So I just got rid of my 99 eclipse last week(had it for 8 years and just got sick of it) this might be long and I apologize if you dont like to read

I picked up a 93 hatch that is in amazing shape as far as the body and interior go. new legit paintjob, no cancer or signs of it, the underbody looks amazing.

Its a turbo'd dc16zc (jdm sohc vtec)
dsm 440 injectors,
walboro 255
fmic
1g eclipse bov
tial 38mm with 10 psi spring
turbo (cant tell what brand, the only identifying mark I can see on it is W12 stamped near the bottom. previous owner claimed it to be a t3/t4 50 trim.. it doesnt start spooling till 3800 hitting peak around 5k)
chipped p28 ecu
catless exhaust with just a resonator and it appears to be 2.5inch
stage 3 clutch (when I asked previous owner what brand he just told me exedy clutch fidanza flywheel and quit responding to me upon further inquires as to more specifics about it and the car in general for that matter)

has gsr brake swap, lowerings springs, looks like stock shocks, some blox lca and some great sleeper steelies


So I am aware that added stress of fi will make things alot less reliable than your average honda and I expected some bumps in the road but this thing has just been a headache and i've only had it for 5 days.

Ive been hanging at my buddies shop more in the last 3 days than I did in a whole year with my eclipse.

after 2 days I noticed oil on the garage floor.. ahh wtf, so I bring it down to the shop (lift is yummy).. by the time I get there the diz is pissing oil. (replaced it, got a faulty one and had to replace it again today)
check everything out and it was running the stock copper plugs which were shot, had a terribad o2 sensor, needed some vaccumm hose's ran differently.

the breather on the valve cover was just sitting there with nothing done to it ( not sure what to do with it, plug it? route it into the charge pipe? right now i just put some hose on it and have it pointing under the engine so it quit spitting oil at the firewall, it smokes out of there as well....)

turbo has no filter on it, not sure how to go about routing that

the tial's diaphragm wasnt working, but i was able to luckily fix it, wasnt ripped.

yesterday the car started smoking white smoke only while driving, checked coolant and oil levels and they havent moved ::

got home last night and the window fell off track, thats still messed up, need to hold it back while i roll it up.

get home today after getting the diz oil leak problem sorted, and its leaking from somewhere else now.. its looks like its coming from the trans case, but I really can not tell.

I've heard so many conflicting stories on where or not I need to goto the dyno, the ecu was loaded with a base tune.. my mechanic told me I would be throwing my money away. My buddy that works for honda told me that with a base tunes its fine as long as its stock internals, but reading on here I see the topic of get a good tune come up alot.

but all the same since I got it I havent been beating on, or going WOT, I kept the spring out of the wg till I get everything sorted because I dont want to blow anything up, I want a some-what reliable car I ofc have a daily driver, but It would be nice to have some fun with this thing and its been limping around since I got it.

I already put a grand into it in the last 5 days and if this oil leak is really coming from the trans case I see disaster there, im just so bummed with this damn thing, I thought the car worked as the owner assured me, but it clearly doesnt.

Im ready to just sell it lol, which sucks cuz I really like it, but if this much trouble already it seems like its just gonna keep getting worse and worse.. is there a light at the end of this one?

 

Sounds like you got a beater/rice/build to me.

For DD the last car I would look for is a FI D-series, unless it was meticulously built up with proper internals, tuning, all the right parts on it ,not running lean/rich, oil catch can etc.

I'd say jump ship and find a stock honda with low miles and go from there.

 

I do have a daily driver, this was supposed to be my fun car, but its had been every bit of not fun so far :<

 

How much did you pay for the car?

 

4grand

 

sounds like you got ripped,If tranny fluid is leaking,check your axle seals and shift rod seal.

 

im under the impression these trannys used regular 10w-30 oil so I cant tell for sure where its coming from.

I mean, all things considered, a prefectly clean hatch with a new paint job, like door jams, engine bay no orange peel, looks brand damn new. new teggy seats, new carpet and door panels.. Add all the turbo parts i figure it would have cost alot more buying a stock one for 2500 in good shape and doing the swap myself.

 

well prices in your area must be different,because you can get a clean 92-95 si with a GSR with all the extras for 4 g's and about your leak your never gonna know where it's coming from unless you check.

 

yeah I cleaned everything up last night so I can start trying to pin point where its coming from.

