1998 Dodge Neon Modified class rallycrosser

So the hits just keep on coming. I installed a hitch, and wae came over to wire up the car a ways back, so it could be used for towing. Its inaugural use was this weekend, hauling my scooter to Twist and Gone 2013 for the competition. At some point, I started smelling a melting/burning plastic/rubber smell, but could never isolate it, and it dissipated pretty quickly every time I stopped and turned off the car.

Finally got home, and went to unload the car, and the trunk floor was almost too hot to touch, so I think I know where the smell was coming from. I have a few holes in the muffler, and I'm wondering if that, combined with the aerodynamics of trailering was capturing hot exhaust gas under the trunk. I'll take it for a spin without the trailer at some point to see if it does the same without it, and I'll get around to replacing the muffler, and maybe extending the tailpipe out the side of the bumper, instead of the back.

But, before that, I need to find out what fluid it has started to leak. Never saw anything dripping when I stopped to check on the car, but after it was sitting for a while, I noticed a dark spot on the driveway. Looked under, and the left side of the swaybar, and the bottom of the left frame rail were wet. At this point, I'm guessing it could be power steering fluid, trans fluid, or possibly my oil catch can overflowing. Been too discouraged to check.

I don't think the car is going to be ready for the early November rallycross.

bullE36 M3. :D We've got almost a month to get you ready to go. Wednesday nights are bad for me, and I'm working the Turkey Shoot on the 19th and 26th, but I'm sure we can get it figured out and ready to go by the 2nd.

You're letting a little fluid leak stop you from competing? My Miata has leaked oil and coolant ever since I swapped the engine.

There's also that little matter of overheating. I had planned on just hoping it would be colder out, but I'm not sure thats going to be enough...

Have you cut holes in the front bumper yet? All the cool people are doing it.

EvanB wrote: Have you cut holes in the front bumper yet? All the cool people are doing it.

Yeah, but all the cool people are removing their impact bars too, and I'm not cool enough for that

Motivation is becoming an issue, too. As I was creeping through Saturday evning traffic in Nashville, IN, it was smelling really bad. I halfway was hoping to start seeing flames, so I could be done with this car. Really wishing I hadn't done the engine swap at this point.

I still have my impact bar and I am cool (well my engine is at least).

I think the problem is your lack of turbo.

Neons look meaner with some holes in the fascia! Gotta take out the actual bumper, though, to make that effective...

I don't recall everything you've done so far on the overheat issue.... I know you have the vents in and added the airdam. What's the status of the radiator? Did you try a good old-fashioned flush? Waterpump could be weak, but I'm assuming you put a new one in with the cloud car motor. How are the upper and lower hoses? I've heard that the lower hose is notorious for collapsing internally, limiting flow. We could try wiring up the cooling fans to be always-on, although if you're getting warm on the highway with the airdam in place, you probably have enough flow. Have you done a leakdown test? I'd be shocked to find a bad headgasket or head, but rule it out? Clog in the heater hoses or in the heater? That shouldn't affect it too much, but you never know. You've got the colder thermostat in there, so that should be okay, but I guess it could be possible that you got a defective one out of the box. Did you find the source of the weeping coolant and fix that? Maybe it's not building pressure? It's a pretty simple system so if we attack it methodically we should be able to find what's causing it.

Or, I'll fiddle with it for you while you take out your frustrations by welding up a new tire changing lever since I turned mine into something of a pretzel on Jerry's tires =)

EvanB wrote: I still have my impact bar and I am cool (well my engine is at least). I think the problem is your lack of turbo.

I have never seen a car and said to myself "Self, that car needs less turbo!"

The car is mostly okay on the highway, except after rallycrosses, which is weird. The computer turns the fans on at 175 right now.

Part of my frustration, I think, is that I've spent about enough to buy a halfway decent SRT-4, which would have been easy to make into a dominant PF class car...

EvanB wrote: Have you cut holes in the front bumper yet? All the cool people are doing it.

I'm thinking about doing this on the e30. Not really for cooling (I'm running a 6cyl e36 radiator, so that's fine), but because I want to shed any weight at the ends of the car possible, but I want to keep the bumpers on for some (tiny) semblance of protection against minor accidents, as well as street-legality.

Its the axle seal leaking. wae and I will be replacing it this week. I'm wondering if the heat under the trunk was trans fluid burning off the exhaust, or if there's some sort of aerodynamic issue holding hot exhaust under the car when the trailer is attached.

Maybe you need to cut holes in the rear bumper as well.

