News and stuff.

First off I'm being officially moved up at work. I've technically been a lube tech this whole time... yet most of the time at work I don't do oil changes, I'm usually doing brakes, services, timing belts... basically I've been a tech in a lube techs shoes. So they are finally removing me from lube tech and making me the tech I've basically been lol.

And as for my engine, sent the bearings back, get em back some time next week. But my friend ha s abrand new box of ACL bearings that are going in to his engine I'm building for him, so I snagged those so I can keep going on my build. So I checked the clearances on his set and they are actually a little tighter than the last set I had which is good, I'm right on the top end of OEM specs instead of just over spec.

I put the pistons all in today, clocked all the rings and knocked em in. No broken rings, yay. All that's left is the easy stuff of just tightening bolts.

Bought 99-00 si ebrake cables and rear soft lines today for the rear disc, just need a 40/40 proportioning valve now.

Painted the y8 tranny and head yesterday, look so perfecttttttttt. The block is going to look a lot better this year too, going to be sure to get all buildup and corrosion off prior to paint, going to look mint. I'm going to be disappointed if the tranny's bearings are noisy or something since it looks so good and I put so much work in to getting the tranny working. Once the whole rotating assembly and pumps are back on the block I'll paint that too, should be back together tomorrow and ready for paint by Sunday.

Here's some pics.

My sweet Competition stage 4 6 puck.


Fresh looking tranny.


Here's my main cap/girdle I didn't have pics for before. I had to remove a LOT of material to clear the Eagles.



And here's how it looked when I turned the lights out and walked out of the shop tonight. Just basically torqueing everything and it'll be done. Easy stuff.

 

man, I'd love to work at a shop. People always say that working on cars as my job would make me hate doing it in my spare time, but I just don't think so. I think I'd be begging my boss to let me stay late and use the lifts and ****, haha.

 

I will tell you first hand, keep working on cars as a hobby. Working on them everyday makes you not want to work on your own when you get home. And you don't make any money working on cars which is why I'm going to go get my welding certification so I can weld instead of work on cars.

 

from what I hear (and what I can tell, around here) there is good money in welding. For whatever reason, its not a field alotta people go into for some reason. I had a gf in highschool who's dad was a welder, he made damn good money and always had work

...not a bad idea now that I think about it. Perhaps I'll look into it as well...

 

+1. The reason why I stopped thinking about working on cars as a living. Hell, I just talk about them all day during work and I still don't want to work on the car or think about it when I get home.

My one buddy left his job has a tech (2 years after schooling etc), for the army in order to avoid becoming burnt out on the car scene. lol

 

Got moar work done bottom end is all together now. Going to paint the block tomorrow, and of it dries quick enough the head may go on. I already have some piston slap turning it by hand, these pistons are going to be insanely noisy until they warm up. Here's what I have left to do:

-My damn bay... Need to get that finished.
-Put the head on the block
-Timing belt stuff
-Put the skunk2 intake on and everything attached to that
-Valve lash adjustment

And then I should be good to go in. Getting close and it's getting exciting but making me really nervous too. I really hope the engine runs and I didn't screw anything up!

I'll drop off some pictures tomorrow.

 

Engine is all done, timing belts set, valve clearances done, and everythigs all painted. Just need to figure out what a few harness clips go to and then it's done. Going to hopefully finish the bay by Sunday, plan is to put the engine in Sunday, hopefully.

Just bought an aem wideband and aem oil pressure gauge off a guy on d-series, he had a boost gauge I was goingto buy too but his dog ate the harness and part of the gauge, aka he sold it. But I'm buying the cluster bezel with 2 gauge pods on it and ordered a mishimoto oil sandwich plate to run the gauge off of from Pat, pumped to see if they car starts lol. Pics to come soon.

 

Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiick. Let me know if you ever need a radiator!

I am mad at myself for not painting my swap before installing it. That would have made the bay look much much nicer I bet.

 

F my car.


Finished my bay Sunday by noon, put the engine in Sunday night. I have a bunch of spots to sand and respray since I had to stand on my strut towers to tilt the engine in, Skunk2 manifold made it a VERY tight fit.

Got the engine all in yesterday, axles in, most of it was done yesterday. Went to add coolant to it Sunday night to let ie sit and bleed a bit overnight, was pissing coolant from the water pipe o rings. Had a half day at school today so I went and ran and picked up the o rings from a Honda dealer because my Acura dealer doesn't stock useful things, at least my discount worked at the Honda dealer. Threw those o rings in and got the coolant issue figured out... kind of. Now it is leaking from what I think is the intake manifold, I have a thermal intake gasket on it so I am fearing that it is leaking. I really cranked on the nuts tonight to see if that'll seal it up, we will see how much it leaks overnight. If it does I will be pulling the manifold and resealing the thermal gasket with Hondabond.

I had one of my friends take out a washer from my rear upper control arm so that I had a little more camber in the rear, tires fit perfectly in the wheel well now, just clear. But when he went to put the bolt back in, I'm assuming he tried to straight impact it without hand threading, and chewed up some threads. I was furious, that's not one of those areas where you can cut a hole for access. That is how my night ended last night. Went and bought a tap today and was able to clean up the threads and get the bolt back in. Washers are all in now, ended up running 2 washers on each side. I'd guess I'm at about 3* of camber, and the rim sits perfecty.

I got my slave bled and I can already feel that the Stage 4 is strong, definitely feel the strength of the upgraded pressure plate.

And now to the BIG problem. While cranking the engine over to build up oil pressure (which it successfully cranks lol, its a good start), my new trans that I got was grind hard. The bearing on the case for the main shaft I think, can't remember, was iffy when I had the trans apart. I KNEW I should have replaced it but thought it'd be okay, well I was wrong. Just cranking at low speed the bearing was kind of noisy, I pulled the plugs out so it'd crank faster and the bearing was super loud. So tomorrow I have to drop the y8 tranny out and put my y7 tranny back in. In the mean time I'll go through the whole y8 tranny and put new bearings in and probably buy an lsd for it, assuming this engine even runs in the first place. Kind of a bummer that I have to dro pit out but I knew there was the possibility it wouldn't work.

So tomorrow I might be able to finally start it, fix the coolant leak, put my working trans in, and maybe start it up, who knows. I did get my AEM gauges today, just need my Mishimoto oil sandwich plate to show up so I can hook up the oil pressure gauge.


I don't really have that great of pictures, will get some better ones. I ended up doing the bay "smoke grey" and layed on some metal flake/glitter effect I found at Advance, looks awesome in the sunlight. When in the dark or shade bay looks grey, but one there's light on it the sparkle looks sweet.

Terrible picture.

Here's the engine when it was just about done... just had to put the timing cover on.

My new gauges.

 

I'd definately get an LSD for the y8 tranny while its dropped. You'll be glad you did.

Rode in a boosted d16z6 a few days ago... it really made me want to boost my D. It was a z6 with a t3t4, a y8 tranny with obx lsd, tuned to about 250hp. It pulled much harder than I thought it would.

Sorry you're having so much trouble with the build, I'm sure its frustrating. Coming along nicely, though. The bay looks good!