89-91 Non Turbo Intake on an 86-88 Block
Disassembly Modifications Re-Assembly Tuning Counter-Points
REASSEMBLY STEPS
Once I had the throttle body fitting, I assembled the upper intake:
This included cleaning the throttle body, installing the upper injectors, and figuring out where I was going to attach all of the vacuum hoses to the intake. After that step, I bolted the piece to the lower intake manifold:
And the final step that was a real pain in the butt? The Oil Metering Pump rod... (PIC) Believe it or not, you can get the rod to fit perfectly with the 89 intake. The first thing I did was I straitened the rod completely. I then made about 20+ trips back and forth from the car to the bench vise as I slowly formed the rod to fit.
One Note about the Oil Metering Pump Rod: MAKE SURE you have the bolt for the alternator in place before you start bending... I made this mistake and I had to re-bend my rod after I had it perfect. One thing that I did do? I moved the engine wiring harness to run BELOW the alternator bolt. The problem with this was that the alternator plug didn't reach. So I had to make it about an inch longer.
ELECTRICAL:
The "Air Intake Sensor" is the same, and will fit perfectly from one intake to the other.
The only real electrical problem was the BAC valve. The 89 intake moves the valve to the passenger side of the engine, so you'll need to extend the plug. THE PROBLEM? The 89 BAC (oval) connector is different from the 86 connector (rectangle). If you were lucky, you got a connector when you got your BAC... if you weren't lucky, then you can file the 86 rectangular plug to fit in the 89 BAC like I did...
ASSEMBLY CONCLUSION:
There are about 20 or so small little things that need to be worked out as you move along through this project... Mostly little brackets and vacuum hoses to hold all of the solenoids. How you tackle them will depend on how much of the emissions equipment you plan on keeping. I kept EVERYTHING, so I had to run a lot of vacuum hoses. Did it work? You bet! When I reconnected my battery and turned the key, she fired right up as soon as the fuel hit the injectors!
I can honestly say that my car ran as smooth as it did before I started the operation. My next steps were to tune the 6-port actuators and the VDI.