Thank you, it was a pain to do but worth the effort.

 

Just loving driving the Z and snapped some pictures. Ordered Kinetic Hi-flow cats today, unfortunately they are for another Z at work. Look forward to hearing what they do to the sound of the exhaust though. Picked up the $5 little cover for the rear wiper arm today. It went missing at the paint shop some how. Getting ready to order the JWT clutch kit and some bearings to tighten up the car some. Also looked at steering wheel options. Not sure if I;m going to recover mine or buy a used one in better shape. also kicked around do I go supercharger or turbo route

 

Time for some wheels!

 

AWESOME!!!
If you go either route with supercharger or the Turbo. Your going to have to start rebuilding the engine to handle that kind of power while still being reliable.
and it comes at a hell of a price

 

You're not going to need a rebuild for anything under 420whp

 

Whats the weak link in these motors when you start pouring the horses to them?

 

I cleaned the Jeep up and then took it to the office to swap out the Z to bring it home and clean. I was driving normally jumped on the interstate ran up to 80 then slowed to 75 and went to set the cruise control. It set and then kicked itself off and the Service Engine Light started to blink. I'm thinking what the **** now. So I slow to about 65mph and get off at the next exit. While coming of the interstate I can tell something is up because the exhaust note has changed and the car is loud like the exhaust had fallen off or something. All the gauges read normal, temp is good, oil pressure is good the car still has power under acceleration but sounds sick. I come to the light and stop and when the light turns green I start off and it stalls. F*$&, so I fire it back up and holly hell it sounds like its coming apart. A thumping sort of sound still seems more exhaust note than engine and the SES light is blinking away. So I baby down some back roads and to the house. It stalls again pulling in the driveway. I shut it down and crawl all over it. Nothing looks out of place, it does smell like its running rich but no visible signs of what the hell is going on. so inside to get on the web since I don't have a scan tool with me, will be hooking it up to one tomorrow to pull codes. So the blinking SES points to a misfire condition which makes since as the car sounded as though maybe it was down a cylinder. I go back out to the car to do the ECU reset/pull codes from the car and I can't get it work. so I fire the car up to refresh my memory of the noise its making to compare with some Youtube vids I watched and ........... it sounds fine. No SES light and it purrrrrs like it always has. WTF is going on with this car??????? I was just starting to enjoy driving it and another issue has reared its ugly head. Id swear this car was made by Jeep with all the issues it has

Any insight is welcome, I'll hopefully have codes in the computer to pull tomorrow to try and figure this out and will update here as well.

 

About 3 months after I'd bought my Z I missed a gear and the revs bounced of the limiter followed by the check engine light coming on. I got home OK making sure I never revved it above 3k rpm, on the drive I was listening for anything that sounded or felt out of the ordinary, but it sounded and felt OK. On my previous fill up I couldn't get the correct octane fuel and thought that perhaps this was the reason for the light coming on. The next day I thought I'd go through the ECU reset just to see what would happen and lo and behold 1 service, another oil change and 7k miles later my Z is running as sweet as it ever did. No repercussions, nothing. Just a thought about your problem, could the light coming on be a result of when the exhaust blew its stack and the resultant change in back pressure caused the light to come on?? A better idea of what's going on will become evident when you pull the codes later. It would be a real shame if you encountered something expensive after all of the good work you've put in on it. Good Luck with it.

 

Probably a bad coil on one of the spark plugs. Same thing happened to me. I got on it pretty hard on the interstate and the car took a **** and started flashing the SES. It sounded terrible to and would barely idle at red lights on the way home. Then the next day it was fine, only for the problem to come back intermittently. A new coil fixed it though and i haven't had an issue with it since. The codes should tell you which coil is bad.

 

Rods. Then bearings. Cranks are forged and strong as H. Block is strong too. If your replacing rods though, might as well do a whole bottom end while your at it. I think conservative boost on stock block is the best route though. DEs anything under 420whp. HRs anything under 540whp. Right shop to tune. Care and maintenance to follow. Should last a good long while. Nothings 100% though.

 

Thank you for the reply and yes it would have sucked big had I blew the motor or something costly went wrong. I babied the Z to work today and it performed flawless. Then decided to take it around the block and give it hell. While easing back into the parking lot it started flashing the SES and it is without a doubt a bad plug or coil, possibly an injector. Ran out of time to scan it today hopefully tomorrow. I'm going to go ahead and get new plugs coming.


Thank you very much for this info as it sounds exactly like what I experienced and points right to my thought of a possible bad coil. I need to hook it to the scanner first thing in the morning before I get busy.



They seem like strong little motors and make such a great noise IMO. Somewhere around 400whp would be sufficient to quench my need for more power but keep the car reliable and easy to drive.

 

Wow, nice thread OP. Hopefully everything goes smoothly!

 

Thank you and the Z is sort of on hold with Trucks Gone Wild in town. Spent my spare time on getting the Jeep ready to go play in the mud.

Plus it's just fun looking at all the crazy things people build.

 

Put new OEM NGK spark plugs in and replaced cylinder 1 coil over. The Z is back to running smooth and a joy to drive.

 

I've just been running this little car every chance I get. I do have a headlight out but all the bulbs in the assembly are inactive so wondering if the plug is loose.

Just chilling in the driveway with my recently lifted WJ