The story of my Silvia in my tiny little garage

Hi,

I already posted in a few threads but I think it's time to introduce myself and my car, it's a long story and not particularly interesting so don't expect anyone to read all of it, parts of this are already written in other threads here on forum.

I'm happily married guy with a job that's average paying at best but my expenses like rent and things like that are really low so I can afford to have a project car and still get by. I was born and raised in Prague and I always liked japanese 80s and 90s cars. Since I was 14 I have always wanted a small light-weight RWD car - something like an S13, AE86, MR2, MX5,... stuff like that. I had never even heard of an S12 until I have seen the ad for the Silvia I now own.

My first car was 80s Citroen AX with a 1.0liter engine which I got from my mother. Everything you touched in the car broke but the car still somehow managed to run for years. At the end of its life the little AX was all rusty, the driver's side and trunk lock rusted off, it had almost no brakes, terrible head gasket leak - the engine ate almost as much oil as petrol, almost nothing electrical worked and the only thing on the dash that still worked was the clock. But the car was such a blast to drive with its 760kg it handled like a go-kart. The engine eventually died for good and the car got scrapped. I was looking at ads for another car and saw an ad with another AX for sale but it was a super rare model that had 1.4 liter engine and it was 4x4! It was really cheap so I could probably afford it but the ad disappeared before I made my mind, that was in 2012. I have always regretted not buying that car.

In November 2015 my wife wanted to buy herself a car so I was checking some ads for her and out of boredom I started looking at cars I was interested in. And there she was, a white '85 Silvia hatchback with ca18et in it. Suddenly I remembered the rare Citroen AX, I wouldn't make make the same mistake again so I decided to buy it. I crashed my bike so I wanted some toy to replace it. I'm not a mechanic by any means - before I got the S12, the only job I did on a car was that I once changed a flat tire on the AX but cars always fascinated me so I was willing to start learning some of the car stuff. I thought that I'll do just the basic stuff like change some filters, change the oil and other basic stuff like that. My plan was that if something important breaks, I'll just bring it to a pro because I though that it's too dangerous to do stuff like brakes by your own if you're not a mechanic. It has turned out very differently than I had planned...

They say not to buy a car when it's raining and they're right. It was raining real hard the day I went to check the Silvia and it was already night time when I finally got there and it was friday the 13th, not kidding. The Silvia was originally owned by a guy from Switzerland and from there it was imported to Czech Republic in 1997. Some old man bought it here  and he was driving the car until 1999 and then, probably because of a broken turbo, put the car in a garage where it sat until 2015. That year the owner of the car died and the ownership went to his son who immediately sold the car to the guy I was dealing with. He told me that he replaced the turbo and the exhaust and that the only thing the car needs is a new battery and that there's a tiny little oil leak somewhere near the turbo, also the fuel pump didn't work and according to him that was the reason he was selling it. He told me he lost all motivation to mess with it and that he wants it away. I was like ALRIGHT! and bought it and had it towed to a tiny little garage I rented to fix the car. They also say not to buy a car that don't start, that's also a very good advice.

And there she is in my garage after I bought her


I had very limited knowledge about engines and cars, I still do but the situation is getting better :). First I took a shot at the fuel system, for 2 days I was searching for a fuel pump relay because I just knew that that must be the cause of the problems. I thought it's weird that I can't find it because according to the manual it was supposed to be there. That's when I learned that Mk1 and Mk2 are a thing. Turned out there is no fuel pump relay in Mk1. I had a friend to help me with this problem, he doesn't know much about cars but he's very good with the electric stuff, what we did was this - I was turning the key in different positions and he was testing the fuel pump voltage with a multimeter at the back of the car. The readings he got didn't make any sense at first. During this my friend touched a wire he should have and got electric shock at that same second the engine fired up! A little bit of panic ensued :D. After a while my friend figured it out, by getting the electrical shock, he grounded the fuel pump which started working for a moment and that was enough for the motor to fire up, so it turned out the part of ECU that controls the fuel pump is fried so we bypassed the ECU and now the fuel pump is always on when I turn the key. It's a sketchy way of fixing it but it works...

