TorqueJunkie

I have a project in mind, where I may have to swap 451 engine in to 450 body. I don't have the 451 on hand yet, so wanted to ask what are the differences between 450 and 451 in terms of body/frame. I know the engine and accompanying things are different, however how about other mechanical internals? Like brakes, suspension, chassis frame? Are the four mounting points in the same place, or different?

Sorry about being cryptic. I am actually considering fitting a full set of 451 electric drive in to roadster's body, including all wiring, instrument cluster etc. To my understanding ED is mechanically identical to 451, and roadster is identical to 450.

Hi to all. So I have this weird issue. My roadster (engine same as 450) is overheating, temperature is jumping around 90-110C. I have replaced the thermostat and issue is still there. If it idles longer at a stop or moving slowly in heavy traffic I see the temperature rising slowly to 110C and above (cooling fan kicks in at 100C). I know it's an air pocket in thermostat housing because temperature drops to 90-100C quickly if I give it some higher RPMs (5000-6000 RPM) while in neutral or running several seconds in lower gear, so higher RPM forces the pump to push some of the coolant through the air pocket. I end up releasing the air via radiator bleeder and temperature sensor at the thermostat once a week or so. All of it would point to shot head gasket, however in this case I would expect to see my fluids mixing or level dropping. However it does not require any top ups, oil is fine and clean as well. I only have to release the air once a week and it's good as before, for several months now. It's almost like it sucks the air in somehow, or as if it boiled. I use a pre-made G-12 yellow coolant mix. Anyone have any ideas before I try introducing some kind of sealing gunk in the coolant?

Just visited repair shop. Yup, it's head, as there are exhaust gasses in the coolant. Damn this car, on my second engine already.

I do my fair share of bleeding each week. Radiator and thermostat, both on flat surface and tilted. Problem is, the air accumulates somehow again. I've paid evilution some time ago. Better than nothing, but pretty basic stuff really. And not useful in this case.

Hi tolsen, I saw you have shared schematics some time ago, but I had some life emergencies and could not follow up with this. Would you mind sharing them again so I can download and get back to it once I am ready? Thanks.

Hi, I want to install an electric heater in a petrol car and probably would need more current at idle RPM. At idle, alternator can only provide around 40% of rated current (75A is rated at around 2500RPM). The questions are: 1. is alternator's pulley size different in diesel and petrol cars? From some pictures I found, diesel one seems to be bit smaller (= more RPM). 2. If different, are the alternators otherwise more or less compatible in terms of mounting to the engine? 3. Can I spin the alternator slightly faster than rated? In electrical theory there should be no problem.

Thanks for pointing out the 451 CDI alternator, looks compatible. I wonder if the DFM pin is used and if B1/B2 are connected internally... Anyone has an electric schematic? I always struggle finding service manuals for these cars...

I have found a need, the question is if it is possible to fit. The answer to your question is in first sentence of my initial post.

I have no fear of no connector. If diesel one wants some extra signal, that's a different story. So, petrol pinout is: B+ D+ W+. From what I saw, D+ is not used, W is likely "charging" Lamp? Diesel pinout is: B1+ B2+ L DFM. B1 and B2 are likely connected internally? L is probably Lamp. DFM is new, called "DYNAMO FIELD MODULATION - Duty Cycle signal from the ECU". Not sure where this goes. Not a huge problem even if it's a PWM from ECU. Info on pinout: https://jasoceania.co.nz/articles/alternator-terminals-explained

OK, thanks for your answer. Now, why?

So I have found out that: Roadster alternator is rated at 75A, and has a 4-groove 58mm pulley. 450 0.8L CDI has a 85A alternator with 5-groove 54mm pulley. These look bit different, including connectors. Mount looks similar. Should fit? Also found several ebay listings for "97A" alternator, but that must be an error, right? Look identical to 75A model. £95 https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/NEW-ALTERNATOR-FOR-SMART-0986049111-OEM-QUALITY/142941593131

Car: roadster 450 petrol, engine similar to fortwo 450. Recently I started hearing very weird crackle noise on takeoff. Not much difference from accelerator pedal, but only happens on very low RPM on first gear, mainly while accelerating on clutch from dead stop. The noise is well pronounced and quite random, I hear maybe around 10 crackles until 10mph is reached, when noise goes away. The car drives normally, I can't hear it while at speed, at any load. I thought maybe it's clutch actuator, but hooked up my delphi box and started actuator cycling (engine off), which produced no weird noises. There are no codes on the ECU. Other idea is maybe clutch bearing... But not sure what noise it should make, also I can't her anything when switching at higher speeds.

