...the old thread seems to have developed a bad attitude or something....
I have had some interesting things come to light over the last couple of days. I replaced the Kombi EFI pump with one from a VL Commodore (bought it from a wreckers) - only reason I replaced the Kombi one is that it belonged to my brother....
I can't recell weather I mentioned this in the past, however, ever since I set this engine up I have had a problem with the charge warning light being on (on my dashboard), I just assumed that the generator or regulator was not working correctly and wouldn't effect the operation of the EFI (as long as the battery doesn't go flat!). It turns out that my assumption appeared to be incorrect. Whilst I was attempting to get the engine to run smoothly, the charging system decided to come good - the effect on the engine was nothing short of amazing! It began to run smoothly and it went from running lean (and me not being able to correct this issue) to running extremly rich (large black clouds from the exhaust and stinging eyes😠 ). I had just about managed to get the O2 reading close to the centre of the scale (which is where it should be), when the engine began to misfire again - I turned around to check to make sure that nothing was loose/had fallen off/caught on fire/run out of fuel/etc when I noticed that the charge light was flickering on and off. I gave the regulator a tap and the warning light came on and stayed on - the engine stalled almost immediatly and refused to run again. As this all happened just as it was getting dark I decided that I had had enough for one day, and would look at it again the following day. When I tried again the next day, the charge light went out and the system ran perfectly - I managed to make a few more changes before the charge light came back on and the engine stopped (with a loud backfire!)
I had a look at the regulator and discovered that it had an internal short to ground(intermittant), which would cause the voltage from the generator do do some strange things! Rather than just buying another reg, I decided to do the right thing and upgrade to an altinator (new) - I should have done this to start with as generators just don't give a clean enough supply to be used with EFI systems. I am just waiting for my parts supplier to get me a price now....
So for the next couple of days things will be on hold until I recieve and fit the altinator - then we try again....
I will be using the spare time to update my website and clean up some little things on the engine.
I showed the original fuel pump to a couple of people and they all think that it is a low pressure pump so I will probably use it in place of the rather noisy 'ticker' pump that is currently looking after the low pressure feed to the surge tank. The fuel reg is working fine.
OK, back soon with some more info and findings hopefully!
R🙂
tassupervee ·
Interesting that that system is susceptible to voltage fluctuation to the degree that it is.
Usually efi computers will operate down to quite low voltages to allow for flattish batteries on a cold morning kind of thing.
Tha fact that the thing had enough grunt to actually wind the engine over but not enough to run the computer correctly bothers me a bit but perhaps it is an idiosyncrasy of Delco hardware.
Keep at it ratty!
L8tr
E
Baja Wes ·
maybe if you fitted a power noise/filter/stabiliser type thing the EFI might run just off the battery. You can buy them for car stereo installations. Don't know what the proper name is.
Having an EFI system that can run off a battery would be a good thing, especially with an offroader.
When I first had my V6 in the front cut I could run it off a rather flat battery with no alternator without any problems with the EFI. In fact for a while I was running it off the battery that came with the front cut (from japan). It read 0 volts on the battery, completely stuffed. I thought I would charge it to see what happened, and it charges. It was always lowish, but if it was charged enough to turn the starter then the motor and EFI would always run.
ratty 63 ·
From my understanding (and feel free to correct me if you like!) shorting the field terminal to ground on the regulator will effectivly disable the regulator, allowing the full voltage of the generator (around 50 - 60 volts I am told!) to enter the rest of the electrical system. If this is indeed the case I feel that it is a credit to the Delco that it is still working!
I'm still waiting for a price on an Altinator - this is likely to take some time as my supplier, well, lets just say, can take some time to get things done (especially when you are related🙁 ) I think I will give him 'till Friday, then go somewhere else if I haven't heard anything - sad isn't it.
R
Doug Sweetman ·
Must be frustrating to get so close, only to have something else go wrong every time. Still, at least this means you should have all the gremlins out of the works by the time its running properly.
I've moved to the next step of research, and shelled out my hard earned cash to buy that Electronic Engine Management Reference Manual you mentioned - if anyone else is interested, its by Frank Munday, and available from either Graffiti publishers or Amazon.com (about $16 US + $9 US postage). Looking forward to receiving it and continuing my research.
Keep at it, I'm sure the first time you drive it will put a huge grin on your face.
:P
HotRodMatt ·
Frank is a bit of a legend. He regularly posts on another board of which I am a member.
Doug Sweetman ·
So it should be a good book then I guess ? I have read the outline (contents) and it seems like its got some very good content.
ratty 63 ·
yep, its a good read - doesn't go into the really heavy stuff, but is enough to answer most of your questions. Very easy to read and understand, well worth purchasing.
R
tassupervee ·
Ratty
Umm cant confirm no deny but if the field voltage is held to zero volts then the alternator output will be zero volts as the gennie requires field voltage to generate at all. Ive never tried it!!
Even if the gennie may have gone to full output the battery will act as the buffer in the system and it will absorb and dissipate the excess juice from the system. (for a while anyway)
That voltage you are referring to would be the gennie running open circuit/no load.
The voltage may have risen somewhat even with it charging flat out but the battery voltage will only have risen to perhaps 15 or 16V at the very most so the comnputer would have no issue with that.
Coincidently, I managed to flash the regulator on my ute the other night and the 55Amp alternator went to full output and ther battery voltage rose to about 16.5V after about 10 minutes of fast idling!!!!
IOt was a complete fluke that i spotted the drama befor I drove up to work the next morning and fried the battery!!
L8tr
E
ratty 63 ·
Even if the gennie may have gone to full output the battery will act as the buffer in the system and it will absorb and dissipate the excess juice from the system. (for a while anyway)
That voltage you are referring to would be the gennie running open circuit/no load.
Yep, quite correct, but I think that the generator running at full load may have been causing some strange electronic interfearence that was playing with the operations of the ECU - not really sure, but I do know that disconnecting the gen and reg caused a remarkable improvement in operation!
I have had a similar situation to the one you mention above, where the reg on my old company car (3 cylinder, 1 litre Suzuki Swift - yuk, gutless wonder) passed out one night (I work nights). I noticed that when I left work at about 1:30am, the headlights appeared to be brighter than normal. By the time I had hit the freeway (about 1 min) I had lost the low beam from one of the headlights. I drove the half hour trip to head office with no other issues, however on my return journey (I live about 3 mins drive from the store), I flicked the headlights from high beam to low beam as a car approached on one of the hilly backroads that I use as a shortcut, it was at this point I discovered that the other headlight had lost low beam too! YIKES! Bit tricky driving home that night - recieved a few polite gestures from other motorists when I wouldn' t use low beam, but I made it home.
I took the car to the company mechanic the next day (after replacing the headlight bulbs), when I arrived he opened the bonnet and put a meter across the battery - then jumped back yelling "turn it off, turn it off!". The battery had a reading of over 28 volts with the engine running! He was worried that it would explode. You could smell the contents of the battery boiling!😠
Surprisingly, the only casualties of this little episode were the two headlight bulbs, but no doubt it reduced the life of the almost everything else electrical in the car!
This car was not EFI, but the Swift I have now is, so I hope that this does not happen again!
On the subject of this thread - I am having trouble getting a price from my parts supplier, but I have had a look around at other suppliers and the best price I can come up with is $299 for the complete kit. I will probably go this way if I don't hear anything from my supplier by Monday.
R
ratty 63 ·
I just had a wander around some of the web sites that I used to visit when reasearching my EFI system and I came across an interesting thing...
I had often wondered if the type III intake manifolds could be modified successfully to suit a type I engine, and it would appear that they can - no pics unfortunatly, however from the description I gather that the type III manifolds have to be cut, shortened and then re-welded to fit, then they have to be swapped to the opposite side of the engine (opposite to the side that they would be mounted on in a type III set-up). From this desicription I feel that it would look very similar to the EFI system that is fitted to the Mexican beetles (like the two that were at Valla - did anyone get a close look at them - very interesting!)
I still wonder how the manifolds would clear the generator stand....
You would then have to make your own manifold centre..... hmmm, might have a look at this once I have my current system organised.
R
[Edited on 13-8-2004 by ratty 63]
lugnuts ·
ratty 63 wrote:I just had a wander around some of the web sites that I used to visit when reasearching my EFI system and I came across an interesting thing...
I had often wondered if the type III intake manifolds could be modified successfully to suit a type I engine, and it would appear that they can - no pics unfortunatly, however from the description I gather that the type III manifolds have to be cut, shortened and then re-welded to fit, then they have to be swapped to the opposite side of the engine (opposite to the side that they would be mounted on in a type III set-up). From this desicription I feel that it would look very similar to the EFI system that is fitted to the Mexican beetles (like the two that were at Valla - did anyone get a close look at them - very interesting!)
