madhatter_xe

what kind of UCA's are you installing? are you putting in new poly bushings at the same time? be sure the UCA's have holes for zerk fittings, otherwise they squeak like hell. If there aren't any holes, drill and tap them before you install them, just makes life easier if you can do it on a work bench. Definitely get a spring compressor, i rented one from PartSource for free. good deal. You might need something to cut off the front shocks too. angle grinder works fine. Good Luck!

yeah everything is back together and it sounds beauty. no more ticking! I used some grade 8 or 10 bolts with Hex heads on them. they worked great and should hold up fine.

I'm not sure about a "how-to", but there is a ton of good information on this site about suspension lift options. you just need to use the search function.

Thanks alot for the tips MWS. I borrowed a buddy's 90 degree drill and the process went great, those heli-coils are quite the invention. I think the reason the headers were leaking to begin with is b/c they fit like a pile of dog crap. I never liked how the joints were sort of "massaged" or should I say, pounded to fit and I think that put alot of pressure on the header flange. So i'm going to get the Y pipe bent so everything fits nice and there isn't any pressure on the header. Yeah I thought the header flange might be warped too, but i checked it and its beauty. So hopefully after getting the fitment issues fixed this won't be a problem. In terms of the replacement manifolds, you might want to check to see if Nissan has developed a decent replacement manifold. To the best of my knowledge those replacement parts will cause you the same grief as the ones that were originally put on the truck. From reading around on this board, headers seem to be the best solution for the annoying exhaust leak.

Yeah, it kept leaking so i kept tightening. I think the threads may have been weakened from before or something and thats why it was leaking, and then i stripped it right out, it didnt' take much torque to strip it. I picked up a heli-coil kit and it says to drill it out with a 21/64 drill bit. Would you happen to know what size is safe to drill these heads with? i've heard that the water jackets are awfully close to the holes. 21/64 is a 64th larger than 5/16. thanks for any info.

Hey guys, I managed to get the new engine running smooth but as I was torquing down the header bolts to get rid of an exhaust leak, I stripped one out. Its the upper one on #6 cylinder (rear drivers side). Now i'm driving around with no bolt in the hole and the worst exhaust leak i ever heard. Just wondering if anybody has any tips to get this fixed cheap. I am thinking that I am gonna have to pull the header off and take it somewhere to get drilled and have a heli-coil put in...but I'd like to get it fixed without pulling off the header. Thanks for any info folks.

Yup, thats exactly what its doing. It pops consistently like every 4-5 seconds....sounds like i'm firing an M16 as I drive down the street. I'll try the seafoam and check out the MAF sensor. Thanks for the tips man.

Hey guys, thanks again for the help on this. I have the exhaust all fitted up and set the idle and timing. The truck idles nice and sounds good, BUT it seems to be backfiring or something. It is making a really loud popping noise in the muffler and spraying water out of the drain hole in the muffler. I'm guessing that fuel is pooling and then igniting in the muffler. I checked the plug wires and they're good. Any ideas for what could be causing this? thanks.

oh man there is tons of room there to get at that thing. Good to see Nissan got a clue and changed the size of the access hole for those bolts. Not much room on the early WD21's.

like mentioned earlier, the rubber dries out and shrinks and then the pulley will fall off the balancer or rotate on it. But if you don't pull the 6 bolts holding them together, ya got nothin to worry about. No reason to buy a new one.

If its the same as an 88, its a pain in the ass unless you have the right tools. I ended up pulling this plate out because I thought it would give me more access to the bolts. But I don't think it did much. What I ended up doing, was using a ratchet with a long extension and then a flex head extension on the end with the socket. The flexing extension allows you to get a socket on the bolts. You might want to try dropping the plate i posted in the picture, but it was a pain to get out, and if you have the flex head, then you shouldn't need to. They're tight as hell too, lock-tited in there. good luck. now that I think about it, you might need to pull the bolts holding that plate in there anyways b/c i think they secure the block to the tranny.

North Shore Off Road is out West, but they sell lots of stuff. www.nsor.com

Could my exhaust be causing too much back pressure? I am running a straight 2" pipe from the Y-pipe back and then it hits the stock muffler. I wonder if maybe the stock muffler is too restrictive? I've noticed its been making the odd popping noise and leaking water when I let the truck run. its almost like the pressure is blowing a hole in the muffler welds. The truck has been idleing great, but when i put the gas on, things get pretty rough and choppy.

