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Duratec Update

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
Jan, have the aluminum liners and narrow timing chain proven to have an acceptable lifetime?

Is this engine available in a car marketed in the US ? I'm not at all familiar with Daewoo.

Bill
 

jumpinjan

Bronze Level Sponsor
Oh, no firm plans, I'm more focused on getting it running in the engine stand and gaining experience in EFI.
Jan
 

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
Here is a shot of the "road rash" picked up by the exhaust pipe. I had it a little low to protect the oil pan.
IMG_1969.jpg


The header, modified, painted and ready to reinstall.
IMG_1968.jpg

I moved the outlet back about 3/4" and out about 1/2". I had to do that because it rattled against the lower A-arm and was very close to the engine block. The repositioning was done by making a cut across the collector, prying it open and welding on a patch. The patch is three pieces of exhaust pipe that had been used on the turbo. The patch also covers the old oxygen sensor hole. The outlet has been shortened about an inch and a half.

Bill
 

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
Thanks John. Glad to see you stop by. Can you give us an update on your project? That is about the drooliest Alpine I've ever seen pictures of.

Bill
 

afssanders

Donation Time
You mean to tell me Gary hasn't been leaking photos? I'll get some up soon. I've been working on it a lot lately. It'll be done this June and I plan on going to the invasion. The car is moving around by it's own power now. In fact, if there wasn't snow on the ground I'd take it out for a nice drive.
 

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
You mean to tell me Gary hasn't been leaking photos? I'll get some up soon. I've been working on it a lot lately. It'll be done this June and I plan on going to the invasion. The car is moving around by it's own power now. In fact, if there wasn't snow on the ground I'd take it out for a nice drive.

Who's Gary? The car is looking great, can't wait to see it. Your site will not allow me to download the video to a PC.

Bill
 

afssanders

Donation Time
He's a friend I met on here that lives near me. Thank you. It does look much cooler in person. I hate to say this to you, but it might be time to upgrade your browser.
 

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
Bill,
You need to have Apple's Quick Time installed to view the video.

I'm running Linux. I have a program that opens most Quick Time videos, but not this one.

Anyway, here are some photos updating my glacial progress on the rebuild. The first one is the heat shield for the oil pan. It also doubles as a flywheel dust shield, a duty performed by the stock oil pan.
IMG_1979.jpg


Next up, a photo of my new fuel rail, complete with new 34 lb EV6 injectors. The stock injectors are 27 lb.
IMG_1980.jpg

The shiny areas are not for show. They are to allow clearance for the hold down bolts.

Here is a shot of the rail mounted mounted on the engine. I really like the way it turned out.
IMG_1982.jpg


Finally, the slightly re-done remote shifter. Initially, it was held in place only by the two upper bolts. Not enough, it would flex while shifting. Two braces will solve THAT problem. Simple fix.
IMG_1981.jpg


Bill
 

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
An update on all the improvements.

First off, the oil pan. Here are the stocker and modified pan.
IMG_1976.jpg


The new pan is not made correctly, the cutout at the lower left hand postion of the pan is too big. It would not seal. Had to build it up with weld. All in all, knowing what I know now, I would of made my own. This one is really too shallow for my needs. But when I started that project I had no idea what was involved.

A small jump ahead to the engine mounted and ready for the hood to be mounted.
IMG_2002.jpg


IMG_2003.jpg


IMG_2004.jpg

Believe it or not, the engine compartment, especially the wiring, has been "cleaned up".

I tried to set the fuel pressure yesterday, but everything was "dead". A couple of clicks when the key was turned on. The starter would engage, the ECU was working, as were the headlights, but the dashboard and fuel pump were dead. The problem was two under dash quick connectors were not connected (one had come apart, the other I had just flat missed) and the fuel pump relay decided to take to a holiday. It suddenly started working, I have no idea why. The electrical system on this car is very complex, but this seems to have been a poor connection.

Anyway, I was able to pump some fuel, found I had a major league fuel leak. Remedy that and I think it is ready for the road.

Bill
 

RootesRacer

Donation Time
If you are worried about the wiring looks, its usually pretty easy to stuff the offending wires in a split plastic sheath.

From the 30,000 foot view, looks fine to me.
 

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
If you are worried about the wiring looks, its usually pretty easy to stuff the offending wires in a split plastic sheath.

From the 30,000 foot view, looks fine to me.

