[s-cars] Flames, good or bad?

[Elijahallen92 at aol.com]

In a message dated 1/15/2004 6:05:36 PM Eastern Standard Time, 
mlped at qwest.net writes:


> Apologies for the earlier tongue in cheek post about playing with Hap's
> mind, but on a more serious note, who's been following you and for how long
> have they been observing this phenomenon?
> 
> I don't *think* I've been experiencing tail pipe flames, but then again it's
> not a part of the car I can observe very well, particularly at 7,000 rpm,
> it's not usually where my attention or eyes are directed.  I guess I'd have
> heard a back fire - I haven't.  And I suppose if I had, I might have been
> paying more attention to possible flames out the tail pipe.  Are we talking
> a burst of flame out the back that's visible by you from the pilots seat?
> 
> AFAIK Elijah this is a new one for me.  Any other FMIC users out there seen,
> felt, or experienced the same?  Is this on your, or your wife's car?  I
> would think, if anything, you should have a cooler, denser air charge now at
> your intake manifold.  Unless this is totally X***ing up your intake air
> temp sensor in the manifold, you should have more air, not less so if
> anything, I would guess lean vs. rich.  Are you sure all your intake valves
> are seating etc.?  How about your cam timing?  Are you dead nuts sure
> something isn't off a sprocket or two?
> 
> I think a steady diet of this kind of problem would well warrant having the
> car taken in for a leak down and compression test to try to eliminate either
> a bad valve not sealing off an unburnt gas compression stroke, or the cam
> being off somehow.  Unless of course you get a Greek chorus of "Don't worry,
> we've got flames coming out of our tailpipes" from all the other FMIC users
> on the net.
> 
> This just doesn't sound like a good thing to me, Dahlback not.
> 
> Mike
> 

Mike,
 Yea, as cool as it is I don't think its a good thing either. Yes I have had 
someone watch as I went through four gears and yes the backfire that I hear 
results in a flame that he said was bigger than a basket ball. Also at night 
when this happens on dark roads you see a flash of light even if your not looking 
in the rear view mirror. I have only checked the cams to make sure they were 
on and they were. I have not taken the head (The one I bought from Hap) off 
since the install last year. The head had been gone through and had new valve 
seals etc. installed before I got it. It also was ported, polished, and had a 
five angle valve job. Ever since the install I have had some other issues with 
the car getting hot at the track and backing boost off after four or five laps. 
Also if the car sits running for a long time it will seem to go into limp 
mode and won't start running strong until I drive a few miles. I had hoped that 
the FMIC and a bigger oil cooler would cool it down and keep boost from backing 
off at the track but its been so cold here if anything the car is running to 
cold and as a result boost backs off when the outside temps are below 20. BTW 
yes this is on my car not the wife's. Thanks for any help.

Elijah