just installed new vtcs over the weekend with the help of a few friends it was fairly straight forward accept we had some trouble with the back head the exhaust cam kept skipping on the chain but after an hours of tweaking and lining we finally got it to tdc. well we got everything buttoned up and started her up and it ran beutifully nice and quite just herd the fuel injectors then i put in some seafoam through the vacum lines let it idle some more and it idle great took it out and drove nice accept one thing second gear seemed a little sluggish i couldnt chirp the tires but the top end felt good
im hoping that i just need to give it a couple hundred miles to let the ecu reprogram itself
any suggestions?
ill post some pics of the install soon

Oooohhhhh yes want the install pics!!! Honestly, how many hours and what sort of resources did you have to complete the install? I have a good friend at a local auto shop, that might help, do you think a pro shop tools would help reduce the time spent or the pain in the a$$ that it might be?? Thanks for the input!!

its not a pain in the **** its pretty easy and straight forward just time consuming a good set of tools would be nice i already have a crap load and just take ur time an extra hand is very helpful it probably took me about 8 hours half that was by myself other half was with two friends

it will take a day morning to night as long as you already have a pair of rebuilt or brand new vtc's with basic hand tools. If your rebuilding them yourself youll need a 1k press. dont forget all the gaskets and a tube of high temp gasket maker for the timing chain covers.

holy crap i miss my car

I found some of the bolts holding the rear timming chain cover a PITA, I needed a 10" or 12" long 10mm box head wrench to get at them. My forearms are like 14.5 inches, so I couldn't get them back there. little Japanese people put my car together

well today i still notice the sluggishness down low and my exhaust sounds different almost like an sti i think im going to reopen up the back valve cover and move the chain one notch on both sprockets i think its to loose on the exhaust side and too tight on the vtc side ill take a bunch of pics

So do you have any pics of the process?

woww now, you didn't mark the chain and sproket??? That doesn't sound like a good idea, moving the chain arbitrarily. If I were you I'd first check all connections and check for a vacuum leak (like on the intake plenum), also did you change the TPS's position.



edit: its normal for one head to have a tight chain and the other side to have slack, I had the same issue and scratched my head on it, but no problems. I suggested in another thread that people do one head at a time, and before removing the chains to first roatate the engine till slack is on the chain tensioner, then mark everyting and take it apart.

well the rear i marked but it was after the chain sliped in the exhaust sprocket so who knows where it is supose to be but ill figure it out and no i didnt change the tps position sensor and i also checked for any leaks but everything is conected properly like i siad the car idles and runs fine just lacks low end and i think i know thw problem hard to explain but we shall c what happens

wooooooohooooo shes all better took me about 5 hours mostly spent trying to get the timing right but i finally got it power is restored felt great and sounded a ton better i feel relieved took a few pics will post them 2moro

So did you do brand new VTC's or rebuilt?

brand new got them for a steal from a nissan tech 200 for both

wow, that is a steal.... does that nissan tech have anymore?

doubt it it was a one time deal it was a wierd scenerio and forgot how it went but the vtcs were payed for and were never used so he sold them to me for 200 worked out great i dont sound like a diesel anymore

you're lucky...i grounded mine out, but unfortunately that doesn't really fix the problem

yeah i tryed the grounding had them grounded for about 10min took the car for a spin and there was zero topend so i just delt with the noise

when the vtc's go bad, is there a loss of power or just this "diesal" noise I hear so much about? does the car shake as if the injectors were no good?

personaly i noticed no difference between my old vtcs and my new ones just that its a million times quiter but there is a big loss up top if you ground them matt has dyno results