Pleides

I would assume this is a hardware-level problem, not something that could be noted electronically either, correct? Do I just remove the timing cover or what all needs to be removed?

I assume this would have been obvious with a timing belt job? Ben replaced the timing components about 1K miles ago since I had a cam seal leak.

Alright, here's how things have gone: I did a compression test with my mechanic Ben. Below are the results: 140, 125, 145, 125 - cold tested Cylinders 2 and 4 had suspected worn piston rings. PRE's were: 60, 130, 100, 150 So I don't think I'll be back at PRE. Scheduled a dyno with Surgeline for September. Kinda bummed. Really liked Austin at PRE. Think they just saw a young guy with a fast car and assumed I had abused the thing and would pony up for a new motor... I dunno. Joke's on them - I drive like an old lady lol

I can count on one hand the number of shops I can trust in the Portland area that I've worked with. Raleigh Hills (my mechanic) and GER-BROCK in North Portland - actually an easier shop to work with but they don't do huge engine work and they're far from me. But I do trust Ben at Raleigh Hills, he literally did the comp test with me and that shop has been doing work for my family since before I was born. I also have tried to remove the spark plugs from this car myself (what you'd obviously need to do for a comp and leakdown test) and have yet to figure out how to get the fourth one out without lifting the car up. I can typically access a lift at work (new/used dealership) but only on the weekends when our mechanics don't have their tools out since the service dpt. is closed weekends. I tend to do a decent amount of work on the car myself but this is something that I'll leave to people who have removed the plugs thousands of times on these. Anyways, excuses and long explanations aside... We'll know by next week. Either there's enough life in the engine to drive it until it blows and I can do a full engine rebuild with more money saved up, or we sell the car for not much. For those with an AP, has it paid for itself? I've kind of avoided Cobb Surgeline literally only because I'd need an AP as kind of a gateway for a lot of their work and it's nearly 700 bucks. I don't really want to pay $700 for a glorified key and code scanner.

Thanks, I'll definitely be giving them a call. I know they're reputable. Sadly they require a Cobb AP for their tuning which I don't have. I'll have Ben do the test Wednesday next week and I'll know by then what's going on (hopefully). I do not have an AccessPort or any method of data logging. PRE made shop notes of things they claimed my car needed but somehow, despite seeing a driver's front axle seal leak (that doesn't appear to be there from my viewing of it), they didn't notice the PS rack leak.. kinda weird. Do you replace the whole rack or can you just replace the boot? Eric only did the comp test because he said my car had a cylinder 1 misfire as the car settled back to idle after a clean WOT pull on the dyno. The only pre-dyno stuff they did AFAIK was the vacuum leak test. I'll have to see how this goes. 80 PSI difference though? I know difference gauges can show different numbers but that's hugely different. Car has never had a valve adjustment though.... so that's a potential point of failure. This could be it. As stated above, car has never had a valve adjustment and I believe had the stock tune for about 180K miles. I would LOVE to use Horizontal since they're a 15-minute walk from where I work, which is really convenient. I'll have to see how things go on Wednesday. To be frank, although I love the wagon, if the car needs serious engine work then I'll have to sell it as it's just been a huge cash suck for me. Unless y'all think I can get 10K miles more outta the engine lol

Well guys, shit just really quickly hit the fan, and I'm not sure what to say. Could use some recourse in a difficult situation. Things should hopefully be resolved within the next week. I may have to sell the car cuz I cannot afford a motor rebuild right now. I took the car to PREracing in NE Portland. They installed my OEM downpipe and new downstream O2 without fuss like I asked. They also were gonna do a dyno tune on my car. Eric, who seemed very knowledgeable, ends up taking a few hours to do his thing and I notice that my car cannot be heard from inside PRE's shop (meaning he's not doing pull after pull on the dyno). After a few hours he comes back and him and the service/sales guy are going over what's wrong with my car. They end up telling me I've got 60 PSI on cylinder 1, 100 on cylinder 3, and around 140 on the other two cylinders. Eric put a very conservative tune on the car and told me whoever did the tune before didn't even adjust the factory timing on the tune. We all noted that it was really weird that the car failed a comp test on what are typically the two most reliable cylinders. Ringland failure was suspect. Car burns about a quart every 1K-1250 miles. Eric raised the idle a bit to compensate for where he said the car would misfire. I should point out that I never asked for a compression test, in case anybody is wondering. I started calling around for motor rebuilds and called my trusted mechanic. My mechanic did a pre-dyno inspection and oil change last week and noted the car seemed fine, drove with lots of pep, and generally worked as it should bar some iffy tuning issues (to be expected given that the car was tuned on a bad MAF). My mechanic Ben, who does most of the work on my car, decided to do a comp test on the cylinder that PRE found to have 60 PSI. I held the gauge while he cranked and the car ended up having 140 PSI on that cylinder - a VERY different result than PRE. Unfortunately, due to their lack of staffing, we had to wrap the car up and schedule next week for a full comp and leakdown test. Also noted - I was under the car while the plugs and coil packs were out. PRE noted on my service sheet that I had a leaky driver's axle boot. I did not notice anything leaking from under the car bar a boot on the steering rack. Axle boots seemed fine all around. I'm more than a little skeptical of PRE now. Has anybody had bad experiences with them? It's all leaving a bad taste in my mouth.

Turbo has about 25K on it and no worrisome shaft play. No leaks.

I'm going to PRE Racing on August 1st for a dyno tune since my car is catless and I want the downpipe cat on there for good and have emissions coming up. Cobb Surgeline was very friendly when I talked to them on the phone but I scheduled this tune over a month ago and had some financial uncertainty at the time and didn't want to spend the money on a Cobb AP. I'll post back if the comp test comes back with some issues. The weather hit 90 degrees F today and the car ran super smooth. Car is just hellbent on being a confusing mess with no CELs No plans to increase power. The 280 WHP it was pushing before clearly is too much for this motor with it's age and mileage. Planning on dialing it back closer to stock. Thanks for the replies y'all, I appreciate it.

Hi all, sorry if there's forum etiquette I'm missing here (this is my first post) but I have a question. My 05 LGT 5MT wagon has had this stumbling feeling between 2-3K RPM for awhile now and I've replaced numerous parts (upstream O2, MAF, PCV valve, plugs, clutch) and all have seemed to help this stutter a bit, but never rid it completely. (In case anybody is concerned, I am going to compression test the engine on Tuesday (7/23/19) as the car burns about 1 QT of oil every 1000-1250 miles or so, despite the new PCV valve.) Car has 206K miles with the original engine. Car was previously dyno tuned by Jared at PDXTuning with a bad MAF sensor (unknown at the time). The car didn't have a steady CEL related to the sensor but would sometimes leave a code for overboosting. The car would also occasionally die at idle or with the clutch pushed in. All of these symptoms have been remedied with a new MAF sensor and PCV valve, however the car still stumbles and seems to get slightly worse fuel economy than it should get considering all I do is freeway driving with heavy use of cruise control (21 MPG). My question is whether or not a car dyno tuned with a bad MAF sensor would result in a wacked out tune when replaced with a good MAF sensor? The car had a much smoother idle and made noticeably more power under all loads with the new MAF, but the fuel delivery has seemed pretty weird since.

*removed because stutter is still there*

*accidental double post, noob here*