Long post alert!Its been well over a year since I updated this build thread and almost 2 years since I bolted the turbo onto it and doubled its power output. Whilst these years haven't been without issues, it has been alot of fun!
Since the fuel pump issues came about in the last post I ordered a new pump which I then left on the shelf seeing as I had a number of bigger issues that needed sorted such as
my Capri and also my wedding.
The Volvo was still being used regularly as it should be throughout all this, with the only big issue being the LT77 gearbox reducing its innards to swarf, leaving me with only 4th gear and a wobbly gear knob. To sort this I used the R380 gearbox I had from a LDV Pilot 1.9d van which is a direct replacement, a much stronger upgrade and also also gave me better gearing. After getting this sorted its still going strong for almost a year!
The second issue was a loss of oil pressure. Initially I diagnosed this as a faliure of some of the hydraulic lifters as they were clacking away like mad, prompting me to replace all 16 of the blighters and try to hand prime them. To do this is failry simple, Just remove the dizzy and use a battery drill to drive the oil pump gears. This resulted in absolutely nothing happening and no oil moving round the engine. After lying on my back for a day removing the sump as I thought the pickup had fell off or the gasket failed I discovered that there was a small leak on the pump unit. This prompted the removal of said leaky pump, which turned out to have the incorrect gasket fitted, however, the main concern was that the pressure relief valve was jammed fully open causing the 90% of the pumped oil to return to the tank. 30 minutes later after a visit to
rimmerbros online, a pickup pipe gasket, oil pump gasket set and an uprated pressure relief valve were ordered. They turned up after a few days, fitted in about an hour and using the old trick of packing the pump gears with vaseline to help them prime, nearly ripped my hand off when I went flat out with the battery drill to prime the engine and have it build all the pressure it could in a split second. Great
Once it was back together, I fired it up and it was smooth as old, turbo'd silk.
Even the
now wife helped change the lifters!
Fast forwards to around a month ago and she started playing up again. Following a good day out and a full tank of fuel going through it, it gradually developed a stumble and began to run a lot leaner than it should, 18:1 afr rather than the usual 15:1 at cruise. It was also down on power and began to miss fire occasionally. Whilst thinking about what had brought this about, I remembered that I haven't replaced the fuel filter since the turbo went on so that would be a good place to start. A good habit is to check any filters you remove as this can tell you a lot about the car. This one told me that when I went for my grand day out and ran the fuel gauge off the empty mark it sucked up a load of clart from the bottom of the tank and gummed everything up. Doh!
I threw in a spare filter and absolutely nothing changed.
The next course was to look at the pump. I already knew I had a spare and that the one that was fitted wasn't much use, so I swapped them over and found that the car ran better, but only because it was pumping the fuel pressure up to 90psi at idle!! Once it was adjusted down to normal, it was back to its lumpy running(ish) self.
The only thing left were the injectors. The sun was out so I set about pulling the inlet apart to be able to remove the injectors and check the fuel rail. Upon removal I found that all the injectors were showing sediment build up and one of them was almost completely blocked, no wonder it was running badly.
Seeing as I required 8 new injectors I had to work out how to pay for them. A trip to the scrappy a week before provided most of the money for a set of 8 440cc Bosch green giant injectors
To get the injectors to fit, i had to wait for the wife to go out. This was so that i could borrow her vacuum cleaner and use it to suck out all the swarf whilst I was drilling out the injector holes. I managed to just get the vacuum back as she came in the house
Once it was all buttoned up I changed the injector size in Tuner studio for the ECU, turned the key and heard the car run smoother than it ever has.
So I turned the boost up another 2psi and pushed some more fuel in
Two weeks went by without issue until the car simply wouldn't start. After trying the key a few times and finding that everything lit up I noticed that the hum of the fuel pump priming had vanished. luckily the lack of a garage at home (still) means that most of my electrical tools were in the cavernous boot so a quick test with the multimeter shown that the pump was getting no power. Traced it back and found that the relay had melted, which I could only assume was from the extra current draw of the Walbro 450 that was fitted.
I quickly ran in a temporary feed straight from the battery, blanked out the image of a fiery death if I car crashed on the way back and got the car home.
Three days ago I got back from my holidays as made up a new supply for the fuel pump with a fused 30a relay which should be sufficient. It was whilst I was doing this that I thought that I should update this thread !
This could be my last post in this thread regarding the car as I will be putting it up for sale soon. A possible house move or the construction of a garage here if we don't move are priority currently so someone else will get to enjoy this death trap
It'll be missed, but it'll lead to bigger and better projects!
James