hella freakin sweet, my rebuilt motor breathed tonight!
 

I finally finished installing the motor I rebuilt tonight. I had a few initial problems because I started rushing towards the end ... :td: bad idea. But the smoking alternator belt due to my stupidity could not stop me. I put 20 miles on it and it ran like a champ (meaning it did not blow up). I started the break in by going down the street at 2 - 3k rpm in first until it got warm, then after getting some gas I took it around the outskirts of town bringing it up to 5k rpm and letting the revs drop naturally to seat the rings in various gears, mostly 1-3.

Anyway, its loud and my ears are ringing right now. I need to find a stock axleback, or even a moderately loud NA setup to swap on until i get the turbo setup going so i can start driving the car a lot more and actually enjoy it.

One thing I dont really get right now is that it seems my speedometer is off a bit (tach seems fine though) I could be wrong though because I am used to driving a 3.9 rear end and 5% larger circumference tires. However after getting on the interstate and matching speed with a semi at just under 80 mph has me wondering.

you are in Cali where semis go 80 all the time.

Well, its been a few days now and ive put about 200 miles on the engine. Finally started putting the hammer down a few days ago and since then have spent some quality time in high rpms. My impression ... wow, this thing hauls ass now! It just feels so eager to go in a way neither the old motor nor my 1.8 ever felt. I always liked the feel of the 1.6 better because of the cams or something ... like you get to 4500rpm and all of a sudden it kicks in and pulls hard to redline, whereas the 1.8 feels somewhat flat.

Anyway, I have not done a compression test, but judging by my ear and by no noticable oil consumption, all seems well and I am eager for my tein coilovers and helium/azeni combo to come so i can get my suspension in check.

Theres still a couple issues that I will be adressing tomorrow probably, first is that my coolant thermister in the back of the engine is out I think and is causing random high idle that returns to normal with TEn and GND jumpered, so the ISC valve is working properly. My other issue is that my fan motor is squealing. Apparantly someone from M.net used some grease on the motor in a certain spot and it cured the problem, so im gonna try that before spending on a new fan.