Ben's Dirty Jap (97 2.2 VTI)

[stal1878]

Got the car back together today! BUT I had to come home in the works Ranger

I was leaning down the back of the engine and I rested my hand on what I thought was the slam panel, but turned out to be the rad tank/top house, which then broke =/ As you can see in the pictures its drokked now so need a new one! Local place we deal with want £70, but I think I have found one on Ebay for £40. Its obviously cheap, but does come with a years warranty so I think I might go for that one(one more price to get at work on Monday).
Only up side was with the rad out I could remove the aircon rad as well. Which means I have removed everything aircon related from the engine bay, just the rad thingy inside the cab left to remove now. The aircon pump was very heavy, much more than I was expecting! My shortened alternator belt fitted fine which was good and you can now reach the tensioner with the a/c pump gone.
I tarted up my valve cover a bit while it was off as well, its by no means perfect, but smartens up the look of the engine bay a fair bit I reckon.
I took the plunge and started the engine...........It ran! The belt didn't fly off and all the valves bend so that was a bonus. Sounds like I got the timing spot on as well! I did think it was making a bit of a funny noise, but might just be me imagining things, plus I don't really "know" this engine yet.
I drained the engine oil and replaced with works 10w-40 mineral. I will run this for a while to give the internals a clean and then do another oil and filter change. The oil filter on there is very new, but looks like the tosser changed that, but not the oil itself
I also took off the cruise control actuator because it was in my way, I think I will loose it though because I don't use it and it leaves me nice access to the fuel filter(supposed to be lifetime so obviously is drokked by now), just got to release its throttle cable.

Belt covers back on:


New PAS belt and Alt belt:


Engine reassembled, note the tarted up cam cover!


Removed air con bits:


Radiators out:


Damage to the top tank:


All packed up and waiting for the new rad:



So I have had the car since the 17th and pretty much its been off the road all the time
Hopefully once all this is done I can rag the drokk outta it and have some fun, providing I did the timing belt properly and it doesn't ping off
Hopefully I can get the muffin thing on the road the early part of next week as I really need it next weekend.

Thanks for reading all this, I bet you lot are bored to tears !

[rob quilter]

Lots of work done there mate!

Glad you didn't buy a gay, boring, common BMW

I'd get the 4ws steering sorted, its not really advised to do any fast driving with it not working, as the rear wheels aren't locked in place and can turn when your not expecting.

I'm sure you'll be able to get the parts you need cheap from on here.

[stal1878]

Cheers fella! Yea it is a fair bit of work, its been in the workshop more than i have driven it

Bit worrying about the 4ws, I thought it locked it place when there was a fault?

I got code 25 IIRC, which was angle sensor in the rear unit. Trying to find a replacement unit, but no luck so far. I could prob get someone I know to repair the sensor for me(if that is actully the fault), but obviously can't take the box off the car and still drive it =/

[rob quilter]

There's a couple of preludes always been broken for spares on here, drop the seller a message asking if they have the unit. Or post in the wanted section with what you need.

[rob quilter]

Here's one been broken:

http://www.ludegeneration.co.uk/prelude ... t2985.html

[stal1878]

Cheers mate

[rob quilter]

Here's all the 4ws fault codes just for your reference:

http://www.ludegeneration.co.uk/wiki/in ... ault_Codes

[stal1878]

Thanks alot for that, took me ages to find a list like that when I was looking!

Do you know if its possible to remove the angle sensors from the unit in situ?
I tried the 4WS reset, but it stops have way through the sequence, because its a major fault I suppose....