Redwing's Car - An Update

[SteveJ]

Even more reason for me to think that Philip is on the right track.  When you start, stop, turn or change elevation, you stir up the tank.  

[Redwing]

At 8:30 tonite, still at 26.

Edited August 21, 2015 by Redwing

[SteveJ]

I hope that we can maybe flush out enough of the crap to let you drive it if we can drop the tank.

[Redwing]

Sounds good, thank you.

Jai

[EuroDat]

Steve, Next time you go, take some extra high pressure fuel hose so yoh can mount the fuel gauge on one of the wiper arms. You can leave the bonnet slightly open. I found it very handy for testing and watching what the pressure was doing while driving and stalling etc.

[siteunseen]

If it has one, what's the G3 filter look like at the tank?

[Redwing]

Reporting, the gauge after overnight, is now resting at zero.

Steve, my ex left me with a pair of exceedingly strong magnets. So strong, a finger would suffer Much Damage

if suddenly caught in between them. I noted someone used magnets to collect the debris in the tank by placing them in strategic places. As a temp remedy natch. Knowing this, and the availability of such magnets, I am just offering this as an assistant to my problems. When you are here you can make a decision as to use them or not. Just a FYI, not too many people would have the availability of these magnets. Especially a female. Hahaha

Jai

[Redwing]

Steve and all,

I was reading a new post, "Poor Gas Mileage 77 280 Z." I mentioned early after I joined, but I don't know if anyone heard me, that RedBird has awful mileage too, 18 mpg. She has been doing this ever since I received her. So now reading this post, maybe this is involved with her problem ('s). Mentoning it, so those that have their thinking caps on regarding RedBird, would have access to this information.

Thanks,

Jai

[Redwing]

Steve, Greg, and Tony really went far and above expectation working on RedBird yesterday. I really want to thank these fine gentlemen for putting such effort and time into her for me. I think it was 7:30-8:00 when they finally quit. It was amazing to watch, all those hands doing their choice of jobs. At one point the back end almost looked like a tornado hit her. Gas tank gone, the deck area was torn up with the inner parts laying in a pile inside her. Be still my heart I thought, they will return her to her glory again. And they did. Hahaha

As of today, this is my experience with her. Steve will write what they all did, I kept track, writing it all down.

So you will get the whole picture later on.

This morning when I went to church, RB got me there. But she was not doing super well. Doing small loping, and would not go over 45 mph. No matter how much gas I gave her. The knock in the back was knocking so fast it was like a machine gun. Fooey, I thought.

As I was starting out to come home, it was not so severe. Then, just as if I HAD FLIPPED A SWITCH, it instantly stopped AND DROVE NORMAL. I could not hardly believe it. Like when I first got her. So I drove on towards Eton, turned around and started from a dead stop. Revved her a bit, did a fast start, and got to 65 before going into 4th gear. She took all the load as a matter of fact, no problem. It was like something had been blocking her from getting fuel, and suddenly it cleared! Poof, all over she said, let's go!

So I will be taking her on short trips like Steve mentioned to test her further. But I am much more at ease with her now than before, even when we drove down the drive. Tomorrow I plan to go 10 miles round trip, to Chatsworth (to get chicken feed, they are out). After this morning I do not expect any problems.

Oh, when she was snuggled into her carport, I revved her a bit, while listening and sniffing. She gave a SMALL poooof backfire each time I revved. So quiet I had to listed hard to hear it.

That's All Folks...

Jai

[SteveJ]

Okay, so yesterday apparently went well. Greg was on hand as was Tony, a friend from the Georgia Z Club.

 

Tony and Greg looked over the car, and then we got it up on ramps. (I can't say enough good things about Race Ramps.) Tony shot underneath and started draining the tank with some assistance from me while Greg worked on the temperature sender and sensor. After the tank was drained as much as we could, Tony was working on the lines in and out of the tank while I removed the trim work to get to the vent hoses on top. Tony got the straps loose and dropped the tank. We poured it out and saw some rust. Then we used some gasoline to slosh around the tank to get out any other loose rust we could. We didn't use anything to try to break it up because I didn't want to remove the sender out of fear of damaging the O ring or retaining ring. The couple of rinses with gas seemed to get some more rust out. We heard something rattling in the tank. I put a strong magnet near the drain hole to capture the rattling object, hoping it was ferrous. We lucked out. Tony plucked out a couple of links of some sort by using a magnetic reach.

 

Greg realized he had some other parts at home that would prove useful to the cause and drove back to get them, stopping to pick us up some lunch on his way back. (Thanks, Greg. I normally don't stop to eat, so the burger was appreciated.)

 

We got the tank back in, and Greg finished the under hood work. (Greg feel free to post details. I was so busy with the tank that I wasn't paying attention to what you were doing.) Among the parts Greg replaced were the PCV valve, connector for the temperature sensor, plenty of vacuum hose, filter on the carbon canister...What did I miss, Greg?

 

We got everything buttoned up, and ready to run. The car refused to start and just backfired out the intake. After going over potential problems, we finally pulled the distributor, and turned it 180 degrees. The Z fired right up. Greg noticed some leaks around the thermostat, so he took it apart again to check assembly and torque. He got it buttoned up, and we got the Z running again. I constricted the return line some and noticed the car ran stronger. I dumped a full container of fuel injector cleaner into the tank, and the car seemed to start running a little bit better. Jai and I took it for a short test run, and we made it back fine.

 

I suggested that the drive to church would be more of an acid test. It sounds like it passed that test today.

 

If the injectors were gummed up some, maybe the fuel injection needed more pressure to get enough volume through the injectors. I'm hoping we made real progress.

[240260280z]

PrayerZ answered!

[grannyknot]

Well done Gents. Sounds like it needs a good old Italian tune up.