I still wonder how the manifolds would clear the generator stand....
You would then have to make your own manifold centre..... hmmm, might have a look at this once I have my current system organised.
R Why dont u just use the FI mexi beetle set up then,its a neat setup Primate was selling one a few weeks back.
[Edited on 13-8-2004 by ratty 63]
🙂🙂🙂
nbturbo ·
Ratty63-check out the Racers Edge section-iswinkles is running FI on his car-a good read.Check out his manifolds and throttle bodies.
nbturbo ·
If you use the Mexican Beetle FI manifolds I believe you will need to modify the engine bay.I purchased a rear panel from a new FI Mexican car to weld into my Oval.The metal channel that holds the engine bay seal was about 40mm lower than the original one and doesn't line up with the side ones-therfore I can only assume that the FI body would have the side channels 40mm lower as well to give the required room for the injectors to prevent fouling on the body.I have also fitted one of these panels to a 66 Beetle and it didn't line up either.A clue for any body doing this job-trying to remove the original channel to reweld it lower is a pain because they are shit quality.I found the locking rods used for B&D roller doors are almost the same shape as the original channels and are galvanised and bend around the curve real easy.Just clamp as you go and braze into position.When finished just run around tapping the C section smaller and seal fits in good.
nbturbo ·
No got that all ballsed up-it was 6 months ago when I did that job-just went and checked my car.The Mexican rear panel had the seal channel about 40 mm higher than the original so makes that story sound like it was written by a dickhead. Can't figure why there would be a difference though.Did anybody take notice of the Mexican one at the last show.
1303Steve ·
Hi
The panel opposite the spark plugs looke different to a normal bugs, but they looked like the ones you see on late EFI Cabrios, the shelf looks narrower. To fit the Mexican manifold you would need to use the alternator stand from the mex bug, the 2 tubes run between it and the fan housing, I reckon you could make one out of steel pretty easily.
You can seen the shelf in this picture.
1302Steve
nbturbo ·
Is there much difference in the Alt. stand?Is that aluminium thing bolted to the original fuel pump bolts something to do with the intake manifold? You can see the rear engine bay seal sits right up level with the rear panel and the opening for the motor definately looks a lot wider.Thanks for that pic.
1303Steve ·
Hi
The bracket is just a support for the manifold, the alternator stand is really cutout to clear the manifold. Next time I see one I take a better picture.
This is quite interesting, as I bought the FI stuff Primate was selling. He did a superb job wrapping it up and getting it ready for a freinds, freind to collect it for me. I give him Top marks for a sellers rating 😀
I haven't had a chance to look closely at how the Mexi stuff will fit the engine / engine bay. First task is to get it road legal again with a standard carby motor.
So what are you thinking now Ratty, I thought you'd got every thing pretty much sussed.
Cheers
Jeremy
ratty 63 ·
Yep, everything is working and I am reasonably happy with it all (or at least I will be once I have my Alternator fitted later today!), however the injectors and fuel rails will overhang the sides of the engine compartment, making it impossible to get the engine in or out (of a standard bug engine bay) without first having to removed the injectors and fuel rails. Not very practical from that point of view - hopefully I won't have to remove it all that often, so it won' t be that much of an issue, however....
I feel that if I could find some way of mounting the injectors in an upright position (like the CB Performance manifolds and the mexican bugs do) then this problem would be removed and I would be 100% happy with the set-up.
It's only a minor thing, but something that others may wish to consider before manufacturing something to suit their engine.
I had thought of mounting the injectors further up the manifold end castings, basically pointing directly down the manifold (in the area where the sharper downward bend is). I know that this is not considered to be the perfect position for the injectors, however as I am running a batch fire injecton system, I can't see it having that much effect on the overall operation of the engine. I have also heard that the further up the manifold that you position the injectors, the more low down grunt you get - has anyone else heard this?
For now I will be running this engine the way it is, however I will always be looking for ways to improve it, as long as it doesn't mean spending a fortune for only a minor improvement!
R
1303Steve ·
Hi
The injector position on my wasserboxer manifold was always a pain, they went out horizontaly and ran straight into the shelves in the engine bay but I left it like that, I figue VW know more than me about ideal injector placement.
1302Steve
Midlife crisis ·
well done Ross glad to hear it is finally running
Marc
ratty 63 ·
... is nothing easy?
Man, what did I do to deserve all these hasles!?
It should be easy, right? Just pick up an Alternator (new - just to be sure) from my parts supplier, change the fan and pully from my generator on to it, and fit it to the engine - nothing to it, right?
Wrong!🙁
I picked up the alternator on Monday arvo., was told that the pully from the 38amp generators fits the alternator and I already have an Alternator stand on the engine so no need for other parts.
The Alternator is a Bosch AL82N, but I there is no other info regarding the Alt on the box or on the paperwork that comes with it, so I have a look on the 'net for details (amp rating mainly). Every second site has a different amp rating for this alternator! It's somewhere between 51 and 57 amps... can anyone clarify this for me? Whilst I am looking for the answer to the above question I find a discussion regarding a problem with the pully rubbing on the front housing of the alternator...hmmm
Tuesday morning, pull down the 38amp generator to get fan, fan backing plate, pully, and woodruf (sp?) keys from it to fit the Alt. Pull the fan off easy but the key is missing from it (so in theory, the fan was not fastened to the shaft, and was able to spin freely!). Attempt to get the back half of the pully off. Fight with it for around an hour(!) before it let go (rusted on) - at least this end still had the key. Pull down a second 38amp generator to get the second key from the fan end - no problems with this one.
Fit fan and backing plate to alternator - easy. Clean up pully and fit back half to the alt. As I was starting to expect (with my luck so far) - it rubs on the alternator case! Aaaarrrrrgg!
Decide to fit a couple of washers between the spacer on the alternator shaft and the pully - can't find any that fit - Grrr! Drive to local fastener supplier, but on the way have to pass my parts supplier, so I drop in to show them the problem. They were surprised to see that the pully came in contact with the case of the alt, and mentioned that they had fitted a few and it had never happened before. Just as an experiment we grabbed a new pully from the shelf and dropped it onto the alt - no interfearence problems even though they look identical! $20 later I have a new pully and I go home and finish the install.
Is it over yet? No!:bounce
Everything fitted I start the engine. The warning light on my makeshift dashboard doesn't go out - aaaarg. Now whats wrong with it? After checking and re-checking everything I had done I decided that either the warning light doesn't draw enough current to 'start' the alternator or the alternator is faulty. I grab my 12V test light and (with the engine running) connect one end to a 12V supply and the other to the field terminal on the Alt....Bingo! the warning light goes out and my multimeter jumps from 12.4V to 13.8V - who would have thought!
Tempting fate, I'm going to refit the exhaust today as I feel that it may be leaking around where the manifold pre-heaters have been blocked off, causing some strange readings on the O2 sensor. Wish me luck!
R
KruizinKombi ·
Good luck!! :bounce
Jeza ·
Ratty
Maybe leave it a month before you play lotto again 😀
Seriously though I can fully understand your frustrations, my 1302 mods usually run into similiar problems, and even more frustrating is when work projects follow suite..... I must be jinxed :o
Hence I don't play lotto...
Don't give in!
Cheers
Jeremy
Midlife crisis ·
Good luck Ross
56astro ·
I've been following this topic reasonably closely (after the topic had been going for quite some time) and it seems that what our market is missing is an affordable EFI kit.
It just seems that people go thru all sorts of hell to get an EFI system (of one sort or another) up and going.
Averyone that has one seem to swear by them, but all the muckin' around must sometimes seem hardly worth while.
Are there kits out there that can be fitted and tuned without too much bother?
1303Steve ·
Hi Ratty63
Was the back 1/2 of your old pulley cast iron? If it was they dont fit alternators.
The money Ive spent on EFI on my car I could have bought a EJ20T.
1302Steve
tassupervee ·
1302Steve wrote:The money Ive spent on EFI on my car I could have bought a EJ20T.
1302Steve
You make a very valid point Steve. Ratty has unloaded a heap of money into the delco setup that IMHO, would have been far better spent on somethying like a Microtech MT-8 of an EMS Stinger.
Both these systems come ready loaded with a working map for your car and with more features available that a V-dub could ever dream about utillising, on the fly tuning for barely a grand with a loom,,, but,,,,, nonetheless, the guys like ratty that have persisted with the like of their installations will have the satisfaction of making it all work themselves.
Just cant put a price on that I reckon.
More power to them!
L8tr M8
E
[Edited on 18/8/04 by tassupervee]
1303Steve ·
Hi
If we wanted an easy life we would not have picked VWs to fool around with. I was offered a twin turbo suby motor the other day with harness and computer, $1200.
