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growe3

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Everything posted by growe3

  1. As noted above, look the car over carefully in the dark. My mother called me a couple of times about a dead battery. I was confident the battery was good, I finally found the problem. When she was getting out of the car, she sometimes managed to turn on the interior light when her hand accidently pressed on the switch, near the grip above the door. As she almost always drove in the daylight hours, she never noticed the light being turned on. On a couple of other occasions she managed to turn the lights on by rotating the headlight switch too far, and accidentally turning the interior lights on during the day. Again she did not notice as when she turned the car off, it was nice and sunny. To run the battery down over night, points to a pretty good drain. At least a light left on, it should be easy to determine if that is the cause. Don't forget the light under the hood, in the glove box, and in the trunk. Another problem may be a good battery, getting poor recharging. The battery may start the car fine in fully charged condition, but if the alternator is not putting out the proper voltage and amps, it will not only not recharge, driving the car will continue to discharge the battery. This often is not noticed, until you turn off the car, and cannot restart due to a low battery condition. Do not overlook the battery cables. Often they look fine, but if there is a small amount of corrosion between the positive battery cables connection at the battery, that will create a poor connection for starting, as well as a poor connection for the alternator to resupply the battery with electrical power. Remove and clean to bright metal ALL battery cables and clean ALL of the ends. Be sure to also clean the battery terminals to bright metal condition, and be sure to clean, or replace, the battery terminal bolts. Review any error codes and post here, there may be some information that could help. What is the charging rate at idle with a well charged battery at idle? (over a couple of minutes) What is the charging rate at idle with a well charged battery at 2500 RPM? (over a couple of minutes) Be persistent, something will reveal itself. -George
  2. Here is the second image. -George
  3. Hi Danbuc, Good luck on your inspections. I don't know if you have seen a couple of Northstar cutaways, but they may help you get an idea of what is in the front cover. I still don't know what could produce a knock in this area. If the bolt that holds the intermediate sprocket in place failed or got loose somehow, I suppose that the sprocket could flop a bit, hard to belive that that could happen, unless someone had been in the cover at some point and did not put the bolts back in correctly. Another possibility would be a chain tensioner that failed or got loose. I would be very interested in what you may find that is causing the knock. I can only attach one image, at a time so look for another image in the next reply. -George
  4. I would be surprised if anything was wrong with the timing chains and sprockets, they are extremely durable. On the off chance that you have a stuck/sticky lifter, you could try running one quart of Marvel Mystery Oil to try and free it up. Marvel will not hurt your engine and has proven many times to be helpful in freeing sticky lifter and rings. It won’t fix broken parts of course, but it can work its way into areas stuck or clogged with varnish. Should you decide to remove the front cover, it is vital when replacing the vibration dampener to torque it down properly + the added degrees of rotation. The oil pump is dependant on the vibration dampener “pinching” the inner rotor in place. If you do not do this in the correct manner, your oil pump will not work. If you decide to remove the timing chains for any reason, it is best to have the engine at #1 TDC with ALL of the timing marks lined up. The timing marks will only align once in eight revolutions. Do not rotate the engine or cams with the timing chains removed; the valves are very easily bent by piston interference due to their small sizes. -George
  5. A post script to my previous reply. As I do all of my own repairs the Timesert cost was not that bad, just not much fun getting the engine in and out. I pulled the engine out the top in each car, the second time I used an engine leveler, much easier to handle the engine. While I knew the Northstar was a good engine, when you have it apart you can really appreciate the engineering that went into its design. Attached is a link to my web storage with an Excell spreadsheet, showing the parts cost. I also fixed the oil seepage at the same time. (see Timesert Repair) Was it worth it? You bet! -George Timesert Repair Cost
  6. I did my blue 93' STS at about 125,000. It is used daily for commute and pleasure trips, still holding fine at 168,000. I also did my white 93' STS at 82,000, low use vechicle. At 98,000 still holding fine. -George
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