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Hackster's LSA / T56 2 door

Great update. It's cool to see you learning TIG in real time, as I collect the parts I need to get mine going. Hopefully I have as much success as you. The control arms look great. You mentioned spraying them with textured black, and I assume you mean rattle can. I spray painted my control arms after I reinforced the sway bar tabs, and within a few months, it looked like they'd been media blasted and were already rusting. Next time, I'll powder coat them.
 
Great update. It's cool to see you learning TIG in real time, as I collect the parts I need to get mine going. Hopefully I have as much success as you. The control arms look great. You mentioned spraying them with textured black, and I assume you mean rattle can. I spray painted my control arms after I reinforced the sway bar tabs, and within a few months, it looked like they'd been media blasted and were already rusting. Next time, I'll powder coat them.

Normally I totally agree......Ill see how this all works out and when I have some time powdercoat. The arms I just removed look brand new after 2 years. The powdercoater I used in Eugene was hands down the best I have ever run across.

Finally had a little time this week to get some work done. It seems like I spent the entire week on those dumb control arms.....oh yeah that and work.

New arms painted, new STS Machining delrin bushings and sleeves installed, Delrin rear bushings and welded cups put back in. I noticed that the fasteners on these rear cups had come loose so I installed a thick grade 8 washer, lock tite and torqued them down.

For a stock setup its damn good looking

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Straightforward install surprisingly enough they went right on. I have messed with the front suspension so many times that I know exactly what I need to swap these out....if you recall I had lots of issues when I first put the car together with the front end.

So with the new arms on, we had a couple issues, fenders needed more work to clear the tires with an extra .75" of width. Drivers fender got rolled a bunch passenger a little bit.

Then onto figuring how to make it steer. I adjusted the outer tie rods and they probably would have been ok as far as thread engagement but I just wasnt comfortable with the minimum thread engagement I was getting. Checked with some folks and they said 2002 focus outers work...the ones I got were no longer.

So I started digging. Turns out that the 740 inner tie rods are 30mm longer than the stock 240 inner tie rods, this was gonna be close and they use the same outer. I had bought some new inner and outer tie rods for the 940 and they happen to be the same rack.....surely this wouldnt work.

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Sure as ****, these bolted right in, 30mm longer, same boot and everything worked. Stoked. I have full engagement of the tie rod and an OEM product on there with the right taper.

I buttoned that all up, adjusted the coilovers, sway bar ends and got the car at ride height and set the camber at 3.9......best I could get before was 2.5 so I am heading in the right direction.

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Got the slam panel on, adjusted the hood latch, grille back on and buttoned up all of my loose ends on the frontend work including drilling and tapping the UHMW air dam so its fastened to both the lower air dam and the skid plate. Should have no problem staying on at 150+

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Its hard to see it, but before there was nothing to stop the air from going under the car, now all the air going through the speed holes and the air dam opening should get directed into the coolers and radiator.

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Very much needed garage cleaning session with the old turd out enjoying some daylight.

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Its rowdy, doesnt sound like a truck anymore as my buddy Asher says about all my ls swapped cars =)

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Very base tune on it, drove around my neighborhood it dies once and throttle needs some sensitivity adjustment but its a whole new animal thats for sure.

:-P
 
Doesn't sound like it should be hauling landscaping equipment anymore!

Doesn't sound like a box van. Good job!

Control arms turned out dope.


****ers.....Although I totally agree with all of these statements =)

After a long tough week at work we headed to the Southern Oregon coast for the weekend and got there just in time friday night to catch the very tail end of the sunset.

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Got home yesterday about 2:30. Had a hell of a time getting the tuning surface to charge but managed to get it stable and we tuned on it for a few hours last night.

We noticed that the battery voltage was dropping and it was taking longer and longer for the alternator to start charging. We had it ECU Controlled and it appears that it was looking for some other BCM to turn it on but it wasnt. We disabled the ECU Control of it and it fixed that but we fought the battery voltage for a solid hour. The car was getting down to 9 volts during crank but starting at just 80 rpm.....we were both surprised it started. Battery was charging at the end of the day. Probably need to get it on a trickle charger and get the voltage up, for a tiny battery it kept going damn good considering how many starts and stops we did.

Managed to get the throttle response smoothed out, but we are stilling having a stalling condition when coming to a stop. Managed to get things running ok except the stalling.

Only managed to get about 40% throttle and 7.7 lbs of boost. Thing is going to be a riot once we have all the bugs worked out.

