Just failed emissions twice

[Gary Palmer]

Originally Posted by Matt Timion

Yep... o2 sensor socket. I tried removing it with a breaker bar last night and a 1 foot extension along with two smaller 3 inch extensions.

The only results was a broken 3 inch extension bar.

Maybe I'll remove the hood tonight and try again. The hood kept getting in my way with the breaker bar.

Or maybe I'll just go to the junkyard today and see how much work it is to get the exhaust manifold off of these cars. If it's easy I'll just do that and remove the o2 sensor that way.

Matt: If you take your socket, extension and so forth with you, you could go for a drive up the canyon, east out of Salt Lake. If you drove it as hard and fast as it will climb that grade, I am pretty sure that it would be warm enough to come loose and you'd be able to get it out. If you drive that long uphill grade at night, pushing hard, by the time you get to the top, if you look, the exhaust manifold is a soft cherry red glow to it.

I would try doing the drive up the grade before I'd tackle taking off the exhaust manifold. You will, very likely, just encounter additional "frozen" bolts and so forth, if you go that route. Just a thought.

[JanGeo]

Manifold bolts on my Geo came out of the header when heated with an Oxyacetylene torch and getting them glowing red hot and we reused them. Maybe get the exhost really hot then cool the sensor with a cold wet rag to crack it loose.

[Gary Palmer]

Sooo, Matt: Did you get the Oxygen sensor to come out, so you could get the CRX registered, or not?

p.s. I haven't noticed anything on the 89, are you stuck, or has it been terminated?

[Matt Timion]

Originally Posted by Gary Palmer

Sooo, Matt: Did you get the Oxygen sensor to come out, so you could get the CRX registered, or not?

p.s. I haven't noticed anything on the 89, are you stuck, or has it been terminated?

Heh.. I've been rather busy lately with other things. Tonight I'm going to try a torch. Do you think a torch from home depot made for plumbing will work?

As for the sedan, All that I have to do is replace the thermostat and take the axle off to fix the axle seal, but I can't find motivation to do it. I should probably do it today thoughas I have to drive to Provo tomorrow for work.

[Gary Palmer]

Ahhh: Motivation issues I can totally relate to! I think what happens for me is that mentally I start unconsciously thinking about one more "but, what if", particularly when you've had restarts, as you have, largely as a function of the fact that your doing something new, relatively speaking. Hang in their, you'll get to it.

On the torch, the normal propane torch you can get at home depot or the like, might work, but they make a higher temperature torch, which is called sosomethihng like a high swirl, high temp, or something like that. It has a longer nozzle and it swirls the air and the propane together, allowing it to get a lot hotter. It get's hot enough to braze really thin sheet metal, but that's in California and I think the higher altitude their might not allow that.

It seems to me like I've seen the torch in the section where they put the MAPP gas, at Home Depot and it was called a MAPP torch. MAPP gas is just a higher burning temperature than Propane, but other than that, they both use the same attachments and so forth.

The flame end of the torch has a nozzle about 2" long with a couple of holes in the sides.

Bernzomatic calls it a "turbo charged swirl torch". They have a model JT539T and a model JTH7. The JTH7 comes with a hose, so you don't have to hold the can to guide the torch. I would recommend that over the other model, which just screws onto the top of the Propane or Mapp container. If you get this, you can use it for anything you would use their other propane torch's for, you just have to turn it down because it will get too hot, if you are just soldering with it, for example.

I checked on Harbor Freight and it looks like they have a chinese knockoff, for $19.99 and theirs a store at 3470 S. State, if you wanted to check that out.

If you use this, all you need to do is to heat the sensor right around the threads where it screws into the exhaust manifold, until it get's as hot as you can get it. Then you should be able to back it out. I've used mine to remove exhaust manifold bolts that were cross threaded and really buggered up and it has allowed me to get them off, anyway.

Good Luck!

[JanGeo]

Scan Code PO401
P0401
80
EGR Insufficient Flow Detected


EGR Insufficent Flow Detected

OK guys what would be a course of action on this engine - been doing this for over half a year and ScanGauge1 mileage indicated about 19.9mpg non-aggressive driving when she thought she was getting 39mpg HA! Maybe on that trip to Maine she did but not now!

[Gary Palmer]

You should be able to check the EGR manually. If you get a short piece of vacume line you can remove the line from the EGR and plug it off, then put the extra piece on the EGR and suck on it. If the engine starts to run rough, then the EGR is probably opening up and when you let it go, it should smooth back out. My guess would be that your EGR valve is either not opening all of the way, or it is bleading back closed.

[GasSavers_Ryland]

how I got my o2 sensor out after it had been in the car for 200,000+ miles, was I cut the wires, leaving enough that I could splice them back together, then useing a snug fitting deep socket of the correct size and garenteed not to brake, I went after the sucker for about half an hour with an impact wrench and the air compresser turned up all the way, I think a used a bit of liquid wrench, and a propane torch, but mostly it was the air impact wrench, and those you can rent, they also make electric impact wrenchs.

[JanGeo]

Originally Posted by Gary Palmer

You should be able to check the EGR manually.

Any ideas were this sucker is hiding on the engine? All I see is intake manifold.

[DirtyOldTown]

,

Originally Posted by JanGeo

Scan Code PO401
P0401
80
EGR Insufficient Flow Detected


EGR Insufficent Flow Detected

OK guys what would be a course of action on this engine - been doing this for over half a year and ScanGauge1 mileage indicated about 19.9mpg non-aggressive driving when she thought she was getting 39mpg HA! Maybe on that trip to Maine she did but not now!

The Honda V6s were bad about the egr passage in the upper intake manifold getting clogged with carbon, causing a P0401. Their fix was to drill out the EGR passage and install a metal sleeve to prevent future blockage. They also said to replace the EGR valve. If you removed the upper intake (easy job), you'd likely see that the EGR passage is completely clogged up. You could simply poke out all the carbon with a pick and reinstall the manifold without using the sleeve kit (a special drill bit is needed to install the sleeve), but it would probably clog back up in a couple of years (maybe even months, who knows?). Also, the EGR is not vacuum operated on this engine, so you wouldn't be able to test it manually. The valve itsself could also be clogged up, but I bet I fixed 50 of these when I was working at the Honda dealer, all of them had clogged EGR ports in the upper intake. Once you clean out the port, thoroughly blow it out with compressed air to be sure that there is no debris that gets into the engine. You should be able to reuse the intake and throttle body gaskets.