Hi all,

I've been asked to help a friend get her 2000 Sunfire running that has been sitting for at least a year. They got it only a couple years ago. It has the 2.4 L Quad 4 LD9 engine.

The previous owners did lots of regular maintenance (I suspect at the dealer!) and all the fluids looked good. I had to take the battery home to charge it up.

My biggest concern was starting it up having had the oil drain down for so long.

First I was going to do an oil change followed by pulling the plugs, putting some oil in the cylinders, and cranking it until I got oil pressure through out the engine. Then I'd reinstall the re-gapped plugs to then start the car properly. I'm figuring that this would allow me to get oil through out the engine without putting it under load.

Now the new thing for me is that it is a variable valve timing (VVT) engine. Is doing the pre-oiling something that is even more important to do or will it cause some sort of harm. I've never worked on a VVT engine so I only know there is more complications with the use of oil pressure to control the cam offsets.

Thanks

 

I would recommend perusing some Quad4 forums for your answers. I did have a Quad4 years back and loved that little engine, but didn't keep the car long enough to have to work on anything.

 

Yeah I thought about that but since I know the people here I thought I'd ask.

Turns out these little engines are pretty cool. Coming at the end of there run, most of the bugs had been worked out. DOHC, 150 hp, 150 ft-lg of torque. Timing chain instead of a timing belt.

Apparently changing the water pump is a bear though and some models had automatic transmissions with no dipstick. Odd.

 

Mine was wrapped up in an '88 Olds Cutlass Calias rated at 160 or 180 hp. Would get 35 mpg doing 75 mph with the a/c blowing nice and cool. They did have some get up and go!