So I have an interesting sound system in my roadster: subwoofer under passenger feet and an amplifier behind the seat, with Brabus logo on it. I have looked around and could not find anyhing like it on the net. Anyone knows any specs or where can these be purchased?

Short story: had thick white smoke, replaced full drivetrain and still have identical white smoke. It's not coolant. Long story: OK, I have a very weird one on my hands. My piston broke a skirt and I still drove it around like that, then it was rebuilt. The rebuild, due to lack of time, took good couple months, but it started right away. I drove it around for the first day and everything was fine. I come next morning, start it up... And after few seconds thick white smoke started pouring out of exhaust. The smoke does not dissipate like water vapour, ir hangs around until blown away by wind. Smell is not sweet, but strong oil-ish. Not exactly oil, and not exactly petrol. Smoke goes away when engine temperature reached around 40-50C. Pulled the plugs and one is soaking wet, same cylinder, so I guess that broken piston made the cylinder oval... Cylinders were honed and all. Just no idea why it was fine the first day. I was not going to rebuild it once again due to lack of time, so I decided to swap out entire drivetrain. I got a fine deal on ebay: 50k engine with transmission, all wiring and sensors, turbo and exhaust, drivetrain, springs, shocks, drums, everything, even oil... Seller even provided service history and a recent video of it running from cold start. Quick plug and play job, it seemed. So it arrived and I have quickly swapped everything. The only part I used from my old engine was TIK pipe, as replacement one came without it. So guess what. I start it up and... 5 seconds later thick cloud of white smoke. It starts, runs and revs fine, but with extra smoke. Pulled the plugs - all nice and dry. Intake manifold is dry, so it looks like oi is coming either from turbo or EGR... But both of these were replaced with the engine. Here's a video: Basically it starts with some residual smoke and exactly 15 seconds after it starts pouring the smoke. Anyone knows what cycles does an engine go through when started? Like pre-cat heater, aux air pump, etc? That's a replacement engine in the video, same deal as original one. I had a theory maybe the ECU failed (it is still same one) and is overfueling it, but I have checked all injectors - working fine. Also checked their timing - around 2.7ms. MAF sensor says 4 kg/h at idle and 20+ when revving lightly. Intake pressure sensor reports around 370hPa at idle and is also changing when revving. Upstream O2 sensor is jumping around 0.15-0.75V and downsream sensor is more or less stable around 0.65V. So all of my sensors seem to be working fine and fuel mixture is good. Only one weird thing though: ECU reports engine load at 28% when idling. Important to note: smoke goes away once engine temperature reaches around 40-50C. Some residual smell is still there, but almost no visible smoke. The new engine is running nicely. I have even probed it with stethoscope and it looks like a young one. So I am lost here. Is it possible to get these symptoms if any of those tiny air lines are mixed up around TIK pipe and turbo? Would I get such huge amount of white smoke if the turbo was shot, and would it disappear once up to temperature?

I simply hold it over sink and pour some boiling water in from a kettle. I don't really care how accurate it is, what matters is if it opens and then closes (right after boiling, temperature is maybe around 90-95C)...

It is very strange to me how people spend 10 minutes with an answer, but don't spend 5 seconds reading the question first. GetSmart, your question has been answered at least twice. Diesel or not, 450 engine is very similar for both petrol and diesel, and also 452 roadster. Short update: all issues have been resolved now. The RPM limit of around 2700-3000 was quite interesting. Turns out, the engine will limit the RPM if two of ABS sensors (rear in my case) are not connected. You can switch through gears manually and go up to 100km/h in 6th gear just fine, if shifted before rev limit. Very weird, as I was expecting limit on speed, and not rpm. I hope it will be useful to someone reading this in future. One more weird issue I had: on an old engine I had a stuck thermostat and engine was overheating. With this new engine, the thermostat appeared to be stuck open, so it took forever to heat up. So I took an old thermostat (stuck closed) from my previous engine and tested it with boiling water. It works. That's strange. I have swapped the thermostats yesterday and now the car heats up and controls the temperature nicely. So that's a win. But what's even stranger, is that this "stuck open" thermostat also appears to be working just fine during boiling water test. What the hell? I do the test by simply pouring boiling water in to the housing of thermostat and observing it slowly open up one of ports. As soon as I pour in some of bit colder water, it closes.

