kev

Looks incredible! Obviously, you are a great machinist! Wow, tons of work on this thing. Do you see any issues without much of a plenum though? Very much the opposite of a Magna with its large plenum and longer runners. It's been a while since I looked into the pros/cons of the different intake types.

Oh wow, yes definitely a different intake than the North American spec cars. But, yes, the two prong one is the CTS for the ECU. The single prong connector runs the gauge in your dash. I've had bad luck with aftermarket sensors. Although haven't experienced exactly what you are describing. My issues were in calibration. The aftermarket sensor displayed either real low or real high on the stock gauge when at normal operating temperature. Actually, I never found an aftermarket sensor that I ended up keeping in the car....I've always ended up tossing in an original one.

I'm confused what is meant by a 'T' shaped connector. Although, the image posted above should help. Item 3 is the CTS for the main ECU. It is a variable resistance thermostat. Item 1 is the temperature gauge in the cluster. It is variable resistance based on temperature. On 87 and earlier cars, this is a single pronged connector. 87 and earlier cars have another thermostat on the heater core piping under the dash to control the operation of cabin heating. 88/89 cars removed that inside thermostat and simply use the same thermostat on the intake, #1, for this purpose....thus these years have two prongs on this sensor. I will say that my knowledge is limited to only to the North American market. EU market cars may be different. Item 4 is for the air conditioning only and it is an on-off thermostat switch. If the temp reaches a certain level, it shuts off the air conditioning Item 2 is a thermostat that is used for the fuel vapor system....this is an on/off type of switch as well. It simply keeps the purge valve closed until the engine is warmed up such that it isn't allowing fuel tank vapor from entering the intake system and increasing emissions under engine warm-up conditions. It's important to note that this is all that it does. If you pull both vacuum lines to this thermostat and plug them, the purge valve still shuts at idle and opens off idle based on the vacuum/boost before and after the throttle plate.

I do just this, whenever possible. Although, I mostly just lurk on fb...or really just look at the messages that pop up in my feed...which is infrequent because I mostly use fb just to browse marketplace. It's a good platform to say 'Hey, I took it out for a ride today' and toss in a picture, but using it to solve issues, nah. Case in point, I now have eight old cars on my property, of different makes/models, thanks to my kids. I'm subscribed to FB groups on all of them, but never once have I found any useful information on troubleshooting/repairing. I have better luck finding information in forums and/or youtube. I do wish it would evolve to the 'community' being mostly FB (like the BS forum on here) but the technical issues/resolutions handled via forums. Although, I agree with some of the earlier posts in that the crashes, and especially the data server issue, drove many away for good. Haha, good point! That just goes to show that many have the same frustrations.

The green fusible link (in the visible fusible link box outside the relay cluster) is corroded or nearing failure.

Do a leak-down test. It will tell you if you really do have a blowby issue. Don't assume the worst from the start. Valve seals will have the same symptoms and are easily replaceable...especially if you have a leak-down tester (if not, buy one, they are cheap nowadays) to hold the valve up without tearing down the engine.

Welcome! So, what are the valve train ideas you have?

I've had overheating issues with larger fuel pumps on these cars using the OEM fuel setup. Could it have been the filter, or the fuel lines, or??? Not sure. In all, I really learned not to like external fuel pumps. I think the in-tank modification that MKS is selling is the way to go...although I haven't personally tried it.

That looks right. I ran them on my 88 starion in the mid 90s. They were readily available in our sizes and affordable. It's refreshing to see people starting to try to take these cars back to pure original. It's not an easy feat!

Similar here. Got my first starion in 92, didn't turn 16 & get a license until 93. Always was a challenge keeping it on the road, and I didn't even think about mods until my 20s when I was out of college and had sustainable income. Yes, these things were even basket-cases in the early 90s when they were only a few years old (my first one was an 84 though). These cars were on Car & Driver's top 10 used cars NOT to buy list throughout the early to mid 90s.

no. They are no longer in production.

Yokohama A403

The reason why it is there is for the right hand drive cars sold to the Asian and Eu markets, the wiper motor is mounted on the driver's side. It also gives access to the wiper mechanism in the cowl.

The only feedback I heard on those assembled heads is that some people complained that the rockers ate the cam. Could have been too tight of a valve lash but also bad materials, etc. I believe all of the feedback I saw was for the manual rocker ones, not sure if anyone had the same issue on a hydraulic rocker head. The earlier model cqs actually had slightly longer valves too, with the manual rockers. Although the manual rockers work fine with the shorter valves because they can simply be adjusted. I don't think I would try to use hydraulic rockers on the longer valves though. Might be worth reaching out to Dad on here to talk with him a bit about all of this.

It’s hard to tell until you start cleaning it up. One of my blocks looked worse than that on there out of the four cylinders. It was sitting in storage for 20 years although the head was visibly cracked in two of the cylinders. The block was magnufluxed SAT and a 20mil bore cleaned it all up great. Sucks, but isn’t the end of the world. Blocks are easy to find, if needed, with everyone destroying, I mean swapping, the engines in these cars these days. My driver that had 97k original ended up having a cracked block and a head with an internal non-visible crack that sucked oil into the coolant.

