Gearhead Thread

[Geowhizzer]

That car will run fine on standard oil.  You're not racing the goddamn thing.

re: Wawa's...maybe that's true elsewhere, but they don't in MD.

Have you ever driven in Florida?  Those blue hairs trying to peer over the steering wheel are nuts!

[General_Failure]

If you're only going 70 you better be in the right lane.

[Rome]

You better be on the shoulder here at that speed.

And I've never owned one of these cars so, believe it or not, I'm asking these questions without sarcasm and I'd appreciate legit responses.   You know, if it's not too much trouble. 

[PhillyPhreak54]

I've always preferred full synthetic oil and fluids

Does standard oil work fine? Sure. But I believe the synthetics offer better protection

[smeags]

so, I changed the knock sensor, both o2 sensors and the brakes all around yesterday on the forester. time for inspection, a week late. 

So glad I did this work and replaced windsheild on this car for my son.

Drive axle went and farged up the tranny. Bye bye.

[Rome]

I've always preferred full synthetic oil and fluids

Does standard oil work fine? Sure. But I believe the synthetics offer better protection

According to the dealer (also a friend) who sold it to me, it's better to run standard oil in it now because of the mileage.  I can do it myself but bringing it to someone reliable is the better option since I have no experience yet. 

[Tomahawk]

Use "diesel" oil....it's got zinc in it

[Tomahawk]

Anybody close enough to New Hope, PA and know enough about shtein to want to go check this out for me?

http://www.jeeptruck.com/jss/sale15/adj207/adj207.html

[Tomahawk]

http://fitechefi.com/

The Riv is going to get fuel injection. I can't believe how easy it is to do this now....don't have to worry about replacing the mechanical pump, routing a return line if the car doesn't have it (like the Riviera), mounting and wiring a control box, etc. Almost better than that is a lot of TBI systems are now self-learning so you don't have to take the car to a dyno to tune it.

[Seabiscuit36]

I had my front diff/rear diff/center diff fluids swapped out with Amsoil, and had my transmission fluid swapped out to Amsoil in my 4Runner about a month ago.  Haven't noticed much of a difference in the ride, but at 80k i knew it was Diff time, and since it was on the lift doing the trans fluid made sense. 

3 months ago I swapped out the stock trans fluid on my Mazda 6 6-speed AT over to Royal Purple.  Could not believe the difference in the drive, so much smoother.   

Well, changing the fluids ended up being the worst choice ever.  T-hawk, any tips?  Truck has 84k miles, engine runs like new.  It's a 2008 V8 T4R 4WD SR5, sealed trans. 

Back around the first cold snap, I had a CEL hit and the codes hit back to a solenoid pack sticking.  Cleared it, seemed fine, and it happened 3 weeks later.  In each case I was on the decline of a hill while the transmission was trying to downshift.  I'd lose OD until the car sat for 30mins or I performed a reset.

From reading, Toyota sealed transmissions can get pissy with operating temps, and the Amsoil might have been too thick for the ECU settings.  Ended up swapping the trans fluid back to the Toyota WS ATF, and replacing the solenoid pack.  Ran fine for the past 3 months until last Wednesday when I turned on a decline where the truck shifted from OD to 3rd, and it had a CEL hit again.  Whats odd was it happened on the same exact turn that I had the previous error codes hit.  Going down a hill and downshifting. 

Had to get it towed to a local mechanic, who in turn is saying that the trans fluid is clean, but has a metallic shine indicating wear.  Quoted me 4900 for powertrain rebuilt transmission, with a 3 year warranty, price includes install and them swapping out my old transmission cooler with a newer model so that everything is flushed out. 

Even my buddy who has a shop has the trans running about 3800 from his supplier, so the price isn't out of whack from shop to shop.  At the miles it's at I'm torn with whether I should get a used one from a junkyard, and whether it'll last.  Or getting a rebuilt one that has a warranty, and just sinking way more into it than I ever planned. 

Drove it home last night, cleared the ECU using my ODBII, and I plan to do a hard reset of it today.  No errors on the ride home but it's having a hell of a time when cold shifting from 2nd-3rd.  Catches some times, goes to 4th in others.  Being a sealed engine is a Pita, can't easily check its fill level, but i could add fluid via the trans cooler.  I was considering adding a magneline filter on there, and throwing in some lucas oil transmission fix as a last dash before scheduling it's surgery.  Any other options? 

[Tomahawk]

I sent a PM in response, Seabiscuit, sorry I couldn't be more help. On a much happier and much more impactful note, just got these today:



On a sadder note, in order to take advantage of the timing control of the FI system, I'd have to buy a new distributor.

[smeags]

are they model/year correct ? either way they nice.

[Tomahawk]

Not at all...OE is stamped steel; these are cast aluminum.

[smeags]

So I went over my friends house yesterday. Got a look at his 2012 laguna seca mustang. #532 of 750. Im not a big mustang fan but damn, that car is sick.

http://www.autoblog.com/photos/2012-ford-mustang-boss-302-laguna-seca-first-drive/

[Tomahawk]

Because I'm finally sick of running out of gas, I removed the fuel tank to replace the fuel sender (a short in the ground causes the fuel gauge to always show empty). The gas tank also has a small crack in the bottom which oddly enough would only leak when the tank was full. I took it to a shop to have it repaired and they said they were going to steam it then weld it.

Anybody know how the steaming process works? Fill it with water then put it in an oven?