Plans

WARNING this post may ramble a bit.......

I have nearly finished my Geo project, and so in the back of my mind there is a nagging feeling...soon I won't have anything to fix. This happened on my previous car, a 1986 Volvo. After I put in a lot of work, learned alot about Volvos, I got it fixed up pretty nice. Not perfect, but anything further would have been mostly expense, and not much experience. So I sold that, and bought this broken down Geo. Once that is fixed, I will be out of projects, but also out of cash. So I have a chance to dream a little bit.....

Part of me wants to make a mileage-getter. I could do it to this car, but I don't have a good feeling towards how long it will last. Its not rusty or anything, I just don't know on a fifteen year old car. So I could start looking for an engine/tranny, rebuild it completely - like balancing the crankshaft, and put in a 3.79 tranny, get it all ready to drop in. Then I would look for a prime candidate with a bad engine/tranny, and swap it in. This way I can go a step at a time, and not have too much invested before I decide.

Another intriguing possibility is making a wood powered truck. I have researched this a bit, and there is a hopper, some filters, and a little fabrication to do. Yes you can run a car on wood. I would do a truck, simply for the extra space in the bed to hold the gasifier. Also a truck is a good candidate for conversion to steam power, as it is rear wheel drive, and again has plenty of room in the back. I would dearly love to do a Metro conversion of some sort, but they are very tight on space.

Perhaps a diesel Metro....I have seen some videos on Youtube of them, they have been done. It would be fairly simple compared to the other options. The question being, is it worth it? Would the mileage go up enough to make it cost effective?

The car of my dreams......a Cyclone engine in a Geo Metro. Google it.

Anyways, enough rambling and daydreaming.....Ive got a gasket coming Monday that will get me back on the road, and finish this stage of the project. So what next?

The new head arrived today, ahead of schedule.







Nasty looking!

Here's a good way to remove valve stem seals easily:



The head cleaned up nice:





I may have some spare parts for sale, came with the head, and all are duplicates:

I am going to redo the head.......again. I created a decent workspace for myself this time.







I built a rolling toolbox, of sorts:



Can you tell which cylinder is leaking? 



New head arrives next week.........

Got tires today. The exhaust is pretty well non existant now, so it sounds like a motorcycle or something. but it moved under its own power. Yeah!!
  


Pretty cool. I DONT really like the sound - I just drove it to town to get the tags, and I feel like I am going deaf. Also, the power is missing - even for a Geo. I could not maintain speed in any gear. I think I got the timing belt off a notch.

Got the parts to fix the exhaust now. I will make it out alive yet! 

EDIT: Little update. I fixed the exhaust (mostly) and now am without a cat. That is where it rusted out, and I don't want to mess with a new one. No inspections in KY or OH.

So its quieter now, but now its super smokin' out the tailpipe. I mean clouds of smoke. And it stalls real easy, has no power at all. Ive got to check the timing belt, and see if I got off a tooth, or even two.

What else could be wrong? I need some input from our techie members 

OK, this is odd....

The CTS and the IAT sensor both tested out bad, and need to be replaced. They are the same sensor, but they are NOT the same connector. Here is a pic of the more common one, corresponding with the CTS.



Notice the offset sliders on the sides. These are reversed from the other one. 

Has anyone replaced the IAT? Where did you get it, did you have connector troubles?

Or maybe I will just file off the little offending tabs....... 
Oddly enough, I was mistaken about the sensors..... OK so thats not so unusual 

I just bought 2 new sensors at AZ, $15 each, and got them home, checked the resistance and they were just the same as the ones I have... about 1.7 cold. 

So that wasn't the problem.

I don't get the check engine light anymore, but the radiator fan never switches on. It will come on as soon as I unplug the CTS. Also it *seems* a little rough starting, which is why I suspected the IAT (I also got a Code 23, which is IAT). Maybe I'm imagining it, I dunno.

Any ideas?

Someone said: test do not guess. So I tested the IAT and the MAP. The IAT is waaay out of specs. It is reading 1.5 Ohms, which on this chart means 230 F incoming air.....  The MAP sensor is easy to test. Provided that you have a DVOM and a hand vacuum pump. This may have been covered elsewhere, but here it is anyway: there are three wires to the MAP. One is 5v in, one is sensor output, and the other is ground. Having identified these, back probe the center wire (the sensor output) and plug it back in. You should read about 3.5v.   Apply vaccuum to the line slowly, and watch the voltage go down.   In my case, it didn't go down at all- the hose was plugged up.  Now it seems to be running fine, as you can hear in this clip:

OK, I have reinstalled the head, and I think I have all the wires back together...the check engine light is on.  When I step on the gas hard, the engine dies/ starved of fuel. On an old carb, this would be caused by the accelerator pump not squirting. So, what causes this on a fuel injection system? Probably I missed some little wire or something.  The exhaust is really loud.....