🔧 BUILD Quarter Life Crisis. It's a thing. v.GN

[v6buicks]

I'm pretty determined to make this thing work again.

PB blaster did a lot of good, but it wasn't enough.

An external waste gate conversion is not terribly invasive since it can be added to these turbos without touching the headers. However, it's expensive, and most of the new down pipes have some fitment issues that make them not worth their price tag. I looked into my puck issue on Buick boards, and it's apparently pretty common. RJC even sells repair parts for their down pipes which are reportedly useless for repairing the actual problem.

The issue is that in order to combat exhaust leaks, the shaft is purposely fit very tight in the bore. However, no space is too tight for corrosion and carbon buildup to get on there and cause sticking. A lot of people actually drill the plug weld, remove the shaft, drill the hole one drill size bigger so that it can't stick, and weld the thing back together. This is at the expense of having a small leak until junk fills it up again. I don't know how I feel about that as a true fix.

Then I remembered an old post where Turbocharged400sbc was bitching about how I used anti-seize on a bolt and that it sucks because it's abrasive and bad for threads. ?

I figured it was worth seeing it I could work some anti-seize in like penetrating oil.

I just worked the shaft for about a half hour... Heheh. Then I brake cleaned the anti-seize out of it and and the motion was feeling almost flawless. There are still some slight hang ups, but I hope I can work them out by continuing to fuck with it. I don't see any reason to replace parts. I'd feel good about putting this back on once it gets a ceramic coating.

 

[sktchy]

First of all. Throw that pb blaster in the trash and get some free all.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

Kroil Sloot

If you have some ARP thread Lube use that with its Molly and graphite to lube the shaft ( use the dry crusty stuff where the oil has drained away from it up near the top of your can if you're like me and bought the giant can cuz you do this s*** way too much) and add a drop of silicone oil or supercharger gearbox oil to keep it wet after the oil carriers in the arp lube burn off. which is really high temp burn off type stuff replacing the low temp arp carrier.

 

[sktchy]

Free all is Kroil based just doesnt have a fancy label. Pb doesn't ever seem to do much but bubble and look cool

 

[v6buicks]

I think I have a jar of ARP lube somewhere.

PB has been working but I know Kroil is way better. I just haven't taken the time to look for it locally. Lol

 

[sktchy]

Pb is fine until you figure out there's way better lol.

Anyways back to your regularly scheduled programming.

 

[v6buicks]

Looks like I have a little mouse problem. Lovely!

Interesting. I've never seen springs inside a radiator hose before. Is this how they used to reinforce the suction side? I always wondered why it was hard. lol I have new hoses in the basement.

It's really unfortunate. My powermaster didn't leak externally, but my reman vacuum master did when I initially did the conversion. That's long since been fixed, but it left it's legacy.

If you're removing a GN downpipe and you don't have a lift, you're going to wish you did.

I find it amazing that people have ran 10 second quarter miles with 6 of these exhaust ports. lol

Anyway, the downpipe and passenger side header have been removed. It's possible that the rattle I was hearing was not the stuck puck, but the not so tight exhaust clamps.

This thing is gross. I don't even know how to go about cleaning it. As per usual, this could turn into a huge can of worms if let it. I was ready to open it up to an extent, but some of these issues could warrant a frame-off service if I really wanted to do the job well. That's not going to happen in a winter, and I'll never get it done in a lift-less two car garage. I'm having a very hard time determining where the line needs to be drawn. Hopefully I'll figure that out as soon as I get the car taken apart as far as I initially planned.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

The lower radiator hose coil is to keep it from collapsing during the factory vacuum fill if I recall

 

[v6buicks]

Judging by the spring, shitty old school clamps, poor appearance, and the fact that they needed to be torn off their respective nipples, I'm going to say they were original.

 

[b4black]

With the test pipe off, the downpipe will come out the top.

 

[v6buicks]

With the test pipe off, the downpipe will come out the top.

