engine re-build CONTINUED !!!! HELP

stephens89sc

Registered User
well, she is getting grrrrreat oil pressure hot on idle is 17-20

at 2500rpm hot its 60-65 psi

and cold when it first starts its 60-70psi

NOW I HAVE ANOTHER FUKCING PROBLEM

IST OFF IT HAS TROUBLE STARTING WHEN ITS WARM IT STALLS AND SPUTTERS AFTER A COUPLE TRYS IT GOES....

WHERN ITS RUNNIGN AND THE RAD IS PRESSURIZED THERE IS AIR BUBBLES IN THE COOLANT RESEVOIUR AND THEY KEEP BUBBLEIN TILL THE CAR IS COLD AND NOT UNDER ANY COOLANT PRESSURE

THE CAR SHAKES A BIT ON IDLE BUT NOT MUCH THATS PARTLY THE CAM.... IT SEEMS TO BE A STRONG MOTOR AND EVERYHTING WORKS IT RUNS GREAT


SO WHAT THE HELL IS THIS PROBLEM HEAD GASKETS?? I HAVE NO LEAKS OUTSIDE OF THE CAR

I RAN CODES AND THERE IS NOTHIGN SO ITS GOT NO PROBLEMS IN THE FEILD
 
Stephen I mean this in a kind way but I dont think you have the temperament needed to be building engines. I mean good lord all the hollering and screaming when things dont go 100% in your favor.
Calm DOWN!!!!!

Now then......How did you torque your heads? What did you torque them to? What type of headbolts are you using?
What kind of headgaskets did you use?
Were your heads straight? How about the block, were the block decks straight?
Do you see where this is going?
No one here built that engine or laid eyes on it.
You are the one that built it and this is just a small sample of the things you should have asked yourself and had answers to before you ever started disassembling your engine getting ready for the rebuild.
Trying to teach someone how to build an engine over the internet after they have already done 100's of things to the engine that none of us know about is damn near impossable.
Sure some of us can give you help and suggestions but we need alot of info from you before we can even venture a geuss.

The last time we talked your friends dad was going to help you.
Did that fall through?
Now is the time to be going through your notes you were making as you completed certain stages of the build. You did take notes did'nt you?
Engine building done properly is slow meticulious work paying attention to even the tinyest details, its not something youre gonna do in a weekend.
Have you read and studyed any of the books written on the subject of engine building before you even started this project?
I dont mean to be a hardass with you about this but you will get far more help if you can paint a better picture of the situation and give us info we need in order to help you.

What you describe now sounds like you either have air trapped in the cooling system or your HG's are leaking or you got a cracked head or block.
Since you built the engine you should already know if the block or head are cracked because you had them checked......didnt you?
That leaves you with 2 possabilitys. Try the easy one first and make sure the cooling system is free of air. If thats not it I would do a leakdown test on the engine and see what that tells me.
Was the engine starting to overheat?
Stephen you have got to keep calm when doing this stuff getting all worked up is not going to help one bit.
Start the engine and keep an eye on the temp DO NOT let it get hot. Shut it down and let it completely cool before running it again. Keep the coolant bottle up to level because as the coolant cools the level will drop because coolant is being sucked back into the rad. Keep that level up as the engine cools or you may suck air back into the system and have to start all over again.
That should work ant trapped air out. Let me know how it goes.
 
im not yellin or anything its just exagerating im actally trying to figure everything out its a damn hard thing to do i never thought it would this hard to build an engine.



the motor isnt overheating its staying at a great temp right in the middle of the guage. now im not gettin any oil in the coolant and im not getting any coolant im the oil, and i have no white smoke.....


it seems that everytime i open the bleeder valve thing on the top of the motor i get a lil bit of air out every time.... but i dont understand why the coolant resovuir has air bubbles... i hasnt seemed to stop yet, ive put about 70km on the engine... its on its second oil change...

i really thank you for your help mike and i can understand that this is frustrating for you.. and i just want to thank you again for helping so much.

i just dont understand the starting problem thats the only thing, another member in the club pointed out the air bubbles and told me it was the head gaskets i tourqed EVERY!!! LOL and i mean mever bolt in the motor to spec... the head gaskets had a 7 step process to tourquing them and i followed it exaclty with a very good touque wrench..
the block and heads were sent in and the heads were checked inside and out, they were also plained or floated or whatever they do to make the surface flat
the block was chacked and it was perfectly flat.. the head gaskets went on the right way as far as i know and i had 2 guys from the sccowc club there when i put them in.....

