Mechanics welcome! 00 GS-R swap problem *lengthy explanation*

[AngelSol]

I have a 00 GS-R. I bought the car with ~122k miles on it and pretty much as soon as I got it, it started burning oil. It started at a qt every 1200 miles and after a year and ~150k miles on the od, it was burning a qt every gas fill up. #3 cyl was the one causing most of the oil consumption and I have no idea of the cars previous life although it looked as if there were wires and lines run for n2o at one time. Compression was pretty low in #3, I think it was under 100 if I'm not mistaken. It was still driveable this way and actually to my surprise, ran decent. The fact that I was running through oil like a fish through water and that it was getting worse was why I went through with what I did. Here's where the problems started:

I bought a 95 jdm GS-R motor, conversion hareness OBDIIb>OBDI off a friend. It was in a hatch that he wrecked but the motor was still in great shape. This motor probably had 60k miles on it at most. The price was right because he had to sell it to recoupe some of his cost on the car. The mods on the motor are a skunk 2 manifold and cam gears (he had buddy club cams in it and sold them and we put the stock jdm gs-r cams back in), 98 jdm header with the 2.5" collector. When we put the cams in the car, the lines on the cam gears match and are pointing at each other and the two holes line up under the girdle plates at the top above the cams when at TDC. When you rotate the engine, all the lines match up on the gears and where the crank TDC mark is pointing. Mechanically, the engine looks to be turning in harmony. I used my TB, dizzy, and fuel rail/injectors off the 00 engine. When I went to start the car to let it warm up to time it, it acted like it was 180* out and was intermittantly backfiring through the exhaust. With the 00 dizzy on the car, you pretty much had to turn it all the way toward the driver in order to get it to somewhat idle decent but it was still backfiring pretty good. When you try to push on the gas pedal, it would backfire, choke and want to die out. BUT, you could easily push on the pedal, moving it a maybe 1/2 inch and it would start to rev up and over 2500 rpms; It would start to smooth out. If you tried to push the gas pedal in further by goosing it, it would back fire and wouldn't rev up. It's like the computer doesn't know where the engine is at as far as timing or it's not getting the correct fuel or TPS signal.

At this point, I had his OBDI dizzy with the 2 plugs so I made a jumper harness and pinned it to my OBDII 1 plug harness and the timing was easier (looked like most honda's i've timed and the bolt was almost dead center at 14*) and it ran a HAIR smoother but it's still backfiring and the gas pedal is the same way. I changed the fuel filter to a brand new one. I then thought maybe his computer was the problem because it's a chipped OBDI computer with a stock chip (I think p72 or p28...I'd have to look at it). He came over to the house and we tried his OBDI computer out of his 95 GS-R and it did the same thing. I put my 00 computer back in, obviously w/o the conversion harness and it did the same thing, only with a check engine light for no crank fluctuation sensor. Now, I'm not getting a check engine light in the car with the OBDI computer but I'm wondering if there any thoughts or suggestions on what may be the issue?

The skunk2 intake mani doesn't have any butterfly valves so that's unplugged and I'm wondering if that could be causing the issue? I've had the valve cover off several times making sure the cams look like they are clocked in the correct position at TDC and all the lines, holes, and dot on the crank line up. I'm kind of at a loss, the old engine was idling and running fine and all I did was swap this in.

Any thoughts? And Thanks for looking!

[AngelSol]

Can a mod please move this to Engine Tech forum... Thanks

[yellowrexsi]

dumb question
are you plug wires on correct

[AngelSol]

I'm pretty sure, looking right at it from the pass side the lower left is 1, then up to 2, then right to 3, and down to 4. I don't think it's in the post above, but I've tried 2 sets of plug wires, rotor buttons, and spark plugs.

[yellowrexsi]

Originally Posted by AngelSol

I'm pretty sure, looking right at it from the pass side the lower left is 1, then up to 2, then right to 3, and down to 4. I don't think it's in the post above, but I've tried 2 sets of plug wires, rotor buttons, and spark plugs.

so you are
2-3
1-4

I think your firing order is off. This is the only pic I could get in a hurry. My book is at home and I'm at work. So I can verify this later tonight

[AngelSol]

I'm not like the picture, I'm like you stated above that. (I'm almost positive) That would explain something and I guess it's easy to over look something stupid when you're not taking it back to the basics.

2-3
1-4

I'll check a when I get home today.

[yellowrexsi]

Originally Posted by AngelSol

I'm not like the picture, I'm like you stated above that. (I'm almost positive) That would explain something and I guess it's easy to over look something stupid when you're not taking it back to the basics.

2-3
1-4

I'll check a when I get home today.

The simple stuff is usually what gets most people. Its easy to overlook


Let me know what you find when you get home

[AngelSol]

Originally Posted by yellowrexsi

The simple stuff is usually what gets most people. Its easy to overlook


Let me know what you find when you get home

It was the firing order, I feel like an idiot to be honest. The good news was that I went to set the idle and learned that there was a small coolant leak on the IAC when I went to unplug it. I almost just left it the way it was and timed it at 1100 just to get her running. The bad is, she's all timed up and runs pretty good down low but up top she's strugglin' like something is holding it back. I did modify my 60k mile cat to take the 2.5" flange for the JDM header and when it was lean popping and missing timing, pieces of it were coming out the back. I'm assuming that my issue now is that the cat is busted up and clogged from all the raw fuel hitting it then lean popping to ignite it. I'll have to take care of that tomorrow! On my old setup with stock exhaust manifold, same cat and the hks exhaust, it was a LOT louder then it is right now with the addition of the jdm itr header. After "fixing" the cat issue, I'm going to weld up an 02 bung and use my AEM wideband from my Cobra and check the A/F mix. That should ease my mind about anything else that could be messed up!

Anyway, thanks for suggesting something that was of the obvious bro as I appreciated the help!

[yellowrexsi]

glad to here you got it
great explanation on the problem, it makes it easier to help when the person knows what they are talking about
good luck with the cat