My multi-day opti experience

[The Gremlin]

So I decided to challenge the daunting task of changing the opti for the first time. This has turned out to be a multi-day affair. It hasn't really been too super difficult so far, but it has just been going slowly, especially for someone who is only moderately experienced in these sorts of things. So far, I have the intake off, the upper radiator hose disconnected, the passenger fan removed, the harmonic balancer bolts removed and I spent a long while today trying to get the pulley off (I already took the belt off). I got a pulley puller to help with this job, but I haven't been able to get it to come off yet. I'm probably not clipping it on right or something, as it keeps coming off and doesn't seem to have a tight enough fit to pull off something that stuck on. Anyhow, I'm saving that question for another thread. Here is a question though (I will probably encounter others along the way and will put them in this thread): I bought a remanufactured opti from Autozone (yea, maybe that wasn't the best idea for the long term but I have to get this car to work and my funds aren't at their best right now). This is the part they sold me there: http://www.shorthills225.org/hrts/CSIGv31/userimages/1/1a0556995c3f.jpg Now, I did a little scouting and I found that this is actually a part that goes inside the opti and has the disc and optical sensor on it. When optis go bad, is this the part that actually goes bad? Or am I wasting my time? Does the rotor ever need replacing? Just wanna make sure I'm putting in the right thing before I waste more of my time. Thanks.

Like I said, I'll probably be asking more questions in this thread as they arise. Your help is appreciated. :)

[Black96lt1]

The bearing can go out in the opti. I once had a ph# to a company that sold it. I found it in one of the bazillion opti threads on camaroz28.com.

What kind of pulley puller do you have? When I changed mine it was a pita. I used the type that looks like a bird's foot. It worked pretty good.

[DR.ZED]

Courtesy Shoebox from camaroz28.com


http://shbox.com/1/pull_pulley.jpg

[White97z28]

Didn't need to take the intake off......or do you mean the air intake, and not the intake manifold

[The Gremlin]

Originally posted by White97z28
Didn't need to take the intake off......or do you mean the air intake, and not the intake manifold
Yea sorry. I meant to say the intake elbow. As an update to this thread, after about 6 days of work I finished the replacement. LOL. Funny part was, that did not fix my no-start problem anyway. Oh well, chalk that one up to experience. :rolleyes:

[Andrew]

get your ingition module tested.

i did my opti yesterday, and of course the coil, module, plugs and wires. that was a fun task.

[Blown_Red_97z]

you can usually get pretty cheap optis new ($200) from Jason Cromer.

[lt1newbee]

I just recently purchased a '94 Z28 with 130k miles. It has a K&N CAI and no Cats with a Flowmaster exhaust. I decided to take it to the track to see what it would turn in the !/4. First run went smooth and it turned 14.35, but the very next run it was cutting out on me pretty bad. It doesn't cut out unless I am really putting the juice on.

That being said, does this sound like the optispark problem I am hearing so much about? I ordered a new fuel filter, Plugs, and plug wires. I am hoping that since it doesn't miss when I am babying it that it might be one of the above mentioned parts. If replacing these parts doesn't work, is there a way to test the Opti?

[The Gremlin]

Originally posted by lt1newbee
I just recently purchased a '94 Z28 with 130k miles. It has a K&N CAI and no Cats with a Flowmaster exhaust. I decided to take it to the track to see what it would turn in the !/4. First run went smooth and it turned 14.35, but the very next run it was cutting out on me pretty bad. It doesn't cut out unless I am really putting the juice on.

That being said, does this sound like the optispark problem I am hearing so much about? I ordered a new fuel filter, Plugs, and plug wires. I am hoping that since it doesn't miss when I am babying it that it might be one of the above mentioned parts. If replacing these parts doesn't work, is there a way to test the Opti?

Unfortunately, there really isn't a sort of direct way to test the opti completely, though you can test whether spark is getting to it as described on shbox.com, in my experience it has just sort of been one of things you knew all along and just had to come to grips with. lol. I replaced mine, and if I had to do it again I don't think it would be nearly as lengthy a process. Then again, I'm bordering on car idiot. :)

[lt1newbee]

Originally posted by The Gremlin
Unfortunately, there really isn't a sort of direct way to test the opti completely, though you can test whether spark is getting to it as described on shbox.com, in my experience it has just sort of been one of things you knew all along and just had to come to grips with. lol. I replaced mine, and if I had to do it again I don't think it would be nearly as lengthy a process. Then again, I'm bordering on car idiot. :)

When the opti is bad, does it miss all of the time, or only when you are giving it full throttle? I will be changeing the fuel filter, plugs and wires on Sunday. How was your car acting when the opti went bad.

[The Gremlin]

Originally posted by lt1newbee
When the opti is bad, does it miss all of the time, or only when you are giving it full throttle? I will be changeing the fuel filter, plugs and wires on Sunday. How was your car acting when the opti went bad.

Well to be honest, my car isn't a shining example of bad opti cause it had several problems at once. Basically a bad opti can be the cause of erratic behavior anywhere in the power band, though. Your natural inclination would think problems tend to lie in the full throttle area, but plenty of people have reported that their car seemed to perform better at full throttle than say 10-20%. Long story short, if you are experiencing a feeling like there is a miss or falter and your plugs/wires/fuel filter are ok, then there is about a 90-95% chance it is opti.

[lt1newbee]

Originally posted by The Gremlin
Well to be honest, my car isn't a shining example of bad opti cause it had several problems at once. Basically a bad opti can be the cause of erratic behavior anywhere in the power band, though. Your natural inclination would think problems tend to lie in the full throttle area, but plenty of people have reported that their car seemed to perform better at full throttle than say 10-20%. Long story short, if you are experiencing a feeling like there is a miss or falter and your plugs/wires/fuel filter are ok, then there is about a 90-95% chance it is opti.

Thanks for the info. I just changed the plugs, wires and fuel filter and it made a huge difference at first. It doesn't miss near as much. I have a good feeling that I will be replacing an opti pretty soon.

[The Gremlin]

Glad to hear you are tracking down the root of your problem. If you go ahead and do the opti and run into a question, let me know and I will help as best I can.

[Patman]

I thought for sure my opti was toast last week, as it would not start on me one morning until I tried over 30 times, and then a couple of days later it was misfiring badly above 5000rpm. It felt like it was hitting a rev limiter above that point, it wouldn't even shift into the next gear until I let off the gas.

In the end, it turned out to just be a burnt coil wire.