C160SFG - 1986 Series 3

[ian65]

well, it's got spark at the plugs...

[ian65]

I've decided to make a last-ditch attempt to fix this car and get it to RetroRides.
It's running a bit rough which may be down to ignition but a more serious problem is that the water pooling on to of the inlet/housings which I thought was spilt from the rad overflow bottle when I moved it is actually a leak
This has stopped the car being driven at all as it's not my engine and the last this I want to do is cook it so any weakness in the cooling system is a big problem, especially with the heat this thing puts out with a turbo on it.
The leaking coolant can be seen here...






I really didn't fancy fixing this at the moment as the whole turbo setup has to come off the car to remove the inlet and get to the gasket ...








but as I've got a ticket for the RRG I thought I'd give it one last go so it was into the mancave for a bit of surgery...







and a hour later I was down to this...




now to pull the inlet and find and fix the leak.

.

[ian65]

found the problem, there was a split in the core plug in the front housing, caused by me when I drifted it in and because I put my trust in the core plugs, I didn't refit the O rings...



which meant the core plug leaked and allowed coolant to track across the gasket as seen here...




I don't know if this contributed to the rough running of the engine but it can't have helped

[DKWW2000]

That is a relief you found a relatively simple fix, a bit of Hylomar blue & the gasket(once dry) should be ok

[ian65]

I thought about using Hylomar blue but didn't want to introduce a weakness into the induction side of things when the turbo is boosting.... as Hylomar doesn't set, there would be the slight chance of the turbo boost blowing some out and giving a leak.
I bought a sheet of gasket material from the restoration show a couple of years ago and made a gasket by drawing around the old one then cutting it out with a stanley knife and some hole cutters... while i was at it I made one for the TII as well as they are both expensive plus I've been waiting for one from Mazda for the last 2 months...



this has the added benefit that I could match the gasket to the Elford inlet manifold which is different to the stock inlet...

[myatt1972]

Frustrating but at least you found it, hope for a RRG convoy yet

[KiwiDave]

I used core plugs when the street port went in. Didn't use O rings either. It is something I check quite regularly though and will continue to do so as I used Blue Hylomar as well. I think I used a socket as a suitably dimensioned drift tool.

What was the gasket paper thickness that you used Ian?

[TOOL]

Dude, I have a couple of Tii inlet gaskets at home. You should have said.

Defo always put the orings in. It's the only thing that seems to seal the little buggers.

My core plugs leaked badly too. Only orings solved it.
Hylomar'd the hell out of it and always leaked.

PS we have a twitter account?

[A7RXY]

Reminds me when I changed my O rings, it took me 3 weeks to get the inlet manifold off as the impossible to see bottom nut had corroded on, but fitted new gasket and O ring and has not leaked yet. Mind you it's not as if I've done that many miles since ......
Dibs

[ian65]

What was the gasket paper thickness that you used Ian?

0.8mm