I was at friend workshop the other day, he had the Delco guru with him and they were tuning a really mean 5.7 dunnydore with the Delco stuff, have to say I was pretty impressed with what he showed me. But I think he was showing me all this stuff because my mate told him I was running Autronic.
1302Steve
1303Steve ·
Pushed the button twice:bounce
[Edited on 19-8-2004 by 1302Steve]
tassupervee ·
Steve
If the Autronic was running with a closed loop mode then i would have had that system anytime. as a standalone management system anyway.
I have an old EMS T1 on my wifes Pulsar Turbo and it is fantastic old system.
I have identified a few shortcomings with the tuning parameters but these shortcomings are so insignificant when compared to ANY carb setup as to not be there at the end of the day.!
Nah, I have a lot of respect for you guys that do it all the hard way!!
L8tr
E
ratty 63 ·
Hi all,
I think I have just about had it all happen.... this one has me stumped:
I have noticed that a couple of minuites of running the high pressure pump begins to make a ticking noise. I know that these pumps are not supposed to make noises other than a hiss whilst they are running so I know that this is not good. Initially I thought that the pump may have been damaged (it was from an unknown source) so I purchased another one and it does it too.... If you leave it running for any more than about 3 mins the engine begins to lean out.
I have now noticed that when you remove the fuel supply hose (surge tank to pump) from the fuel pump after the car has been running there is a 'sucking' noise as you 'crack the seal'. As the pump is right under the surge tank I also noticed that you can hear an air bubble (I assume) in the surge tank. Initially, when you remove the hose from the pump, almost no fuel comes out of the hose. Then, after the air bubble in the surge tank, the fuel poors out....so it would appear that a vaccum is being generated in the surge tank!?!
I have been back over the info that I found when constructing this system and I have noticed that in almost every case, the return line from the fuel reg is routed into the main fuel tank. I haven't done this, instead I have routed it back into the surge tank, and I think this is where the problems is...but I don't know why! Can anyone even attempt to explain this to me?
Just a few more details about my system and the way it is connected: The surge tank is about 2 litres in capacity. It has 4 hose fittings in it - 2 in the top and 2 in the bottom. The 2 in the top are connected to the main fuel tank - one with a low pressure pump, pumping fuel from the main tank to the surge tank, the other returning unused fuel and any air back to the main tank. The two fittings on the bottom are the supply to the high pressure pump and the return from the fuel regulator....
Ratty has unloaded a heap of money into the delco setup that IMHO, would have been far better spent on somethying like a Microtech MT-8 of an EMS Stinger. Both these systems come ready loaded with a working map for your car and with more features available that a V-dub could ever dream about utillising, on the fly tuning for barely a grand with a loom.
Tassupervee, I have spent about the same money as this on the Delco ECU, however I did have to purchase and modify the loom (but a wiring loom from a Camira is cheap and easily available and also requires very few mods). OK, so the map I started with is a Camira map, but a VW will start and run on a Camira map (although a little rough). Have you seen a Delco/Kalmaker set-up in use? Not much you can't do. Remember that regardless of which ECU you choose, you still have to purchase fuel pumps, TB(s), an O2 sensor, fuel rails and hoses, MAP sensor, CHT sensor, injectors, surge tank, not to mention the dozens of hose clips, bolts, nuts, washers, etc that go into the mechanicals of the system. This is where around half of the set-up costs have gone with my system - hence the $2000 price tag.
I personally liked the Delco/Kalmaker system. I had heard good things about it from speaking to people who had used it I had also heard bad things about some of the other brands (some sensitive to voltage fluctuations, some poor after sales service, some a lack of information), so this influenced my decision. I am very happy with the Kalmaker software and its abilities - I have had no issues with the ECU and software at all - all my problems have been mechanical. Something that would effect any brand of ECU.
My suggestion to anyone looking to attempt a FI conversion is to shop around an talk to the users of these systems. This is where you will hear most of what you need to know about reliability (both in day-to-day running and stupidity proofing:thumb ). Look at what they can do and compare this to what you want it to do. There are dozens of options to choose from....
There are a couple of ready made systems available from sources overseas - both of the systems that I looked at appeared to be quite good, however I was concerned with the spare parts situation, are they interchangeable with parts available in Australia or do I have to purchase everything from the US. The price for these systems is also quite high (higher that what I have spent on my system I think, and you would still have to supply a surge tank, fuel lines and modify your main tank for a fuel return line.....) Have a look around the CB performance site or the Webber site. Sure, they would be easier, but $$$$$......
OK, enough from me, I'm going to see if I can understand what is going on in my surge tank:puke Any ideas?
R🙁
Baja Wes ·
sound kinda similar to the weird cutting out problem I had with my surge tank set-up, but your set-up is now similar to my corrected set-up so I wouldn't have thought you'd have any problems.
It sounds like the surge tank is starving for fuel.
Have you connected the low pressure pump backwards so it is pumping from the surge tank to the main tank? That would start the HP pump of fuel.
Is the fuel line from the surge tank to the HP pump big enough, free of restrictions, tight bends, filters, etc?
Put your hand on the surge tank, is it getting warm at all?
ratty 63 ·
Hi Wes,
...yeah, it sounds like that, however I have dissconnected the low pressure return line from the surge tank to the main tank and have extended the hose so that I could run it back in through the filler hole of the main tank - this way I could see what the return to the tank looked like and check for air, surging fuel pressure, etc. The return is constant and contains no obvious air bubbles. I then removed both the low pressure lines from the surge tank and started the car (with the low pressure pump disabled:duh). The idea here was to use the two hose fittings at the top of the tank as vents (to ensure no vac in the tank). It still stalled (the surge tank was still at least half full). The vac seems to be forming in the hose between the pump and the surge tank....?!?
The hose between the pump and the surge tank is quite long which is not really necessary (I just had a spare piece of fuel hose, so this is what I used - I had planned on trimming it to the right size once I have everything mounted.) It is currently all above the height of the pump, so no air should be trapped. The only two things that I can think of are a) I have used right angle fittings on the bottom of the surge tank so that the hoses are kept up as far as possible - perhaps the restriction of the right angle is causing some sort of problem (but I wouldn't think so!) or b) the return from the fuel regulator contains so much air that it is being drawn into the pump (I wouldn't think that this would be correct either, but I'm clutching at straws here...)
The hoses are all free of restrictions and the filter on the HP side of the system is after the pump.
The surge tank is stone cold, as are all the fuel lines and rails.... the engine is only running for around 2 mins before the pump begins to make noises so I wouldn't think that there would be enough time for anything to get hot...?
Hmmmmm
R 🙁
ratty 63 ·
Wes, I just had another look at your web site and the only difference between your surge tank set-up and mine is the fact that you are using an internal pump and mine is external - again, I wouldn't have thought that would cause any sort of problems....
R 🙁
Baja Wes ·
what size line are you running to the HP pump?
That line should be very short, as short as possible. It should preferrably be straight with no bends.
Right angle bends are bad for flow. One right angle bend is equivalent to a few meters of straight pipe pressure loss wise. Then you sound like you have a big length of pipe on top of that. That's bad for fuel flow. The high pressure pump is trying to pump that fuel at a pretty fast rate, so it loses alot of pressure in the lines leading up to the pump. I don't have the problem as my pump is swimming in the fuel.
Fuel has a very high vapour pressure, meaning it doesn't take much of a pressure drop (or temperature rise) for it to vaporise. I think that's what's it's doing. It vaporising in the pump, known as cavitation. It makes weird little crackle rattle kinda noises when it's bad enough.
Try as little hose as you can before the pump, it should be a decent diameter too.
Baja Wes ·
this is basically what your running, which is basically what I am running;
I have the 21st Century Performance book written by that guy, and he knows his stuff.
He basically saiys you need at least a 1/2" line to feed the EFI pump, and it should be mounted as close as possible (and always below the fuel level). Most of the guys running surge tanks for conversions or track use have a 1/2" outlet on the surge tank, point striaght into the HP pump. No bends or anything, and a very short length of hose.
Another company that sells intank pump kits has the following to say about fitting external pumps...
Common problems associated with stock fuel tanks and fabricated pickups are pump cavitation, vapor lock, varying fuel pressure, exaggerated pump wear and lean conditions during both low and high loads. Note: Unlike a carbureted engine, any loss of fuel supply at the in-tank- pickup will immediately result in a loss of fuel volume and pressure at the EFI injector resulting in lean conditions and engine damage.
hinted at potential problems with starving the HP pump of fuel.
ratty 63 ·
Thanks Wes,
All of that info says what I was thinking. I suspect that the length of hose is causing the problem - that, coupled with the right angle hose fitting in the tank is likely to be the cause. I will go and shorten the length of hose between the fuel pump and surge tank and give it another go.
