My 88 SETA

[It's Soda Not Pop]

one thing i have learnt is if you dont know root cause dont be suprised if it rears its ugly heads sometime down the line. Ive swapped parts and issues resolve temporaily and many weeks later back to square one, hopefully not in your case though as you probably have atleast elliminated several potential soucres. Not saying your issue was with trigger but it is not uncommon for people have had issues with triggers on standalone MS etc with similar issue of breakdown at topend. tbh you probably needed to look at diagnosis with a scope triggers and the primary/secondary coil to get to the bottom of it. i would love a picoscope but a good one is spendy once you get all the bits

Long story short. Before I swapped out the coil and plug wires for OE stuff. I noticed that coil had black oily liquid in the center post. After I cleaned it real good. I took that car out while picking up my daughter. I did the old 2 to 3 shift spiritly. The car never bucked. It was only after swapping over everything to the new stuff that it started happening again. Also when I was removing stuff to go to the individual coils the plug wires broke while I was taken them off. I've never had this happen with plug wires. So I believe my issue was somewhere in there with ignition. Maybe I'm wrong, but the car works now (Knock on wood.......bam bam bam) and I'm not looking a gift horse in the mouth.

[digger]

Almost every thread on this forum and others including FB pointed to going standalone. I did everything except swapping the harness out. The harness is what jlevie did. I looked at used harnesses online and none that I found look as good as mine looks right now. That being said I believe the issue was with the ignition wiring or one of the supporting components. I did replace all of these items with oe or name brand products. I planned on going standalone anyway, because I'm turboing the car. As far figuring out what the route cause was, I was really tired hitting a wall with this issue. I wanted to drive the car and enjoy it. Buying this has allowed me to have my car back.

one thing i have learnt is if you dont know root cause dont be suprised if it rears its ugly heads sometime down the line. Ive swapped parts and issues resolve temporaily and many weeks later back to square one, hopefully not in your case though as you probably have atleast elliminated several potential soucres. Not saying your issue was with trigger but it is not uncommon for people have had issues with triggers on standalone MS etc with similar issue of breakdown at topend. tbh you probably needed to look at diagnosis with a scope triggers and the primary/secondary coil to get to the bottom of it. i would love a picoscope but a good one is spendy once you get all the bits

[It's Soda Not Pop]

It’s a shame you didn’t find out the root cause as it would be interesting to know and be definitive in terms of solving the issue

Almost every thread on this forum and others including FB pointed to going standalone. I did everything except swapping the harness out. The harness is what jlevie did. I looked at used harnesses online and none that I found look as good as mine looks right now. That being said I believe the issue was with the ignition wiring or one of the supporting components. I did replace all of these items with oe or name brand products. I planned on going standalone anyway, because I'm turboing the car. As far figuring out what the route cause was, I was really tired hitting a wall with this issue. I wanted to drive the car and enjoy it. Buying this has allowed me to have my car back.

[digger]

It’s a shame you didn’t find out the root cause as it would be interesting to know and be definitive in terms of solving the issue

[It's Soda Not Pop]

So the other day I finally went standalone. I'm using ClassicDaily's PNP and Individual coil setup. I was having cutout issues when I would go WOT. Switching to this new setup has been a great experience. All of my issues that was having in the high rpms are no longer present. Classic Daily is a member on here( jakeb ). Hit him up if anyone is interested in ecu besides MS.

[It's Soda Not Pop]

Are you pulling the motor or trans to do the turbo swap?

The plan is to refresh the bottom end. So yes. To be honest I'm not sure if the bottom needs a refresh. It's more piece of mind for me. I do plan to pull the Trans and engine out.

[2mAn]

Are you pulling the motor or trans to do the turbo swap?

[It's Soda Not Pop]

Low to mid 300s isnt getting too wild with a Turbo, I would start with a stock clutch and see how long it lasts.

I see that, but I would rather do it once and not multiple times in a short period. But at the same time if a stock clutch holds then that's a relatively cheap investment.

[2mAn]

Low to mid 300s isnt getting too wild with a Turbo, I would start with a stock clutch and see how long it lasts.

[It's Soda Not Pop]

For the power levels I'm aiming for (above post) what clutch should I run? I don't mind it being a bit heavy, but I also want to be able to daily drive this if I want. I love driving this car.

[It's Soda Not Pop]

So I believe I've decided to go down the turbo path instead of ITBs. This was actually my initial plan when I bought the car. As much as I still want an ITB car, I believe the added power from a turbo will ultimately satisfy me more (I could be wrong and the NA ITB build would rock my world, but I digress). I believe the turbo build will be cheaper (this is relative I know, what is cheap) in the long run. I plan to just refresh my bottom end. Leave it stock just new rings, bearings, gaskets, etc. I already have a good head (just have the surface cleaned). low to mid 300's is my goal for now. I want this to be reliable (as reliable as any car can be I guess). I believe this power figure is extremely doable and shouldn't cause a lot of headache in the long run. I'm going to go with jakeb from Classic Daily's PnP ECU(hopefully his turbo kit and/or setup when ever he offers it)
Feel free to chime in with advice and thoughts please.

[It's Soda Not Pop]

Here are a few picks from a local Cars and Coffee that I go to.

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*Here is a little update how things are going with the car:

So in last year or so my car has been running a little off at times. Meaning every once in awhile it would buck under acceleration. Just for a split sec. It also had some hard starts, especially in the mornings when it's cold. I've been just chopping up to E30 woes and/or something I need to replace that I just haven't done yet. The other day I was driving back from the mountains near my house and all of a sudden my car made a pop (basically a backfire type deal) and started running rough. I thought that maybe I had blown the engine or spun a rod. Come to find out one of the spark plugs had backed out enough for the compression to spit it out. Now I know that this is a stupid problem to have. I have always tighten the sparks down tight (granted I don't use a torque wrench on them). I have never had this happen. Anyway I replaced all six plugs and the car fired up and ran great. In the process of me replacing plugs I was also cleaning up some grime and dirt and oil. I noticed that my engine ground (drivers side from the oil pan to the chassis) was extremely dirty. I took off and cleaned the cable and the contact points. I also replaced the hardware with new stuff. Since doing this I have noticed a huge improvement in how the car starts, drives, idles, etc. I know grounds can cause issues. But I would have never thought it was giving me the kind of issues I was having. Moral of the story is sometimes things aren't complicated. Sometimes it's the basics that you need to check. So far so good.

[It's Soda Not Pop]

Question about the bumpers, noticed you have an 88. It came with the stock steel/chrome bumpers? If so aside from the bumpers that you ordered from catuned, did you need additional hardware? Ie the shocks? Or is just the covers sufficient? Thanks and nice ride.

So it came originally with diving board bumpers. But the previous owner is the one that converted the bumpers. The PO did the bumpers and trans swap. I did everything else.
I believe you need to get different mounts in order to run the euro or plastic bumpers. I got lucky in a way that some stuff was done prior to me getting it.
Appreciate it.

[hopeful]

Question about the bumpers, noticed you have an 88. It came with the stock steel/chrome bumpers? If so aside from the bumpers that you ordered from catuned, did you need additional hardware? Ie the shocks? Or is just the covers sufficient? Thanks and nice ride.