Okay, so IT WORKED. I jammed a large thick screwdriver against the bottom of the engine block and was able to break the bolts loose on the balancer.

Super happy.



Success!

 

So bad news I broke something. Air pump bracket.


Wtf is that bolt? I had no idea it was like that. I went to loosen it first and popped/broke open the bottom of the bracket.

 

Got the Opti off. Bad news, it was installed correctly. Everything lined up perfect. Here's how it looks. There is oil on the shaft but it looks like there's supposed to be oil on it because it has 2 rubber seals on it similar to the CKP built in seals. Will add a photo of the camshaft and timing cover next. Stock GM cam. Stock GM bottom end, stock GM heads and intake.


There's the camshaft and front timing cover.

I'm leaning towards chalking this up to a defect in the autozone opti. I know the readings on the scope looked right, but who knows. Maybe they're off just enough to throw the p0336 code.

I'm not sure if I want to look at or replace the timing chain at the moment. Maybe.

Looks like I'd need to remove the crankshaft pulley to do that. Not sure I want to do that tbh.

Only other possible things are low compression. Sadly, it seems this work has left me in a worse position than before I started. I have a broken bracket, and no definitive diagnosis.

This is what I need to get poppin' again: https://www.eficonnection.com/home/p...cal-water-pump. Honest to God. I can't afford it right now but you better believe once I start working I'm buying this thing. Last smog tech I went to couldn't even find the factory EGR valve in the factory location and still gave me a pass on the visual. Not his fault, he just couldn't find the thing sitting on the back of the head. And to be honest, I didn't even know if it was there or not either. After the test, I went to see if it was there. Sure enough it was. If they can miss something like that there's no way there're going to know whether I'm supposed to have an optispark or coil packs for f*cks sake.

I just hope I don't have low compression causing my problem. That would totally suck.

 

I would do what both Shoebox and Injuneer said with the crankshaft position sensor before going any farther, they have an absolutely exorbitant amount of knowledge about these cars between the two of them and ignoring it would be flat out dumb. If you can't track down an issue there then it would likely be the optispark, my car always randomly threw the P0336 code with a cheap Carquest optispark. If you still have to opti out you may want to pop it open with the four E4 bolts if I'm not mistaken, and then see if the two screws I've included in the picture below are tight, you may void the warranty if you do this however. The two screws in the carquest opti I had actually completely backed themselves out giving some play in the internal assembly, I believe this was likely causing the code because my car still ran well just as yours is. I could even hear them move around as I pulled the opti off. Just some food for thought.

 

I don't see how loose rotor screws could cause this problem...but then this engine has mysteries still unsolved ;-) God bless my old LS1...still going strong after 22 years of unconscionable neglect;-) Woohoo!

 

I'm not 100% sure, but when the rotor screws were totally out it would cause some play in the entire internal assembly. My thought was that this could cause small differences between what the metal shutter wheel was reading with the sensor because it would actually wobble back and forth, I've had two opti's die on me from rotor screws backing off. Both of them would display a P0336 code more and more often as the rotor screws became more loose I believe. The screws being loose would allow the rotor to wobble around inside, and the metal shutter wheel may actually contact the sensor because the rotor screws give it some stability. However, you would think this would effect performance somewhat, it did for me, but according to the OP. My reasoning here may be flawed, the P0336 may just be due to a bad quality sensor inside the opti, maybe I'll throw in one of those old optis sometime and see if they'll throw that code now that I've re-tightened and assembled it.

 

I somehow missed this post. You're right. The reason is that I don't know how to repair them.

I would think the connector needs to be cut off and then a new one crimped on. I also don't know how to use the multimeter. So I guess I should try and put the key in the ignition, would that give the wires power to measure with the multimeter?

The truth is that I'm not a mechanic and I'm not really even good at trying to be a DIY mechanic. The only reason I do my own work on my car is only because I don't have any money and I like the car too much to get rid of it. So I just slog through it as best as I can, usually break a few things along the way. And, eventually, it works in the end.

But if anyone tells me the proper way to check and repair wiring I'll do my best to emulate that process.

 

Okay so I was looking for a guide on how to repair wiring in general and I found this article: https://www.popularmechanics.com/car.../a643/2705606/. And, it got me thinking. About 8 years ago I did the 'halo-eyes headlight mod.' Which used these generic blue halo style fog lamps sold at a pep-boys parts store. I put them where the factory headlights used to be.

Well, when I put them in I did a crappy wiring job. I just sliced some of the rubber coating off of the sides of the headlight and high-beam cables, and off the running lamps and turn signal cables. I basically just wrapped the exposed copper from the pep-boys lights around the existing cables where I cur a hole in the rubber shielding and then wrapped them up in electrical tape afterwards. And that was it.

Does any of the running lamp, turn signal, headlights or high beams share a ground with the CKP or Opti-spark? They've definitely shorted out before and the electrical tape falls off over time. When I did this 8 years ago I thought it was fine. But now I'm beginning to realize that maybe I can't just wire something in like that.

 

you need a set of ignition wires like yesterday.

 

Alright, I slowed down things a little and got my multimeter out and learned how to use it.

I'm pulling 10 volts at the CKP sensor in the timing cover. I measured it where the exposed wires were just to make it easy.

I feel like that's probably correct. I think I should trace all the grounds out in the engine bay, and make sure all the grounds are working correctly as well.

Now that I think about this further, I do have a weird electrical issue with the stereo. It acts like it intermittently shorts out now and then. It cuts power, then turns back on after being out for 10 - 20 seconds if it bumps or bounces around.

Could any of this be related to my shoddy running lamp and headlight wiring job?

 

Okay so I found a bad ground. The flat chassis wire that runs from the driver side head to the sheet metal by the radiator appears to be bad.

 

What do you mean by "bad ground"?

Turn your multimeter to ohms. To measure the resistance of any wire you should isolate it from both ends, and have your meter lead on both ends to check its continuity. (Edit: by isolating, that means either de-mating the connector the wire terminates to, or removing fasteners that hold the electrical terminal to chassis or component)

Aside from a break in a wire, other things to look for are corrosion, damaged or off nominal terminations.

Then you have shorts, where the outer jacket of a wire has been stripped away and the copper strands or conductors arc against the chassis of the vehicle (or any metal bonded to chassis...such as headers or exhaust manifolds etc).

You have a picture of the wire damage? I might have missed it.

 

I didn't upload a photo of the wire, but I think it has corrosion. There are parts of it that are blue-green.

When I check the other grounds nearby, as well as the engine block, heads and anything else I get 0.00 ohms. On this connection I got 1 ohm, I double and triple checked it. That flat copper wire is no good.

 

The resistance of the wire may indeed be 1 ohm. 1 ohm resistance is normal depending on the size of the conductor and the length of the wire.

I'd like to see the wire damage. It's an obvious issue that needs to be corrected. Especially if it's got broken strands and/or corroded.

 

Yeah it's definitely blue-green all over xD. Looks like the statue of liberty.