EvenOlder

Per the title, i'm considering removing and mailing away for cleaning my fuel injectors.

[1990 T2, and i'm doing it because cold starts are great but hot means pedal to the floor and sometimes 5 secs of turning over before it catches. Yes, yes, a rebuild is in order. But in the meantime, it certainly couldn't hurt to clean them.]

But i'd like to hear if it's difficult, or simply a matter of following the steps listed on rotary resurrections teardown.

My past experience, rated by difficulty:
Install new shocks and springs (pre assembled): Difficulty 1. Whistling as I worked.

Remove air pump, install double pulley and new belts: Difficulty 2. No cursing.

Remove ACV and install blockoff plate: Difficulty 4. Angry muttering while pulling air intake components off.

Replace rear differential mount: Difficulty 6. Mild cursing while accessing nuts.

Replace stock downpipe with RB straight through: Difficulty 10. Days of f-bombs, blasphemy and dark thoughts about the car.


So should I attempt the injectors or pay for a professional?

Thanks,
steve

dean23

very easy imo. i plan on swapping my secondaries to the primary position and installing new secondaries in a matter of 15-20 min tops. just be careful of things falling into the intake... its a killer...

Sojin

Well if you have to know its not hard u have to remove some stuff but its not to hard just make sure ur check things over b4 u pull anything off because u might rip something out but for the most part its a 2-4 it just matter some times little things can b a real bitch.

yella41

just use different color paint crayons to mark the vacumn hose, and there connectors, and than it is real real easy to do.... takes maybe an hour in and out. Well maybe two the first time... ive had my intake off a few times now... and dont forget to put the grommetts back in with new orings and ;ithium grerase... save yourself some agonny

rspeed9i6

ive got an s4 and did my injectors myself....it took me about 1hr 30min the first time...yea..keep track of where all the vaccuum hoses go...that was the tricky part...if u can...take sum pix b4 u start taking stuff off and thru the process....it will help...i also kept all the bolts in labeled sandwich bags which helped with the installation later....also, i dont know if it it was just me, but i had to re-adjust my tps wen i put everything back together....so u might want to look that up...i have a thread on it...search "idle surging" if u need to....

arghx

iTrader: (3)

expect to replace gaskets, injector clips, vacuum lines. everything seems to go to **** when you pull it off for the first time. I mean it COULD go smoothly but any time you are doing something for the first time, budget at least a weekend.

well uhhh

+1 ^ agreed 100%. I underwent this exact same thing and as i took off the uim, i saw some things i didn't like at all. subsequently, the car ended up on jackstands for 6 months. too much **** was too old and i wasn't comfortable...

Shainiac

iTrader: (7)

Fixing the old **** that breaks, or taking your time preventing this is the the most frustrating part. Other than that, it's a pretty straight forward job. While you have the intake off, you might want to delete the rats nest, replace the fuel lines, and test resistance on such things as the coolant sensor, ect. If youre going to have your injectors cleaned, take them to a local diesel show. Your almost guaranteed to find a diesel shop within an hour. I took mine to a shop and $85 and a day later, I had clean, tested injectors

It was the first real project I did on my car and was a real confidence booster. Good luck!

Valkyrie

Suspension Bushings: 18 (You will hurt yourself)

ilike2eatricers

ditto. also get the coolant hose under the UIM that one is a bitch. may as well replace the fuel lines while you are in there

Sojin

redoing a wiring harness 20 "plz kill me" lol

Sojin

o anyways i rmvd my intake manifold the other day to replace the coolent line cap off the hose that gose from the motor to the TB and it took like 10 mins and i was bsing with a friend at the same time so you should be good to go

Valkyrie

Once you've taken off the UIM enough times, getting to the injectors is easy peasy.

You'll want to get a replacement gasket ready to go, though. And some 10mm silicone hose to replace the injector grommets (because they're old).

Also, you'll be out of operation until the injectors come back from the cleaners. Unless you have a sonic cleaner and a injector flow bench...

EvenOlder

THANKS EVERYONE!

The advice given here will certainly save me a bunch of time.
So far, I'm thinking:
1. Plan for 2-4 weeks of car downtime
2. Paint/picture/bag everything
3. Plan to buy an UIM gasket, new vacuum hose and fuel lines, 10mm silicone hose for grommets (I'm hoping that will become obvious once i'm in there), various other odds and ends.
4. Consider rat's nest elimination. I've read many accounts of this while researching the ACV removal (done.) I'll look it over at the unveiling and think about it.
5. But hopefully, not too much "impossible to get a wrench on" situations with this.

steve

.Zero

I know this should be common sense but don't over tighten the bolts on the upper intake manifold. Cast aluminum breaks if you do

I made that mistake. It was a noob mistake but I know better now.

if you do break it. message me and i can tell you a quick and temporary fix for it.

magus2222

iTrader: (22)

dude. replacing suspension bushings are a 5 if you have the tools and the knowhow. hell, removing the engine is a 7, putting it back in properly and getting it running is a 12.

peace

rspeed9i6

oh and another thing...DONT LOSE THE LITTLE PLASTIC SPACER BETWEEN YOUR PRIMARY FUEL RAIL AND THE ENGINE!....i had to order one frum mazdatrix on emergency...lol...and payed like 20bux for a piece of plastic for one day ship....

