kyepan 291 Posted March 2, 2006 Hi there, The mi was running great for the first day of ownership, now she wants some tlc and has decided to make a whining noise, its coming from the distributor or very near by. It had been making a small metalic sound like a brake disc shield or exaust heat shield was loose at low to mid rpm for about 20 mins or so.. i gave it a bit of gass down a dual carrigeway, only 3-4 seconds worth in second. The next time i started it about 2 hours later, it turned over for alot longer and took a bit of gas to fire up, it sounded like a fan belt was slipping but more tinny. The noise stayed and is rev based, the car now is really reluctant to rev and is a kangeroo.. So there was no vibration noise, little vibration noise, lots of vibration from the dizzy area and not a happy car, all in the space of a couple of hours. and no more than 30 mins easy driving. It's an mi16 with a metal thermostat housing,(just had a leak fixed before i got it, lots of silicone sealent, possible bodge) no adaptor plate that i can recognise, a bosch distributor, and an orange dizzy cap with... possibly male ends. I would guess its running an 8v ecu as the dizzy has no torqx bolts and is a push on fitment. I played with the rotor arm and its not held on by much more than a little spring loaded bit of metal, do these get loose, the cap had condensation, so dried it out, the condition of it was not fantastic..i will probably replace it over the weekend. a few questions that i cannot find answers to.. 1) The dizzy shaft had about 20 degrees of play when rotated,is this normal and used for advance? 2) the dizzy shaft had about 8-10mm of end float and did not feel fantastically solid laterally.. is this normal? 3) can the water leak from the thermostat housing get into any bearings in the dizzy and cause them to fail, dad said it sounded like some kind of bearing failure. are there any bearings further up inside the thermostat housing that could have got wet and failed also 4) if i took a couple of pics could somone identify how the hell somone has managed to get this dizzy to work without the adapter block. not gone any further and taken the distributor off, cos it was cold and dark..will buy nessecary parts and fix on sat. any help appreciated, as i can't wait to get back and drive it again. Justin Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kyepan 291 Posted March 3, 2006 hi there, have taken some pics and have a couple of vids with sound if anyone wants to have a listen to the noise... the wonders of mulitmedia, he he . pm me and i'll mail the vids (quicktime needed) Mods these are under 700px in size, and about 20-40k each is that ok no spacer? from behind male connectors dizzy 205 water jacket? is it ok that this is exposed? once again, any help appreciated. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Normski 1 Posted March 3, 2006 Your car will be running the 8valve ecu, as that's why you need a mechanical distributor. The other exposed camshaft end in your last picture is perfectly ok, it's where the power steering pulley was mounted on the 405. The adaptor plates you can buy are just that, a means of fitting a distributor to the Mi16 head. That lump of alloy on your car is doing just that. The coolant distribution/thermostat housing is underneath the distributor (looking at your first picture). It's the yellowish/orange bit. It won't be causing any of your problems. I don't have that set-up on my car so i'll leave the rest to someone that has the same set-up as you. My advice would be to get the proper parts back on the engine. The Mi has fully mapped fuel AND ignition as standard. It'll run far better. (Unless you plan to use carbs in the future, but even then, fully mapped ignition is the way to go). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kyepan 291 Posted March 4, 2006 (edited) The adaptor plates you can buy are just that, a means of fitting a distributor to the Mi16 head. That lump of alloy on your car is doing just that. just to be very clear because i'm not sure i completely understand, so its using the 8v water jacket/thermostat housing. and thats acting as the adaptor instead of using one of these; or is there an adapter i can't see till i take the dizzy off today My advice would be to get the proper parts back on the engine. The Mi has fully mapped fuel AND ignition as standard. It'll run far better. (Unless you plan to use carbs in the future, but even then, fully mapped ignition is the way to go). converted to run using 8v ignition, then converted to run 16v ignition.. roughly how much would that cost? Edited March 4, 2006 by pugtorque Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pug_ham 242 3 Cars Posted March 4, 2006 just to be very clear because i'm not sure i completely understand, so its using the 8v water