im not worried about the coolant bublein as much as the starting problem... i dont know if they are connected in any way but im trying my best to solve this problem and any suggestions would be great.... also how would i rule out the head gaskets, i wanna narrow this problem down... where should i start.. i dont think its the head gaskets leaking cause when the motor is cold it starts great... its only when its hot and i try to re-start it that it sputters and dies
 
im not yellin or anything its just exagerating im actally trying to figure everything out its a damn hard thing to do i never thought it would this hard to build an engine.
OK sorry my bad, from the looks of it you were going balistic. LOL!!!!! :) Now you understand why it costs so much for someone else to build an engine for you. ;)

the motor isnt overheating its staying at a great temp right in the middle of the guage. now im not gettin any oil in the coolant and im not getting any coolant im the oil, and i have no white smoke.....
Those are good signs!


it seems that everytime i open the bleeder valve thing on the top of the motor i get a lil bit of air out every time.... but i dont understand why the coolant resovuir has air bubbles... i hasnt seemed to stop yet, ive put about 70km on the engine... its on its second oil change...
The resoviour has bubbles in it because there is air bubbles in the cooling system, thats one way it works out. Keep an eye on the coolant level in the bottle as the engine cools because the level will drop because air will be worked out as coolant is pulled from the bottle to the rad so keep the level up in it. Dont let it run dry or it will pull air back into the rad. If the bubbles dont stop in a day or so somethings wrong.

i just dont understand the starting problem thats the only thing, another member in the club pointed out the air bubbles and told me it was the head gaskets i tourqed EVERY!!! LOL and i mean mever bolt in the motor to spec... the head gaskets had a 7 step process to tourquing them and i followed it exaclty with a very good touque wrench..
the block and heads were sent in and the heads were checked inside and out, they were also plained or floated or whatever they do to make the surface flat
the block was chacked and it was perfectly flat.. the head gaskets went on the right way as far as i know and i had 2 guys from the sccowc club there when i put them in.....
This all sounds encouraging. You did put the HG's pointing in the right direction did'nt you? Meaning the arrow and the word front were put in the front of the engine.

im not worried about the coolant bublein as much as the starting problem... i dont know if they are connected in any way but im trying my best to solve this problem and any suggestions would be great.... also how would i rule out the head gaskets, i wanna narrow this problem down... where should i start.. i dont think its the head gaskets leaking cause when the motor is cold it starts great... its only when its hot and i try to re-start it that it sputters and diesI dont think the bubbling has anything to do with the starting problem.......not yet anyway. Do a leakdown test on the cooling system and if the HG's are the problem you'll know then.
 
the head gaskets went in right the "front" inprint on them is facing the front of the motor.... now how do i test the head gaskets? ive never done it before....


do you have any idea on how i can find the starting problem.... where the hell would i start?... acutall come to think about it even beofre the re-build my engine had troubles starting when it was hot and sometimes when it was cold just like now so its not something ive done recently to cause this i dont think

although it seems to be worse now.
 
The starting problem may be electrical. You may even be refering to the warm start stutter that many people with SCs seem to experience. Several reasons have been given for the cause, but I'll let others expand on that.

When you start it warm, does it sputter & idle rough at lower RPMS like its going to die but usually doesn't die?
 
well what it does is when i go and crank it nothing happens its like theres no gas or no spark, then if i give it gas like hit the gas pedal then it starts up and 99% of the time it stays started but theres the odd time that it sputters and dies, but i can always get it started it just looks sorta gay when u have a nice car and people are lookin at it and the thing wont even start LOL i just HAVE to have my car perfect, ive spent months and months on this car ive had it for like a year and a half and ive driven it for about 2 months outta that time often on and the rest ive just poured money into it trying to make it look good. like new moldings outside around the windows, got it painted, lots of drivetrain parts have been replaced ect...

