Dead Air

well that was a long stretch.

Mid-week during cross season even.

Well lets just say - it is an indication of a few things going on.

Car is fixed more or less I think. I hope. Seems to be. It might take a bit of time for the coolant to get all the bubbles out but hopefully we'll reach some stasis soon. First good sign was this morning putting some coolant in there before driving in. Yes. I drove today. Breaking a damn good loooong streak of perfect weeks.
More on the commute relating to training and cross later. I'm talking about the car now. So this morning putting the coolant in, there was no pressure in the hose. That's either a good sign or a bad sign. Good sign in that there should be some pressure in the system but it shouldn't hold it once the car is cold and has sat for 24+ hours. And even after a week, opening the coolant reservoir meant a cascade of coolant bursting out pre-head gasket change. It is also starting very smoothly, and seemed to take a bit longer to warm up this morning than previously.

I'm still not pushing the car - no high RPM high load situations yet. Trying to let everything break in a bit before rattling it through the paces. At some point I'll put the pictures I snapped during the process up. I wasn't too good at getting representative images of each step... but I think i have at least one shot with the head off...

Starting it up was a bit stressful. Everything buttoned down (i thought) except the #3 injector. You leave that one cracked to purge air out of the lines. Basically crank the engine over until fuel starts spraying out of the loose nut/pipe connection. Once it sprays. Stop cranking, tighten the nut down and start it back up.

And so I did. Started it up. And it was idling, sounded okay even. But then it started sucking down coolant and i couldn't tell if there was an exhaust leak or if i was burning PB blaster off the turbo bolts or if the wind blowing into the barn tail pipe to bumper was carrying some exhaust up under the hood. So after a bit of idling I blipped the throttle position sensor (pedal) a touch. and then #4 injector started blowing combustion gasses out around the injector body. Fuck. Shut it off quick. Tighten the injector bolts down again (of course I'd piled the tools back into the box and cases in the mean time). And fired it back up. Gave it a bit more of a blip and whoosh smoke and weird noise... FAHHHHK OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT. Fearing the turbo just blew or some other expensive nightmare I peered at the smoky mess (mostly exhaust blowing up through the engine bay). And found, that I'd forgotten to attach the turbo to intercooler pipe. Well it was in place but I'd forgotten the clamps. Quick work with those. Few. Yeah the car smokes a lot (even running 100% bio) when the turbo isn't hooked up, and it sounds weird. But there was also a strange sound from the timing belt side. So I cracked the cover open and it seemed okay. I had a great idea to leave it cracked open while i started it again to see if the belt was running okay. Started the car. and w/in about 30 seconds a horrible metallic screeching noise started from the timing belt side of the engine. Another wave of oh shits and then i shut it off, and put the cover back in place. And then noticed it wasn't seated just quite right. Got it seated. And started.

Ah. Now it seems to be running smoothly. But then. Shit? What's that smoke? is that exhaust gas escaping between the turbo and the manifold? Shit. I need to run the RPMs up a bit to see if I can feel any exhaust gas escaping. It could just be PB Blaster burning off because the turbo at this point is getting kind of hot. Or exhaust from the tail pipe blowing out under the car but this stuff smelled different than the tail pipe. And yes. I did actually breath in the tail pipe, and thanks to the ~18-20% oxygen content and the biodiesel, it is harmless and you don't even notice it in the lungs. But this stuff smelled different. Didn't want to chance it. My bro came over to hold the throttle down a bit while i felt around with my fingers around the junction. I couldn't feel any escaping gas, but the smoke was getting thicker, but then the turbo was getting a bit hotter. I added a touch more of a turn to the bolts holding the turbo on, snugged them down a bit more. Oh well. Fuck it. If it is leaking it will either get worse, fill with soot or i'll have to take that apart. screw it.

But in that process i got a check engine light (and the coolant needed to be filled with some more water.

Shit. CEL isn't good. Damnit. Fire up the 486DX dell laptop from 1995 and check. Cat temp Sensor open/short to ground. Shit. Oh right. I had unplugged that for some reason. Damnit. I get it plugged back in. Reset the light, topped up the coolant and waited for it to reach normal temperature.

It seemed to be running smoothly.

All that was left to do was pull the lower rad hose and drain the water out and refill it with Coolant. No, I didn't go back to the wonderful G12 stuff. Or the new G12+ stuff. I used the PEAK universal antifreeze that was on sale at Autozone for $6/gallon. Yeah. I cheaped out on the coolant. So what. This new universal stuff is all coolant. And well maybe i have to change it out again but I have my doubts that this car will last another 200,000 miles or 13 years which ever comes first. I mean it might and well in 5 years I'll just change the coolant. But I'll probably have to put a new water pump in before then anyway. And I'm leaning to the side of coolant is coolant, esp in the last couple years with the move to "Add to Any Color Antifreeze" labels on some of the stuff.

Pulling that lower rad hose isn't much of a problem. Getting it back on is a royal Bitch and a Half. just a bit pain in the ass. Esp w/o the remote hose clamp pliers. I probably could have saved an hour or two of labor if I'd bought a pair of them. But I made due with what I had. Just was challenging.

Got it all back together. Tools loaded up and was headed home by 8:15-8:30 or so. Didn't start work Tuesday night until ~6:30 anyway. Not bad.

Anyway. I drove in today and it was nice and smooth. Moved it a while ago and it starts much more effortlessly now. That's not a bad thing. And I think based on the change in the exhaust note that the timing is slightly more advanced than before. But I haven't checked the timing graph yet. The mechanical marks were bang on and it doesn't sound retarded, if anything it might be a bit advanced.

Why drive in and kill another perfect week? First reason: I rode hard to get home in time last night. I was flying around the place here trying to get some images taken and printed for my oldest's class. They did a mold experiment and well K brought one wicked stinky moldy piece of the bread home for me to take some images of for the class. And left a bit late. No easy ride home. Had to redline it all the way. It hurt a bit. But I got home in time. Walked to the farmer's market, bought a few things, then the littlest and I took the passat over to run a couple errands and it worked then too.

My legs were tired. I was tired. This is supposed to be a rest week per the calendar and well I'm trying to stick with something for a change. So I drove. I've got to hit whole paycheck tonight as well. Might as well combine trips (efficient and all that). So I drove. But in my carbon neutral B100 burning old wagon.

Maybe next Tuesday I can actually get out for the smack down for a change. Although with the daylight running short we may need to head on a shorter route to the east instead of out west.

Vermont is coming up. I haven't been out to race there yet. It will be my new course of the year. Of course despite what J-Hole said, Waterville CX was anything but lame, even if it was new. The other verge race I've missed is Maine. I don't think this year will work to get up there. Maybe I can try and hit it next year. Last weekend just confirmed thought, I love racing cylocross. There isn't anything better.

And yeah, still haven't written up Wah-ville CX yet... soon...

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