Mine was u-bolt clamped and a tight fit to begin with unfortunately. Now that it's out I'm going to try to separate them, but I'm not holding my breath.

 

[Mr_Roboto]

Good to see you're started, even if you're not ecstatic about where it is. You always do nice work and pay attention to details, I'd think this one's gonna take you time.

In terms of the heads, I think it shows how powerful boost can be. It also makes me regret touching my 4.0L head considering how fast a cam only GN has gone in the 1/4 and considering that it has 60 CFM on a stock GN casting.

 

[v6buicks]

Boost Lab called me back. I got fucked on that TA49 "core".

Apparently the shaft is bent and the turbine wheel is worthless. The ball bearings that were used to build this one are apparently obsolete, so the only way they can fix it is by converting it back to journal bearings. They assured me that the amount of time it takes to spool will only be raised about 100-150 rpm, but it's still not as good. After all that, the cost to repair would be $1100. I would have just bought another stock turbo or a brand new TA49 had I known that. FML. If I tell them to send it back I'd be out the core price, shipping both ways, and a $90 inspection fee, so I told them to just go ahead with the repair.

I'm sick to my stomach.

 

[v6buicks]

I've since cooled off a bit about the turbo. I still got screwed, but Boost Lab offered to give me free ceramic coating since I was already paying so much money. That makes me feel quite a bit better. Their service is also very quick, because I already have a tracking number claiming delivery by Saturday!

I took more stuff off the front of the engine and didn't feel amazing about it. First of all, wtf 80s GM?? It's no wonder how Honda and Toyota started surpassing your sales numbers because this construction is fucking terrible. It's not that I didn't know this already given that I've had an '85 El Camino down to a short block and did an air pump delete on an '88 C1500. This experience still doesn't frustrate me any less! I just oddly miss foreign manufacturing right now. I have so many loose bolts, nuts, and brackets without even a good way to store or ID them, so I already know that reassembly is going to be extra frustrating.

Speaking of bolts, I have a lot of ugly ones. They will work just fine, but I want them to look just as nice as the parts they're fastening. I might start another thread with my questions about that.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

Get a tub like a Rubbermaid one and do your own rust removal soda bath with the pool shock chemical and car battery and charger.
Then toss them all in a bucket and take it down to your nearest zinc plater

 

[v6buicks]

Get a tub like a Rubbermaid one and do your own rust removal soda bath with the pool shock chemical and car battery and charger.
Then toss them all in a bucket and take it down to your nearest zinc plater

I didn't know it was a thing to take your parts somewhere to have that done. I wonder if my powder coating guy does that kind of stuff. If not, there's an anodizing shop on my way home from work that does black oxide. I haven't had great luck with black oxide though. It seems to rust really quickly.

Do you know if the plating process affects or does any harm to non-metallic parts? Have some parts that I can't strip down any further but are getting rusty like my intercooler fan and Power Master pump. I'm guessing the act of getting the parts clean and free of rust is going to be the bigger issue though.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

Black oxide is low oxygen corrosion rust it's benefit is that when it is coated in oil it holds that oil fairly well and the oil in it prevent oxygen from interacting with the iron underneath. It's why your impact sockets and everything don't really rust until you clean the oil off of them.

Yeah you'd end up with a lot charge for a basket or bucket worth of hardware I think we ended up doing about a half full 5 gallon bucket for 70 bucks at one time for gold zinc

 

[v6buicks]

This is an overwhelming view for me, but it's also a lot less so when I realize that I could have the Camaro to this point in about an hour.

I get why turbo Buick owners are so irritable and closed for questions. ? These obviously went together somehow, but the amount of shit in the way of any job makes all repairs and maintenance a pain in the ass. I really should have just pulled this engine out, but the silver lining is that I'm learning a lot about the car.

I finally got the driver side header off, and uncovered one of the most infamous repair items.

Can't see it? Allow me too zoom in a bit.