I spoke to my Brother about this problem too, and although he wasn't sure of the cause he suggested that I check inside the surge tank for foreign objects that could be partly blocking the hose fitting. Apparently he has seen something similar in a Kombi that he had at work once - it had lolly wrappers in the fuel tank :duh that would float around in the fuel until one was drawn over the tank outlet by the fuel flow. It would then block the outlet and the engine would stop. Once the engine stopped, so would the fuel flow and the wrapper would float away from the tank outlet, so the car would then re-start OK - strange but true! My Surge tank in new and I don't store my lolly wrappers in the fuel tank 😀 so I can't imagine that being the cause, but I will have a look whilst I have it all apart anyway.
I think that if I was to re-make the surge tank again, I would create it so that it suited an internal pump for a couple of reasons:
1. One less thing to have to mount = less hose
2. Internal pumps are usually cheaper than external pumps
3. There is no length of hose/right angle fitting issues!
Finally, that drawing above is Identical to the set-up that I have, except I have my return from the fuel reg going into the bottom of the tank. I am using a fitting in the bottom of the surge tank that is the same diameter as the hose fitting on the pump - obviously the hose between the two is the correct size to suit.
I'm off now to shorten the hose and check the internals of my surge tank - I'll post the results.....
R :duh
tassupervee ·
Ratty
Once again I am not casting aspersions at your choice of clobber.
I believe that the delco/kalmaker combo is very tuneable.
However, I have had the benifit of using both EMS T1-4 on my wifes turbo e15et (pulsar) and the Microtech MT-8 on my FJ20et.
Plus I have had experience with other Microtechs on atmo and turbo rotors.
I have dealt with both Dom (Microtech) and Pete (EMS) and only have good experiences with them.
Both the systems came ready to run and both systems did exactly that and I enjoy the fact that when I identify a tuning issue with either of my systems I simply reach under the seat, grab the handpeice and tune away based on the EGO readings.
Its all too easy.
I get a bit suspicious of up to 20 year old electronics and wiring hardware ratted from wrecked cars thats all.
Id much rather start from fresh with a spankers loom custom fitted to my particular application.
Anyway keep at it dude and best of luck.
L8tr
E
ratty 63 ·
Tassupervee,
I s'pose it all comes down to what your are most comfortable with - and I can deffinatly see why you would want to start with a brand new wiring loom! This just proves that any recommendation (of a brand/model) comes with some personal preference included and is not just based on facts and figures. There are many good systems out there - it's just a matter of finding the right one for you....
On the subject of what appears to be my fuel starvation problem, I have spoken to many people today and it would appear that I am creating a vacuum in my surge tank by using hose fittings and hoses that are too small on the low pressure side. I don't completely understand why (I think you would need a degree in hydraulics to understand!:thumb), but this is the basics of it, as explained to me by someone who has studied hydralics:
'When using a two pumps in a system including a system that contains a storage container (surge tank in my case), the highest flow rate of the of the two pumps is what controls the flow rate of the system.'
Let me see if I can give you an example - I looked around and found these figures in another post regarding surge tanks:
a few figures for the interested, fuel flow from EFI pumps, all at 40psi.
Now, my HP pump is a VL Commodore unit (rated at 2.3L/min) and my low pressure pump is a facet pump (rated at 2.2 l/min) - therefore it is possible that the HP pump is trying to draw 2.3L/min and the LP pump is supplying 2.2 L/min
If this was the situation this would mean that:
2.2 - 2.3 = -0.1 <- this negative value indicates that in a system like this, a vacuum is being created. If the value was positive it would indicate that there was pressure being created in the tank, which may cause other problems (although not likely in my case as there is a return line to the main tank which, I think, would allow this pressure to escape)
Now I know that my LP pump would be having trouble flowing 2.2 L/min as the hoses and fittings are way too small, so I will upgrade them tomorrow (er, actually later today:P) and do my own tests.
I will also take the time to test the pump that was originally sold to me as a high pressure pump, but turned out to be a low pressure pump - I think that it will flow better than the facet pump - time will tell.
Of course, if I have this all ass-up and anyone would like to correct what I have written, please feel free as I don't wish to mislead anyone! I also realise that this is a very 'dumbed down' version of what is really happening so that I could be made to understand the basics and there is a lot more to it! :thumb
Just before I sign off, Wes, what size hose are you using between your fuel tank and the surge tank? This may explain why our systems are basically identical but yours works and mine doesn't.
OK, thats it for now - time for bed!
R🙁
Baja Wes ·
Ratty,
Whoever explained that to you has led you up the garden path, and completely confused you.
What they are describing, is what would happen if your HP pump / fuel rail return line was returning to the main tank. Then your LP pump would have to keep up with your HP pump. This is why I have told people not to return the HP pump to the main tank.
But with your set-up, the HP pump goes from the surge tank, thru the fuel rail, and back to the surge tank. That is a relatively closed loop that fuel could circulate around forever.
But when the engine is running fuel is lost from that loop, through the injectors and into the engine. The LP pump only has to supply enough make-up fuel to the surge tank to refill what is lost through the injectors. This is much less fuel than what the HP pump is actually pumping.
So you LP pump is not causing you any issues. When I first set-up mine I didn't even have a LP pump and let it gravity feed into the surge tank. The problem I had then was then closed loop of HP pump > fuel rail > surge tank kept recirculating and eventually made the fuel to hot and caused a kind of vapor lock. So my LP pump is simply installed to circulate fuel from the surge tank to the main tank to even out the temperature.
Basically the LP pump will be pumping heaps of fuel to the surge tank, the engine will hardly use any of it, and the majority will simply return back to the main tank.
My LP pump lines are 10mm, but that's because they started off as gravity feed lines.
My HP pump lines are 8mm. If I had an external HP pump I would use a 1/2" line to feed it.
Trust me, your LP set-up isn't causing your problems.
1303Steve ·
Hi
Leigh and I are both using Carter lift pumps, not sure of their rating and we both return our fuel to the tank, never had a problem.
Steve
Baja Wes ·
I imagine the carter lift pumps have a healthy enough flow rate to keep up with the HP pump. If it wasn't quite enough it would suck itself through the return line from the surge to the main tank anyway (I assume you have this line otherwise you'd be pressurising your surge tank).
I guess the main point is that the LP pump is not causing the issues that he's experiencing.
ratty 63 ·
Hmmm, thanks guys....
Looks like time to experiment and see if we can improve things.... I am going to change surge tanks to my brothers tank as his is larger in capacity... I am also going to experiment with where the hoses connect to the surge tank to see if I am not creating some sort of fuel swirl inside the tank which is causing it do to strange things....
This has got me stuffed....
R 🙁
Baja Wes ·
What size line is feeding your HP pump now?
Have you moved it close to the surge tank?
Can you get rid of the 90 degree elbow?
ratty 63 ·
OK, I have tried a number of configurations - all with no luck...
Wes, I have about 3 inches of 12.7mm fuel hose between the bottom of the surge tank and the inlet of the HP pump. As yet I haven't removed the right angle fitting (its the Gold Coast Show holiday today, so nothing is open 🙁 ) I'll change it first thing tomorrow morning after I visit the hose suppliers.
I have upgraded the fuel line from the main tank to the surge tank (and all the fittings) to 8mm hose and I have tried fitting the low pressure pump both under the surge tank and under the main tank. I am now feeding the low pressure fuel into the surge tank through the bottom of the tank and returning the fuel from the fuel rail/regulator through the top of the tank. The inlet to the HP pump is now directly opposite the return from the reg....
I have even checked the voltage at the fuel pumps again today to be certain - both have 12.9 - 13.1 at an idle, so I can't see it being a voltage issue....
I pulled the return line off the surge tank with the engine running and there is a good amount of fuel being returned back to the tank - (I hate it when you squirt yourself in the face with petrol - Yuk :puke ).... this makes me think I might be looking in the wrong place.....
Can anyone tell me, if there is too much fuel being returned to the surge tank (via the fuel reg) what would the HP pump be likely to do? I know that this would cause the engine to run lean - particularly if the pump could not get enough pressure to the injectors.....
Also, last night, whilst making one of a hundred Pizzas at work, I realised that I didn't know what a Carter pump is/does/looks like - can anyone give me a description (or even a photo)?
Unless someone here can come up with another idea, I think I will do a couple of things tomorrow and see what effect they have:
1) replace the right angle fitting in the bottom of the surge tank.
2) remove the surge tank completely and fit the HP pump directly in the line from the fuel tank - not permanantly, but as an experiment to see if it still has its rattling fits after a couple of minuites.
3) if 1 doesn't fix the problem and 2 does, then I will fit up my brothers larger surge tank and try that - can't see how it will make a difference, but you have to try it to know....
