A fresh start the next day. I bought this car expecting that the engine would not run. I was told that it had overheated and lost most of the coolant. That can be very serious; cracked head, seized engine kind of stuff. 90% sure that the engine was going to be pulled and scrapped. Now that 10% chance of 'not quite so bad' is my focus. Yes, I am thinking of how cool it would be if I can take this $2,000 car, poke it in a few places, level up the fluids, and drive it off to the sunset. It's a happy dream, don't wake me yet....
Today's agenda:
Don't rush.
I break expensive things when I rush.
Get a better idea of what the DTC codes mean.
Make sure the battery has a good charge.
Correct Oil and Coolant levels.
Crank the engine.
Assess.
Codes:
1121, 1171, 0160 - Likely bad connection to an o2 sensor.
OBD II Codes P0160/P1117/P1121
1124, 1126 – running lean, most often big vacuum leak.
Looking for the last word on P1124 & P1126 fault codes - Rennlist Discussion Forums
1411 – SAI problem, again, likely a vacuum leak.
P0410 and P1411 - Running Out of Ideas - 986 Series (Boxster, Boxster S) - RennTech.org Community
0300, 0301, 0302 – Misfires bank 1 (1-3), not surprising with the previous codes.
0341 – Cam position sensor. I'm not going to worry about this one just yet other than checking the connection.
Battery:
I had run a battery maintainer all night. I checked and found that the connection was bad and it did nothing. Sitting at about 11.5 volts, I put a 10 Amp charger on for about an hour to get it in the solid 12v range.
Looking at the battery I remembered the water pooling in that area. This can lead to water seeping into the brake booster and corroding it on the inside. I soaked it up with a rag, then blew compressed air from the wheel well end of the drain to clear any blockage.
Oil: I had added about two quarts when I thought the level was low. Now I drained about a gallon and checked the level. Still reading high, off the scale. Drained more. Finally got the level at the middle of the range, draining almost
SEVEN quarts. I won't be surprised if the extra oil has blown the AOS, but that should be replaced anyway if I keep this engine. There was no sign of intermix. The oil that came out all looked clean and fresh.
Coolant: Judging by the empty gallon jug of 'drinking water' in the trunk, I am not too concerned about what coolant goes in for now. I thought of using some old coolant that I hadn't disposed of yet. Not a good idea – more contamination and mess. I gathered up two 1/2 jugs of distilled water from the trunks of other cars along with a fresh gallon and poured it in. That got it initially leveled up.
I put a piece of tubing over the missing dipstick tube as a temporary fix. While doing that, I saw that the vacuum line leading to the SAI valve was cut. No sense in trying to piecemeal the vacuum tubes. When I replace them, I will get it all.
Time to see what happens....
(Looks like the embedded video link didn't work, so click the link for the video)
https://youtu.be/r7GrhPwlnT0
It started right up and initially ran smooth. Cool. As it started to misfire, I revved it. Probably not a good idea, more of a reaction. Time to shut it down, I have seen enough.
After the run, I visually checked for anything disastrous. No new puddles, no chunks of metal on the floor, nothing burning.
https://youtu.be/2pUvldk6FmQ
Clear the codes, top the coolant and do it again. Rough start at first, but idle isn't bad at initially. Coolant ran low and idle started to degrade, so shut down again.
Now I am really thinking this is a rescue mission rather than a recovery; we have a live engine and I can still save it. (Again, this is my happy dream, don't wake me yet....) I am not ready to commit much money to it yet, I know it could all go bad quickly. I don't know the extent of overheating that it had. It looks like it still retained some coolant, but this engine could be a time bomb. If I can make it work well by replacing some peripherals: AOS, tubes, sensors and wiring, this could go well. I have a few boxes of stuff, some new parts and some salvaged from a bad 2.7L, that is just taking up shelf space....
What next? Check all the tubing and wiring. Fix the obvious. Do not attempt to run it again until known vacuum leaks are fixed. Clean or replace the MAF. Eventually run it again and diagnose it further.