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Hopefully we can get it figured out or we start over with a manual e38 ECU...

The other thing we ran into is IAT2 temps are super high. Water flow seems good but we are wondering if I had somehow collapsed the Intercooler brick in the top of the lid. Its common when running high boost.

We were seeing IAT2 temps consistent up around 110-120 degrees with them only dropping down to 100+ when on the road traveling no boost. I verified this morning in a cold condition that the IAT2 temp sensor is reading correctly so the next step is to pull the lid off and see what the brick looks like.

I did manage to get more tension on the belt and have not had any issues with it jumping ribs like the first test drive. Really glad I have some adjustability in my tensioner setup, made it much easier to get this perfect.

Front suspension feels good, car tracks good, rides rough but racecar so we live with it.

Really hoping that we can get the tuning buttoned up this week and I can get to mounting up some new tires and figuring out the vibration I have out back. I am really hoping that its from square tires and not a rearend failure.

Sean
 
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Well trouble shooting through it, found that the brick was not collapsed.

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But since I was in there this far I decided to go ahead and reinforce it since Ill be running more boost than stock.

some 5052 plate and 5356 rod and my rookie TIG welder ass had a reinforced brick for about $15.00.




Crude pressure test but it held 5 lbs and no bubbles.

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Apparently these swell up so got a new one and slapped this **** back together.
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I obviously had some air in the system and did my best to get it burped, but now have much more flow through the system as is evident in the reservoir. I still have a heat soak issue when stopped as the temps start warm but cool down once everything it up and running.

Going to do some heat shields between the exhaust and the heat exchanger hoses to try and help shield the exhaust heat from the hoses. Also a hood vent is probably unavoidable at this point.

We started tuning again last night and worked on it all night. Michael the tuner is a total boss when it comes to tuning. We found that the prior night there was a table he imported but didnt adjust for injector size so we started over. We ended up tuning the speed density stand alone then tuned the MAF and once we got them close it was much much better. He explained it all to me and I understand how we got where we did but super glad to have him doing the work.

So its 95% tuned, needs to see a longer pull under boost and I have to log some more IAT's but its totally drivable at this point. 11-11.5 AFR on boost, moderate timing so we keep it alive a little longer.

13 lbs of boost on the new setup, sounds killer with the cam.

It has zero issues now lighting up the tires anytime, any gear without even going full throttle Should prove to be rediculous :-P

Now to turn to the vibration in the rearend, some new tires and a proper alignment.

Happy Tuesday
 
Man the last time it seemed like this was super easy, bolt stuff together, tune it then break stuff.

This time around I am having a hell of a time. Car was running great the last time we tuned it. Tried to drive it to home depot the following day only to have it die again when coming to a stop.

Drove it again on Saturday only to have it toss the damn belt off and leave me stranded.

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It had done this one other time too but thought it was due to not enough tension.

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Clearly its walking to the front of the drives and destroying belts.

I redid the tensioner yesterday, put on a 1" shorter belt and started it up and it is walking off the crank pulley first so that leads me to believe that the last pulley before that would be the one to cause the misalignment. That is the alternator which is new with the upgrades as the last one failed.

So I guess from here I tear it all apart and start with a new alternator since I dont have a lazer alignment tool for the serpentine belt.

Pretty frustrated with it at this point, ready to just walk away for a bit, especially considering every event for the foreseeable future is cancelled.

Stupid car...
 
belts

Hey partner, Hang in there !!! I know the feeling. A couple of times i felt like giving up on my brick , but then all the blood, sweat and tears put into it will be worth all the cursing and disappointments on the way to the finish line. Maybe you have a bent bolt and that may cause the belt to lean forwards. Relax take a breather and get a 5 gallon coffee mug .
Take care DZ.
 
Hey partner, Hang in there !!! I know the feeling. A couple of times i felt like giving up on my brick , but then all the blood, sweat and tears put into it will be worth all the cursing and disappointments on the way to the finish line. Maybe you have a bent bolt and that may cause the belt to lean forwards. Relax take a breather and get a 5 gallon coffee mug .
Take care DZ.

Thanks man, its much appreciated.

I am more updating this thread so I can vent but if anyone has anything that I have missed please chime in.

So here is where I am at.

I have replaced the alternator with a Reman AC Delco one as I had a cheap oreilly parts store one on there. I questioned the runout on the pulley but it was identical to the delco one.

Same issue, belt begins to roll off the crank pulley to the front.

