After rebuilding the turbo, new distributor and remote mounting the module, i changed the oil and got to drive the TC today for the first time in a about 8 weeks. It puffed alittle on start up like always. but after warming the car up and making a hard run it started to smoke a bit then just kept smoking i pulled the plugs and the #4 plug was black and covered in oil. This bird has been a pain, and im catching flack for it.
I have roughly $750 and no one will touch the bottom end for that. and im not comfortable rebuilding it. i cant even find a decent motor in the jy. I dont drink but im thinking of taking it up everyone tells me to put a 5.0 in it, i dont want to do that and no one can understand why. i really dont want to send this car to the yard, or sell it to someone that wont keep it a TC. if i decide to sell it, i'll post it on here first.
Thanks for everything Fellers
There's a guy in Ohio that has some super low milage TC engines for good prices. I am having one shipped to my work in California for just over 800 bucks. If you want you can email or PM me and I'll give you the website. I know it's sometimes frustrating, but don't do something you may regret later. If you sell the car, you'll miss it.
What's the history behind it? The bottom ends seem to be very reliable and last forever. Puff on startup could be valve seals; oil in one cylinder could be a blown head gasket. Can we help you figure it out before you spend big dollars?
Matt's right. You need to do a little more testing before concluding it's a bottom end failure, at least per what you are telling us. You should do a compression and leakdown test. Look for oil in the coolant and coolant in the oil. Also bubbles in the coolant.
I'm all for putting a V8 in a Turbo Coupe, however this is not the answer to your particular problem. A V8 can have a head gasket / bottom end failure, and also any of the other problems you have previously fixed in your 2.3 that you mentioned in your post.
The solution to this is to investigate and fix the problem at hand.
Compression : Cylinder #1 145, #2 145, #3 150, #4 100 goes up to 125 when i ad a bit of oil to the cylinder
I dont have a leakdown tester, im going to try to borrow one this weekend.
I dont want to swap a V8 in it, i'ev done that with a 92 explorer and a 5.0 from an LSC not fun...
the car has 152xxx miles on it and from what the original owner told me it sat for about 7 years after he bought a Supercoupe. he took it around the block a few times a year, that was it.
There was major oil coking on the turbo shaft during the rebuild, but was cleaned up when i had it balanced, when i did the valve cover gasket there the head was exceptionaly clean, no discoloring of the head, no noticable wear on the cam lobes.
I know it needs valve seals, has since i got it. never had a car smoke all the time with just the valve seals. i know it wont pass emotions testing (at least until september when they arent required on anything made before 1996) its buring oil pretty good. there isnt any oil in the coolant, or coolant in the oil and the car runs great aside from the rough idle ( i have cleaned the IAC, and reset the TPS .94 volts) and the oil smoke. im not really wanting to sell the car. I will if i have too though...
The big improvement in compression in #4 with the addition of oil says there is a ring problem in that cylinder. 100 is low. Your other cylinders are very good.
What the issue is can't be told until you get it apart. Might be a cracked ring, might be piston damage. Also need to see what shape the cylinder walls are in.