman any time the hatch is open, which is hard on my back, and doesn't always work. What I'd like to do is make the hatch open farther. With the gas struts removed, I got about 10" more travel (measured at the bottom corner) before the hinges/roof topped out (I didn't check to see what actually hit). I took a few measurements and it looks like I can get roughly 3" at the corner for every 1/2" I can add to the struts. Of course the hatch still needs to close, and longer struts are also longer when compressed, so I can only take this so far. The standard struts do not appear to be fully compressed when the hatch is shut, so I think I've got a little leeway to work with. I considered moving the lower pivots up the pillar, to use however much compression is left in the standard struts, but I don't see a way to do that without butchering the pillars, so I'm hoping to find a slightly longer lift strut instead. I dug around on Rockauto, but didn't find a winner. I found a few that are dimensionally close to what I'm after, but their strength numbers are way off (factory replacements are around 110lbs, so I don't trust 90, but 202 would probably break something). I also found a place that makes custom struts, but naturally they're 4-5x the cost of the off-the-shelf OE-replacements. It does occur to me that a suspension lift would also raise the hatch relative to my head. Lifting the truck just to get the hatch out of my face is not my first choice, but it is an option, and my parts car does have lift springs on it. I'm hoping for a simple solution that doesn't involve a helmet or an angle grinder. Anyone else had/solved this problem?

At least it's mostly fixed! The transfer is mounted on rubber, so, yeah, it should have a little wiggle to it. Not sure what you mean by lateral play--is it axial (moving parallel to the shaft) or radial (moving at 90 degrees to the shaft)? In either case, AFAIK those bearings aren't preloaded like wheel bearings, so I wouldn't expect them to be perfectly tight anyway. If it isn't loose enough to trash the seal I doubt it's an issue. There might be a spec in the service manual for allowable play. The CV runout is an odd one. I don't know that it's an issue, but I would not have expected a CV to do that, at least not enough that you'd notice it by eye.

My diesel knowledge is (still!) similarly limited, but I would add checking the water separator if you haven't. Pull a fuel sample while you're at it and look for algae or other goo. Might be worth blocking the EGR to see if that helps--if it's easy to get to, it's an easy thing to rule out. I would not be surprised if the rebuilt pump needed some timing or other adjustment. I have not studied it but do have a copy of the TD27 engine service manual on Dropbox, if that helps (I don't remember where I found it or I'd link you there instead). The place that rebuilt the pump might have some ideas, too. And yeah, get some fresh fuel in there before you try too hard to dial it in.

No worries man! I was kind of surprised the clip was available on its own--more surprised that the temp selector is too! Good luck and let us know how it goes.