...any other suggestions? I'm getting desperate! :bounce
Whilst I'm asking questions - is just wonder if it is necessary to 'force feed' the VL pumps.... does any one know?
OK, I've had enough for today - I'm going to work.
R 🙁
AdrianH ·
This may sound stupid, but have you tried to run it with the fuel tank cap off ? Just in case there is a vacuum problem there ??. Main tank vent blocked or non existant ?
FWIW - you lose about 5% flow with a 90 degree bend
ratty 63 ·
I have tried to run it with the fuel tank cap off - no difference (unfortunatly).
Silly question time - if I remove the vacuum hose off the top of the fuel regulator, that should increase the fuel pressure causing the engine to run rich shouldn't it? Mine doesn't - have I got an issue with the fuel reg??? Put that on the list of things to check tomorrow - I know that the quantity of fuel returned from the reg at an idle should be around 750ml/30secs (or so I am told)....
I'm so confused:duh
R 🙁
Baja Wes ·
AdrianH wrote:FWIW - you lose about 5% flow with a 90 degree bend
I don't know where that came from, but it's not correct.
If you only have a 90 degree bend, then it is basically 100% of your friction loss. What effect those losses have on the actual flow rate depends on the pressure-head curve of the pump. Therefore you can not apply any rules of thumb like you suggested. And all that really applies to the HP-discharge side of the pump.
On the suction side is a different matter. The pump will have a NPSHr - net positive suction head required. The NSPHa (available) must be higher than the required for the pump. By having restrictions (such as 90 bends or filters) before the pump, you are lowering the NPSHa. If it drops below the NPSHr then you get cavitation > pump damage > reduction or loss in pump flow. All this can acutally be calculated if you have the data for the pump (NPSHr), but I don't like your chances of finding it for a car fuel pump. I've done the calculation on way too many industrial pumps to count though.
Anyway, back to the story. the vacuum line to the regulator will vary the fuel pressure, but only a relatively small amount compared to the high pressure the fuel is delivered at. I'm not sure your air fuel read-outs would be sensitive enough to see the effect of removing the vacuum hose off the regulator.
Sounds like you need a fuel pressure guage. See what happens to the actual fuel pressure. Really no matter what the regulator is setting the pressure at (within reason) you'll get a similar amount of fuel getting returned back to the surge tank. So calculating that flow probably won't tell you alot. You won't be able to say "oh I'm getting too much fuel returned to the surge, it must be running lean and not getting enough fuel pressure", it doesn't work like that.
Another thing that I thought about, do you know what duty cycle your injectors are working at?
The reason I ask is that by running batch mode your injectors work more often (but not for as long) than in sequential injection. If your running a high duty cycle then maybe the injectors are overheating after a few minutes of running and causing your troubles. It would also have probs when revving the engine using full throttle too is that was the case. Just something else to consider...
AdrianH ·
Hey I am reading a book called Forced induction performance tuning, in it it states " Some however choose to use a small pump to feed the swirl pot and run the fuel return line back to the swirl pot rather than to the fuel tank. I do not believe this is a good idea for two reasons: unless the swirl pot is fairly large it can run dry at high engine loads and high RPM, and second, at lower engine loadings the fuel will get hot circulating in a closed loop and the engine could become dangerously lean"
Might help ??
Baja Wes - thanks for the flow info...
tassupervee ·
Aidrian, I cant see your logic here dude.
If the engine fuel return is fed to the surge tank, the chances of the surge tank running out are actually significantly lessened.
The lift pump only has to deliver enough fuel to cover what the engine uses. In most cases, this will be easily covered by nearl any electric fuel pump.
If the engine fuel return is piped direct to the main fuel tank, the lift pump has to cover what the engine uses AND what the fuel pressure regulator bypasses.
This is often in excess of what many single electric fuel pumps can cover.
The fuel gets warm yes but since it is technically not a closed loop in practise the fuel does not get overly hot as the lift pump is always supplying some fuel into the pot to replace what is used, even at idle and the pot by its nature looses heat like a radiator.
The heating of the fuel in the surge tank is relatively insignificant in the overall scheme of things.
tassupervee ·
Ratty
You have described your surge tank LP feed, HP feed and engine bypass returns.
Obviously, the HP feed needs to be at or near the bottom of the tank, the engine bypass return should be above this to prevent hot fuel and/or any air directly recirculating same with the LP supply from the lift pump.
Where exactly is your surge tank vent/return back to the main tank? At the very top I presume?
Just a thought.
L8tr
E
AdrianH ·
Tas, its someone elses logic - direct quote 🙂
ratty 63 ·
Thanks for your input guys - I have a confession to make:
I have finally found the problem - but it's not over yet....
I discovered when I removed the return line from the top of the surge tank (the one from the fuel reg) that the flow was ... er ... significantly less than what I was told... actually there was nothing coming out at all at any time, regardless of engine revs. It would appear that the fuel reg is blocked or faulty in some way and no longer allows the returned fuel to go through - it's always the things you check last and/or assume are working OK that catch you out.
I assume that this would have been causing the pump to get to full pressure, overheat and boil the fuel, causing the strange vaccum that I observed.
Strangly now, having replaced the pressure reg with one from a running VL (have you ever tried to get one of these out of a VL - don't! Pay someone else to do it - not easy!) I am unable to get the engine to run correctly - it's always lean unless I run the injectors at almost 100% - and thats just at idle! Before I start looking for more equipment failures, I'm going to reset the Calabration in the ECU and check the fuel pressure at the injectors...
If its not one thing, its another!
I'll let you know how it all goes....
Thanks again guys - I appreciate the help. 🙂 :kiss
Just something I noticed - does anyone know what the fuel damper does in the GM fuel systems - no manuals make any mention of their function, just how to remove and install them - I don't have one (and as far as I know neither do the Kombis, which use a very similar system) - they are mounted just after the high pressure pump, usually under the rear of a Commodore/Camira.
Thanks again (geez I feel stupid for not checking that earlier :blush )
R
[Edited on 30-8-2004 by ratty 63]
Baja Wes ·
ratty 63 wrote:actually there was nothing coming out at all at any time, regardless of engine revs.
Well that would certainly explain your problems. Not very good for the pump, and probably quite dangerous too. I woulda thought the fuel filter might have started getting hot, also pays to check that things that are supposed to be cold actually are cold.
I've seen industrial pumps (we're talking 300mm diameter suction and discharge piping) that have been operating away happily, and then some idiot closes the discharge valve, stopping flow in a similar fashion to your fuel reg. Anyway it operates like that for a while, but the heat of churning the fluid inside the pumps builds and builds until the fluid in the pump boils, then probably starts superheating. The pressure in the pump builds so much the pump physically expodes, it's like a bomb going off. We found one large chunk of cast iron pump casing about 20m away from the pump.
Anyway, back to the thread. Don't know what a damper does, but going by the name I'd say it dampens. Either the pump design, or the injectors working, must cause pressure pulsations in the fuel lines, and I guess the damper is there to try to dampen the pulsations out.
Midlife crisis ·
After read some posts on an US site about FI Wes you hit the button on the head it is there to stop the pulsations, so the injectors get a steady flow of fuel
Marc
ratty 63 ·
hmmm, might have to look into fitting one, It might just make the pump last a bit longer.... I'll see what they are worth....
I spend yesterday attempting to tune the engine, eventually having success! Something worth noting (and not mentioned anywhere in the documentation that is supplied with the ECU) is that the ECU doesn't know how many cylinders the engine that it is attached to has, so it assumes that it is an 8 cylinder initially - this plays havoc with the tuning. It will, after some run time, work out how many cylinders it is working with and re-set itself, but until it does, expect it to not want to make any sense whilst you are trying to do the initial set-up. Once it had this issue out of the way, it ran perfectly!
For those of you considering the Delco - the VW engine will start and run OK on the Camira calabration! I had to change the acceleration and deceleration enrichement sensitivity (make it less sensitive) before it would idle, but from there it's all OK. Obviously it runs rich in some spots and lean in others, but with the automatic VE update function turned on, the ECU soon sorts these out for you. I imagine that the maps will be much closer to where they need to be once I can place a load on the engine as the auto tune function requires you to hold the revs and vacuum steady in any one place on the map for more than 3 seconds before it makes the update - this is quite difficult to do on a VW engine with no load on it. The engine is very quick to respond to throttle movement and the vaccum levels fluctuate a little, even when the revs are steady and the throttle is held as still as it can be on a running engine. Still, with that said, the changes to the original (Camira) map that have been achieved with the auto VE update are already noticable 🙂
Something else of notice is that, my Brother tells me now, the test engine is actually not the stock standard 1600 that I thought it was, but is actually a 1641 with a mild cam in it (thanks dude, that makes things make a little more sense!), still even with this engine, I have had to make no changes to the fuel map at idle to get it to idle smoothly (previously, with a carb it had a bit of 'cam stumble' at idle). Even my brother was surprised how smoothly it idles! Should be interesting to see how smooth we can get the idle on an engine with a bigger cam!
