RX7 LS1 V8 rebuild

[Mar71n]

The cars not been filled up from a pump for a while.

Happy with the temperatures in traffic.

The reason for going over to Dyno Torque in the first place.
I've borrowed the standard Pop Ups from the Orange RX, so with a bit of wiring Ta Da

Bugger, same brake binding issue on the way home, managed to limp it into the some garage

We had checked over the calipers on the ramp no obvious problems & we could push the car freely in the work shop.
Set off again & worse only got about a mile before it was like the the brakes were on. This time all the discs were very hot, so a few more cool down stops, strange planning the journey ahead to get to the next lay by.
last stop the car rolled to a halt & no hot rota's. at this point I was a bit lost as to what was going on.
Answer, I'd just stuffed the loom up out of the way when we were sorting the air con out & it was jammed against the top of the brake pedal. At the last but one stop I'd pulled the brake pedal up by hand & drove to the last stop without breaking, so the loom was holding the break pedal down once I'd braked.
Well that's what I think was happening!
Better do some more investigation work as off to the Dyno on Thursday.

 

[Mar71n]

All strapped down.

Final result. 437bhp at the crank.
The heat & noise is intense when the car is on a run.
I've driven it on the road after the dyno session & a lot better to drive, but it was only on a get it running map.
Very happy to be at this point.

 

[Mar71n]

It's putting up a fight to just be a working car

The brake binding wasn't the loom, the nut onto the actuating rod was loose so floated about, hence sometimes okay then binding brakes.

One of these cars has a working alternator!
This is a couple of weeks ago, the one bearing had collapsed & buggered the armature & brushes, one rebuild later & back up & running.

And the day before 7's day
The slave cylinder gave up the ghost.
So exhaust off & gear box balanced on the lift,

Craig at Dynotorque found a SH unit which we cleaned up & tested so put it all back togeather.
Had a word with the car so it worked faultlessly there & back to Emma's cafe.

 

[Mar71n]

Well I had lots of plans for the car over the winter & none of them got worked on!

Taxed & MOT'ed the car yesterday, so first run out last night & ........

Not just parked up

Rescued by DynoTorque Thanks Nate
Electrical gremlins, I tried to tune the Dakota Digital speedo box & after stopping it wouldn't start. My guess is I've pulled a wire & lost a signal.

 

[Rhino]

That's a pain but looks like a quicker recovery service than you'd get with the AA

Are you running the dakota digital off the speed sensor or via the ECU? If via the ECU you might be able to adjust the ratio in the ECU instead of the speedo box, as I remember it could be a bit fiddley

 

[Mar71n]

That's a pain but looks like a quicker recovery service than you'd get with the AA

Are you running the dakota digital off the speed sensor or via the ECU? If via the ECU you might be able to adjust the ratio in the ECU instead of the speedo box, as I remember it could be a bit fiddley

A lot quicker than the AA

I think the sensor is in the gear box, yes it's a faff to adjust with the trim buttons, I did have the speed spot on but for some reason since the rebuild it's no where near. Need to find out what the issue is & wiring is really not my strong point.

 

[giryan]

I really need to work out how to rewire my Dakota Digital Unit, I swapped my stock GM ECU for a Haltech Rebel LS, and haven't yet hooked up it up since all the wires changed. So the normal speedo doesn't work, and I just have a can gauge displaying it.

 

[Mar71n]

I really need to work out how to rewire my Dakota Digital Unit, I swapped my stock GM ECU for a Haltech Rebel LS, and haven't yet hooked up it up since all the wires changed. So the normal speedo doesn't work, and I just have a can gauge displaying it.

People that understand the sparky stuff apparently it's an easy job, for me

 

[Rhino]

It could be that the settings were lost due it being powered off for so long during the rebuild or a diff ratio or wheel size change? I’ve got to correct my speedo as I didn’t get the settings right when I changed the diff with a different ratio, it was under reading and explained why I thought people was driving slowly.

The norotors thread on it might be of some use, but there many variations based on if the input signal is from the speed sensor or ECU, and different ECUs, its gets confusing quickly.

Would be interested to hear how you got on with the Rebel LS ECU, as I’ve been thinking of upgrading from the standard GM ECU but that’s might be because I’m re-tuning the car following a cam & head change.

 

[giryan]

It could be that the settings were lost due it being powered off for so long during the rebuild or a diff ratio or wheel size change? I’ve got to correct my speedo as I didn’t get the settings right when I changed the diff with a different ratio, it was under reading and explained why I thought people was driving slowly.

The norotors thread on it might be of some use, but there many variations based on if the input signal is from the speed sensor or ECU, and different ECUs, its gets confusing quickly.

Would be interested to hear how you got on with the Rebel LS ECU, as I’ve been thinking of upgrading from the standard GM ECU but that’s might be because I’m re-tuning the car following a cam & head change.

The Rebel LS has been great so far. It took me quite a while to get to actually drivable, but that was more about fucking up my ACL and being unable to move around the car for ages than the ecu
The harness was as close to plug and play as you could hope for in a non-PnP kit. The 3 high amp outputs needed connecting, fan, fuel & starter, then getting the battery cables hooked up. At that point I could go through the wizard in the NSP software. NSP was a bit to get to grips with, it took me longer to get from the initial start in the wizard to actually running off the key, but I think mostly that was because there was literally zero internet at the workshop, there are lots of ways to trigger start and I had them most of them inverted, so to start off with I only had it running as long as the "in start mode" timer was running, as soon as the ECU thought it was out of start, it just stopped the engine
Once i was home could look stuff up on the internet I realised why it was wrong and the next time I was there it worked fine.

Mounting it has been a bit of a pain, and I haven't really got a final place. The GM ECU was small enough to be shoved behind the trim at the side, with the Mazda harness plugs still in place, but the Rebel LS is quite a bit bigger and doesn't go. I think it might fit if that side is cleared out of the original harness and stuff, but that was a job for another day

Tuning wise the Rebel LS was very drivable out of the box, my battery was toast and between that and the cam it meant that idle and going to idle when stopping at lights etc.. was bad and it did stall quite a bit initially. Advocult sorted out that and did a tune which made all the difference. https://fdoc.co.uk/forum/threads/ls3-95-fd3s.2315/page-2#post-64642
I've not done a massive amount of driving yet & not been on track, but it seems like the all round drivability is way better than with the basic changes that were done to the GM tune to make it run with the cam etc.
Now I have got to grips a bit with NSP it seems like it's pretty great, I can do tweaks pretty easily too, and I'm looking forward to doing more with it.

 

[Mar71n]

Didn't have to take it off the trailer to get it fixed.

This has been waiting a long time to pack up, the cars been garaged for years so must have got wet in it's previous life.

It was the power feed to the coils

So sorting one problem through up another, by unplugging this it decided to have a hissy fit& drop one bank of cylinders intermittently, at least it didn'tleave me at the side of the road.

Up & running again, hopefully thats it for a while!

 

[Mar71n]

Bugger.
Ran out of talent & parked the RX7 in a hedge
The picture doesn't show how for I managed to get it off the road & how steep the bank is, go me.
Big thank you to Craig, Nate & Taz, with their help we managed to get it recovered ourselves, but I think they've collectively delisted me from their phones.
The damage is not that bad broken both front wings & the front bumper is a bit knocked about, but no metal panel damage bar the odd scuff to the paint.
I had been putting a budget together for another Tillet seat & some more finishing off work this winter but looks like that will go towards the repair bill.
Won't be on it any time soon but I'll get back working on it hopefully in the new year.

 

[Gunnytron]

oh no, that's sad. Looks like you got off lightly though.