New engine. won't start.

[sparky Paul]

I wonder if the WE and WA stamped on the two rings relate to the PWE and PWA in the two part numbers?

I never saw an actual photo of the PWE ring, only drawings - perhaps they are all generic images that were used.

[JimSh]

Well done you.
I've been following this thread avidly without understanding a word.
Got to admire your perseverance.

[CRC]

I wonder if the WE and WA stamped on the two rings relate to the PWE and PWA in the two part numbers?

I never saw an actual photo of the PWE ring, only drawings - perhaps they are all generic images that were used.

That's a good point .....generic images are often  used  and just end up causing confusion in most cases when searching for a specific part.

[Si Crewe]

There's a lesson for anyone doing an engine swap on one of these things, or indeed an ECU!

Being Hondas, I guess most of these succumb to rust rather than mechanical failures.

I know it's a cheap vehicle but spare parts are cheap so it IS (IMO, at least) worth trying to repair mechanical problems.

The cheapest L13a1 engine I saw on eBay was £65 (collection only) but for £100-odd you can buy an engine delivered to your door.

It should be within the capabilities of most home mechanics to replace one of these engines.
It looks kind of daunting inside the engine bay but if you approach it methodically, it's fairly straightforward to remove the electrical spaghetti and hoses, remove ancilleries such as the inlet and exhaust manifold, alternator and starter motor and then just drop the engine & gearbox out and replace it.

Stuff like this is what causes problems, though, and deters people from doing something which shouldn't really be that difficult.

At the end of the day, I didn't have any significant expenses, aside from the engine.
No need for new gaskets or seals.
Basically, £110 for the engine, about £50 in fluids and £15 for a couple of big tupperware tubs to put bits in and a bunch of freezer bags to put bolts in and write on them where they came from.

The one thing I learned from all this is, don't be afraid to take the front bumper/apron off.
I left it on for the first couple of days and battled to jam my hands down the front of the engine and through the holes in the front grille.
Eventually I had to take it off to get access to the starter motor and a couple of sensors on the front of the engine.
It's 4 crosshead screws under the bonnet, 1 more under each wheelarch and a bunch of plastic clips.
After that, it's 4 bolts to remove the crash-structure behind the bumper.
Takes about 5 minutes... as long as the screws aren't rusty.
Makes access to the engine, all around, SO much easier.
Wish I'd done it straight away. Probably would have saved me a day and some skinned knuckles.

[sparky Paul]

The one thing I learned from all this is, don't be afraid to take the front bumper/apron off.
I left it on for the first couple of days and battled to jam my hands down the front of the engine and through the holes in the front grille.

Being forced to take the front end off the car to get the engine out and back in is getting more common these days, especially with the slope of modern windscreens. Often that means bumper, reinforcer, rad pack and slam panel. The mark 1 is obviously marginal, and you could probably struggle through, but taking a few bits off obviously makes life easier. Looking in the engine bay of the mark 2, it's much tighter under the scuttle, and there's even less room between the rads and the engine. I suspect you may have to open the front up.

As you say though, although it looks a daunting job, if you have the essential engine hoist and are steady and methodical, it's pretty straightforward... usually. If something looks a bit complex, I might also take a few photos of the layout as I go.

Good job though, well done... and I've learned something too.

[Kremmen]

Reminds me of the Hillman Imp.

Lift rear engine cover, unbolt rear panel, undo wires, engine out rearwards on a trolley jack. Friend of mine used to take the engine out to service and clean his annually. He could get the engine out in about 10 minutes.

[JimSh]

Sorry if I'm being thick but as I understand it both engines work with the 12t ring.
Why did the "new" engine have a 34t ring?

[sparky Paul]

Sorry if I'm being thick but as I understand it both engines work with the 12t ring.
Why did the "new" engine have a 34t ring?

Both engines would work with the 12t ring on the OP's ECU.

The engine with the 34t will have come from a car with an ECU that's set up to use the 34t ring.

Hope that makes sense 

[Si Crewe]

As it turns out, I didn't take a lot of "pretty" pictures.

I did take a heap of pic's but they were mostly detail-shots, to remind me where wires went, where bolts came from and how things fit together.
If you're doing something like this, I'd suggest taking pic's of EVERYTHING that you're going to touch with a spanner, screwdriver or pliers.
You might think you'll remember where it all goes but a month later, when you're staring at a big pile of bits, you won't!

Anyway, here's a couple of pic's.



Gotta have a good work-space for this sort of job. 



Don't think it'll polish out.



Old engine out. New engine ready to go in.
No need to remove subframe, steering rack or anti-roll bars.
Just popped the driveshafts out, disconnected all the spaghetti, took all the engine & gearbox mounts off and dropped the old engine/gearbox onto the floor, swapped the engines over and then hauled it back up into position.
The actual engine-swap only took half a day.



Well, I guess I got a profile pic' out of it all! 

Maybe worth saying that the new engine seems to be running quite a bit smoother than the old one (even before it self-destructed) and I'm now seeing up to 57mpg, apparently.

Going to be "running in" the new engine for 500 miles, just to give it chance to get used to running again (no telling how long it was sat in a scrapyard), clean itself up and dislodge any muck inside it and then I'll replace the oil/filters again and treat it to a new set of plugs.

[sparky Paul]

Looks chilly! I also approve of the use of the bin-bench, I'm a fan of those myself 

Good job, well deserved success.

[Westy36]

  Fantastic job, great photos. You've shown us parts of a Jazz I hope to never see!

Be interested in seeing how the new engine works out. Keep us all posted.

[Si Crewe]

One thing I meant to say...

Check out how low down the air intake actually is (passenger side, next to the bottom of the radiator).

Under the bonnet, you can see that the air intake connects to the inner wing.
I thought it was just sucking air in from there, with the wheelarch protectors serving to prevent road-crud getting into the system.

Turns out that there's another pipe which runs down the inner wing and actually draws air in from underneath the front bumper.

If I'd known this, I probably would've been more concerned about attempting to cross a flooded section of road.
Course, there wasn't actually any alternative so I'm not sure what else I could have done.
The real problem was the twonk in the Sprinter, coming the other way, who (presumably) decided it'd be fun to drown a teensy little car. 

With the intake where it is, though, it's certainly possible that water-ingress caused or aggravated my conrod problems.

[Jocko]

A mate of mine had a similar experience with his Renault 25 and a bus. His engine seized immediately and on a strip down was found to be damaged beyond economic repair.

[sparky Paul]

With the intake where it is, though, it's certainly possible that water-ingress caused or aggravated my conrod problems.

It's a reasonable bet that there is a connection, I'd forgotten about that little episode 

Sucking water up the intake rarely ends happily.

[culzean]

Hydraulic lock - water gets into cylinder and water will not compress so the conrods get bent or broken.... many engines have gone to great scrapyard in sky that way.  On a bike forum there was a guy who had his bike fall off the prop stand and lay on its side for a long time,  then engine would not turn over - the oil from crankcase had got into cylinder, he was able to drain it out an run engine ( bit smoky for a while ) - but if engine already turning when fluid gets into cylinder it never ends well.