There are still a few things that I want to change about this system, however I really 'need' to get the bodywork finished so that I can drive this car and see what the FI is all about, so the work on the FI system will probably stop at this point, at least until I have the body ready to go back on the pan.
I would be interested to see how everyone else that is putting together a EFI system is going - and I hope that all the problems I have had, mistakes I have made and stupid questions that I have asked are of some benifit to others. 😀
This system isn't finished (it probably never will be as I want to experiment with different things) - I will let you know happens as it happens right here!
Thanks for your help guys - its a great feeling knowing that I have finally conquered it. Can't wait to drive it now....
R 🙂
MickH ·
congratulations in getting it sorted!!!!!! Do you have pictures of your surge tank and the location?? I'm about to go EFI on the Manx and can't decide if i should put the tank at the rear or front.....any problems encountered with the tank etc etc?? any info would be good. Thanx
ratty 63 ·
Mick,
My surge tank is mounted beside the gearbox and is fed from the main tank by a low pressure pump. The return from the fuel rail (via the fuel regulator) is also plumbed into the surge tank - basically the same design as Wes' set-up - the only difference being that I am using an externally mounted high pressure pump (and my tank is at the rear of the vehicle).
Couple of reasons for mounting it at the back:
1) You only need to run one, small diameter return line the length of the car - not two larger diameter lines
2) The pumps are closer to the Battery = less wiring length = less voltage drop = less chance of voltage related pump issues.
On a vehicle as small as a Beetle or Buggy, reason 2 is not really an issue as long as you run decent size wiring.
I wll post pics of my tank and design as soon as I can get my digital camera back from my wife (she's starting a photography course this evening so the camera has gone to work with her!). Probably tomorrow morning....
R 🙂
MickH ·
Yeh,no worries thanks for that. I'm not keen on running a high pressure hose through the car and was contemplating mounting the surge tank at the rear. My tank setup is similar to Wes's also.I also have an external pump which was why i was interested in where you shoved everything!!!!:thumb
Midlife crisis ·
Great news to hear that it is run Ross.
It will be good to see t on the road
Marc
Doug Sweetman ·
I'll add my congratulations to the list - WELL DONE 🙂 !
Though like you said, the proof will be in the driving. Just whack a seat, fuel tank and steering column on it, and lair ass around the block for a while 🙂
you know you want to........
tassupervee ·
AdrianH wrote:in it it states " Some however choose to use a small pump to feed the swirl pot and run the fuel return line back to the swirl pot rather than to the fuel tank. I do not believe this is a good idea for two reasons: unless the swirl pot is fairly large it can run dry at high engine loads and high RPM, and second, at lower engine loadings the fuel will get hot circulating in a closed loop and the engine could become dangerously lean"
Adrian
Ahhhh, sorry dude, my bad.
I didnt read the punctuation on the post carefully enough and i assumed you were actually adding the bit about "not being a good idea" blah blah..........errrrrhhhhmmmm.
Unless the actual quote is innacurate, a typo or such, then the writer is sadly mistaken as the opposite of what he states is largely true.
L8tr
E
tassupervee ·
Ratty
Well done M8.
Perhaps a "not see the wood for the trees" syndrome.
You will never see a carby as useful for anything but the bin once you nut your system.
Got any fingernails or hair left:P
L8tr
E
ratty 63 ·
Though like you said, the proof will be in the driving. Just whack a seat, fuel tank and steering column on it, and lair ass around the block for a while
you know you want to........
...er...actually, that was what I was thinking of doing...Hmmm, I know where all that stuff is, shouldn't be too hard.....
I was thinking of, at least, preparing the floorpan for our clubs show in a couple of months - just enough so that it can be driven through the carpark to the display area.... Could generate a little interest, if nothing else.
Perhaps a "not see the wood for the trees" syndrome.
You will never see a carby as useful for anything but the bin once you nut your system.
Got any fingernails or hair left
Yep, I think that you have hit the nail on the head when you say "couldn't see the wood for the trees"! :thumb
...I already see carbys that way - I have since one of my friends and club members allowed me to drive his TIII Notch with aftermarket EFI....
...fingernails are still OK, but the hair is almost gone :thumb
Mick, I have included a few pics on the bottom of this post so that you can see how my surge tank fits, however as the body is not on the pan at the moment, and I have been swapping and changing the hose locations at the surge tank whilst I was trying to fix the last problem, nothing is in its final position.
I plan on running the supply line to the HP pump in the opposite direction to the way it is currently facing so that I can clamp the HP pump to the torsion tube on the passenger side of the car, with the output end of the pump facing the gearbox. I will then mount the filter on the gearbox fork before the line goes through the rear engine tinware and on to the fuel rail.
The return line will come back across the engine (on top of the supply line, behind the alt. stand.) and exit the engine area through the rear engine tinware, beside the supply line. It will return into the top of the surge tank.
I am using the original steel fuel line through the tunnel to supply the low pressure pump and filter, which enters the surge tank though the bottom (although if you haven't had your tank made yet, it could enter through the top - most commercial tanks are like this. I just had a spare hose fitting on the bottom, so that is what I used!).
The return back to the main tank uses the same sized line as the original supply line and is plumbed into the top of the tank. I haven't yet decided where I will mount the low pressure pump, but it will probably be clamped to the underneath of the parcel tray, beside the surge tank, once the body and pan are back together.
All the pumps will be rubber mounted so that I minimise the pump noise in the car (the VL pumps come with a rubber sleeve so this won't be too hard 🙂 ) I will have to manufacture a couple of mounting brackets, but this won't be difficult.
I will begin to mount things when the body is almost ready to go back on. In this way, I will be able to cut hoses to the correct length, rather than have to guess and replace/shorten them over and over. As you can see from the photos, the two chunks of wood and a cable tie are doing a great job of holding everything still at the moment! 😀
What engine and ECU are you planning on using?
I have run my engine for around half and hour every day so far and it is getting smoother and smoother every time - got to love the auto tune function! ... and what about the instant start - hot or cold - Yipee! 😎
Hope these pics are of some help...
R 🙂
Pic 1: Underneath of surge tank - high pressure pump to the right of the picture - this is a Jap pump with an anti back flow valve fitted to it - the high pressure hose exits at right angles to the pump, making fitting in my chosen location much easier - not bad for free!
Pic 2: Top of surge tank - low pressure pump (purchased for $20 at the Toowoomba Swap) on the right of the picture
Pic 3: Fuel tank connections - just in case you were interested! :thumb
[Edited on 2-9-2004 by ratty 63]
1303Steve ·
Hi
Looking good. To keep things simple I just ran an EFI filter before the LP pump, I dont like the idea of pushon fittings on the HP side.
Steve
MickH ·
Thanks for the pics!!!! I will most likely run my pot to the rear also...with the low pressure pump feeding through 10 mm line from the front under the fuel tank,through the tunnel to the surge tank. The return line will also be 10 mm to the bottom of the tank. I am undecided on which ECU I will run at the moment as I have 2 to choose from. The engine is a 1916......will start building the car tomorrow night and will have pictures up in a week or so of the work in progress. Keep up the good work!!1
k
ratty 63 ·
Sounds good - can't wait to see the pics....
R 🙂
56astro ·
Mick H wrote:I am undecided on which ECU I will run at the moment as I have 2 to choose from.
The AUTRONIC with the autotune features seems to be the pick of the aftermarket ones
MickH ·
56astro wrote:
Mick H wrote:I am undecided on which ECU I will run at the moment as I have 2 to choose from.
The AUTRONIC with the autotune features seems to be the pick of the aftermarket ones
But I don't have an Autronic. I have a Motec and a Wolf plus the Webber one I got with my kit....have not decided which one to use....:jesus
56astro ·
DOH!!
sorry, didn't know that 🙁
MickH ·
56astro wrote:DOH!!
sorry, didn't know that 🙁
Thats OK...so you are also Pobjoy powered....can't wait to feel the difference in performance. Ratty63...bet yer busting your nuts to go for a drive with the EFI:alien
ratty 63 ·
...your not wrong - just went and dragged out a front end and stripped it down - needs new bushes - will get that sorted out and painted ASAP and get the brakes organised .... who needs a body!!?! :duh
R 🙂
56astro ·
Mick H wrote:...so you are also Pobjoy powered....can't wait to feel the difference in performance.