I have called Turn One who built the power steering pump and billet pulley and got their measurement of 3.290: from back of steering pump to center rib of pulley and measured that. It checks out. I removed the power steering pump from the mount, cleaned the back of the pump, sanded the surfaces of the spacer and cleaned everything and reinstalled.

Replaced 2 of the 3 idler pulleys as they had a small ridge at the back of the pulley.

I have removed the supercharger pulley and verified that the pressed on hub is the correct distance from the snout, cleaned the back of the pulley and hub and reinstalled.

I have verified that the crank pulley is seated all the way onto the crank with a measurement of 5.111" being OEM and I am at 5.108" from the block to the center rib on the crank shaft.

I borrowed a Dayco lazer from a buddy and adjusted the lazer to be within 1/32" over a 4' distance on both sides so its pretty accurate. I shot the lazer from the crank to the power steering pulley, from the PS pulley to the alternator and the crank to the alternator, crank to the blower pulley and they are all dead on and land right on the center of the middle rib.

I have checked all of the mounting surfaces for flatness, including the mounts for the idler pulleys.

I put it all back together last night and quick blip of the throttle and the belt starts rolling off the front of the crank.

I tore it back apart, and shot from the crank up to the tensioner and that is the only place I get a questionable reading. Nothing has changed, same mounts, same tensioner as before. I feel that if anything the tensioner is 1/16" too far forward.

I have spent hours and hours working on this with no resolution and I am beyond frustrated. I have gone through three belts, 1 alternator, 2 idler pulleys and still have no more info than when I started.

For ****s and giggles last night I put the belt on and ran it to the back groove on the 8 rib blower pulley and it didn't roll off the crank, but it was at all kinds of weird angles so I know that isn't the answer.

The thing that really puzzles me is that there are only 2 variables with this. PS Pulley and Blower pulley.

I am at my witts end. I have spent more time trying to solve the belt issue than I did with all of the upgrades this winter so I unless someone has some great info or things to check that I have not done already I am throwing in the towel on this turd. Ill likely go back to the original blower / pulley / throttle body setup and sell it or push it in the corner or storage somewhere. I'm mostly frustrated that it was 100% dead reliable engine wise last year and now I cannot even make it around the block.

Hope everyone is staying safe out there.

Sean
 
It almost sounds like a belt tension issue. If it wasn't for the laser verification I would have guessed a pulley was on backwards too.
 
The faces of the pulleys might all be "aligned", but there's no easy way to check that the axis of rotation of each part is parallel with all of the others. Using a laser across the front face of each pulley will not tell you too much, as the diameters are small and the sine error is also going to be small for a given angle.

This is a common issue with tensioners, as they have slop and can twist out of alignment but it's not easy to see.

I'm not sure if you have any really straight flat bars, but something that's 12+" long placed on the face of each pulley will help show any issues.
Use some angle or box tubing clamped to the crank pulley as a reference. Maybe the laser placed on the face of the crank pulley would work, as you could measure from the ends of the bar (that's on the pulley being checked) to the laser with a steel rule.

Or just shim one side of an accessory to until it holds the belt on and call it good.
 
Is there anyway to check the runout of the pulleys when mounted.

I have checked the ps pulley, alternator and Blower pulley for runout, all well within acceptable range. I dont really know how I would check the crank pulley.

The faces of the pulleys might all be "aligned", but there's no easy way to check that the axis of rotation of each part is parallel with all of the others. Using a laser across the front face of each pulley will not tell you too much, as the diameters are small and the sine error is also going to be small for a given angle.

This is a common issue with tensioners, as they have slop and can twist out of alignment but it's not easy to see.

I'm not sure if you have any really straight flat bars, but something that's 12+" long placed on the face of each pulley will help show any issues.
Use some angle or box tubing clamped to the crank pulley as a reference. Maybe the laser placed on the face of the crank pulley would work, as you could measure from the ends of the bar (that's on the pulley being checked) to the laser with a steel rule.

Or just shim one side of an accessory to until it holds the belt on and call it good.

The lazer I have is an actual line, so when you shine it onto the other pulley you can get a good idea by rotating it that the axis rotation is correct. I am shooting from the center of the pulley onto a target on the other pulley. If there was a bent shaft or pulley you would be able to pick that up pretty fast.

I have some 1/4" thick aluminum flat bar that I have used to check alignment on with good luck. Everything other than that tensioner shows to be well aligned.