Sojin

GL just make sure everthing gose back where it came from and have fun

MillerLite

any idiot with a Haynes or Chilton.. or even better the factory Mazda manual can change the injectors.
you do have one of these right?

EvenOlder

Haynes yes, chilton no, FSM online. You'll note, however, the many bits of advice in this thread are not given in the various manuals.

ramello

iTrader: (1)

another consideration would be to replace the OMP lines, you may end up not having a choice by accidently cracking one when your in there working as they usually are pretty brittle after 20 years of high heat

EvenOlder

Yeah, I'm gonna research PreMixing tonight after watching Black Snake Moan.
If the only drawback of OMP deletion is needing to have a container of oil with you at the gas pump, and it doesn't somehow prematurely wear/hurt the car, sign me up. Simple is better in most cases.
steve

Howru

iTrader: (25)

Tape off the manifold. If you lose a nut or washer down one of the runners, its a pain to get out if it made it inside the engine.

arghx

iTrader: (3)

the hose that goes from the iron to the TB is a big bitch if you've never messed with it before. When reinstalling the UIM, I usually have the UIM on the studs but not really seated, then I manuver the UIM as I slide the coolant hose on there (with a carefully positioned screw-type clamp). Then I fully seat everything.

Another thing I would recommend you do is run a boost pressure test before you pull off the UIM. www.boostpro.net/prodtester.html or make your own out of home depot parts. Then if you have any leaky gaskets or vacuum hoses that are loosing air under boost, you will have an idea where to look.

As far as replacing vacuum hoses go, the best advice I can give you is to install the tightest fitting hose you can, or it WILL leak under boost according to my pressure testing experience. You should barely be able to slide the hose on it's so tight. I just use cheapo autozone 5/32" on a lot of barbs (3/16" would fit but it would leak when pressure tested) but use whatever brand you like. I'm not sure what that is in metric (for silicone) but even if you ziptie your lines they will still leak boost if the hose isn't small enough.

hanman

done this many times, and I am in fact doing it right now on my vert.
Needs:
Silicone hose. Buy bulk from www.hosetechniques.com

New injector orings. Call Ray Crowe at Malloy Mazda. You need three things. The upper oring, the rubber spacer, the rubber grommet for each injector. The oring seals the injector to the fuel rail, the spacer is what the rail tightens down on, and the grommet is the seal on the engine block.

New upper intake manifold gasket, again, Ray Crowe.

Depending on year and condition, fuel lines (try and find metric, and it HAS to be injection qualtiy), that coolant hose behind the throttle body that was mentioned in earlier posts (you don't want to have to replace this later), and OMP lines (only if needed, as in you break one).

Warnings:

Be VERY careful with the electrical connectors on the injectors. They are easy to break at this age. BTW, GM connectors from your local parts store will work, but keep the wires oriented correctly. I use a utility knife to pull the wire spring out, and then grab it with needle nose pliers to pull it out far enough to get the connector off the injector.

When reinstalling the top end, torque the manifold bolts, you don't want to do the same thing as the post above.
Pressurize the fuel system BEFORE you put it all back together. Nothing worse than a fuel leak after everything is all back in place. I don't have a second gen turbo yet, but with the N/A you can pressurize the primaries first (plug the fuel line to the secondaries) and the pressurize it again when you have the top end on, with out the air plenum. See the section in the manual about how to use a jumper wire on the connector by the air filter to do this.

As stated above. Be very careful to not lose or forget about the black plastic spacer for the primaries. If you don't put this on, or get it only on one bolt, you will have MAJOR problems. Ask me how I know this.

Advice:

The special pliers from Harbor Freight that are used to loosen fuel/air/coolant hoses are a godsend. As are the small pliers with the 90 degree bend in them.

Use silicone spray, or something similar when putting the fuel and coolant hoses back on. Use zip ties on the silicone air hoses to keep them secure.

I stuff shop rags in the intake runners to keep foreign objects out while I am working on this. You may have to work at getting the old gasket off the manifold too. I have used the spray on gasket remover in the past with good results.


For the injector cleaning, I use RC Engineering www.rceng.com , but a lot of the guys use Witch hunter. Threre is also a thread around here somewhere about an outfit in Jersey which is very economical.