Yep,
give the Kads the flick eventually,
new Al case,
044s with twin plugs,
EFI
Schweet daily driver.
Might even contemplate nickies and forged slugs !!
Baja Wes ·
glad it all worked out in the end. It will be very satisfying to drive. 🙂
Still, a subaru conversion would've been easier :P
MickH ·
Baja Wes wrote:glad it all worked out in the end. It will be very satisfying to drive. 🙂
Still, a subaru conversion would've been easier :P
I would have to agree....and in my case a lot cheaper as well....:o
ratty 63 ·
...maybe...but then you have the issue of water leaks.....:repuke
MUD BASHING ANYONE ?? ·
Subaru dont you mean scoop of poo
56astro ·
Any updates Ratty?
ratty 63 ·
Updates, um, OK....
Sorry, I have been getting quite involved with finishing off the rest of the car so that I can drive it and get a really good idea about how it all works.
I have still taken a bit of time to fiddle with the setting and maps but nothing too serious. I have also set up the ECU to auto update - and it is working fine! The engine is running noticably smoother every time I start it and the graph produced from the O2 sensor readings isn't fluctuating anywhere near as much as it did when I first started all this - of course this is all done with very little load on the engine (only the gearbox - not wheels yet), so I have really only started working on the tip of the iceburg...
I still find it amazing that it starts so easliy and runs so smoothly, regardless of the engine temp.
So far my longest continuous run for this engine/system has been just over 2 hours and this was whilst I was making adjustments to the maps (read: fiddling :thumb ), but I only have one minor issue to comment on:
Whilst the engine was running (it had been running for around 10 mins) it suddenly quit - like someone had disconnected the coil as the fuel pumps were still running. I had my PC connnected to the ECU, so I had a look at the guage screen to see what had caused this to happen and everything appeared normal, so I pushed the start button again. The engine would start momentarily, then stall again - like it was too lean/not enough fuel...
I went right back through the entire set-up - wiring. fuel pressure, ECU settings, etc - and nothing showed up as being incorrect...strange.
So I decided to up the amount of fuel being delivered to the engine by changing the fuel map - even with the settings at 100% (maximum fuel) it still sounded too lean. I reset the settings back to what they had been and tried a different tack.
When setting up the Delco, you have to tell the ECU what your engine size and injector efficiency rate are so that it can calculate the base pulse rate. If you increase the base pulse rate, you increase the amount of fuel injected accross the entire fuel map, so, considering this, I decided to up the engine size in the BPC calc to see what happens. I initally uped it to the maximum setting (2000cc per cylinder = 8litre 4 cylinder:duh ) and hit the start button - bingo it started and ran very rich, so I slowly decreased the cylinder size until it appeared to be running OK - it all settled out at around 800cc/cyl = 3.2litre engine .... not exactly correct!
Not sure why this was happening, I began to ask questions on the Kalmaker forum to get some answers, but unfortunatly no-one had seen this happen before. I also noticed that the ECU thought that it had a 8 cylinder resistor pack fitted (res packs are used for limp home mode I believe).
Then, after a couple of days of running fine with these settings it stalled again. This time it restarted OK, but was now running way too rich - I began to reduce the cyl size again and the engine settled down as the size reached 412cc/cyl - which, strangely enough, is correct for this engine! The ECU now thinks that it is fitted with a 4 cyl res pack and has been running fine ever since ... still not sure what caused to to do this, but I suspect that it could be that I have not earthed the case of the ECU as the manual tells me to do (it should earth through the mounting bracket which is not yet fitted to the vehicle). I will keep you up to date as I find out more, but right now I am dieing to get this car finished and go for a drive.....:bounce
How is everyone else going with their projects?
I hope to have my web site updated with all the latest info soon - too much to do and so little time!
R
56astro ·
gathering hardware :thumb
Midlife crisis ·
Just think of the fun of the first drive
ratty 63 ·
arrggg! Everything has changed colour!! Looks cool though!
56Astro, what equipment are you thinking of using? I'm just interested to see what others are thinking/doing.
Midlife Crisis, did you fix the issue with your factory TIII injection (I know, not exactly on the topic but close 🙂 ). If so, what was it?
What do you reckon, should I try to get just the floorpan (with engine and box) to our show in November for ppl to look at, or should I just keep plugging along with the bodywork until it is all done, then show it off😎 ?
R 🙂
ratty 63 ·
hmmm, changed back to the normal colours again ... was I just seeing things?
R :duh
Midlife crisis ·
keep going and get it all done.
No still chasing the hunting problem.
Marc
56astro ·
ratty 63 wrote:56Astro, what equipment are you thinking of using? I'm just interested to see what others are thinking/doing.
R 🙂
Bottom end for an EFI 2332.
Not anything ballastic but very very streetable.
Looking at very good stuff on the STF.
Might have to do a mock-up of the plenums in PVC, cause we don't have access to great options with respect to Al welders int he country like some city folk. :duh
11CAB ·
Hey Rosco, definately bring the floorpan to the show, I'm keen to see the whole setup which would be much easier to see without the body. I'm sure there would be plenty of interest in it too.
Then finish it and show the whole car off......:bounce
ratty 63 ·
Hmmm, I'll see how things pan out - I don't want to waste too much time on making it into a temporary display if I can better use the time to complete the car ... but I would like to have it there....
R
ratty 63 ·
Hi all,
just a quick update:
I Emailed Alan at Kalmaker (the manufacturers of the ECU I am using) and asked about this intermittant 'personality swapping' issue - where the ECU changes from thinking it is controlling a 4 cylinder to an 8 cylinder. He tells me that he had never seen it happen before but his best guess was that the Resistor Pack (or Respak as it is known) was faulty. The respak is fitted to the ECU and tells it how many cylinders it is controlling. In this way the ECU knows how much fuel to inject at each pulse (ie: 4 cylinder needs 1/4 total amount of fuel per pulse, 8 cylinder needs 1/8 amount of fuel per pulse). If the ECU thought that it was connected to an 8 cylinder it would only inject 1/2 the amount of fuel required for a 4 cylinder in a complete cycle, so therefore the engine would run lean.
...anyway, Alan suggested that to save time (and postage) that I run a soldering iron over the respak incase this was the problem, and if this didn't fix it, then I should send the ECU back to him and he would check it over. (imagine the problems/damage you could cause to the equipment, telling your customer to attack something with a soldering iron! - lucky I have a 'bit' of experience at soldering). Before I touched it with a soldering iron, I ran my multimeter over the respak to see if I could find the problem. One of the 5 sets of pins (that are connected) on the respac was open circuit. I checked out the solder connections with a magnifying glass to see if I could see why, but the solder joint looked perfect!. Then I re-soldered the joint and re-tested - all OK. This joint must have been intermittant as the ECU would work correctly sometimes and not others, and with a perfect looking solder joint, it would have been impossible to test/predict for this failure. I was just unlucky.
I have had the ECU back together and running during the weekend (around 1 hour of run time so far) and have had no problems - the cylinder size is now set as 412cc/cyl (which is the correct measurement for this engine). Looks like it's all OK now.
As I mentioned before, I was surprised that Alan suggested that I re-solder the respak myself, but his only interest was to save me the down time that sending the unit back to him would have caused. Personally I think that was great! :thumb Half an hour with a multimeter and a soldering iron and away we go again. Woohoo!
I am seriously considering bringing the pan/engine to our show in November - it will depend on a few things though (I've now been waiting for 4 weeks for my front end to be re-built, and as far as I know they haven't started it yet 🙁 - hope its not another crank bearing length delay (4 years and still counting))...we will see what happens - I am about to make a phone call to stir things up....
R 🙂
KruizinKombi ·
Well here's hoping that's all the problem was! It's amazing how much time can be wated on a dry joint, I had a similar problem with my central locking for the kombi. :duh
Pan/complete car.... makes no difference to me, as I won't be there to see it. What I'm hanging out for is a dyno sheet!! :bounce
56astro ·
Good news Ratty.
I bet that's a relief!!
ratty 63 ·
..yeah, definatly a relief after all the problems (mechanical) that I have had it was nice to have something simple for a change. Everything is still running fine...but I still hesitate to say that it is 100% yet...its the old story, as soon as I say it is perfect, something will go wrong! So in my world, nothing is perfect!!
The body of the car is going to the blasters in the next couple of days so things will be moving a little quicker - I hope to have this vehicle registered (or very, very close to registered) by Christmas...reckon its possible?
Crank bearing issue is beginning to move too...
R
Midlife crisis ·
Good to hear the news that the ECU is sorted. Ross can't wait to see it
Marc
ratty 63 ·
Hey Marc,
If your in this area at any stage and would like to have a look at it (it's not much to look at at the moment - still needs to be tidied up - but it does run! 🙂 ) just drop in.