So the car could finally be started! It idled quite well and when given less throttle the RPM went up as expected but with more throttle the RPM actually went down and if I had kept it at more than 1/2 throttle the engine would have stopped. In my case it was the MAF sensor, I carefully pulled it out of the aluminium housing and gave it a good clean with a spraycan of MAF sensor cleaner and that did the trick! Really cheap fix. I also did some other minor fixes.

After that, when I jacked up the car I found out that the brakes are busted, they were all rusty and seized. bleh


And then I had them refurbished


Soon after that I found out the real reason the guy I bought the Silvia from wanted to get rid of the car. The oil and coolant were mixing and like A LOT. The usual cause of that is the failed headgasket, the guy who sold it to me must have known, all the signs were there and he fixes cars for a living. Well it turned out it wasn't the head gasket, the cylinderhead was cracked. After 2 months of searching, I sourced a different head, got it pressure tested and found out that it's cracked in the same spot as the original head. So I had to find yet another head, this one was finally alright. I put the engine back together. While doing that I accidentally stripped a exhaust mani bolt hole. I managed to fix that too with a helicoil set.

Finally, I managed to start her up with the new head. It was a very proud moment for me, I managed to do all of this by myself (almost) in that tiny little garage with limited tools and budget. I stood there proudly as the engine was spitting oil on the ground and on the exhaust where it was burning off and making clouds of smoke. This probably was the tiny oil leak the guy I bought the Silvia from warned me about. Also she had bad overheating issues at the time she still had the cracked head, turned out someone installed the thermostat the opposite way. During the cylinder head replacement I also fitted new the water and bought a new thermostat, I also did the timing belt with the tensioner, all new gaskets and other stuff while I was at it.

The oil leak turned out to be interesting problem. The oil feed hard line for turbo was cut in two parts and these were connected by a rubber hose and a pair of hose clamps, this rubber ruptured. I think someone was removing the turbo and cut the metal line in two because he couldn't get to the bolt at the end of it. Probably previous owner. I replaced the hard line with a braided line.

Ok so after 10 months the car is finally able to drive! I tested it out and found out that I have a boost leak, minor fix, I just tightened a clamp I forgot about.

Here she is!




During the second drive I found out that the clutch is slipping, oh boy, here we go again :rolleyes2:. I knew the clutch is near the end of its life but I hoped it will last some more. Unfortunately I don't have money to fix that right now, I have to wait until the payday :/

Right now, I am also in the process of flushing the cooling system to deal with the aftermath of the cracked cylinder head. So far I have flushed it twice with distilled water with a coolant flush additive and once with only distilled water. The water I get out of it still looks like instant coffee with milk :/ At least it looks like the oil is mostly out of the system. Well, I'll just continue until it's clean.

My Silvia is exactly what they call a lemon, there are a lot of issues with her I had no idea about. At least the shell is relatively rust-free so I got that goin for me...

BUT I still love my Silvia and I have a lot of plans with her!

THE LIST:

fix fuel system (turned out the part of ECU that controls the fuel pump is fried so I bypassed the ECU and now the fuel pump is always on when I turn the key)
fix alternator (got it refurbished) (the refurbished one didn't work so I got a new one)
fix brakes (refurbished calipers, new pads, new front rotors, braided brake lines)
get and install new cylinder head (that was huge pain in the ass)
fix the turbo oil leak (replaced damaged oil feed hardline with a braided line with banjo bolts on both ends)
new water pump (had to modify the lower timing belt cover because the new pump wasn't exactly the same shape as the old one)
new thermostat
new clutch XTD stage 1
new tyres, although the ones that are on the car aren't cracked and the tread depth is good, they are almost 20 years old Bridgestone Potenza Adrenalin RE002 195/60 R15
new bonnet - this one is bent and it just looks ugly as it's not flush with the other panels
fix the front lip - I'll probably just use rivets. I think it will look cool and it's cheap
new tail lights
fix sagged doors
upgrade the suspension - in process - BC Racing BR series coilovers + other stuff
front mount intercooler
boost controller
aftermarket air filter
blow-off valve
boost gauge, air/fuel ratio gauge
electric fan conversion
new paint job
paint the stock wheels just refurbish the stock wheels, the original colour is starting to grow on me
also wash the car

Looking good. I admire your dedication to take on this project car without a deep skill set, like me. Although I don't envy you for finding parts in Prague.

