Hmm. I had not considered this.

I will pull the cat and check it once I get the front of the engine back together. The timing belt checked out fine.

Still, I would expect a blocked cat, like a fuel system deficiency, to cause more severe problems at higher RPM and load. That's what's weird about this problem. When it's happening, the engine idles poorly and has little torque below 2000 RPM, but runs well at high RPM and high load.

 

Cat looks good, although two of the four studs are now stripped to hell.




Fuel system seems healthy. Before the filter change:

Key on, engine off: 44 PSI
5 minutes: 35.5 PSI

Idle: 35 PSI

Dead head: 78 PSI
5 minutes: 64 PSI

 

 

I take it you do not hear any rattles when you shake the cat...

 

Joe, just bear with me on this:

Did the brakes feel any different when you had your engine issues?

 

On a completely unrelated topic, can I use an aluminum tube and fin type "radiator" designed to cool a pc (thermaltake 240mm radiator, to be exact) as an oil cooler on my scooter?
I'm going all out on this thing!

 

That is correct. And having so examined the cat, I carried it outside and held it up in the air. So positioned, I gazed through it at the sun, and seeing it, judged the catalyst material to be intact along its entire length. My neighbor, passing by, observed thusly:

"That's an interesting telescope."


I did not perceive an obvious difference in the feel of the brakes.

 

Does the scooter have an automotive-style pressurized oil system?

Bursting strength would be my principal concern.

 

I am now double-clutching downshifts AND upshifts. I scoff at syncro wear.

 

That is my concern, too. That's why I would like to use a tube and fin type over the traditional whatchamadoodle type - like what we have on the cars.

There is a mechanical pump, so the oil is pressurized. I honestly do not know how much.


I am beginning to worry about overheating the air cooled engine with the big bore kit, EFI conversion and gear-up mods on the transmission system.

I went to the motorcycle fair over the weekend. There are quite a few decent scooters, but they are just way too expensive. Some are pushing upwards of 10K Euros. Mine is definitely not expensive...

I examined all the expensive scooters. What makes them expensive - other than the shiny finish - is a bigger bore, EFI and oil cooling. So, I feel better about spending a few hundred bucks to "improve" my bike.

Pretty much the same approach as the car. With every penny I have buried in the car so far, I get to drive a very cool performing car that puts truly expensive cars to shame, for the price of a 3 year old VW Passat .

 

I just ordered 6 gallons and saved $71

Thanks for the heads up.

 

?!?

Over here, €10k will buy you two full-size motorcycles, and not shitty ones either. For that money, you could have a CBR500R plus a KLR650 with a bit of money left over.


Now, I'm curious as to why you asked about the brakes. You're thinking of a vacuum leak, I suppose? Were that the case, I'd expect RPM to rise. But the IAC valve was definitely being commanded to produce 60 kPa, and the engine was idling around 850 RPM.

 

Not that you dicks deserve to know, but this morning I headed to Gettysburg, which I was afraid might be dumb but I was truly impressed with the magnitude of the carnage that took place there. The fact that the disagreement was about whether or not it's ok to own humans like plow horses made it more sobering still.

After that I headed south east towards Baltimore then realised at the last minute that nobody ever went to Baltimore on purpose, so I swerved right and hit Washington instead. I spotted a white WRX with a skinny driver and a sarcastic passenger, but it didn't have a goofy license plate so I kept going. Across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge and into Delaware just so I could say I've been there. (It's true! I have been there!) After farting around in Dover for a while I headed south to Lewes and caught the Ferry to Cape May New Jersey. Now I'm in a motel in Cape May New Jersey. It's not the shittiest hotel I've ever been in, but the carpet is sticky and, well, it's almost the shittiest hotel I've ever been in.

I'm hoping that tomorrow I'll make some actual friends so that I won't need you guys. If not, you'll be updated.

 

Hmm Cape May New Jersey that's where i went to boot camp for the USCG.
Interesting memories.
And as far as us being your friends Dave: ACK!!! ACK!!!

 

Playing raceroom with an xbox controller is like driving using a rock to steer.

 

why you pass the brain without stopping?

 

Because it was Saturday and you were probably still in your pj's. I didn't bring any so it would have been awkward for everyone.

Anyway, this morning I started driving up the coast of New Jersey, but the only thing there was New Jersey. I felt compelled to drive through Atlantic City, but that was just like the rest of New Jersey only more intense. In fact, everything you've heard about New Jersey is true and I really can't add anything except that the roads are probably worse than you've heard. AWD was helpful though obviously not necessary. After clawing my way up to New York State I went around "The City" because it takes a bigger commitment to penetrate than I was ready to invest. Got home to several inches of snow and more falling. It might be a month or more before the Miata gets to stretch its legs.

1140 miles in 2.5 days. The 35 miles to work in the morning will probably seem long...

 

Certain things are outrageously expensive over here. Those two bikes you mentioned would be close to $20K in Turkey.

A friend of mine bought an Audi Q7 in the states. In Seattle, to be exact, and she paid something like 45K for it. They go for $177,678 for the 3 liter diesel version here. And look at my sig for gas prices.

My scooter cost me just about $1100. It was about a month old when I bought it. The thing costs about 2K brand new now.

Anyway.. I was trying to picture your car's symptoms, and trying to come up with a possible scenario by eliminating variables. A large vacuum leak seemed likely for some reason.

Come to think of it, you might want to hook up your TPS on a scope and perform some torture tests while watching out for dropouts. TPSs spend most of their lives in the lower range and that's where most glitches happen.

 

I'm accustomed to the price of gasoline being high by American standards elsewhere. Not so much the price of motorcycles.


I can't quite envision how a bad TPS would be causing this sort of anomaly at idle without also showing up in a log as bad.

Replaced the fuel filter this morning. The old one, along with the lines and clamps, looked brand new. I must have changed this when I first bought the car and forgotten about it.


I have begun to consider the possibility that this fault is indeed related to the ECU. I can think of only one root cause which completely fits all of my symptoms and leaves nothing to mystery: highly retarded ignition which is for some reason occurring only at low RPM. This would permit operation with normal AFR at a 60 kPa idle, and also cause torquelessness when on-throttle.

I am going to start carrying a timing gun with me in the car. If it does this again, that will be the first thing I look at.


Total number of productive things I accomplished this weekend: 0

 

Join the club. I managed to make zero progress on my projects, too...