Fixing the Toyota
The bottle-neck to moving forward has been fixing my little Toyota pickup. It’s been sitting in the backyard since last June(?) with a dead cylinder in the #6 hole. I thought it was the head gasket (here in this post), but when I took the head off last month, the gasket was perfect. I started looking at the head- and found one of the exhaust valves had a crack in it . I’m very lucky it didn’t break into pieces and ^%$&& up my engine. Very lucky.
Need a special tool to install valves, so I ordered three (might as well replace all of them while I have it apart), and my awesome friend who wants to remain nameless helped me install them.
Put the thing back together, plugged everything in that I could think of; made sure none of the extra bolts were important- and tried to start it. It tried- it really did, but it won’t start. Sounded like it was starving for gas. First I replaced the fuel filter-
Fuel Filters:
Let me just add a note of frustration here about fuel filters- I’ve replaced three of them in the past 30 days-
Honda Civic– this is a joke- on a Honda Civic, the radiator is held on with one bolt. One. You undo that one bolt, take the hoses off, and it pops out. The fuel filter? Seven bolts- 1,2,3,4,5,6,7. Why seven? Two for the housing, two for the bracket, two for the fuel lines, and one more on the backside of the bracket for who-knows-why. I’m assuming that if that car ever gets obliterated in a train wreck, the fuel-filter engineers wanted to make sure that the filter would remain intact. In case of zombie apocalypse, Ima hide next to this-here fuel filter, where I know I’ll be safe…
Toyota Landcruiser– Four bolts. But waaaayyyyy down in the engine bay- strategically placed above the axle so it cannot be accessed from below, and also to ensure the bolts can only be “felt”, not “seen”. And also, surrounded by a jungle of vacuum hoses, alternator wiring, power steering lines, two dipsticks, and all the brake lines come to a head. The only way to access it is to bend your arms around all the brake lines, remove the dipstick and vacuum hoses, and then try to feel it without seeing it. 12mm bolts on the bracket, 17mm for the fuel lines.
Toyota Pickup– here I have this 4×4 truck with a long bed on it and an extended cab. Here’s how I imagine the discussion at the Toyota Pickup Fuel Filter Location Engineering Meeting:
Technician:..So where should we put the fuel filter?
Manager: What are our choices?
Insane Engineer: Well, we gotta put it somewhere between the fuel tank and the fuel rails.
Technician: How about right up here in the engine bay where it can be easily accessed?
Insane Engineer: Nah. We don’t want it there- someone might think it’s the battery for the windshield wipers.
Technician:Â How about under the truck in this 24″ of blank space?
Insane Engineer: Nah. Rock might flip up and knock a hole in it. We’ll put it on top of the transmission support brace, in between this support arm and this emergency brake line bracket.
Technician: Won’t that be hard to access ?
Insane Engineer: No, because we’ll install it before we put the cab on.
Technician: I meant ‘won’t that be hard to access for the owner’- you know, to replace it?’
Insane Engineer: What’s an owner?
Manager: I brought donuts.
–End of “Fuel Filters” Rant
I traced all the wiring, and it looked good, so I took the bed off (easier than dropping the tank- really!), and checked the pump (yes, with the engine to “on”, and in the first 3 seconds) with my voltmeter and- no power. Took the air manifold back off- found that I plugged the ground for the coolant temperature sensor (CTS) into another ground on the engine bay. Oops. That explains why after putting it back together my temperature gauge buried itself in the red zone even when the engine wasn’t on. But no luck on getting the pump going. Put it back together and shorted the diagnostic pins Fp and B+ and voila! pump is pumping. So now it’s either the circuit open relay or a bad ground somewhere.
Meanwhile, found a blown fuse in the left side kick panel labeled “Ignition”. Replaced it, and blew it again when I accidentally shorted one of the relays while trying to remove it. But I didn’t know that until my mechanic friend showed up a few days later. While I was “not knowing that”, I got so frustrated with the thing, I called my buddy and offered to pay him if he could help get it running. Since he’s a full-time mechanic, he’s pretty busy anyway, so he said he could come over this week after work one night.
He came over, and we started checking for spark at the coil- none. I that’s when I checked the ignition fuse again- replaced it, and now we were getting spark at the coil and the spark plugs. He sprayed some carb cleaner into the intake, but it still wouldn’t go. That’s as far as I got the other day. He commented that maybe my timing is out of wack. But I checked it 3 times already. So he started looking at the distributor.
“Maybe the distributor is set 180 degrees off?” he said, “Maybe it’s firing on the exhaust stroke instead of the compression stroke?”
Lightbulb! I took out spark plug #1 and he put a rubber hose on the hole to check for a puff of air on the compression stroke while I hit the key and then checked crank pulley to see when it was Top Dead Center- shornuff- the distributor was off by 180 degrees.
For the non-mechanically inclined: The spark is supposed to occur just prior to the top of the compression stroke, which will force the piston down, and rotate the engine. But on a 4 cycle engine (about 98% of all gas vehicles) the piston also rises a second time on what’s called the exhaust stroke- where the exhaust valve opens, and the spent gas is expelled. So there’s technically 2 points where the piston is at Top Dead Center (TDC)- once at compression, and once at exhaust. If you fire at the exhaust stroke, your engine will never start, and it will sound like it’s starving for fuel (which it is because the injectors are firing on the exhaust stroke).
He quickly put the distributor back on, setting it at the correct TDC, closed everything up, and I fired it up- started right up, ran a little rough (still need to set the timing on the distributor), blew a bunch of smoke, and kept running. Yay!
The next day, I started it and realized I had one of the fuel return lines plugged in to the wrong slot- and one of the air boxes that deals with the pcv valve started overflowing with gas instead of air. After a few hours of searching for a diagram of all the air hoses, I finally found one- and not from the manufacturer:
I still need to torque the crank bolt (harmonic balancer pulley), put some fresh oil in it and some antifreeze. Then it needs a bath, and maybe I’ll drive it for a while- at least until I find that Highboy….
Bought a sawmill
Meanwhile, found a really awesome deal on a sawmill. An Oscar 121 – a mid-range saw usually costing around $4,000. From an LHBA member for cheap. Almost half price. Only used once and looks brand new. Has some bad gas in the tank, but the compression is good. Just haven’t had a chance to put good gas in it.
Got the building permit
Follow up to my last post- the guy at the inspection department plugged in the numbers- said my plans show my house will pass with flying colors. The reference home is set for an energy efficiency of 100 (see my last post). Mine had to be 70 or less. He called a few days later and said my house comes in around 56. Awesome.
Took the info down to the city- and after some confusion on which comes first-Â utilities or the permit (the city said it was utilities, while the utilities said it was the permit- it’s the permit), paid my $650. The secretary said it would be a few days- had to go before the city council, but then she sent me an email that afternoon:
I think the neighbor had a word with the mayor. But now I can’t transport my forms until I get my truck fixed (don’t want to keep using the trailer).
Finished the model
My wife has also been working on the model- It is looking really, really neat:
loghomejourney 
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