Okay, i'm making some headway, I ended up tweaking the PS cam a little bit so things line up perfectly now with the TB marks. Then I started examining the vaccum lines and found that a couple were in the wrong spots...my pops sort of started connecting them when i was at work and I don't think he paid much attention to where they went. i also pinched the aiv hose off with some vice-grips for now, and plugged the tube that was venting into the catalytic converter. I'm still having trouble finding something to plug up the emissions fitting in the header. No shops around here sell metric bolts that big. anyways, things seem to be running a bit better, but I haven't taken it for a rip yet to see if its still lacking power. thats a good call. I tried it, but nothing showed up.

Can you describe the vibration a little better. Does the vibration travel through to the steering wheel? or is it strictly the engine shaking? does the tach needle start shaking too? it could be a U-joint or steering component also.

so you re-bent the metal egr tubing and threaded the end from the manifold into the header? or did you just eliminate the egr tubing all together? do you have any pics? that reminds me, i need to plug that tube that went into the cat. too. I removed all the stock stuff and had straight pipe put in from the Y back to the muffler.

yeah exhaust stuff always seems to be rusted to hell and ugly to work on. Soaking them with liquid wrench or something like that for a couple days always helps. If you have a torch, you could always heat the bolts red hot and then give them a whack with a hammer. then they usually unscrew.

You yankees really need to get with the times! j/k, i hate metric too. 125kph is about 78mph

yup, i just went and marked the dizzy up and when the rotor is on the mark things seem to line up right. Here are some pics of where stuff falls when the rotor is on mark. sorry about the blurry pics...apparently i have arthritis at 25. I'll have to start trying to figure out the vacuum lines, and then get those holes in the headers plugged. hmm, sorry i don't think i'm following you here? I was thinking about just plugging the hole with a big bolt and eliminating the AIV all together. not sure if that would hurt anything. But if I can find a compression fitting that will thread into it, I will do that. what did you end up doing with the EGR?

okay, i'm gonna go mark the dizzy and see if my marks line up when the rotor is in the right spot. If its good i'll have to start checking vacuum lines. I know for a fact that hoses aren't hooked up right...or at all in some cases. I attempted to use the vacuum line diagram in the FSM...but it confused the hell outta me. I may need to find a picture of somebody's engine with the air cleaner removed to see if the lines are going to the right spots. i also still have the egr and aiv ports open in the driver's side header...that could probably be causing some problems too. i can't find fittings that will thread into them. but i;ll make sure the belt is right for now. thanks for the help!

Sorry, i'm not sure what the size is, but if you plan to keep the pathfinder for a while...or do more work on it, you should probably consider just buying an entire metric socket set.

hey casey, how does a guy know if the dizzy is set correctly? i'm wondering because when i line the rotor up like the picture in the FSM, the timing mark on the crank seems lower than it was on my first motor.. and my first motor ran good. neither of my engines have any marks on them to line the crank mark up with. I always just scratched a line on myself to use as a guide. But now that things may have been outta whack, that line might be in the wrong spot. I'll try to take some pics tonight and let you guys know what i mean.

okay, i think i might have found the problem. I took your advice and checked the rotor on the distributor. I rolled the engine around til #1 was at TDC on comp. stroke and found that when i lined the rotor up like it says in the FSM, the cam marks were out a tooth compared to the marks on the backing plate. I'd like to be sure I have the rotor in the exact right spot. Can anybody tell me if the rotor center, should line up with the tiny L shaped thing thats welded to the dizzy plate? there is two of them on the plate straight across from each other. thanks again. hopefully this is the problem..

alrighty...this is turning into quite the headache...thanks alot everybody for helpin me out here. yeah i probably should've just pulled the cap and checked the rotor, but i ended up putting a pencil in the hole and using a little strip of kleenex to be sure it was on its compression stroke (i don't trust the feeling in my finger). Turns out i did put the pulley back on right, so i set the timing to 12..or a bit after the 3rd notch, and its still running ugly. so i pulled the rad and all that fun stuff and have the TB covers off. I'll try to explain exactly what is going on now: - turned engine over by hand until all my marks lined up...but its not really perfect..there is the right amount of teeth between the cams and the cam and the crank, but the one mark on the cam is like 1/2 a tooth over from the mark on the backing plate. so i don't know how to fix that without having the wrong # of teeth in between the cams? -so i figured i'd roll it over a few motr times and then when it came around again it was a full tooth over, so i kept rolling it over and every time it came around it was another tooth out. -now its like 5 teeth out and my arms are sore.. So i guess i'm wondering if the belt marks should ever line back up with everything again..and how many times do you have to turn a full revolution of the engine to get back to that?? did i luck out by pulling the covers off and just needing to turn it a couple times to have everything line up? thanks again!

thanks man, clear as mud! now i know where to set it once i find TDC.