The Frankenprotege rallycar worklog

[SgtRauksauff]

brake fluid? is it on the driver side? not sure what else would eat rubber, unless you were using some sort of high-power degreaser/detergent for cleaning something?

just use some duct tape, it'll be fine....

[jay]

We took it all apart, again. Found no real smoking gun. Gonna redo the speedisleeve cuz John was able to make it move, but even if it was leaking, no way could it account for the volume of flow. The seal housing was fine, but the machine shop just used a paper gasket and it came off nice and clean. Too clean. As if they used no sealer. So maye that's it, cuz the corners where it meets the block and MBSP are critical. We pulled the oilpan as well. We'll get every sealing surface clean enough to do surgery on, layer up a nice even squish of Toyota black, and then before putting the trans on, we'll put the engine together enough to fire it up and make damn sure it's not leaking...

[Mazda_Powered]

should be nice and sealed after the Toyota black, sounds like you're kicking ass tho, good job!

[KaleoXtreme]

Sounds like a good plan. Looking forward to positive results!

[jay]

how to make it not leak

OK. so we have an oil leak into bellhousing not solved by installing speedisleeve on suspect crank sealing surface, so back to my pal's shop it goes. We installed the oilpan but did not install the mainseal housing, and it has a paper gasket. So the housing's coming out. If the housing's coming out, the pan's coming off. If the pan's coming off, the MBSP's coming off too. And all those surfaces get cleaned...cleaned like you really mean it. I spent around 4 hours getting all the old toyota black off of everything everywhere. Then you brakecleen every surface, remove all traces of oil from anyhwhere near those surfaces, put a thin layer of toyota goop on them, and reinstall. Quickly, so it doesn't get a chance to set up before it's bolted together. The only gaskets used are the halfmoon rubbers at each end of the crank, and they got toyota sealer on them as well. No pan gasket, no housing gasket, just toyota goop. And to make sure it had no excuses, we let everything set up overnight. Then yesterday we fired up the engine with the trans out of the car, so we could see if there was any leakage and there wasn't. So we went to lunch and tried it again. Still no leaks. Gratifyingly, it looks like we got the leak at the other end of the engine as well, so maybe I don't have to do front main and it was the halfmoon gasket. Maybe we didn't eliminate all oil traces when we did that install. Now that we were fairly sure it wasn't leaking anymore, we took a good hard look at everything else and fixed a couple of what could have been rally ending problems, and simplified a few other things. Like now the starter's held in with 2 bolts instead of 3 and that last one's a real beeyotch to get to, and we simplified the lower front trans mount, and increased the number of fasteners going from the trans to the block. The car's back here, and later I'll finish assembly and make sure it's all happy, but it's been driven at least a few minutes and no oil in the bellhousing so I'm saying job done. There's a rallycross at the end of July in Chehalis, if I'm not working, I'll go down there and thrash on it. Make sure it's ready to rumble at Mt. Hood in October...

[Mazda_Powered]

glad she fired up without any signs of leakage man!!! good things are coming your way...

[bomdoutscort]

Great job and dedication.

[jrally]

Way to stick with it and get this thing back together. I've got some oil leaks of my own, on the Escort rally car. I'm thinking it's more of a crankcase breather (lack of) problem and a reverse light switch on the tranny leaking.

-Jon R.

[jay]

After taking a vacation from the damn thing, I went ahead and finished putting it back together and testdrove. Good news, no oil in the bellhousing. Bad news, the leak at the other end of the crank didn't go away when we redid the pan. So it looks like I gotta do front main as well. At least the trans doesn't have to come out.
I like the way this thing comes on boost. My driveway does not, however. I'm gonna hafta fire up the tractor and boxscrape it again...

My pal John accidentally gave this car its permanent name... Humpty. Within a few minutes, I redid the rhyme:
Humpty Dumpty sat by a stage
Humpty Dumpty don't need a rollcage
Despite all our best efforts, one time or ten
We just can't get Humpty together again



all we can do at this point is laugh about it....

[Mazda_Powered]

haha that sounds like a good time. Glad the difficult crank seal is holding lol, sucks about the other end...but shouldn't take much work.

[jay]

The leak wasn't the front mainseal. It was weeping from around the halfmoon or the bottom of the pump gasket. Either way, I was looking at a big ugly job. Since I had nothing to lose, I decided to clean up that area with brakleen and qtips, since there is a nice big gap tween the pan and housing to stuff more toyota goop into, stuffed it full like a roachcoach taco, let it set up a couple days, testdrove for 10-15 miles or so, and look maw, no leaks. I'm calling it job done till further notice. I figure we're using that stuff as gasket material everywhere else, that it's capable of sealing sh!t up on it's own as long as surface prep is good enough, that this repair oughtta do. Now it's on to getting the front end alignment down right, and check struts for compliance (something you simply have to have done with competition struts that have been sitting), and new ECU, now that it's a going concern. Then new seatbelts and recertify the fire system. Then go RALLY. Hot diggity.

[bomdoutscort]

Congrats. I hope it was worth the wait, tears, blood, sweat, wrenching and rewrenching lol.

[jay]

If it ain't, the for sale thread'll be on this board....

[letard]

nice work, i just finished reading the whole thread lol, wish i had coin to do something like this

[jay]

Well, after 2 years of blood sweat and money, I'm just about at the point of wrapping this thread up and putting the skidplate back on. I'm replacing the inner cv boots today without questioning how they got those mysterious holes in em, and tomorrow it's going back up to my pal John's shop. Difference being I'm driving it, not trailering it. Gonna go up there to pick up some parts. I have a spare rear diff that we've gotta turn from stock open to welded spool, and I have a spare set of front LCA's that need stretching. Good excuse to take it out and finish the breakin period. If everything goes well this week, we'll use the rallycross at PIR on Oct 9 as a shakedown, and then send entry in for the Mt. Hood rally. Oh godam I'm so so stoked...