Then someone has been there before you...it's probably an 83-85 head or someone went out of their way just to go with manual rockers. Post from shelby. He was the guy to go to when it came to engine clearances. Adj. tappets will always be heard, I've also found that the best results are doing the adjustment on a hot engine, hot meaning recently ran, not necessary to be 190 degrees , and i use .006 for the intake and .009 for the exh., also go back over the valves after you have done them a couple of times. Time can be saved if you go by firing order , do only the intakes first, then do the exh., when right the .006 should have a little drag on it when going under the tappet, if it is real loose the lash is not tight enough, to double check your self use a .007 if it goes in then you know your too loose i place the feeler gauge in place and snug down the adj. until the feller can't be moved easily now lock the adj. nut and the pull on the threads will give you the clearance you need to move the feller gauge, it takes a bit of practice to get it right but it's not hard to learn the feel , our engines increase the valve lash as the engine heats up unlike most cars also never use the starter to turn the engine use a wrench on the crank pulley to turn it clockwise , never back it up , and i have found many cams that have low spots on the base circle , meaning there are spots that maybe a .001 or so smaller then other spots , if you hit a high spot on the base to ad.j the lash it can be loose at other spots , also the base of the cam lobe where the rocker starts to raise can have a bit of wear , this can cause a valve to sounds looser then it really is , the major thing is to have them all even with none making more noise then the rest,, and NEVER try to make them as quiet as hyd lifters that’s asking for trouble , you will always hear the lifter click that’s normal there are some late model engine s that the injs make more noise then solid lifters when they are running, some injs. are very noisy when working

Well, if it was a manual rocker, you'd see the adjustment studs on the top of the rocker over the valve. If the top of the rocker over the valve is flat with just a very small vent hole on the corner, it is hydraulic lifter. They do sit pretty close to the valve. Kind of a poor photo because I have the fingers of gloves over the end of the rockers to hold the lifters in place when installing, but you can kind of see what I mean here: Found a better one (stock hydraulic rocker setup): I agree with facebook. it's not my thing. It has the same issue that the forums had years ago, in that technical information is lost..sometimes within hours. The good thing about forums is you can easily add sub-forums to disseminate the info. Although, I'm happy that the drama left and went over the facebook. I sometimes chuckle over the crap us moderators got over the years when I see basically the same thing happen over there now that the active membership is high. Not such an easy job, is it? But what happens? Members leave and create their own starquest fb group...meaning that there are now like 5-6 different groups to further add confusion. My favorite, sarcastically, is when someone posts the exact same post in each of the groups. Ok, well I'll get off this bandwagon.

There aren't too many of us left here who still actually post on these forums. Most ran off to facebook. Lot of people come here to lurk but few post nowadays.

No, all SQs had jet valve heads. Other non-turbo 2.6s had the non-jet valved heads. I have run the JV elimination kits on several cars over many years with no problems, including my current driver CQ. I've also kept the jet valves on several of my cars with no issues either. In fact, i've only ever installed the kit on cars where I had a suspicion that the JV was sticking (although, it never actually turned out to be the case). If you do start to have overheating issues, then, yes, the thermal expansion of the dissimilar metals in the head may cause it to crack. Now if I have to buy a new head, then I always get a non-jet valve casting.

I don't know anything about a holly standalone but, as tux indicated, you should have the ability to update your startup fuel curves based on temperature. What are your AFRs when it does finally start? That will give you an indication on whether you are flooding it or not giving it enough fuel. Does the computer tell you the air/engine temperature? I have had similar issues on mine, and still do depending on the specific temperature. It takes a long time to iron these out because you really only get one shot at that moment and at that temperature.

You shouldn't have a problem with a stock 88/89 head gasket (Felpro 9116). An 87 and earlier one, Felpro 8770, may give you issues if you start upping the boost. But the question really is how much you trust that HG not knowing when it was replaced last. If you plan on reusing your head, i'd simply pull it and replace the gasket...the MLS ajusa is the way to go nowadays (especially with the felpros going obsolete). I have had bad luck with the non-MLS ajusa head gaskets, I will say. I had leaking coolant on two different engines after installation.

Photo on how I plugged my EGR port in the head. I believe it was 3/8 NPT, if memory serves me correctly. It looks like it is threaded deep in there but the passage is at an angle, the left side of the plug is just a little past the gasket surface.

I'm not exactly sure what causes the coining via the ARP studs that doesn't happen with the stock bolts. Higher preload, less stretch, different bearing surface, stud diameter, different materials...probably a combination of a few. This use to be documented very well on here including detailed photos of the coining....frustrating. All of the photos showed coining offset from the center of the hole meaning that the stud/washer appeared to not be centered in the hole after preload. Anyways, here are the photos. Pretty easy modification to do. You still retain the ARP washer with the insert...thus it looks like a double washer. This pushes the nut up higher which causes more interference at the one point in the valve cover, but the VC needs modified when using ARP studs regardless on whether you use the inserts or not. I can't seem to find a photo on the VC modification. I think I said that the stud hits the sheet metal in the VC in my last post, but in thinking about it, it actually hits the casting. There is a square port cast as part of the VC for the crankcase evap system that interferes. It needs to be ground a bit...again pretty simple to do. I used one of these adjustable reamers...not sure I'd recommend but it worked

If it were me, I'd either do the bare minimum on the 'used' head or buy a new casting and then seat the 'new' valves and do a match port on intake/exhaust. If you are dumping your emissions, you may want to consider plugging the EGR port in the head. Keep in mind that you will have to modify your valve cover a bit if you go with ARP studs. The stud hits the sheet metal for the breathing system at the one location. Also, ARP studs are known to 'coin' the bearing surface on the head. You can add inserts to the head to prevent this. I can try to find some photos of this process, if you are interested. Honestly, I don't see any need to go with ARP studs unless your goals are really high boost. When's the last time anyone here has heard of a failed stock head bolt? I've actually heard more stories about issues with the ARP studs (i.e. the coining I mentioned and the mods to the valve cover) than the stock head bolts.

From the research I did at the time, the GM vacuum pump was found to be very successful on other turbo cars. Although, I do agree that the PCV will mostly likely still need to be retained for vacuum conditions (based on my own experience). The vac pump has to work better than tossing a breather on the valve cover. It doesn't need to pull much of a vacuum. I do feel that the factory port on the valve cover is too small regardless the method you use.