So, here is what has been going on, the short short version:
1. I've been working 60-70 hours a week.
2. I had to work on other family members' cars, including my mom's "new" CRV.
3. I have some personal obligations I've had to take care of.
4. My CRX up and suddenly refused to start.
Other cool stuff:
I did a preliminary tune on an ITA CRX. On a dyno no less. That was an interesting day. I'm going to eventually get to finish the tune.
I got offered some side work welding roll cages on the weekend over the winter. I am certainly going to take that up.
Anyway, to my CRX.
It simply refused to start two weeks ago. It had been stalling at idle occasionally, but I took that as me needing to clean up the tune for the colder weather. I am not going to detail everything, but, basically, I found three issues:
1. Code 8
2. The alternator bearings are fragged.
3. The TPS is missing a bolt and slightly loose.
I got a new distributor, but because I had to repin the connector to match what was on my harness, I boogered that up and it took a while to figure out WTF I had done wrong. Then I reset the cam timing and did that incorrectly. Man, that was horrible to drive. I finally got to resetting the cam timing, correctly, today but the ECU threw a code 9 at me, which I solved by swapping the wires for the CPS on the dizzy. Yeah, I know, that makes no sense according to the FSM, but, the CPS is used as the reference to determine how the other sensors should look. I had it correct originally, but had swapped them incorrectly when I was repinning the main dizzy connector, and I spent the whole afternoon beating my head against the hood (literally, I hate the hood latch mechanism! LOL) until I got everything straightened out except the ignition timing.
The distributor is not allowing me to advance the timing as much as it is needed. I am going to solve this in the timing maps of the ECU rather than slotting the darn distributor holes. I know something is off somewhere, but, at this point, I just need to get the darn thing moving again.
The alternator, usually a simple thing to take out with most CRXs was a pain to get out of mine. Normally, the easiest way is to jack up the driver's side of the car so the suspension is in full droop and you can shimmy it out that way. Well, with the JDM axle setup with the intermediate shaft, you can't do that. I managed to wiggle it out through the other side, and in moving crap out of the way, discovered that my TPS sensor is held on loosely by one bolt and the other one is who knows where. *sighs*
Anyway, here is what an alternator should NOT sound like:
Alternator bearings going BAD
I think I have a spare that I have to dig for. I need to get this thing running in a couple of days, as I've been borrowing my mom's CRV and she needs it back on Wednesday. Fun.
Expect more updates on other stuff as soon as I can find the time to sit down and write up blog posts. I do miss doing that.