 

seems like its a clean car except for the engine and what not.. so you can make a decision of fixing whats wrong with it or just swapping and go b-series. if you want a fun car, b is the way to go and then at least YOU'LL KNOW what has been done to it instead of guessing what the previous has done.. btw, got pics of it? dying to see it

 

I would try and sell it for as much as you can and get a completely stock one. That way you can build it up yourself and have that satisfaction of knowing your baby

 

honestly , I would take a 1000 buck and rebuild the damn thing with vitaras or CP pistons , and get some rods , all new seals , and maybe even tranny rebuild if your worried about it.

 

Well, you're doing things right by trying to locate the leak etc.
As a project car (fun) car I don't see it as that bad... I mean, it runs and once you've worked out the kinds I think you could easily have a solid fun car.

Even trans case etc... parts for honda's are soo damn cheap that it shouldn't cost too much more to get opreational again (especially on a d series).

Obviously you'll know more about what's going on once that oil leak is tracked down.

 

In my experience I've shopped around for a ton of D-SERIES FI builds and 90% of them were pretty bad. Strong fuel smell, leaking parts, mix matched parts. Turbo 10 sizes too big etc.

The only thing that would get me to buy a D-series build is if it had proper internals and all the right parts.

-block-
eagle/vitara scat/vitara FJR/vitara custom lengthFJR/vitara TT/vitara/CP tec.

-turbo-
T3/T4 50trim or 57trim turbo ,not go over a .63 A/R

Keep your hopes up maybe you can get it running clean and leak free, my first goal woul be to fix the weakest link in a D which is the block with it's pencil thin connecting rods. If you want a long life daily beast.

 

well as far as we can tell today the trans case was leaking because it was over filled.. but its strange it didnt start happening till 3 days after i got it.

a whole new can of worms with the thing today... I would post up some pics but I left at my buddys shop crippled.

we did some tinkering around today trying to sort crap out, it was smoking pretty bad whenever you hit the gas(smelled like fuel), checked into things I think we had the wrong plugs, got some densos that matched the info on the the timing belt cover.

I got out to test drive it, i get into second and put the clutch into take a turn and it dies, wont start without the gas on the floor.

once its running it idles fine, but dies the second you touch the gas and let off..

 

still not sure whats going on with it. best guess right now is the timing belt chipped a tooth or something..

 

timing belt was fine, turns out needed a new cap for the diz is all it really was >.< but now the smoke problem is bad, it smokes gray, and smells like oil/fuel. theres smoke coming out of the breather hole on the head as well.. rings?

 

Piece out the drive train and put something else in there. Don't dump any more money into that drive train.

 

that certainly is an option, but it seems a little late for that.. if I can pick up some vitaras for cheap and its finally solid wouldnt that work out decently as well? I hope that all that needs to be done, ive fixed so much already seems kinda dumb to give up.

 

if the oil leak is between the motor and the tranny it could be your rear main seal and thats only a 8 dollar seal you can put in yourself. best to pull the motor to replace it as well. 2 hrs it can be done.as for the vent off the valve cover you need to buy a vented catch can and make sure the PVC check valve has been removed( can cause pressure to build in the bottom end when boosted) from your black box by ur oil filter. then when uhave a catch can connect the black box and your valve cover vent hose to the catch can. ive been riding my turbo z6 on 10psi on a gt28r as a daily for 2 yrs no problems or smoke over 120k on a stock motor. best to run a chipped ecu with a basemap and get someone to tune it. hope that helps goodluck.

 

thanks for the advice, Im gonna see what I can figure out. i hope I can get this into working order. the smoke is whats really concerning me now. could it all just be from running rich? or is it more likely a ring problem?

 

prob rings i would really check that pvc valve it can cause this because of the pressures building up in the lower crank case

 

huh no kidding. I noticed tonight that there was no smoke until it got heated up, and once it was, it was pretty bad. it started looking a little more bluish than gray, but its so hard to tell. Id hate to fork out on the re-build when it might be something so simple

 

That block is going to need to be honed, no doubt.

Chipped P28 is a joke for tuning, people may as well use an Apexi piggyback! Nothing against you. This thing was never tuned and has been running on a generic base map.

If you feel you have to dump money into it, get the Vitara pistons, hone the block and tune it on S300 or Neptune or nothing!

14.7 psi only increase rod load by 20%, well within range of stock Honda rods. If its properly tuned you will be good.

 

I mean for the time being if I could get a working car for throwing acouple hundred more bucks and a weekend into it that would help while I bandaid my bleeding bank account. If I could stop looking like a rolling fog machine while driving, I can live without boosting till I get the funds for some tuning, lol. I hate driving my saturn, but ac sounds kinda decent about now.

I just hope that pistons is the last of the issues, and hopefully the real one.