I purchased my 81 turbo (with turbo removed), which has been off the road since '08, almost 2 weeks ago. I was determined to run the engine today, so I fixed a gas leak, put 5 gals of fresh gas with some fuel injector cleaner (I may still have some old gas in there), and checked the cam cover gaskets that were said to be leaking. Before I was going to change the gaskets, I was curious if the gasket bolts weren't tight enough, and I was right. I was able to give them another 1/4 to 1/2 turn. I cleaned up some of the oil (and leaves) that collected by the spark plug wells and started her up. She was very rough, but with a little coaxing with the gas pedal I was able to get her to idle, rough, but idling, and no oil leaking from the gaskets (yet). Turns out #1 isn't firing.
I got the car up to temperature and the fan eventually kicked in around 195-200 degrees, so I was happy about that. Then after letting the engine cool down for an hour, and a good 45 minutes of soaking up the rest of the oil and pulling out all the oil soaked leave residue with paper towels and thin bamboo skewers, I pulled the plugs and replaced them with my new Boschs gaped at .028. That #4 was a little tough to loosen up. All the old plugs were carbon fouled with a tiny bit of tan on the last three, the first had no tan (as suspected) and they were all gaped well over .030. The sad thing is that the car ran essentially the same with the new plugs, if not worse.
I guess my next step is to check for air leaks and look at the injector system. Or could it be valve clearances. I've never had a car with fuel injection before, so I'm completely ignorant about them, except for the little I've read. I'd like to get them cleaned and serviced anyway. I read about a couple of places that do it inexpensively on this site. I may have to do that, but first have to figure out how to get them off.
Any insight would be much appreciated. I want to get her on the road soon.
GT