| So...I get bored owning a Z in South Dakota during the winter time and it leads to projects like this one. Basically this started as me wanting to swap my plenum for a PC one and in the process do a few things like the TB bypass and PCV re-route. Here is the before-ish shot.
 Plenum removed.
 Cleaned up a bit...notice any magical color changes??? I guess now I need some new wipers!
 Old plenum, which I then removed all the TB coolant lines and smoothed/sanded til I was blue...or I should say shiny gray in the face. Once you start smoothing a plenum it will inevitably take longer and involve more than you originally thought. I spent about 12 hours on mine.
 Back from the blaster
 Random shot of the inside of the plenum after cleaning it out...I thought it was cool.
 New plenum. At this point I must give credit to Don, member black300zx. I sent him the plenum for the powder coating. It turned out great! He does excellent work and the price was good even with shipping both ways. He is also excellent at communication and customer service...I believe he actually did mine twice because a texture from the blaster showed through the first time.
 While waiting for various parts to arrive I deleted the EGR system because it was completely clogged and ditched the CC in favor of one of these.
Also tested all my injectors and coil packs to see if everything was up to spec. All seemed well and this will play into the final act of my story. You see when all was said and done and I finally had all the parts. I started putting things back together. It had been awhile since they were originally taken off so I took my time, put everything back together, re-clocked the TPS and then left the Z over night with the battery charger. This way I figured I could double check all my notes and connections the next morning before I inevitably started to trouble shoot any starting problems.
It would not start for an hour at least. So I would go back and forth, wiggling connections, checking, scraping away corrosion...etc (keep in mind my Z was running great before I started all this). Any way...I finally get it to start but it is definitely not running right. Sounds like at least one cylinder is down. Combination of mechanics stethoscope and Datascan software indicated that actually 2 cylinders are down. (I found the Datascan to be very helpful with its active test ability to shut down cylinders one at a time and see what happens...when I tested 1 and 5 they had no effect on how it was running) So I started pulling plugs and they all were getting plenty of fuel. Tested for spark and all were getting spark. Now I was pissed because my injectors were all fine before, and I was starting to suspect that 2 had died while sitting there for a month. I actually almost posted a couple questions earlier today, but each time was able to find sage advice somewhere in the archives. It wound up being bad connections/corrosion on the injector connectors which I had already cleaned once! Eventually I was VICTORIOUS! And this is the result, along with some new silicone intake hoses and T-bolts. Thanks Coz! Still needs some cleaning up, but I was glad to have it up and running again without too much trouble. Few sounds in a garage are better than that engine firing up after hours of it just cranking over.
 Nearing the end I will say thank you for all the great info on TT.net and to many of the members who provided some tips for reinstalling my plenum. (grinding PC off for the grounding points, gasket tips, etc) THANK YOU! And lastly a picture of what is to come in the next project...I've been meaning to get around to this for years.
 "Anyone that gives him the link is a b**** ass fish giver." - YugoBernie (NoVA) |
New plenum...engine bay simplification and a thank you! - 
