The car i bought twice.
 

So this build thread is long overdue and should have been started about a year and a half ago when i originally bought the car.

And so the story begins roughly 1.5 years ago when i bought a beautiful maroon 91 talon tsi shell from Halon. That winter i swapped out the drivetrain from the current 91 talon tsi i was driving (Thanks to pushit2.0 and his crew for doing all the work while i sat around). The swap was a success and after a random no-start issue and the help of turbotalon1g got it running again.

After all that i ended up moving and with work, i was just to busy to give it any love except from time to time. after having issues getting it to run right, poor alignment, rattling pieces, and eventually giving the t-case death whine. I lost interest in the car and along with a lack of funds decided to trade it for a good DD in the form of a lexus sc400 and some cash on top.

A few months later it was up for sale again at about $2k more than i traded it for. I missed the car and all but i wasnt going to spend that much money. another few months after that it was for sale a 3rd time, however this time it was less than i sold it for. The issue was that it was running horribly and not firing cylinder 3. The kids mechanic told him compression was 150-150-130-150 and the low compression was causing the problem stating a bad head gasket. after a short test drive i decided to take the risk of buying a poor running dsm and had it towed home.

Got her home and started my own tests. compression was 150 across the board, spark was good, along with all 4 injectors being good. but cylinder 3 just wouldnt fire. spark plug came out wet and the cylinder was wet. after sitting for a few days stumped as to why a cylinder with compression, spark, and fuel wouldnt fire it dawned on me to pull the ecu. low and behold, ecu damage!

Grabbed a socketed eprom ecu from 93gtpeater that day and had her running on all 4 later that night, WOOT! The fuel injector seals are still junk and causing boost issues but that will be fixed shortly. seals are already on the way.

The end result is that i ended up getting the car back for less than i let it go for, with about 2 grand of extras done to the car. got it back with some nice 18 inch rims with good rubber, upgraded from painted stockers with crappy rubber. a set of corbeau seats that fit my fat ass. an alignment. nice catchcan. and a few other misc goodies here and there.


Anyways time for everyone favorite thing on the forums. Pictures!


These are from before i let the car go.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Here are some more i took just tonight. obviously after buying the car back :banana:

also i did the wire tuck around the fuel rail the day before selling the car.

Gotta say, even with all the problems these damn cars have. i sure did miss it.

Will also be grabbing some more tomorrow when the light is better. there isnt shit for lighting in my garage.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Nicely done! Getting it back cheaper and having more goodies on it, have to love that!

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

best 160 dollar dsm upgrade ever.

Dont get me wrong though, i feel bad for the kid having giving it up so cheaply on his mechanics word. but i cant argue with a sweet deal in the slightest.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

I have to agree with JET on that.

What are your plans for it? Gonna run at PG?

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

right now im just planning on having a kind of a nice summer/dd out of it. at least for now.

I do plan on running it at the track at least a few times a year.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Hell yeah. She's back into some good hands :)

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

I saw that car on craigslist. I wish I would of looked at it but oh while its in good hands. Glad to see that ecu worked out for you. You taking it to boost for boobies or the spring dyno day

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Nice!

I like the old gauge setup better :D

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Wow, this car is still around? Nice to see it's in capable hands. Makes me wonder what happened to my old DSM.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

I wonder as well...I always liked your car!

I watched this thing travel around on CL and here, good to see it's up and running good!

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

boost for boobies is my current goal for getting things done. then i do plan on being at a few dyno days and other events as well.

Ive got some Drop Engineering Motor Mounts on the way along with the fuel injector seals and a few other goodies.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Man, this thing is a bigger whore than Mine/Scheides/Ling Ling's old 1g! haha

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

i wonder what happened to my 91 fwd tsi :(

sold it to my bastard friend when i bought the evo and he destroyed it, boosted way too much, no tune no nothing just a moron than he fried the ecu...then sold it to someone else

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Yeah, never thought my excellent condition rust free shell would trade so many hands. Kind of makes me wish I never got rid of it...

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

i dunno man, you got that sweet lexus now. i lost interest in mine when i found out it was 3800 pounds. same reason i dont want a 3000gt vr4.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

just grabbed these. she needs to be cleaned for sure.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

well ive been collecting goodies over the past couple weeks

front and rear strut bars. drop engineering motor mounts. tubular from crossmember with poly bushing, and fic bluemax 1450's

the fuel injectors went in a few days ago and motor mounts and crossmember in today. couldnt break the bolts on the rear mount with the engine in the car, got those soaking in pb right now though.

gotta say with the front crossmember from bulfab. it is a great piece. i got the single piece bar. and it cleans up a shit ton of slop vs just running the stock front crossmember. the stock crossmember alot causes the engine to pivot back and forth because of the rubber mounting bushings. the tubular front crossmember has solid mounts to the car and does not pivot as the stock piece did. very stable and offers A LOT more room to get to things from under the car.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Those drop mounts are pretty good. Drop sent a set when they first came out. I didn't get to drive with them much, but they're darn nice looking. I almost wished the bushings were a little softer though, as with cams, it did have some vibration at idle. Much better than solids though lol. It's nice to see more than a few people doing the tubular front cross members, they look pretty nice.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

yea they are pretty nice. i think the avid mounts are a little nicer looking but they are 25% more money. the avids do however have selectable "stiffness"

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

well just finished up the motor mounts and dropped the car down. started her up and the vibration at idle wasnt bad at all. slightly increased over the 272's and balance shaft delete but minimal at most.


Running into a new problem now. the front o2 sensor is not switching back and forth in dsmlink and will not idle in closed loop. ive tried replacing the sensor a couple of time but still no go. checked the harness to make sure there wasnt a short and that is good as well. any ideas?

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Run it open loop and be done.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Or sell for the 2nd time and be done?

Maybe buy back for the third? :wedgie:

Good luck!

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

she does run pretty good in open loop like this. but it just seems like a problem to me and i want to fix it.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Some reason maroon Talons are :bengals:

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

If it idles, then that's good enough. Cars often don't idle the best at the A/F that stock O2 sensors want to put them at. A working O2 sensor at idle can also often causing it to surge or move around if the car isn't all stock.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

i havent had any issues with idle surge on this car and im sending the throttle body out for a full rebuild as well.

i just dont like the deceleration characteristics as the rpms drop because its not in closed loop for decel. it always dips lower than idle and tries to die before the aic kicks in and saves it.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

Nice car, and i really like the replacement for the front crossmember! Who did you order it through, and what was the total cost? if you dont mind me asking! I would like to get a nice piece like that before my engine goes back in.

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

165 shipped. bulfab.com

Re: The car i bought twice.
 

throwing out an update as its been a while.

got the shifter cables figured out via random shifter linkage bracket i found in the garage. not the 4 bolt one but the one that bolts to that. so she shifts like butter again. mmmmm butter!

had an issue with the battery draining and found it was the starter. to bad it killed my optima. luckily its under warrenty.

took it out today with the bad battery in after jumping it. i didnt give it the beans due to the lack of a decent battery so i figured the voltage would be all over the board.

still having issues getting it into closed loop for idle and deceleration stuff. it died twice when pushing in the clutch and i freaked out cause the battery cant hold a charge. luckily it started on the 2nd crank cause thats about all the battery is good for right now.

also found an exhaust leak at the top of the downpipe so hopefuly thats giving me the problems with closed loop.


current things on the plate for upgrades and what not are fixing the exhaust leak, dsmlink v3 upgrade, and sending an n/a throttle body out. doing the throttle body because she idles great with the biss all the way in and this bothers me.