I guess it's pain in the ass to get the parts wherever you live. I have to order the parts from all over the world . Mainly US, Britain but also Australia, Germany, China and the cylinderhead bolts that are in the car I had to order from an e-shop in Saudi Arabia. I have never bought parts directly from Nissan, it's too expensive.

a little update:

I riveted the old front lip back on the car. I might paint the rivets black eventually but I think I'll keep this look for now, it looks kinda neat.

Another update!

Just installed new tail lights, I went from this:



to this:



aaah, much better

and I found a wasp nest in the vent hole, hehe


Post Merge

Very nice.  Where did you find that strut bar?

iceageg on 07:27:00 AM / 06-Sep-16
Very nice.  Where did you find that strut bar?

Man, what luck to find such a treasure chest! I know you will be putting these items to good use, great updates!

Keep posting. There are some of us who care.

Alright, another update! Right now I'm in the middle of changing the clutch. I went for the stage 1 XTD clutch mainly for financial reasons it cost me about 4000 CZK (160 USD) to buy and get it all the way around the globe from Cali to Prague. The cheapest clutches I was able to find here were about 7000 CZK (280 USD) and that's without the postage, that might seem expensive but the quality is probably on a whole different level compared to the XTD. The XTD clutches are considered trash but they are meant for a CA18DET engine which in stock form produces 228 Nm of Torque and since my Silvia has a puny 31y.o. single cam engine, that brand new was rated with 183 Nm, I think that the XTD clutch should be good enough for the job. I guess only time will show if I made a mistake or not. The throwout bearing that came in the kit was different than the one in my gearbox so I had to order the correct one but that's no biggie. I can't finish the job without the second set of hands so I have to wait till Sunday when my friend will have time to stop by and help me to put it back together.

Also the cooling system is finally clean. It took exactly 45 litres of distilled water to flush it properly.

While I wait till Sunday I decided to fix an issue I had with timing marks on crank pulley not meeting the pointer thingy on the belt cover thus the timing being impossible to set correctly. Turned out it was just another fuckup of one of the previous owners who for some reason decided to disassemble the crank pulley and then put it back together incorrectly.

So now I can properly set my timing! I already ordered the timing pistol for that. Never done that before but as I understand it, retarded = safe but boring ; advanced = more power but danger of detonation. So guys what's the sweet spot for a stock CA18ET? Btw. I run 100 octane petrol because the lower octane types of fuel in Europe usually have biofuel mixed in them which supposedly damages older engines.

Today I managed to put the whole car together. The new clutch is in which is a huge item to cross off the list. While I was at it I also changed the gearbox oil and the diff oil. I also did the timing which I set somewhere before the last timing mark so it should be around 17-18°btdc.

Then I went for a test drive. Everything seemed fine with exception of some weird noises which still need to be identified but I didn't have the time to worry about that too much because the engine stalled during the drive and then wouldn't start again. The battery is fairly new, about a year old, but there's nothing odd about it being almost flat since I abused it quite a lot without properly charging it during the repairs. But flat or not, once the car is started all the electricity should be provided by the alternator so it seems like busted alternator, right? But that's really weird because I had it refurbished 6 months ago.

Anyway, unless I'm missing something, I'm pretty sure it's the alternator so the plan is that tomorrow morning I'll get it out of the car and bring it back to the company that refurbished it for me.

alright so a new alternator is in place and it provides sweet 14.something volts which is awesome! I did another test drive yesterday. I did about 30km in heavy traffic, more than half of it was a proper traffic jam and everything went really good, the new clutch seems to be breaking in pretty good and the water temperature was more than satisfactory so I am now really confident that the cooling system won't give me any headaches any time soon.