The original incarnation used the split plastic stuff, but I thought it looked bad. Looked into using the non adhesive plastic wrap, all I could find was bright blue. Settled on a satin black electrician's tape. I secured the "free" ends with wire ties, I think it will be okay. There's just so much crap in a small space.

John, if I did not mention my mistakes, I would have nothing to talk about. The past 5 months have been spent correcting mistakes, now I am busy running down fresh boo boos. Seems everything electrical works excepts the turn signals. Also picked up a strange sound. I fear it is a rod hitting the windage tray. One thing I do know, there will be no dropping the oil pan for a look-see.

For initial start up, I set the scaler to 14, it had been 20. It started without too much angst, the throttle plate had to be opened a little more and I think I had flooded it. It runs pretty good at low speeds, but something happens at about 4K, don't know what. I sure hope it is leaning out. This was just a quick spin to be sure nothing would fall off the car, all the fluids stayed in, etc. I will start collecting data tomorrow or Sunday.

The rebuilt transmission worked fine, clutch needs to be bled. Speedo needs to be recalibrated, I'm using the transmission speedo output instead of taking a reading from the rear U-joint.

It turns out the fuel pump problem was due to a cheap Chinese relay. So I replaced it with an expensive Chinese relay. What's a fellow to do?

Bill
 

Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
After a few more months of chasing Gremlins, the car, as Barb put it, is like a real car. List of boo boos and remakes is long:

The transmission started to make noises.
The noise from the engine quieted but never went away.
The new oil pan was resting on the cross member cut out.
Oil pressure would drop to zero on hard left turns.

The only solution was to pull the engine and that is a BIG job. Well, maybe not the only way. I pulled the cross member, then the tranny. Replaced the tranny with a fresh (25,000 mile) junk yard unit. Pulled the oil pan and relocated the oil pickup and made it about an eighth of an inch longer. The rod ends had bashed the windage tray pretty good, leaving bits of steel in the pan. So I removed the tray, cleaned up the pan and reinstalled it. Then cut some more clearance in the cross member for the oil pan and reinstalled everything. Took something like 8 days. A miracle around here.

The changes all worked. The "new" tranny is great. Shifts great, so I suppose those fancy synchronizers pay off. The engine is now very smooth. I had doubled the engine mounting biscuits, it now runs on 1 1/2" of rubber on each side. The vibes around 2,000 rpm are gone. As a plus, the engine no longer sounds like a thrashing machine.

But it still did not run right. The tune was very unstable, especially at lower rpms. After a few weeks of changing things and no progress, I checked the back pressure on the fuel return line. Ten psi with the engine idling! I called RootsRacer (the supplier of my ECM). He said the back pressure should essentially be unmeasurable and recommended a minimum of 1/4" I.D. return line and preferred 5/16". Well that was the issue. I had posed this question years earlier and the answer was 1/4" minimum. He meant I.D., I thought O.D. as I was using tubing. So I ended up with 3/16" I.D. (When I nod my head, hit it.)

Anyway, a trip under the car and I could see no way I was going to snake a 3/8" tube the length of the car. Maybe if there was no wire going through the frame openings. The only way I could see to do 3/8" was to remove the wiring, install the tubing, reinstall the wiring. Not with the temps in the mid 90's. So I used 5/16" brake tubing, which about doubles the flow of 1/4" tube. Big enough job! Especially around the steering arm.

The return line pressure is now in the 1-2 psi range, I think. I am using an ordinary pressure gauge and it is impossible to get a reading. The needle moves off of zero, but not into the area that is calibrated. The car is now much more predictable, especially at idle and low speed throttle response.

We have been working on tuning the engine for daily driving. It is getting close. The tuning map is a nightmare. There is a column of mostly .93 next to a column of .98's. I'm fairly sure this is due to the long, small I.D. runners on the intake manifold. It would be interesting to see how a similar manifold with larger runners would tune and perform. Maybe someday. But maybe not. All that low end grunt is nice. After a drive, my oldest son referred to the car as "The Hill Climber". It is an apt description.

WOT tuning has a way to go. It is still a little lean at WOT to make max HP. But there is enough power that you'd better have the car headed in the right direction when punching it in low gear.

Right now, I think the car is ready for some long trips. We are planning a trip to Columbia, MO (about 450 miles) in a couple of weeks. Then the Invasion and finally, a trip to Northeastern Ohio in October.

Bill
 
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