I just grounded my VTC's last night. It definitely cured the infamous tap, but it seems like I have also lost top end. Like one of the other guys said, there now seems to be a flat spot starting at 5K RPM, where that's where it used to kick ***. It also seems to idle a little rougher (kinda sounds cool like hot cams) My car, a 1992 SE 5spd, has never run consistently since I got it. At one stop light it would run perfect with no tap, with full power, then at the next, it would tap like hell and couldn't even beat a one-legged guy on a big wheel. And more often than not, it would run less than average. Seeing that it now runs consistently better, I guess I'm happier because the tap is gone, and the car is running reliable better. However, when the car was running at it's most optimal performance, there is a noticeable power loss now from grounding the VTC's. Whoever said that they did not really notice a difference in performance must be smoking crack, or their Max was pathetically slow to begin with. I do have a question and hopefully someone out there has experienced the same problem. What would cause the car, to all of the sudden, drop a cylinder (i.e. it feels like it's running on 5 cylinders)? Every so often my car will do this, but it always fixes itself. Sometimes it fixes itself within seconds of driving, other times it could last for miles. Does this sound like one of the coils is malfunctioning? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

Sounds like a coil or injector slowly going. About people not seeing a power loss by grounding the VTC's: VE Max's that are autos for some stupid reason don't have the variable intake manifold that the 5-speeds do. My car (auto) starts to fall at around 5k even with an upgraded exhaust and intake. If I grounded my VTC's (which I plan to do soon ), then I am speculating that I would not see the big power loss that the 5-speed guys are seeing.

 

Mizeree_X is correct, I believe. My car started doing the samething this week and I took it to the shop and sure enough cylinder #3 was dead as a door nail. A little tip to see if the injector is bad, remove the plug and smell it, if it doesn't have a strong odor of gas or whatever more than likely the injector is bad. I am going to try and run some cleaner through mine just in case I can get it to come back to life. Good Luck!

 

If you speculate your vehicle is misfiring, take a dollar bill and hold it up to the exhaust (with 2 hands). The misfire will "pop" the dollar bill quite loudly if its happening. This will help you narrow things down a bit.

This trick is a bit harder if you have dual exhaust.

 

Well, here's the thing, it doesn't do this very often. It might do this two days in a row, then it won't do it for 2 months. It's really weird. However, it did happen today and I got out and started playing with the wires going into the coils. All of the sudden, when I moved one of the wires for the coil for the #1 cylinder, the car cleaned up. I hope this is the problem. Ever since I did that, the car hasn't screwed up. I guess I'll find out the next time this happens. I will try the dollar bill thing as well. I never heard of such a trick, but I'll try anything. I'm still amazed that grounding the VTC's stopped the typewriter noise. I did lose top end initially, but since I advanced the timing last night, the car feels stronger all through the power range. I just hope it continues to run like this, because it has never run this well or consistent in the year that I've owned it.

 

For my car (and every car is a little different) I switched to a Nissan oil filter and 10-30 Mobil 1 Synthetic. I swear the VTC tap was gone in 4K miles. I dont get it. Just thought I would share that with you.