I am not sure what accessory I would shim, nor how I would do that, nothing is old volvo 240 with a bunch of bushings and tinker toy brackets. Everything is beefy machined aluminum brackets that bolt to the heads or block. Nor do I know what one I would start to change.

Not trying to argue just talking through your suggestions.
 
I have checked the ps pulley, alternator and Blower pulley for runout, all well within acceptable range. I dont really know how I would check the crank pulley.



The lazer I have is an actual line, so when you shine it onto the other pulley you can get a good idea by rotating it that the axis rotation is correct. I am shooting from the center of the pulley onto a target on the other pulley. If there was a bent shaft or pulley you would be able to pick that up pretty fast.

I have some 1/4" thick aluminum flat bar that I have used to check alignment on with good luck. Everything other than that tensioner shows to be well aligned.

I am not sure what accessory I would shim, nor how I would do that, nothing is old volvo 240 with a bunch of bushings and tinker toy brackets. Everything is beefy machined aluminum brackets that bolt to the heads or block. Nor do I know what one I would start to change.

Not trying to argue just talking through your suggestions.

No worries :cheers:

I'm not talking about a bent shaft, but more one that is angled slightly. I do a lot of laboratory laser alignment work, so I get what you're trying to do... and I just see some (perceived) sources of error :)

I looked up the Dayco laser kit, and the targeting system. It shows you rib-to-rib alignment, and in a crude way at that. There's just a lot of ways to introduce error into the system.

For tweaking the alignment of the accessories and tensioner, you can place a shim (thin spring washer) under a mounting boss and then install it.

Another trick, is to make any smooth pulley have a slight barrel/convex surface on it. This is what's used in industrial belt systems to aid in tracking. Not much is needed. A mini lathe and a file work really well for this.
 
No worries :cheers:

I'm not talking about a bent shaft, but more one that is angled slightly. I do a lot of laboratory laser alignment work, so I get what you're trying to do... and I just see some (perceived) sources of error :)

I looked up the Dayco laser kit, and the targeting system. It shows you rib-to-rib alignment, and in a crude way at that. There's just a lot of ways to introduce error into the system.

For tweaking the alignment of the accessories and tensioner, you can place a shim (thin spring washer) under a mounting boss and then install it.

Another trick, is to make any smooth pulley have a slight barrel/convex surface on it. This is what's used in industrial belt systems to aid in tracking. Not much is needed. A mini lathe and a file work really well for this.

Sounds like I found the guy to help me out....:-P You make house calls when all this virus **** is cleared up?

I will take some photos of the mounts tonight. What if a pulley needs to go in towards the block? Machine it off ?

Appreciate your help.

Sean
 
No worries :cheers:

I'm not talking about a bent shaft, but more one that is angled slightly. I do a lot of laboratory laser alignment work, so I get what you're trying to do... and I just see some (perceived) sources of error :)

I looked up the Dayco laser kit, and the targeting system. It shows you rib-to-rib alignment, and in a crude way at that. There's just a lot of ways to introduce error into the system.

For tweaking the alignment of the accessories and tensioner, you can place a shim (thin spring washer) under a mounting boss and then install it.

Another trick, is to make any smooth pulley have a slight barrel/convex surface on it. This is what's used in industrial belt systems to aid in tracking. Not much is needed. A mini lathe and a file work really well for this.

Damn dropping wisdom. I can imagine that pullys might not seat perfectly or have some in and out play. One thing I was thinking about was the load put on the belt when the ac comp engages. Idk does Kevlar grow much with heat and or harden with heat rather than getting more grippy as a rubber belt might.
 
Sounds like I found the guy to help me out....:-P You make house calls when all this virus **** is cleared up?

I will take some photos of the mounts tonight. What if a pulley needs to go in towards the block? Machine it off ?

Appreciate your help.

Sean

The in/out isn't as much of an issue as the tilt. If the in/out was over an 1/8", then that would cause some issues.

I'm down for house calls, it would be cool to see the car in person.

So three things I thought of:
1. The water pump (?) pulley (big smooth boi) and the small smooth idler are both stamped steel. They will have a slight taper to them to release from the stamping die. The angle that they are stamped would push the belt off towards the radiator.

2. You mentioned that running the belt 1-rib towards the block helped. Can you space the water pump pulley out away from the block?

3. The small idler, just before the blower pulley.. can you add a thin washer under one of the spacer posts to tilt axis up just a tad?
 
hey, belt out !!!!