It's the good ol' 3-5 crack. Stock headers will always do this. I'm not sure if I'm willing to attempt this repair, but I bet I can convince a coworker to do it. Supposedly there's an extra brace you can add to help prevent future cracks too. I have yet to see an example of one though. I'm not sure if it's the flange I'm supposed to brace or just make a web to put between the two runners.

There really doesn't seem to be a better place to put the AC compressor when it's disconnected from the bracket so that's really in the way. ?

I'm starting to get indecisive in terms of originality. I have all the parts to keep it looking stock, and I think it looks great with all the factory parts. It gives it a sleeper vibe. At the same time, it's not a stock car nor is it even that nice, so why bother? I think it's worth doing some tasteful modifications while I have the thing apart. The EGR is kind of in the way of service and all the chips disable it anyway. I'll probably block it off. The charcoal canister is also in the way of big air filters and the original air box is a big restriction. It would be an upgrade to ditch that too. The turbo drain tube was kind of a bitch to get loose and I see why people tend to convert to AN stuff. It's a short length of hard tubing with ribs for minimal amounts of give and also minimal oil flow.

The goals for this winter are starting to get narrowed down. Performance is becoming less of a short term goal, but it's still definitely part of the plan. I just want this thing to run solid for now, and I believe I've found a lot of great ways to improve and modernize. Most of that will happen by fixing exhaust leaks. Any part I remove will also look better than I found it.

 

[v6buicks]

After doing some light googling, a lot of turbobuick.com members seem like a bunch of clean-handed babies. All the suggestions I see are TIG only! Gotta use unobtanium rods! It'll warp! Just buy TA headers. They're only $8,000.

The real car guys from the good old days say otherwise. After some heavy googling turbobuicks.com (yes, a completely different forum) says the headers are just 409 stainless. Clean them up really good, put a small valley in the crack and MIG it up. They even posted a picture because the cool guys do shit themselves. What do you know! It even shows the brace that apparently held up very nicely from '98 to at least '10!

Yeah, they probably will warp, but they're already leaking sooooo..... It's going to the belt sander regardless. I don't know what all the TIG snobs are squawking about because there's no way to see this section of the header when the car is put together anyway. Would TIG and and back purge be preferable? Yes. Will other means work? Also, yes. I'm going to try this myself. It'll hold.

 

[v6buicks]

This is about as far as I plan to go. I'll probably replace the timing chain at the least because of there is a lot more slop than I'm used to seeing. I have no idea if it's worth attempting a double roller swap or anything like that. Turbocharged400sbc daturbosix Is it even something worth attempting when I know that I'm not swapping cams or aggressive valve springs?

Also, I started looking at my headers a bit closer.

Oof

OOOOFFFF!!!

That vertical crack on the left is so bad that the pipe is actually blown out. I had to squeeze it back into shape with channel locks.

This car never would have ran right if I didn't dive in here. This was a serious leak. Considering how easy it was to pry the four little welds holding on the heat shield, I'm now guessing THAT is the loose change sound I heard under certain loads.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

If you're not changing anything a good quality melling or cloy's timing chain would not hurt

 

[v6buicks]

If you're not changing anything a good quality melling or cloy's timing chain would not hurt

I'm going to do a mild spring upgrade, but that's probably it. Any reason to go with a roller? The tensioner pad doesn't even look worn.

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

If you're going to go a bit nuts with spring pressures I would say the double roller but if you're just doing a mild spring pressure increase I would think the factory style rocker link timing chain would work just fine for your use

 

[v6buicks]

If you're going to go a bit nuts with spring pressures I would say the double roller but if you're just doing a mild spring pressure increase I would think the factory style rocker link timing chain would work just fine for your use

I THINK if I ever decide to party it's not going to be with a 109. I might even start gathering 3800 stuff in preparation for the 109s demise.

 

[daturbosix]

The HD cloyes should be fine. No need for double roller or gear drive.

If you need those headers welded, let me know, I've done a few on my own cars... Don't feel bad, they ALL split