i just hate it when it doesnt wanna start
 
the head gaskets went in right the "front" inprint on them is facing the front of the motor.... now how do i test the head gaskets? ive never done it before....
That all sounds good Stephen. To do the leakdown test you need a cooling system pressure checker and the job is as easy as replacing your rad cap. Go to www.autozone.com then go to the loaner tool program then click on cooling and heating system. There you should see 3 tools, the 1 youre interested in looks like a small bycycle hand pump with a gauge, hose and cap that goes on inplace of your rad cap. While the engine is cool you simply remove the rad cap and install the tester cap in its place. You then use the hand pump to pump up pressure in the cooling system. What this does is pressurize the entire cooling system just as if the engine was running and the coolant was hot. Once pressurized watch the gauge on the tester, the system should hold that pressure and not drop, if the pressure drops you have a leak somewhere. Once you have established that the system does not hold pressure start looking everything in the cooling system over for leaks, look for coolant leaking. Check everything external on the engine such as hoses and connections, waterpump and gaskets, sensors that are mounted in the cooling system, thermostsat housing and gaskets, rad itself, heatercore, and check the joint between the block and heads. If everything on the outside of the engine is dry and not leaking but you are still losing pressure then the leak is internal and could be the block, the heads, timing cover or HG's leaking. Stephen I thought I would hear from you long before you reinstalled the engine and fired it up. We could have tested the engine for these types of leaks while it was still on the engine stand and was easy to work on and found any problems before you did all that work. I do this on every engine I build so that after it goes in and fires up if I have a problem such as you appear to be having I know its not anything to do with the engine.

well what it does is when i go and crank it nothing happens its like theres no gas or no spark, then if i give it gas like hit the gas pedal then it starts up and 99% of the time it stays started but theres the odd time that it sputters and dies,I dont think this has anything to do with the cooling system problem you appear to be having, but I'm not ready to rule that out yet until you do the leakdown test. The problem sounds more like a flooding condition right now. Lets make sure we have a problem with the cooling system or not first, then we will takle your starting problem.
 
ok man my car has some serious issues, ive been driving it around all day today and ive had it off and on like 6 times and its only given me a starting problem once today

the bubles have stopped as far as i can see.... why the hell does my car have a mind of its own... **** the next thing is its gonna tell me when i can drive it LOL
 
stephens89sc said:
ok man my car has some serious issues, ive been driving it around all day today and ive had it off and on like 6 times and its only given me a starting problem once today

the bubles have stopped as far as i can see.... why the hell does my car have a mind of its own... **** the next thing is its gonna tell me when i can drive it LOL

Well i would'nt call that a serious issue but its 1 I would'nt like either. Now that the bubbles have dissapeared and your engine is not overheating it sounds like youre finaly on the right track.

Lets try to tackle that starting problem.
Pull codes and see if there are any. Postem if you gotem.
Describe in as much detail as you can what is happening when the problem begins. You have to be my eye's and ears so leave nothing out and dont forget I'm totaly blind here so treat me that way.;)
 
ok well when its totalyl cold it sarts up right away like it should, once its been driven for a while when i try to restart her all she does is crank over but when im cranking it over and i step on the gas it starts up its like starting a carburated car when its cold, u gotta give it some gas but then it runs fine
 
Well when you press the gas pedal on a EFI engine that tells the comp that it needs to shut off the fuel injectors so it does. You then keep cranking and once the engine draws enough air in to offset the extra fuel that is present Wha..la..it starts.
The term for this is dechoking.
Something is flooding your engine.
Get your hands on a fuel pressure tester gauge and check your fuel pressure at the fuel rail.
Start the car with the gauge connected then shut it off and watch the gauge post back and let me know if it holds pressure for about 10 minutes after shutdown or if the pressure starts dropping imedeatly after shutdown.:)
 
ok man thx i will do that ive workin alot in the next few days but i will make a post to let u know the outcome


and its weird everytime i drive it it seems to work better, it feels stronger and better now than it dd yesterday... i dunno maybe its just my head lol


anyways thanks man and if ur ever in the vancouver area let me know and stop off for a beer
 
my car does the same thing when i start it hot, i have a fuel pressure gauge but i can't find the damn valve fitting
 
Alright Stephen.....But NO HUNTING!!!! Drive the car but dont abuse it. The first 2000 miles or so are very important.
Maybe as your new parts settle in that starting thing will improve.
Good luck.
 
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