The only problem is that once I revved up the engine over 4k rpm I started to smell burned rubber and the alternator v-belt started to squeal. The v belt I have on is 9.5x875 mm and it's brand new, well was anyway... I had to tighten it again, it's a little bit thinner now because the slipping through the alternator pulley atomised some of the belt surface and now I have black rubber dust over my engine bay.

I really don't know what's the problem the pulleys seem to be ok, they are not misaligned and the belt is more or less the correct size. I did a research and if I'm not mistaken, the OEM belt should be 10x875 mm, they didn't have such belt in the shop I was in but they had the one I ended buying which is 0.5 mm thinner. The lady in the shop told me that there is no such thing as 9.5mm pulleys, that the 9.5 belt is meant for 10mm pulleys and it should be direct fit for my application.

Well if she was right, I really don't know what I'm doing wrong ...so if anyone has any idea, I'm all ears. For now, I'll get another belt and get the car to tech inspection.

I just changed my belts and from memory the alternator belt is 11mm wide  or 13mm wide (the car has two 13mm wide belts and one 11, i forget which is which though)

11? well, that's a surprise. I bought a 10mm one today from company Bando which I had thought is the true OEM one until I have read your post... I put the belt on at a car park right in front of the v-belt store and then drove the car to get it inspected. And I passed, I'm road legal now! The belt seems to be holding so far but I haven't taken the engine to the upper rev range yet.

It wouldn't be my post if there wasn't  a "but" coming so here it comes. The upper radiator hose gave way on my way back from the inspection. Man, I'm so glad that it didn't happen in front of the inspector. So much for my confidence in the cooling system... It was just a small puncture so mended it with duct tape which thankfully was enough to get me and the car safely home.

My radiator hose busted in that exact same spot. Got one of those universal flex tubes of roughly the same length and it worked like a charm.

your belt pic looks like proper size

well, that was a quick fix for a change

I'm luvin it, keep up the good work!

Since my car is roadworthy now, I decided to turn my attention to the interior and make her more pleasant car to sit in. The most annoying thing about the car was an incredibly loud heat blower so the first thing on the list was to address this issue and it was a great success! I even made a how-to with pictures here

Next thing today is to get the interior properly cleaned, I'll have the whole interior steam cleaned and disinfected.

I haven't done much to the car recently because it's freezing out there and I don't plan to drive the car until after the winter ends. The plan is to hoard parts and get busy when spring comes.

The most important thing on the "to do" list is to change the steering rack bushings. I ordered a set from experimental engineering but when they arrived I realised that the driver's side bushing is made for 25mm bracket but the bracket on my car is 21mm wide. Has anyone dealt with this issue before? Will getting the correct size bracket fix my issue or will there then be other fitment issues on the crossmember side or with the power steering rack itself?

I put some of those Experimental Engineering bushings in my car last July when I replaced the steering rack. Everything fit perfectly. Are you speaking of the C-shaped bracket that goes over the top of the rack to bolt it down? If so, does the driver side bracket fit correctly?

yes, that c-shaped bracket or strap that goes over the rack with bushing and bolts down to the crossmember. I haven't tried to fit the EE bushings yet but they are made for 25mm brackets and I know that the driver's side bracket on my car is only 21mm wide (I measured it a month ago to find out if z31 poly bushings would fit. Unfortunately the z31 driver's side bushing is not for 21mm wide bracket, the bracket on z31 is apparently either 15/16in or 3/4in wide, whatever that is in normal measurements.)

I think the problem is only on the driver's side ,the passenger side bracket is 25mm even on my car so I there shouldn't be any trouble fitting the EE bushing there.

