As promised, here is the write-up to my stage 2 cam istallation in my '92 KA.
First off, I’d like to thank Nick (blueS13) and Mark (Elroy) for all their help. I honestly couldn’t have done it without them. That said, here goes: we set up shop in my garage on saturday the 21st of Oct and get to work. after removing the valve cover, the sick smell of walnuts hit our noses (oil change?). we took a pic of the cams and gear after finding TDC, or top-dead-centre. (this pic saved our souls). the upper face cover had to go to. Getting the cams out was a bit of a pain, since we needed to borrow a 1" wrench and wrestle with the shaft, but we did it. After lubing everything up with the Redline lube provided, we put in the exhaust cam. nice fit. naturally, we moved onto the intake - no fit. What???
This gets it’s own paragraph. the shaft is 1/2" longer than the exhaust, and doesn’t fit in the KA!!! I freaked out, but the guys kept their cool. WTF do we do? We phoned up Crower but they were always busy. So I ran to the computer and went on SON to find number of anyone I could think of, Varun, Sasha, Chris, Jover… LOL. Midway through explaining to Sasha what was going on, we find a peice of paper in the box that read:
FWD intended setup. For RWD vehicles, grind down slotted end of exhaust cam and switch the intake cam for exhaust and exhaust for intake." Are you serious? you want us to mill a cam inmy garage? and use the intake cam on the exhaust side???
We had no option but to follow the directions. Out came the grinder to my new cam, and we swapped the two and put them in. then came the fun. We lined up the top two marks, but not the center mark. And our TDC, was it on compression or exhaust? hmmmmmm. We went with what we thought was right and bolted everything down. We started the car, and it ran horridly. Gave it some gas, and it nearly died. Hmmmmm, back apart she goes. the next couple hours was all about problem sovling, consulting manuals, and highschool auto shop memories. Using a motherass ratchet and socket, I cranked the engine to TDC one last time before assembly. Having cracked the KA so many time, the risk of forgetting the ratchet on the crank became an ongoing joke. But things got serious as we neared completion. After going through finals checks, it was time to test…
I turned the key: “du du du ddRRRRRUUUuuuuummmm~kl;sdfjkpoierjf[wjfadjfajg;fjgalgjgaj;fk;glf…” WTF??? turn it off! turn it off!!! Snap, what now? we all had our theories, till soemone remembered to look down the crank shaft - the RATCHET!!! yes, I did it, i forgot the ratchet in place. the engine turned that thing over @ 500 RMP hahahaha. It shaved a 1/16" of the fan, and nicked the lower rad hose… and unscrewed the crank screw!!! After fixing my blunder, we tried it again for the last time: “du du du ddRRRRRRUUUUUUUuuuuuuuummmmmmm”. Success. Ran a little rich, but sounded great non-the-less.
Sunday I picked up a Megan 3" cat-back, and we installed that with a custom 2.5" test pipe. Along with the cold air intake that was already in place, the car felt significantly better, in ways like:
-the engine is very strong now
-it feels like the car speed matches the RMP’s as they go up, since the KA usually makes the car feel like it’s draging behind a bit.
-tires break traction easier throughout the power band
-on a warm engine, power kicks in @3500RMP; on a hot engine, it seems to pick up @ 2500RMP
There you have it folks. A full weekend for sure, but a good one. Hope this was a fun read, pic should be up soon.
Leo. (with props again to Nick and Mark)