Thanks tolsen, will take a look. After some reading I see that my RPM limit at around 2.7-3.0k may also be due to EGR solenoid. Would I get a code in this case? I only have "rough road detected".

It's not coolant. Drove it around for 50 miles or so and no more smoke, so it was oil in exhaust due to wrong orientation during storage... However thermostat is stuck open... I wonder why are these things so fragile, I already went through three of them. Incorrect coolant? ABS sensors are not yet connected and it is limiting RPM to around 2700. ECU has an error "rough road detected" Hopefully that will go away when ABS is sorted out. Gear position and clutch learning was a hassle... Somehow it did not want to perform half of adjustments, but after many restarts it finally went through. Of course you have to select model 450, as these Chinese Delphi boxes don't support adjustments on 452. Thanks again.

Thank you guys, you gave me some fresh ideas. I have contacted the seller and he recalled storing the drivetrain tilted to the back for couple days and found a pool of oil under turbo, it leaked through inlet port (TIK pipe was removed). Since it still had exhaust attached, it is likely full of oil now... I will try to burn it off, as there is probably no other way to get rid of it. I'm bit afraid this will damage the CAT. I have checked brake fluid reservoir and it is full, also intake manifold is dry-ish, so probably not the cause. But very nice to learn about this possibility as well. My previous engine had a very interesting fail. It ran fine after rebuild, but was same amount of oilish smoke the second day and I found a pool of oil-ish liquid in one cylinder. I suspec maybe the head cracked, even though it was pressure-checked and faced before. I have removed it and got checked again, and it is fine. However they only check coolant lines, but not oil. I saw there is a method with red dye, maybe that will clear up things.

Oh really. Okay. Please be kind and direct me to roadster/452 forum, if it exists. 452 is basically the same as 450, fyi.

Had to pull and reinstall all three pistons on this one. Was not sure if this is possible... So here it goes, it's a surely fiddly job, but still much quicker than splitting the block. And can be done on car. But you will need several 1/4" extensions, a telescopic magnet and a small diameter flashlight. Edit: post removed due to lack of interest.

It's a roadster. So I had knocking noises, but otherwise no other issues: no smoke, good acceleration, etc. Teared it apart and found a broken piston: So now the engine was rebuilt: fully rebuilt, tested and resurfaced head, all new gaskets, all new rings and, obviously, new piston. It started up right away, no issues there. I let it idle for one hour while rear bumper was being prepared, then It was calmly driven around for a few miles, and idled some more. It worked very well, sound is fine, good power, no smoke. I come the next day and start the engine. Starts nicely, but immediately there is a huge thick cloud of white smoke. It is almost odorless, but does not dissipate quickly. So I figure okay... the engine cooled down and maybe the gasket leaked. The tests were done: Spark plug in cylinder #2 is soaked wet, others are dry. Compression: good in all cylinders (~12.5) Removed all plugs and introduced some pressure in each. No hissing neither from intake, exhaust, oil or coolant. The confusion started when I saw a puddle of liquid (like 1/8th inch) on top of intake valve in cylinder #2. Endoscope also showed a puddle in the cylinder. The main source of confusion is that the liquid is oil(ish): it is oily just as oil, color same as oil (my coolant is bright green). If it's coolant, then why so oily and no color of a coolant? If it's oil, why white smoke and no odor, also where is it coming from? Is it possible that fresh oil (while is still clear) burns white and with much less odor? Other cylinders and intake manifold are dry, so not a turbo or breather. I have pulled a valve cover and replaced valve seals: same issue. So not a valve seal. Now I have pulled the head. Looks fine, no cracks or anything... Gasket looks fine, but hard to tell on these multilayer ones. Pulled all pistons. All look fine, rings are fine, gaps facing right directions, etc. So where is the problem, and what do I check next? Important to note that this happened over night: was fine in the evening, and smoked up immediately in the morning. Any ideas?

Apparently some oil burns are quite white. For example, when I had an incident with breather, smoke was thick white.

Yes, same cylinder. If bore was damaged, I would expext the problem to be visible right away, and not the other day. I can't imagine how the situation could get so different over night, when now I know that rings are fine.