The bushings are the best you're going to get. I wouldn't want 4mm of possible slop in the rack although I suspect it won't move considering the passenger Side will secure it. With no other good bushing option you might be better off having a 25mm bracket shipped in.  Try Row52.com. You can locate parts cars and get someone to pull and ship for you. The bracket is small and light so shipping from North America shouldn't be too much.

You pretty much said what I'm thinking. I totally want these awesome bushings on my car and I hope that getting the correct bracket will be enough to get them fit securely. I was just wondering if anybody has ever encountered this stupid issue before, someone must have, right?

I've seen pictures of two different sized steering racks for the S12, maybe one was a manual rack, but it seems odd for the bracket to be a different width with no other modifications. Maybe yours is a Euro variation for some reason.

well, we'll see how it tuns out.

Apart from these bushings that give me a headache I already have other pars that just wait here for me to fit them. I got the EE T/C kit, new gearbox mount and a new clutch slave cylinder. I also plan to get new rear rotors and pads, new sunroof weather stripping and the sunroof trim. The sunroof does not leak but makes all sorts of noises while I'm driving so I hope getting new weather stripping will help.

Love reading your journey with the s12  Yes keep updating us ! There are many of us who absolutely love are s12's!!  I have owned mine since1994 and until I found clubs12 I thought I was only one who truly enjoys these cars!  So continue being resourceful and keep this machine running!!! Greetings from Allegan Mi

thanks ndd! There's still so much stuff that needs fixing so there will definitely be more updates after the winter.

My car had the 21mm bracket as well and I wasn't able to find a 25mm. So I've just been rocking it with the 21mm and it hasn't moved yet.

I have had the luck to meet some s12 guys who also own parts cars so with a little bit of luck I might be able to source the wider bracket. But it's good to know that it can also be done without it

The weather is very slowly getting into the spring mode and the temperatures are getting more in favour to some outside work. It was around 5°C during the day, that's 41°F for the people using the weird units, so I could finally proceed with the build a little bit!

I started with the rear brakes. Protip: to fit new pads, you can't just push the caliper piston in, you have to twist the piston clockwise to get it far enough inside the caliper. I bought that sci-fi looking cubic tool for that but none of the patterns on the cube sides fit my caliper piston so I ended up using a pair of circlip pliers and it went surprisingly easy.

I had some free time today so I replaced the gearbox mount for a new one. The old one looked a little bit tired.

And by the way, the quality of the pictures I take is now much better because I started borrowing wife's Canon.

+1 for borrowing the wife's camera.  I am beginning to understand where all that money went and why.  Did the new mount noticeably reduce vibration when driving?

What did you end up doing about that steering rack bracket?

iceageg on 07:04:18 AM / 22-Feb-17+1 for borrowing the wife's camera.  I am beginning to understand where all that money went and why.  Did the new mount noticeably reduce vibration when driving?

weitrhino on 09:28:02 AM / 22-Feb-17What did you end up doing about that steering rack bracket?

I finally installed the EE solid steering rack mounts today. I followed the supplied instructions and it was pretty straight forward job. Now I'm waiting for the silicone sealant to cure before I can do a test drive.

Alright, what I did about the thin driver's side bracket:
As I mentioned earlier, I contacted the guy with a parts car and he said he has one. When I met up with him, it turned out that the bracket he had is also the thinner one but I ended up buying it of him anyway along with a pair of spare headlights and the front grille, not that I need them but why not... Well, having an extra bracket meant that I could experiment with that bracket without the danger of destroying the bracket I had on the car. Theories were many and varied but the solution I finally decided for was to lay weld beads on both sides of the bracket and file them to fit the bushing. To ensure that you'll end up with the same amount of material on both sides, it's better to first completely finish one side and then do the other one. I had my friend do it for me because I don't have a welding machine (...yet) and he did a really good job! Here's some pics of the modified bracket:





And here's the already painted modified bracket next to the original one:



After I had good look at how's the steering rack designed I must say I don't think it's the best idea to just run the solid mounts with the thinner driver's side bracket like some of you guys do because the passenger's side mount is not designed to limit the lateral movement, it does limit it to some degree by friction caused by the clamping pressure between the bracket and the crossmember but that's it. Unlike the driver's side, the passenger's side bushing doesn't have any groove in the steering rack to sit in, it can theoretically just slide left and right on the steering rack.

