well, i am on my 2nd opti within the last 1,000 miles and i am absolutely fed up with this car now. my options are:

fix it and sell (buy a LS1 TA)

swap in a LS1 and sell all my LT1 stuff

coil pack it

i cant decide. i hate to give up when i am soooooo close to a cam-only 11 sec pass but damn do i hate this opti. help me decide yall.

 

what's going out on the opti? the roter or optical sensor part. Were they used opti's you put back in?

 

Somthing else is causing your opti woe's.. 1K miles is pretty low to be having these sort's of issue's.. But if you just hold out a lil longer.. Somthing's in the wind...

 

In the last year I put 2000 miles and 3 optis on my car. My latest one just took a dump last week, haven't changed it yet. Lucky for me, I get to replace the harness every time as well because the connector corrodes bright blue, ruining my connection and the inside of the opti.

 

Fireman,
I feel your pain. Is your Opti vented? Have you used dielectric grease on the connections? I've had to fight the same problem. On my last Opti change, I vented the Opti, used dielectric grease, and removed the MSD coil, which returns my ignition system back to bone stock.
Kevin

 

Used dielectric grease last 2 times, just ended up with soft, mushy, bright blue corrosion. I am factory vented, I have removed and cleaned both vaccuum hoses coming off the opti as well. My ignition is totally stock too.

 

thats screwy, I hear the check valves going in the harnesses is very common problem, just get the LTCC & forget about the opti firing anything & all the corrosion problems are non-existant, I took the rotor off in my opti & replaced with an old rotor with the ends cut off & just the middle section left to be used as a washer, I was going to just put in a washer instead of the rotor but the weight of the middle part of the opti is lighter then most washers when you cut the ends off

 

The least dramtic thing you can do is to coil pack it. It's also the cheapest.
(Replacing the stock opti and selling the car is cheaper at first, but once you'll take a bath on value, because you'll never sell it for what you've got into it. That may be fine with you, but you should be aware of it. )

Plus, this way; maybe you can hit the 11's on motor.

You can't do that if you sell it or convert it.

 

Fireman,
I just noticed that you've got a CC306 camshaft. I've got a CC305 in mine as well as a Comp Cam double roller timing chain. (I did the electric WP conversion.) One thing that I did on my last Opti swap was shim the Opti away from the timing cover and cam approximately .120". I had noticed when I installed the last couple Optis that there was a good bit of resistance for the last .080-.100"...almost as if the dowel pin in the cam was too long

After carefully measuring the pin, I determined that it was not the problem. It was only engaging the Opti approx. .200". I tried to measure the depth of the hole in the center of the cam. It was difficult to obtain an accurate measurement with my crude measuring instruments. So to be on the safe side, I decided to pull the dowel pin out of the cam .120" and shim the Opti out .120". You can only shim the Opti .150-.160" because the balancer will rub the Opti if you shim it any further.

I wonder if that blue corrosion that we're seeing in Opti is caused by the heat inside the Opti, that is resulting from mechanical interference inside the Opti. Like I said, I'm not certain that the Opti shaft was bottoming out in the cam, but there did seem to be some sort of interference that kept the Opti from sliding on the last .080-.100". Have you noticed any difficulty in sliding you Opti all the way on? Hopefully we can determine what is going on without having to convert to one of the non-Opti alternatives?

Kevin

 

I always have a hard time lining it up correctly, when I get it in the right place it just pops in. I'm going to pull the latest bad opti off tomorrow and I will post the condition of the opti, the harness and if it comes off easy or hard.

This is the first real help I've gotten with this, thanks guys.

 

What are the symtoms of a bad opti? Here are mine...
http://web.camaross.com/forums/showt...hreadid=281379

 

Okay, just pulled the opti off. Came off like normal, there is some resistance the first 1/4"(coming off) or so. I believe its just the rubber o rings causing that. I looked at the back side of the opti and there is no evidence of the pin bottoming out. The opti connector was difficult coming unplugged, this is normal, the corrosion on the connection causes that. No evidence of coolant hitting the top of the plug or anything.

 

i dont understand how an opti goes within a couple k unless it gets wet.i replaced my opti but doubt thats what was causing my problems,didnt use dilectric grease or vent it and it still looks and runs fine.i suggest getting the delteq kit which i will be doing soon too.i helped 94_camaro_LT install it on his car and it was so easy and ran bueatifully.it sold me right there.

 

You have 3 options:

Dynaspark
Delteq
LTCC

Search on each one and make your decision.

 

My connection to the opti turns to sh*t with blue corrosion. Even if I go with one of your options, I still have to keep the opti. It may not fire the cylinders, but it still needs to read the hi/lo res pulse. I was all ready to convert to the HEI distributor until I found out I still have to run the opti and that my PCM still has to communicate with my opti.

I cold dump $600 into an LTCC or Delteq, but that won't help me at all.