OK. . so. . I took out the MPFI injector and reinstalled the SFI injector spider and it runs fine. No codes, no stumble. Did I miss something?

 

Improper routing of the injectors (injector - cylinder mismatch)?

 

I'm pretty sure the numbering was correct. I remember thinking how nice it was of them to number them for me. The MPFI is plug and play right? Is the CASE learn imperitive here? Perhaps I just got a faulty spider?

 

Yes, the MFI spider is a drop in replacement for the SCFI spider. A CASE learn is not required for a spider replacement.

 

Another thing I noticed during this tear down is that the VIN on the engine doesn't match the VIN on the car. I assume this is not normal and at some point this car got a different engine.

So, I suppose I don't have a clear picture of this cars actual miles which the ODO says 98k, although the rust underneath would suggest something different.

Is there a possiblity that this car has an engine or even a computer that doesn't play with the spider?

Or is it just more likely that I got a bad spider?

 

It's an SCFI motor which changed very little from '96 thru the end of production in '05. About the only change that I can think of that has anything to do with the spider is that sometime in '98, the spider bracket changed. The bracket used before the change needs to be swapped out for the later bracket. This has to do more with the line routing than anything else. There is a possibility of having a line rub on the older bracket and the newer one provides proper clearance.

Other than that, there is no changes that I know of that could cause the problem just by swapping out the spider.

Did you check for bent pins on the MFI spider? They can get bent quite easily.

 

Well, I guess for the time being I'll send it back to Amazon and try to get my $180 bucks back. It's running ok with the old spider. I cleaned up the old one a bit, hopefully it won't give me any issues. After having the heads off and now it's back together and running, I'm a bit burned out on it and don't feel like removing the upper manifold yet again. So I'll put this issue to rest for the time being.

So, next couple issues, that I have questions on.

1. Does this engine have 3 upstream o2 sensors? What is the recommended interval for changing them? My other car is a Honda Civic and I discovered it was supposed to be changed at 100k. I just did it with 136k and wow what a difference it made to it's idle. Much improved. Do you know of any pictures of their locations? Are they hard to get to? Funny I had the exhaust manifolds off at the heads and I don't recall seeing o2 sensors. .

2. Are the idle pulley and alternator pulley supposed to spin loose and free without the belt on, or be somewhat restricted? I heard a noise that sounds like it's coming from the pulley, so I removed the belt and went to give them a spin and they didn't spin free like I thought they should. I thought with the flick of the wrist they should spin many times around freely on their own. These might go about half a turn before stopping.

3. Hissing after I start the car. Sounds like it's coming from the back side of the engine bay on the drivers side. It does not seem to be a vaccuum leak, I sprayed the lines with carb cleaner and didn't find anything leaking. Only does it with a cool engine.

 

1. 2 upstream, 1 downstream. The upstreams are on each side of the y-pipe, after the y-pipe to manifold connection on each side. Not hard to get to at all.

2. Someone else will chime in, but they should be loose and free.

3. Sounds like something's not quite sealing until the engine heats up, which is when metal expands. Haven't a clue what, though.

 

Leeann got #1.

#2 - They should spin relatively free. Both are on bearings and without an energized field, the alternator should not have much resistance if any.

#3 - Probably your A/C. If the A/C was just running, there would still be a pressure differential between the high side & low side. The hissing could be just the pressure equalizing. Another possibility is a faulty check valve in the brake booster allowing vacuum to leak from the booster after the engine shuts down.

 

plz tell me u cleared the code after the repairs lol

nevermind after reading the 2nd page i see that u did, my buddy did that with an egr code or something similar and thought it was still bad