I don't think it's really dangerous to run the thinner bracket but it's possible that the steering rack will move left and right the 4mm that the thinner bracket is lacking in width.

Also, while I was under the car I found and removed the source of a exhaust rattle that had annoyed me for quite some time, it was the catalytic converter heat shield which was badly rusted. It was in such a bad shape I couldn't figure out how to save it so I just removed it completely.

Another task is checked off the list, the electric fan conversion is done!

I used two of these, which is a fan from second gen Kia Shuma (or Sephia,or Spectra, or whatever...) :



These were literaly the cheapest electric fans they had on the scrapyard. When I cut some stuff off the top and bottom of the fan shrouds and turned them 90°C, they fit quite nicely next to each other over the S12 radiator core. It's not a perfect fit, they don't cover about 5mm of the top part of the radiator core and they go over the radiator sides about 5mm on each side. To prevent the fans from sucking air around the sides of the radiator, I glued stripes of plastic in the inside of the fan shroud to cover that 5mm gap. I used the plastic stripes I previously cut from the fan shrouds. For the temp switch I used a dual temp switch from Skoda Fabia (part nuber 1J0959481A)

Here's how it looks like:








And here's where I accomodated the relays and the fuse box:


The first fan kicks in at 97°C and stops at 87°C and the second fan kicks in at 102°C and stops at 97°C. I live in a mild climate so I bet only single one of these would be sufficient to cool the engine, they are pretty strong, I don't know exactly how much current they pull because my multimeter is only up to 10A and I didn't want to fry it but they used 30A fuse with this fan in the Kia. The second fan is there only if the first one failed or if the engine for some reason really was about to overheat, it also has a loud bearing so I'll definitely hear if the second one kicks in for some reason. So far I've only tested the setup on idle but it seems to be doing great, the first fan kicked in when it should and cooled the coolant to the bottom border 87°C in less than 30 seconds.

Not all the credit goes to me, I had a friend help me with the wiring and another friend who fabricated the piece for the temp switch to go in, he made it out of steel and I made the pipe lip with jb weld and then painted it:



NEXT UP is a mod that I'll probably hate myself for but I want to try it out really bad because it's a new after-market part for the ca18et and that's pretty rare.

I have a feeling my engine mounts are going bad so I was searching what can be done about it and found, what I believe is, the only bolt-on replacment on the market:



These are polyurethane engine mounts for the ca18et produced in the neighbouring Poland by company Silver Project, I contacted them about the stiffness of the polyurethane because they don't advertise it anywhere and they told me they are 63 duro which, to me, seems pretty soft for poly mounts so since I couldn't find any reviews of these mounts, I decided to try them and find out if they are useable on the street. They are supposed to be bolt-on so I can always go back to stock mounts if the vibrations are bad.

I've enjoyed following your work over the last 18 months or so. Always a solid job.

Yes, ALWAYS great to hear of other nut cases out there like me. I admire the determination of the few still enjoying keeping these cars on the road. I am getting more and more questions about my S-12's all the time.

Thanks guys, I appreciate it.

I got the Silver Project engine mounts installed and tested. They are not exactly direct fit, I had to modify them just slightly to get them fit. There are two threaded holes in the engine-side of the mounts but only one of them should be threaded so I ran through one of those on each mount with a 10mm drill bit, other than that, they fit pretty well and the engine sits in the same height.

The engine mounts perform as advertised, the engine is not going anywhere and the shifting is super precise even in higher rev range. As for the vibrations, I don't mind the extra vibrations that go through the steering wheel, the seats or the pedals, it's actually nice to feel the engine like that, but oh god, the soundtrack! The spectrum of sounds that the interior learned to produce is surprisingly wast. The dash rattles, the sunroof rattles, the door rattles... and it changes depending on the revs, it's like avangard symphony, unbearable.

