What kind of camshaft did you install? Aftermarket ones designed to increase performance have the side effect of making it idle poorly. This is why racecar drivers are always gunning the engine to keep it running until the race starts. They don't idle.

 

The camshaft is supposed to have been from a D17A1 engine. The reason I say "supposed to have been" is because it isn't identical to the one I took out of my car. My old one had a notch on the end, but the one I bought doesn't.

The idle issue definitely had to do with the aforementioned bonehead move--the car will idle now.

 

Latest issue is that once I put timing belt on and the alternator and PS belts on, the car will start fairly normally, idling around 1000 rpm, but when I start to drive, it does the same thing as it did before: it won't idle, and it won't let me do an idle relearn; the tachometer reading just drops until the car dies.

Thoughts?