E36 M3

wae came by yesterday, and since he's an expert at axle swaps (I think it comes with the territory of owning a turbocharged Neon), I mostly stayed out of his way.

The seal looked good, except where the puller tool had hit it (Warning sign #1)

The driveaxle popped out of the trans with pretty much no effort (Warning sign #2)

The stub that goes into the trans looked like it wasn't perfectly smooth (Warning sign #3)

Despite the above issues, we went ahead and did teh seal swap. Both of us were having trouble telling if we were getting the axle seated, but we could get it to a point where it didn't come out without pulling really hard, so we assumed it was seated. No noticeable click of the snap ring, though.

I rolled it out of the garage and let it sit overnight. Today after work, I checked under the car, and didn't see any fluid leaking onto the driveway. Took it for a quick spin and parked it. A few minutes later, I looked under the car, and it looks like its leaking worse than before (may just be because it had more fluid to lose than last time).

So, possiblities, in order of my opinion of their likelihood:

1. Somehow the axle stub got mangled at some point, and is causing fluid to leak. Is it possible it got some corrosion on it from sitting for a while, and that could be causing it?

2. The new seal got installed improperly. Doubtful.

3. The leak is coming form the pressed in part of the seal, since the area it presses into is a bit messed up, but I doubt this is it, or it would have been leaking all along.

4. The leak is coming from somewhere else. Doubtful.

5. There's something that has happened to the differential that is keeping the axle from properly seating.

If the seal surface on the axle is borked, then you need to replace the axle. Or the inner CV, but replacing the whole axle is actually cheaper most of the time and as a bonus you don't get to accidentally smear CV grease on everything you handle for the next ten hours.

Could be a lot worse. I had a Protege come in a couple months ago with a leaky trans. The seal was riding on the axle and pushed out of the trans. (Strange)

When we pulled the axle out, we saw that the inside of the seal was packed full of chewed up but intact roller bearings.

We'd already long deduced that it needed a transmission, but saying that first doesn't make for good narrative, does it?

The joys of fwd axles are why my next 'race' car will be RWD.

In reply to cghstang:

The answer is always Miata.

In reply to eastsidemav:

I'll always put money on "installed improperly", especially if I was involved in the installation effort :)

I've got that stub that I can bring over and see if it we can get it to seat better. I'm still not happy with how far the axle went in to the diff. I mean, I couldn't just pull it out, but I couldn't really hear or feel the click, either. If it's not actually seating, I could see how a turn could be sliding the axle on the seal, causing fluid to dump a bit.

I've seen the side gears and bushings wear so the axle has too much radial slop. No seal in the world will fix that, but its pretty obvious, too. Did you use a factory or better seal, or did you pick up a CR piece of crap at the corner store? Did you put a wee bit of silicone on the outer surface to seal it to the housing?

Spread the snap ring a bit on the end of the stub axle, and it will probably stay in better. Not too much, or it will jam going in and thats even worse.

Picked up a National brand seal. They've worked fine in the past. I had not used RTV on the seals before, since the I haven't had to before, but I'm beginning to think I'll try a very thin coating on it, just in case, and I'll pick up another axle, and hope those two things do the trick.

Or, I'll just set fire to the car. Just getting really mad at myself for taking a reliable and regionally competitive PF class car, and turning it into an unreliable and uncompetitive MF class car.

eastsidemav wrote: Or, I'll just set fire to the car. Just getting really mad at myself for taking a reliable and regionally competitive PF class car, and turning it into an unreliable and uncompetitive MF class car.

At least it hasn't been on jackstands in your garage for months.

cghstang wrote:

eastsidemav wrote: Or, I'll just set fire to the car. Just getting really mad at myself for taking a reliable and regionally competitive PF class car, and turning it into an unreliable and uncompetitive MF class car.

At least it hasn't been on jackstands in your garage for months.

Nope, that was just last October to May...

I was trying to humorously reference my own plight, not trying to poke fun at your situation. Your car is having teething issues after the transformation to MF contender. Progress on mine stalled about 30% into the transformation process.

cghstang wrote: I was trying to humorously reference my own plight, not trying to poke fun at your situation. Your car is having teething issues after the transformation to MF contender. Progress on mine stalled about 30% into the transformation process.

Go back now, before its too late!!!!!

cghstang wrote:

eastsidemav wrote: Or, I'll just set fire to the car. Just getting really mad at myself for taking a reliable and regionally competitive PF class car, and turning it into an unreliable and uncompetitive MF class car.

At least it hasn't been on jackstands in your garage for months.

Are you getting months confused with years?