Upon closer inspection, the original engine mounts are in pretty good shape. I thought they were shot because of how soft they were but I guess that's just how they are. They'll definitely go back in soon.

Love that description! I can just imagine the vibrations and resonations going on.

Alright, here's an update: I have done some long due servicing - I have replaced the spark plugs (my choice were the NGK BCPR5ES-11 and BCPR6ES-11), NGK sparkplug wires, NGK/NTK O2 sensor and a new distributor cap.

Right after I changed these I started to get engine hesitation at random RPMs, when it happens I get 0 power for a few seconds but at that time it happened only twice during 3 drives. I thought it's a bad electrical connection at the fuel pump because when I bypassed the ECU so that the pump is always running when the key is the "ON" position, I only twisted the wires and didn't bother to solder them.

Well, to get the connection soldered I had to get to a friend who actually has a soldering iron, the car almost died 6 times before I got there and that was only about 4km drive. I soledered the connection and the drive back was without a problem. I did one more test drive and found out, that the engine hesitates at 5k+ RPM, I thought that's a separate issue but looking back, it's probably still the same one. Anyway, I suspected the coils so I tried the dual coil mod but that didn't help at all and the hesitation at random RPM came back.

This really pisses me off, I wanted to go on a two-day trip in the s12 tomorrow

I really don't know what can be causing it, is it the new dizzy cap? bad ecu? bad fuel pump? or a dirty fuel filter? probably not the fuel filter, it seems more like a electrical problem... Am I missing something?

I'm usdm so.

No codes? Don't think the ecu says much about the ignition.

Check the values on the power transistors. These failed on me at about 5x the rate of coils, but my stuff was getting hit with an msd and an amp.

The way to go for plug heat range is read the plug. It's about the cylinder temp. If the air outside is cold, there's more oxygen in every cubic foot of air, so you'll make more power, if it were carbureted, it make make it lean when your in it, which means hotter chamber temps, which you deal with from there - read the plug, change the plug range if it's not correct. You have fuel injection - it should keep it pretty close to correct a/f even in cold, possibly, you'd just have to rev it a bit when it's freezing ass cold.

I upped my compression, ran a used intercooler, went from, t2 to t22, and ran a euro cam, here in pa, where we have 10F days, I never had to change the plug range on my car. It'd feel a little slower north of 5500rpm, but the head sucked, but it wasn't slower up there.

Anyway, I digress. It's not easy to find problems in these things sometimes. Good luck

This sounds like an issue I've had before. Did you by chance loosen your distributor when changing the cap? I'd double check your timing.

Also try cleaning the grounds on both coils at the terminal and where it contacts the body. Can't hurt.

I think I'd focus on the wires and cap because these were changed just before the issue showed up. Put the old wire set back in and see if anything changes, then do the same with the cap. At the very least you can get back to square one and take your trip.

Please verify this condition did not exist prior to the work you did?
If so, replace only one component at a time with the old part to try and isolate the problem.  Good luck, anxious to hear you report back. I have other ideas if this doesn't give you the answer.

kelso840 on 09:21:24 AM / 04-Jul-17This sounds like an issue I've had before. Did you by chance loosen your distributor when changing the cap? I'd double check your timing.

Also try cleaning the grounds on both coils at the terminal and where it contacts the body. Can't hurt.

JonB on 08:48:40 AM / 04-Jul-17No codes? Don't think the ecu says much about the ignition.

JonB on 08:48:40 AM / 04-Jul-17Check the values on the power transistors. These failed on me at about 5x the rate of coils, but my stuff was getting hit with an msd and an amp.

rednucleus on 12:19:24 PM / 04-Jul-17Please verify this condition did not exist prior to the work you did?

New rotor too?  Make sure rotor bolt is secure.

rednucleus on 12:50:52 PM / 04-Jul-17New rotor too?  Make sure rotor bolt is secure.

Always change rotor with cap change. I have had two S12 rotors that had an intermittent short down thru the distributor shaft.