installing fuel injection

[mperez]

I have recently posted a " wanted...fuel injection for my '74 " on the pelican parts bulletin board,
I need to know what type of fuel injection do i need ( L-jetronic? D-jetronic? H-jetronic? any others i missed?) my car is a '74 1.8....
i also wanted to know how hard will it be to install all this stuff to a stripted down 1.8 with duel 40s Dell with and a .009 dist. and no fuses in the black box in my engine compartment?

I need to smog my car... so i know i need to put back the fuel injection system back on.. I live in the Los Angeles area and smogging is need to register a car in CA.

i just read about an exploded pictures book .... can anyone tell me if they have one of these and if it is worth the $19.00?

I know alot about my car the way it is since i rebuilt the engine, but i have no idea about putting back on the Jetronic fuel injection system... it is hard to maintain? I would really like to be able to do this myself so that i can maintain it myself...

So is there any one in the Los Angeles area willing to help a fellow 14'er install all this stuff for a fee. I just need to see someone elses 914 engine so that i have some sort of idea how to put it together.

signed smog desperate!

Michael

[Dave at Pelican Parts]

The 74 1.8 was the first car EVER to use Bosch L-jetronic FI. So that is the stuff you'll need. (Stupid smog laws say that you have to have original stuff, even if a different system will run cleaner! Dumb, dumb, dumb!!!)

If you have a Haynes manual, there is a reasonable (if small) photo of a complete early L-jet system in the "fuel system" chapter.

The L-jet will probably not work that well with the 009 distributor, so you should also think about replacing that as well. Technically, I think only the stock distributor is legal anyway, but I doubt they'll check the part numbers--just the timing at idle. (Hmm, with what I hear about the 009, that may catch it anyway.) The L-jet use (I think) only one of the relays on the relay board--if that. They have their own "double relay" that lives near the battery and controls the fuel pump and FI. Since fuel pumps are usually replaced with carb setups (carbs want 3 PSI, FI wants ~50 PSI), you'll probably need a fuel pump as well.

I hope you didn't put anything more "radical" than a stock cam in the car when you rebuilt it, or it may have a tough time passing. If you went just a little "wilder" than stock, you should be able to squeak by. If you went pretty "wild", the car won't run right with L-jet and will probably pollute MORE than with the carbs on it!

As for reliability, the L-jet is OK if you get it put together correctly, and if you keep on top of the maintenance.

From what I hear, the "exploded diagrams" are simply the line-drawings from the factory parts book. Those are used in several aftermarket manuals, such as AA, AJ-USA, etc. I don't know if there are any on this site or not, but you can get a catalog from one of those other two to look at the drawings. (And laugh at the prices, at least with AA!)

There is a diagram of where the hoses go on a 75 1.8 available on the 914 Fan Page, [url]http://www.914fan.net[url], in the Tech Refs section. It does have the extra smog crap, plus the front-mounted fuel pump, but apart from that shows where the vaccuum and fuel hoses go.

If you simply cannot get it all together, you might consider registering it non-operational until 2004 (5 years!!) when it will be exempt. Or, you could non-op it for the year it has to be tested, then drive it the next year (test is every other year), up until 2004.

Good luck!

--DD

[John Rogers]

You might want to check the site:
http://www.conservatory.com/vw/manuals_nyx/EFI-DL.html
to see what is involved with the system as far as installing and setting the L-Jet system up. It is a scanned manual of the FI systems. As for non-operation, I had thought of doing that with an old car (88 and a non-Porsche) we use to go to work as it didn't want to pass smog and it even had a rebuilt engine. The tech at the smog station where we get our cars checked said I could non-op it but would have to bring it current before I could register it and drive it? Ended up costing me $850 or so. The other fact I learned with the smog nightmare is that you have to have REPAIRS DONE BY A CERTIFIED REPAIR STATION TO HAVE THEM COUNT TOWARD THE WAIVER AMOUNT if you want to use the waiver! Repairs and stuff you do yourself or at non-certified stations does not count.