Glowing red Exhaust .. woah!

[boostamante]

So i went back yesterday and we took a stab at it again. Runs fine now and no glowing red anything ( mind you it was around 7 ish and light out).

Seems i was off on the crank timing mark. I set it to the very last crank cover mark the 1st time and not to The 2nd to last timing mark which is 0.

So Wednesday I'll be finishing wrapping up all the little tid bits and driving her for 500 miles before wheeling it. Looking forward to this

 

[Talyn]

It is normal for the header to glow during a cam breakin. I typically jumper the electric fan when doing a cam breakin so it is running constantly and blowing air over the header.

Sounds like the dizzy is one to 2 teeth off, late spark, or you have a leaking inject(s), or both and thus raw fuel burning in the exhaust instead of the engine. This is not normal, it is a fire hazard, it will quickly ruin the CAT, and is not visible in day light.

Or it could be that.

 

[i973eat1]

On my 99' when I put a new engine in there it wouldnt even start with the dizzy being 1 tooth off

 

[David_Bricker]

My old 440 magnum in my van would have the first 3-4 inches of the manifolds glow red under a very light load. At light load, it ran quite high advance. The moment I hit the throttle to accelerate, the red glow would disappear. I also jetted it to run as lean as I could get away with.

So, high rpm, no load, and potential high advance, and today's engines running leaner for smog purposes could cause glowing exhaust.

David Bricker / SYR

 

[Ecomike]

Today's engines, since about 1977 run rich for smog purposes, not lean. They run rich to supply the fuel needed to get the Cat hot enough to work right. The Cat does all the work cleaning up the rich burn...

 

[Talyn]

They run rich on start up to get the engine started easier as well as heat up the cats, not the whole time.

 

[boostamante]

So now i have another problem. Transmission cooler lines keep blowing off... great. I bought some dorman pastic pieces to replace the old worn ones and they wont stay on. Looks like i need to hit up the stealership.

 

[crimsondragon]

You should see turbo manifolds. I would get my manifold and turbine section cherry after a hard run.

 

[boostamante]

You should see turbo manifolds. I would get my manifold and turbine section cherry after a hard run.

\
Dude, don't remind me... i want to turbo the XJ but ... you know... money...

 

[Ecomike]

They run rich on start up to get the engine started easier as well as heat up the cats, not the whole time.

On the start up that is correct, but once the O2 sensor feed back control loop is started it still runs a little on the rich side of the stoichiometric ratio (Or so I have been told and read repeatedly). Not as rich as on start up, but still richer than was needed before CAT converters (I am told). That is steady state at idle. During acceleration (rich again), deceleration (lean) and heavy loads (richer), it is another story. And at constant idle it varies back and forth rich-lean-rich-lean...., in a pulse wave pattern and tries to average out just slightly rich thanks to the feed process control loop operated by the ECU/PCM.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air%E2%80%93fuel_ratio

For gasoline fuel, the stoichiometric air–fuel mixture is approximately 13:1, but E.P.A. regulations raised the ratio to 14:1 to allow the use of catalytic converters i.e. for every one gram of fuel, 14.7 grams of air are required (the fuel oxidation reaction is: 25/2 O2 + C8H18 -> 8 CO2 + 9 H2O). Any mixture less than 14.7 to 1 is considered to be a rich mixture; any more than 14.7 to 1 is a lean mixture – given perfect (ideal) "test" fuel

After reading that, I am not sure all of that is even correct. Something in that is either incomplete, or contradictory. The 13.1 sounds like it may have been old style prefect gasoline, before oxygenated fuels were added, like MTBE and ethanol.

I still wonder how they expect to burn all the fuel with a rich mixture and a shortage of air, even with a CAT, but this is a Government agency, so why should it make sense. Perhaps the CO is finished off going to CO2 when it exits.

Perhaps the process control cycling from the ECU-O2 feed back loop cycling back and forth solves the lean burn (excess air) overheating the engine issue, and keeps the engine cooler, and supplies the excess fuel to the CAT on the rich swing side to keep the CAT hot.

Every time I dig into the topic I find a new level of complexity.....

 

[Ecomike]

So now i have another problem. Transmission cooler lines keep blowing off... great. I bought some dorman pastic pieces to replace the old worn ones and they wont stay on. Looks like i need to hit up the stealership.

Sounds like you got the wrong ones, wrong size/style. I had that problem, they look the same, very close, but they will not hold.

 

[boostamante]

Sounds like you got the wrong ones, wrong size/style. I had that problem, they look the same, very close, but they will not hold.

Yeah, found that out the hard way

Bought some new units today and all is well.

 

[D.I.T.A]

I honestly don't think you have a problem, If its running good and all your systems check out your good. Both my black xj and green one have had the header glowing red especially when I play in the snow with them don't stess it.