jacket/thermostat housing. and thats acting as the adaptor instead of using one of these; or is there an adapter i can't see till i take the dizzy off today It looks to have a chopped up 8v thermostat housing as a dizzy adaptor, the standard Mi16 thermostat housing is underneath it. (Like Normski said, the orange bit with the plastic cap & hoses attached to it. converted to run using 8v ignition, then converted to run 16v ignition.. roughly how much would that cost?That depends on how much you can get the Mi16 AFM, ECU etc for, theyhave gone through ebay for over £200 before but usually can be found for less than that. Either that or as a temporary measure get the correct adaptor pictured above, thatmight take some of the play out of it. Is everything tight on the head? The 8v distributor rotor arm is just a push fit onto the shaft. I also don't have this set up but afaik the dizzy isn't used for anything except a spark on you car set like this. There is no advance or anything as its a mechanical system which isn't connected. The link you posted mihght be a similar problems to yours but without having the proper adaptor & just a hime made one its hard to say. Mark the distributor position & takeit off to look inside & see if there is anything obviuosly wrong. Graham. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kyepan 291 Posted March 4, 2006 The link you posted mihght be a similar problems to yours but without having the proper adaptor & just a hime made one its hard to say. Mark the distributor position & takeit off to look inside & see if there is anything obviuosly wrong. Graham. Thanks for your replies, marked it took it of, and quickly discovered that water had seeped in from the leak on the water jacket and totally destroyed the dizzy, it rattled when you shook it. the vacume advance was still ok though but the bearings in it have completely died.. Good news is they fixed the leak properly as you can see sealent on the inner around the cam shaft. so i needed a new bosch dizzy, off we went to the scrappy in search of a replacement distributor, and found bosch dizzy from a white 1.6 gti with a clip fitment clap,(mine is screw on) female connectors (mine are male) and broken diaphram... So the leads don't match its cap, and my new cap won't stay on.. but fits. Bodged an old dizzy screw fitment cap with the right make connectors to fit, and she's running again, quite well. although now idles lumpy when warm going to a much better scrap yard tomorrow, to see if i can find one with a working vacume advance and may bodge another new cap to fit without splitting it in the vice this time.. will put up photos of the dizzy when i can.. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pug_ham 242 3 Cars Posted March 4, 2006 Its been said that you need a 1.9 GTi dizzy for this but I can't see much reason why ifits only there to make a spark at the righ time. see if i can find one with a working vacume advanceThe vacuum advance should be left disconnected afaik, it'll have very little effect on your car imo still running the 8v loom & ecu, the Mi doesn't have it as its all ecu controlled. Graham. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kyepan 291 Posted March 4, 2006 Its been said that you need a 1.9 GTi dizzy for this but I can't see much reason why ifits only there to make a spark at the righ time.The vacuum advance should be left disconnected afaik, it'll have very little effect on your car imo still running the 8v loom & ecu, the Mi doesn't have it as its all ecu controlled. Graham. thanks graham, yer i'll block the pipe to the vacume advance so it doesn't register as an air leak. gonna go to the enormous wokingham scrappy tomorrow in search of a better dizzy that doesn't require a bodge. and maybe some 1.9 driveshafts / hubs etc as mine may be on their way out, lots of vibrational noise around 4krpm Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kyepan 291 Posted March 8, 2006 Got the vacume advance out of the knackered one, so will swap at the weekend... *adds to growing list of jobs. he he Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kyepan 291 Posted March 21, 2006 (edited) Got the vacume advance out of the knackered one, so will swap at the weekend... *adds to growing list of jobs. he he Have changed the vacum unit over, really easy to unclip, but a bitch to relocate, in the dark , with only a torch.. grrr.. and its now fine, really runs well.. and more importantly.. idles perfectly... Did a list of other things too like fixed the split lead, and renewed the dizzy cap / rotor / plugs (plugs looked fine)...so it's smoother through the rev's too.. and what a throttle response.. edit... i'll also post up some pictures of the old dizzy, its quite a state. Edited March 21, 2006 by kyepan Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