Hey , this is just a weird idea. Can you get a smaller belt even if it is a cheap one without using a tensioner and replace the flat idler pulley for the grooved one? That might just work. I had a problem like that one time back in 2000 in a dodge with a 6 cyl mitsubishi engine.Then i found out that the idler pulley arm was bent do to an accident and the belt :) was rolling forwards. I took it out and kinda forced the belt with a screwdriver at the alt pulley.
well good luck amigo. Stay safe and secure.
DZ
 
The in/out isn't as much of an issue as the tilt. If the in/out was over an 1/8", then that would cause some issues.

I'm down for house calls, it would be cool to see the car in person.

So three things I thought of:
1. The water pump (?) pulley (big smooth boi) and the small smooth idler are both stamped steel. They will have a slight taper to them to release from the stamping die. The angle that they are stamped would push the belt off towards the radiator.

2. You mentioned that running the belt 1-rib towards the block helped. Can you space the water pump pulley out away from the block?

3. The small idler, just before the blower pulley.. can you add a thin washer under one of the spacer posts to tilt axis up just a tad?

Hey , this is just a weird idea. Can you get a smaller belt even if it is a cheap one without using a tensioner and replace the flat idler pulley for the grooved one? That might just work. I had a problem like that one time back in 2000 in a dodge with a 6 cyl mitsubishi engine.Then i found out that the idler pulley arm was bent do to an accident and the belt :) was rolling forwards. I took it out and kinda forced the belt with a screwdriver at the alt pulley.
well good luck amigo. Stay safe and secure.
DZ

Props to culberro for his wisdom. I kept at it, and kept at it. I tried a number of things, lazer this and that. I first made a shim to go behind the entire right mounts of tensioner bracket in an attempt to straighten the tensioner our, but all that did was make the tensioners squeak and the belt still rolled off.

I could see the belt angle being off from the alternator to the idler and onto the crank shaft. It was not indicated with the lazer though. I took a smaller more manageable piece of aluminum angle and checked for alignment fore and aft as well as angular and I kept coming up with the alternator and idler (Hung off a bracket that bolts to the front of the alternator) being 1/16-3/32" farther out from the block than the power steering and crank pulleys.

I was chasing the problem at this point so I crudely machined 2 new spacers. The originals were 1.899 and the new ones were right about 1.810. I dont have a lathe so this process was difficult. I used some aluminum tube taped onto a 1/2" diameter bolt it was a snug fit. Marked it with the caliper and spun it up in the drill press and used a hacksaw to get a nice square cut. I then used a nice file to clean it up and get it to the exact dimensions. I am within a few .000 of an inch so I figure its close at this point.

I replaced the stand offs with the shorter ones and checked the alignment. Seems much better and still nice and square.

I picked up a new shorter belt 101 1/8" in case anyone is wondering so that the tensioner is right in the middle of its travel and started it up.....For the first time the belt sounded normal a few revs in the garage and the belt stayed on the crank pulley.

Good signs.

Took a trip around the neighborhood and the belt stayed on everywhere but the blower and it moved forward on the pulley one rib.

I had questioned the alignment of the tensioner but couldnt really figure it out. When you look down on the alignment from the top and even measure it with a straightedge all looked good. You had to tun that up and down and eyeball it to see that the tensioner was angled differenty than the blower and crank pulleys. I disassembled for probably the 50th time, replaced one of the idlers that seemed to taper like a cone and put a small 1/16" shim under the locating pin on the tensioner and put it all back together, everything looks in line and checks out with a straight edge.

Drove around the block and got in it and back off, belt stayed on for the first time in a while. Took a second spin around after a quick check out and holy crap the belt was still on. A few healthy burnouts, feathering the throttle and some sideways action and still have a belt. I had a couple pieces of belt material in the engine bay after my shennanigans but that may be expected after driving like that on a new belt and pulleys.

So I am 90% sure I have the belt issue resolve and can get to my other list of ****. Front of car needs to get raised up a bit, its too close tire wise. Car needs aligned badly and the tune needs a few things fixed now that its actually running and driving and I can stop being pissed off at it.

Goes to show you that the fancy tools dont always fix the problem. Also, I have no idea why either of those items moved, I am guessing that the alternator housing is machined differently than the old one and that the tensioner angle change made the problem more prevalent.

Thanks again Turbobricks for keeping me motivated and some suggestions on the fix.

Hope everyone is safe and staying away from people =)
 
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