I have an '88 323 2WD and after some idiot crashed into the front driver side my insurance company replaced the front headlight/turn signal/hood and radiator at an ICBC "approved" company.. well I drive home (a lil under 10 mins) and by the time i get there the temp is at 2/3+ and the low an behold, the headgaskest is shot on a 130,000 km original engine. The insurance company wouldn't fix it, the body shop wouldn't fix it, so I was SOL. I opened up the engine about 2 yrs later and figured out the problem in short order, the idiots at the body shop forgot to remove the lower radiator dust cap... a tiny lil red plastic cap was all it took, and even when i brought the cap with pictures to the body shop the guy still told me I was SOL, ******.

She was my daily driver/autocrosser/fun car and the car i let my brother use, as I had a 2003 Mazdaspeed Protege insured aswell for road trips, dates/weekends/etc. I did basic aftermarket and junkyard mods on her:

-2.5" mandrel bent downpipe into a 3" str8 through (legal and fully functional) cat into 3" regular bent (cause at 3" on a 1.6 and stock turbo the cost of getting a full mandrel bent exhaust is just not gonna be worth the bang for the buck ecspecially on a secondary car) exhaust tubing all the way back to a 3" str8 trhough Borla "muffler". Thank god for turbos, cause there's no way i could get away with that on some of my N/A Si Civics, when my 323 gt was running it had a beautiful throaty sound that doesn't offend and is fully legal. Cost of parts (cat/'muffler'/2.5" DP/3" regular exhaust tubing) and shoptime including help/labour from exhaust shop owner set me back $500 CDN all together.

-'88 626/MX6 GT intercooler with custom pipe $50 and an hr of my time.

-Autometer A/F and Boost gauges about $100ish including maybe an hr for wiring/installation.

-disconnecting 11 psi cut-off switch (hence the A?F meter) free

-big *** custom K&N filter built into a DIY forced cold air system (essentially a small 1.5" flexible pipe mated from front spoiler into a hole drilled into the bottom of where the air filter is mounted) with an aluminumm heat shield in between the filter and engine/rad. $60 for the filter, and maybe $20 for the mandrel bent tubing and bits and pieces to make it work.

-MSD blaster coil and 8.5mm spk plug wires and NGK performance plugs, maybe $200-$250ish all together and about an hr to install everthing.

-Apexi turbo timer for a lil extra turbo life, about $100 bucks and an hr of install time.


I am forgetting a few minor mods, and still plan to do some more once the engine is being rebuilt (port/polishing), slightly lower compression, a BOV and replacement CPU to run 16 psi saftely without having to watch my A/F meter all the time.


Before the accident and shoddy repairs blew the head gasket it was running comfortably all summer (in Vancouver, BC) at 13.5 psi, and up to 14.5 psi during the winter with some room to spare. She'd run a 1/4 mile late 13s ealry 14s and I really miss smoking domestic V8s in a little sleeper that very few people know about

I'm having a very hard time removing the crank bolt, I have no Air compressor at home and I don't feel like towing it to a friends house an hr away, or to the shop where i'd have to pay for storage/shop fees..

Anyways, I have to move in 2 months.. I have the top end apart and when i last worked on it with a tech buddy I went to trade school with and without an air compressor we just could not break the crank bolt loose. *I just went out to give the crank bolt another try and it broke free, but I don't want to go much further without any tips.



Any help/tips would be appreciated, I'd like to get it runniing again then swap out the ecu and do a few more basic mods.

PS. any relatively cheap tricks, parts or tips for increasing the bottom end's performance slightly would be appreciated aswell. keep in mind this is more of a daily driver and fun/balanced car than a power beast that will understeer with a blip of the throttle, I'm more interested in good, reliable power than crazy ***** out 1/4 mile power. I was thinking of a heavier clutch but then I'd have to beef up the tranny cause anyone with an '88-89 gt/gtx knows the tranny isn't the strongest out there. I don't want to swap the turbo or turbine/impellers unless I absolutely have to..

MOST IMPORTANT, this is an "All go, No show" car.

This is my second '88 323 gt (last one was silver, this one is red), the 1st one I owned was before I was a mechanic and some idiot turned right into me almost head on and wrote off the 1st one, if I knew now what I knew then..lol

 

So yesterday i started taking the bottom end apart from the tranny and engine bay, everything took about 4 hrs then we left the engine on a jack and the steering engine mount until we had some more time today.

By removing a few small brackets and such and with some serious muscle we wiggled the bottom end out and put it on a stand until it goes to the machine shop to get disassembled, checked for warpage, etc etc.

More updates with pictures to come.

 

The block is on the stand and i just completely disassembled the remaining components to get them ready for the machine shop.

Every thing looks pretty choice (the motor had only 130 000 km when the head gasket went, and was shut down before there was any oil/coolant smoke from the exhaust), the cylinder walls just have about 5mm of light surface rust at the top and no discernable wear, so they should only need to be honed. By the looks of it I probably could have gotten away with just a block surface check/cleaning and if necessary a slight plaining. But since i plan on keeping the car forever I decided to check EVERYthing vital to an engine that will consistanly run 16 psi of boost (almost double stock boost) without any future problems.

One thing that would need replacing within 30-50k km is the clutch, and I'll probably plain/lighten the flywheel anyways so definately a good idea to replace the clutch since it's all apart. I'm not sure if I'll go with a performance clutch kit, as I'd rather burn out a clutch than my tranny, since we all know the stock GT/GTX trannies are fairly fragile. My tranny is still good right now, no 2nd gear synchro problem yet, so I wanna keep it that way as long as possible. If* i had unlimited fund I'd have the tranny rebuilt and beefed up, but I just don't have the time or money to do so. I'll use this box up and do it down the road when i have the time and money...

Before I take all the parts in I'm going to take some before photos of the main components and engine bay, should be tomorrow or the next day.


Still open to ANY and all questions, tips or feedback.. 8)