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I just rebuild the stupid engine..

I think the reason is failing oil pump... the oil pressure light was flickering when i was changing gears on my way home (though I only drove like this for about 3 minutes.. was almost home).. and I noticed that if I was under 1k RPMs or changing gears it would flicker at me..

my friend is pushing me to get a new car.. but it's funny because as much crap I get with cars... I just love it too much to part....

Well I can tell you one thing for sure...

It isn't God's fault.

No I shouldn't blame him... but ugh... I can't ever catch a break with this it seems. I mean I just can't comprehend why this happened.. I was very gentle with the car for the 1,000 miles.. did a couple of oil/filter changes... I took care of the motor.

Honestly sounds like the Hydraulic Lash Adjusters (HLAs)

Get the engine up to temp and they should quiet down after
a bit. If not there's some good cleaning guides on here.

Easy enough to check HLA's

Pop off the VC and squish the HLA's. If they compress, they're noisy.

Ryan wrote:Easy enough to check HLA's

Pop off the VC and squish the HLA's. If they compress, they're noisy.

Will try that! Though SuperK got me some pretty new HLA's that are being used in that motor.

Hey man I'm with you. God has let me down numerous times so I gave up on him. Then I watched a few movies and saw how Joe Pesci can really get the job done so now I pray to Joe. Funny thing is I get about the same result with Joe as I got with God. 50% of the time I get what I want, 50% of the time I don't. Joe came through on a pair of headers I needed that God didn't even seem to care about. So man from now on, pray to Joe Pesci.
Oh ya I agree, check your HLA's.

Daninski wrote:Hey man I'm with you. God has let me down numerous times so I gave up on him. Then I watched a few movies and saw how Joe Pesci can really get the job done so now I pray to Joe. Funny thing is I get about the same result with Joe as I got with God. 50% of the time I get what I want, 50% of the time I don't. Joe came through on a pair of headers I needed that God didn't even seem to care about. So man from now on, pray to Joe Pesci.
Oh ya I agree, check your HLA's.

Daninski-ism at it's finest ;D

ahh man I love you guys.

This weekend i'm going to help my mom's boyfriend get this Pontiac finished up from hers/his garage and then pull mine in. We are going to drop the oil pan/MBSP off and check s---. We are going to check and make sure the oil pump isn't clogged as he thinks the pickup or strainer could be clogged. Not sure but worth a shot ya know? But we are going to go over the oil pump and check all that out.

But yeah want to make sure the oil pump is good since my OPS light flickers..

Dark_Rider2k3 wrote:ahh man I love you guys.

This weekend i'm going to help my mom's boyfriend get this Pontiac finished up from hers/his garage and then pull mine in. We are going to drop the oil pan/MBSP off and check s---. We are going to check and make sure the oil pump isn't clogged as he thinks the pickup or strainer could be clogged. Not sure but worth a shot ya know? But we are going to go over the oil pump and check all that out.

But yeah want to make sure the oil pump is good since my OPS light flickers..

Shim the oil pump while you're at it, ;D

So I got the car into my mom's garage and got it apart.

So this is pretty much what is wrong:

1. When I first installed the motor, a bolt on the fuel rail got cross threaded. This caused a stress crack on the back of the head. I fixed this with some epoxy all around which fixed the problem.

2. Flash forward to when the issues started happening. While the oil pump necessarily wasn't bad, it was going bad. The reason for it failing is because some of the epoxy didn't fully cure (I thought 2 days straight was enough but I guess not =/) and broke off. It traveled down into the oil pan, where eventually (on that day) it got sucked up and clogged the strainer/oil pump.

3. Before I could stop the car, the engine already suffered some damage. At first it looked small.. the engine bearings were badly worn but still had some lead on them... but upon checking the head, the cam journals are shot.

After looking around, I found out that it would be roughly 600 bucks to fix this engine. However, I just found an EGT engine for $350 bucks I can drop in.

So now, I am going to drop in the new engine, use my timing belt/tensioners/water pump, and save the old BP for me to eventually rebuild.. maybe I'll get better pistons, some GTR connecting rods with it.. who knows! But for now that engine is being retired as I need an easy fix that won't blow all of my tax returns I'll be getting.....

scratch that, the old engine is going to be parted out.

This motor only has 32,223 miles on it and is clean as hell!!!!!!!

so.. SCORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sounds good and from now on no more stinking epoxy. Drilling and over sizing the hole may of worked just for future reference. So keep us abreast on the swap.

Daninski wrote:Sounds good and from now on no more stinking epoxy. Drilling and over sizing the hole may of worked just for future reference. So keep us abreast on the swap.

Will do! I have a pic I'll upload shortly. She is very dirty on the outside, but a gem on the inside.

My plan is to just do a straight swap in. No monkey'ing with the motor for now. Then, in the summer, I'll swap over my MBSP and Mazda VC. I'll also give the engine bay/motor a good wash in the summer as well. With all the snow around and salt, I figure I'll just hold off on some of the cleaning and such. I mainly need her to run.

I'm going to keep my timing belt/tensioners, water pump, and a few other goodies in case I need 'em for later. Might even part out the old BP for parts if anyone needs anything.

Should take me about a day to get the motor out and new one in. Don't have to really swap anything over except small things like spark plugs...