My project, all help welcome.

[Pritchett]

So instead of hijacking a guys thread I've decided to create my own. My goal is to make my car as best as possible while taking current budgets into consideration. I've owned the car for approx 10 years and can never see myself getting rid of it, so time is not really a factor.

The run down...

Body- 93 Mx-3 GS
I'll post pics later but the body is in great shape rust wise...dent wise, not so much. Body work will be in this cars future but is not on my to do list yet.

Engine- KL-ZE w/kl-01 cams, curved neck manifold etc.
My current setup runs ok but not as smooth as I'd like it to. I just recently installed the rear O2 sensor and the motor has smoothed at idle a little better. It has a stumble(read miss fire) from time to time and it bothers me. I was running Bosch platniums +4 and it was running great, however now the stumble has since developed so I took the advice of our mx-3 community and went with NGK's. The stumble is still there #3 cylinder sparkplug boot is split in half about midway down the plastic/rubber, the connector looks fine but could this be the culprit? I should clarify it was like this since the swap and was working fine. Another note..I swapped out the k8 ecu to that of one out of a automatic mx-6 or so the seller told me. Says 626 on the box but it's written in marker which leads me to believe it was purchased from a scrap yard or something. I can get the proper code at a later time, I also swapped the vaf out of the same car. It cured my bouncing idle but the vris points appear to be off. Should be a win tho, 2.5L fuel management over the 1.8L map.

What's some good/easy mods for spark production? Is the msd box easy to install? Anyone know about aurora...it's a company in abbotsford,B.C that makes spark plug wires. What about a power pack conversion? I'm open to ideas.

That's it for now as I have to help the wife make dinner. If you can shed light on anything I'm wondering about please do so. I want to get this thing working good before I pull the engine to fix the syncro's in the tranny.

[mx3_ryder]

Your misfire is probably from the bad plug wire arching. Get that changed so you can rule that out. What throttle body are you running? You should be running a kl47 throttle body for your curveneck and kl31 or kl36 ecu with your stock je50 vaf. This is the combo you want for a smooth running ze.

[Pritchett]

Got some numbers,

The ECU is a KL55, the VAF is a KL02 and the throttle body is a KL68. I checked the throttle body of my other ZE and it's a KL68 as well.

I made the mistake of power washing the engine bay and now it misses like crazy. However when it's cold it runs much better

[Pritchett]

Took off my disty cap and sprayed it with WD-40 to displace any water that may have gotten in there. Also inspected the suspected #3 cylinder problem. There was a little water inside the hole as well, not much but a small amount. I WD'ed it as well and then blew it out with compressed air, I taped up the cracked boot and started it up. It didn't arch from the taped crack to a ground, but did from the hole to the ground...so that's temp fixed for now. I then inspected the other boots and found bad stuff. Boots for cylinders 2 and 4 had minuscule holes burnt through them and were arching out and around the boot to a ground. Sucks cause these are 2 NGK wires...4 years old maybe but not a whole lot of use on them. So plug wires will most certainly help my motor run smoother. I'll update when I research the aurora plug wires a little more.

[Nd4SpdSe]

Ya, burn holes would be a bad sign.

If your still suspecting spark issues, you can look into the HEI mod, or HEI + External Coil

[Pritchett]

Ordered my aurora plug wires today, $178 with express shipping. Not bad considering the NGK's are $160, while the aurora's are 8.5mm and explain their product and plug wires in general pretty thoroughly.

I want to add an external coil and the HEI mod but currently do not have the know how. I'll have to do some research on how to do those.

[Nd4SpdSe]

There's diagrams around for those. Check the FAQ, I think there's a thread speficially in there for those

[Pritchett]

Got my plug wires today, installed them right away. Misfired a bit then ran fine, however after it warmed up the engine got worse. Once it's at operating temp it misses just as bad as it did before. My dad told me this is symptoms of a bad coil.

Also now it seems to have a lot less get up and go, for example with the old plug wires when I'd punch it in 2nd gear it would accelerate pretty fast and break the tire loose a lot. Now it seems to accelerate with less "umph".
However before when I was cruising around and let the rpm's get low in say 3rd-4th it would sputter as I pushed the gas, well now it performs much better in this situation, with absolutely no sputter and just clean acceleration.

Any ideas about the misfire now? I have a basic multimeter, is there a way to test the coil to see if it's the culprit?

[davmac]

You'll have to check the online manuals for testing the coil. I understand that coils sometimes act up when hot - but usually the engine stops or will not start. Since ignitor and coil problems usually mean the car will not start I think your problem is more basic.

First check and clean ground connections. If there is no improvement I'd check and, if not new, replace the distributor cap, rotor and plugs (in that order) first. If all this fails to correct your misfire then maybe go to an external msd coil and GM ignitor module.

[Pritchett]

I had the coil replaced a few years ago but it hasn't gotten much use, the cap has not been replaced nor the rotor so they are both likely candidates. Thanks i'll try those first