The Lowdown

[DnaProRacing]

This will be a very long msg but it has to be done. May help some, may not. but this is what I went thru with my 92 lumina Z34 LQ1. repairs and mods. Im not a mechanic and will prolly never be one. in fact, up till when i bought this car, I knew nothing about fixing cars. I learned as I went along replacing/repairing parts on my Z. anywho, i bought the car for $1300 and it didnt run. as you know, you have to jack the engine forward to replace the back spark plugs. once I did this, it started up just fine. after a test drive I noticed a thumping noise from the back that turned out to be a broken bracket on the driver side sway bar. the dog bone strut was also worn to no repair on the front of the engine. both very cheap and quick fixes. shortly after, i experienced what a ton of others did with the roaming idle and stalling at red lights. after a ton of research on what i could say is a ton of forums. seafoam was the most common denominator. soooo, I added a pint of seafoam to the oil, a pint to my gas, and then draining a pint of tranny fluid and adding a pint of seafoam transtune to the tranny. ran for a few days then changed all the fluids. it was incredible the difference this made with power/idle/etc. ohhh but the issues continued. shortly after that, the car started surging and puffing out black smoke on accel. was told that was definately a fuel issue. changed the fuel pump/filter, map sensor, o2 sensor but the problem remained. come to find out it was the computer telling my injectors to stay open too long. once that was replaced, perfect. im in love. the car ran great and had plenty of power. but, im never happy, had to get more power. did more research, found out that you can get a performance chip for this model, along with better exhaust and intake setups. went so far as to replace all the troublesome vacuum lines with silicon hosing which work awesome. carbon buildup had all my vac lines pretty much clustered, as well as the upper intake. sooooo, did an upper intake cleaning with seafoam deep creep, got my injectors serviced, and made my own egr bypass using sheet metal "just to keep things clean". but, found out if you do ANY mods to your car, it simply must be tuned for them to work properly. the performance chip was the answer to that. had the egr disabled thru the chip so i wouldnt get the ses light. it also holds my temp at a cool 180 degrees "same as my thermostat". the driver side fan is always on. the second fan only kicks on when temp reaches the red, which it hasnt cuz it pretty much stays between 180 and 200 even at red lights. it idles at a nice rumbling 600rpm when in gear and about 800 rpm when in neut. the car is 16 years old, has 217,000 miles on it, and runs like a race horse. the top end "this car is known for it" is simply jaw dropping. BUT, 0 - 60 has always been a challenge. stock is 7.2 seconds. i know im beating that, even tho ive never really timed, i do know that my head hits the back window when i throttle it, all the way up to about 130mph. since my gauge only goes to 115, not really sure how fast it can go, i do know i bury it quite often and i can certainly feel more accel. in fact, another gear kicks in when i get to 115mph. i had the limiter set to 150mph thru the performance chip. doubt it can do that tho. im very happy with all that i've done to this car, on the same note, you either have to be an experienced mechanic or have a bottomless wallet to keep it going. i've got about $7000 dumped into it so far and have yet to tint the windows and paint it. i kept saying i have to get it mechanically fit before cosmetics. yep, still searching for that comfort zone to break down and paint it. i have replaced or fix just about everything under the hood so i wont list all that ive done. but, the mods i have done are magnaflow converter, silicon vac hoses, flowmaster muffs, performance chip and k&n air filter. i always use synthetic oil and flush the tranny every 20k. also, i use techron in the fuel every 3k to keep the injectors clean. seafoam in the oil one week prior to oil change. and seafoam transtune in the power steering and tranny a few days before flushing. to sum all of this up, simply keep your engine/sensors clean, do tune ups often, and always look for warning signs. i will help anyone in here that asks "this model only". i can only tell you what i've done with certain issues and how i did them. hope this helps those who are seeking help, i know the pain of owning the LQ1 so i am certainly willing to help you out with yours...