As I explained to Marc at the Byron show on Sunday, after much consideration, I have decided that I will complete the car and install everything correctly before displaying the 'finished product'. I considered that I could easily spend a week (or more) sorting out and cleaning up the wiring and hoses so that it was presentable - only to have to pull it all apart and do it again once the body is back on the pan. I feel that I would be better off spending this time getting the body closer to being re-united with the pan than fiddling with presentation of the EFI for our show...
So whats happening with the rest of you? Anyone any closer to getting their system running?
R
MickH ·
turn the key next Wednesday apparently.....will let you know how i go!!
bugboymatt ·
MIck where did you get your efi from ? any idea of price !!! u2u if ya not wanna broadcast price's.
I was just reading some info on an EFI related forum when I stumbled across a discussion relating to the current model VY Commodore. Apparently Holden are claiming that they (the VY) use a non-return fuel system - ie: the fuel does not return to the tank... not sure why they would go to this effort (there must be a cost benifit, but what else?:duh)
The details were a little vague:duh, but it would appear that they either have a pump that has a pressure release regulator built in, or the return from the fuel rail is returned into the low pressure side of the fuel pump. Apparently this is becomming very popular with the hotrod folks as it saves them fitting return lines and fitting to the tanks (makes sense to me!:thumb)
Has anyone heard of this? Anyone with connections to Holden that can find out more - this would make fitting an EFI system just that bit easier if it is true. 😎
R
VWCOOL ·
Non-return fuel systems was introduced on the Holden V8 Gen III in 1999. It works better for power, emissions and driveability because it keeps the fuel cooler in the fuel tank (less vapour emissions) , while allowing the fuel to heat up in the fuel rail, giving a better atomisation etc
I am not sure about the pump/plumbing specs - it is in-tank and must have an internal pressure regulator
[Edited on 20-10-2004 by VWCOOL]
Baja Wes ·
ratty 63 wrote:or the return from the fuel rail is returned into the low pressure side of the fuel pump. Apparently this is becomming very popular with the hotrod folks as it saves them fitting return lines and fitting to the tanks (makes sense to me!:thumb)
Maybe it would work for the hot-rod guys as most of them don't run their engines for more than 10 mins 🙂
The problem there is that the fuel rail in your normal set-up gets quite hot. This in-turn heats up the fuel in the rail, and if you return it straight to the pump suction you simply recycle hot fuel around the fuel rail, which gets hotter and hotter...
When I originally set my car up with the return to the surge tank and no recirculation to the main tank, the hot fuel from the rail heated up the surge tank and caused problems. So bypassing the surge tank and recirculating straight to the pump will be even worse!
One way to the fuel rail would make a little more sense. the hot fuel doesn't come back to the pump and cause problems there. It simply sits in the rail compressed under pressure. It may vaporise once it's injected but if it still burns who cares.
A normal HP EFI pump wouldn't like pumping against a dead head (virtually no flow), so they must have a new design of pump. Maybe it's really cool and is variable speed and only pumps as much fuel is require to match the engine and keep the pressure, therefore saving energy by running slow at idle or cruise. hmmm, would be interesting to see what they are doing....
type1ute ·
nce the pump gets to a certain pressure don't they cut out??? noidea wat i am talking about, just curious
Baja Wes ·
no, not HP EFI pumps, they just keep pumping.
If they did cut on and off they would be doing that constantly and the pressure would be spiking up and down.
tassupervee ·
ratty 63 wrote:Hi everyone,
I was just reading some info on an EFI related forum when I stumbled across a discussion relating to the current model VY Commodore. Apparently Holden are claiming that they (the VY) use a non-return fuel system - ie: the fuel does not return to the tank... not sure why they would go to this effort (there must be a cost benifit, but what else?:duh)
R
This got me to thinking and a good M8 of mine in Melb. is a development engineer at GMH so i asked him about this and he laughed heartily.
Evidently, not true!
l8tr
E
VWCOOL ·
tassupervee wrote:
ratty 63 wrote:Hi everyone,
I was just reading some info on an EFI related forum when I stumbled across a discussion relating to the current model VY Commodore. Apparently Holden are claiming that they (the VY) use a non-return fuel system - ie: the fuel does not return to the tank... not sure why they would go to this effort (there must be a cost benifit, but what else?:duh)
R
This got me to thinking and a good M8 of mine in Melb. is a development engineer at GMH so i asked him about this and he laughed heartily.
Evidently, not true!
l8tr
E
well, er, your M8 is wrong, coz that's how it's been done for 5 years with the Gen III and now introuced on the HFV6
tassupervee ·
Oh well, I guess he does not know what he is talking about then.
ratty 63 ·
Does anyone have one of these cars? I would be interested to see exactly how the fuel system works.....
R
tassupervee ·
Dont even think about it Ratty!
Hehehehehe!
tassupervee ·
Oh, bty.
The guy at GMH who works as a design engineer requests VWCOOL to provide a detailed description, and where he got his information, of the static (non-returning) fuel supply systems, including the 2 hoses that come from the tank, apart from the tank vent, that have apparently been in use now for the last 5 years, surprisingly to him without his knowledge.
He also said he has had quite some years developing both those engines fuel systems both in and out of the cars and the fitting of that newer engine to the new Rodeos due out in a few years, and says he has a bit of a problem with not knowing anything about the fuel system that he actually designed and heads will roll in the R & D department for using a fuel system that he is not familiar with.
Thanks in advance M8.
Dont go flaming me, I'm the messenger.
L8tr
E
ratty 63 ·
Grrr … why is it that every time I post a huge post the forum crashes or otherwise ‘eats’ my post….:bounce
OK, try again….
I thought that this might be of interest to some of you who are still looking at creating an EFI system. A couple of weekends ago I spotted a ‘68/’69 Bug in the carpark at the Boondal Entertainment centre (the meeting point for Dubs by the Pub). It appeared that the car had recently been rebuilt and it looked great. The engine lid was up so I wandered around and had a closer look and this is what I found:
The owner of the vehicle was nearby talking to a couple of interested on-lookers so I took the opportunity to join in. The system is a Haltech system which the owner tells me is basically an off the shelf/ bolt on system. The only thing that the installer had to do was created the injector mounts in the manifold end castings. As you may be able to see from the pic below, they encountered same problem with placing the injectors in the same position as the type III manifold as I found when I created my injector mounts…in this position the injectors come in contact with the side of the engine bay. To get around this issue, they had cut a chunk of metal out of each side of the engine bay….
The centre section of the manifold is interesting too. I’m not sure why the upright section of the manifold is angled like that…perhaps so that the accelerator cable lines up with the TB? If so, why wasn’t this addressed when the manifold centre was designed? Being on this angle, it makes fitting an air filter very difficult!
The owner of the car mentioned that he had not yet had a long drive of the car as they were still having trouble with the engine overheating when used at high speeds – it was still fitted with the non-vented ‘68/’69 rear lid and the engine is a 1916cc…so this would likely be part of the problem!
I particularly liked the idea of the crank fired ignition, which was part of the off-the-shelf install. Apparently the entire EFI system fits using supplied brackets and existing bolts. The only mod required was to mount the magnets in the back of the pulley (small drill and a bit of glue).
I was told that the system was laptop tuneable, but the owner had had the system installed and tuned by a workshop, as he didn’t want to try it himself. I stuck my head under the back of the car and couldn’t see an Oxygen sensor (it may have been there, but I didn’t see it), so this would be one reason why you would have it done by a workshop.
Whilst I was taking a couple of pics of the engine, one of the on-lookers asked how much a system such as this was worth….the reply was $4000 plus fitting and tuning! :duh
….makes my $2000 system look even better to me!
Oh yeah, I asked about a surge tank set-up and was informed that no surge tank was fitted – apparently the workshop that fitted the system felt that a surge tank was of no real use on a road car….hmmmm.
Did anyone else get a look at this system? What are your thoughts? What about other sytems? Is anyone else getting anywhere with there systems? Tell us about them (and show us the pics too 😀)
I'm still looking at converting my ignition system to a crank fire system as I need the space where the dissy is for the A/C compressor!
R 🙂
ratty 63 ·
crank angle sensor....
If anyone would like a better quality version of these pics sent to them, just let me know....
Doug Sweetman ·
Nice shots Ratty.
Not real keen on the no surge tank idea - fine if you only ever run with at least 1/4 of a tank of juice I guess.... but sounds dodgy to me.
VWCOOL ·
tassupervee wrote:
ratty 63 wrote:Hi everyone,
I was just reading some info on an EFI related forum when I stumbled across a discussion relating to the current model VY Commodore. Apparently Holden are claiming that they (the VY) use a non-return fuel system - ie: the fuel does not return to the tank... not sure why they would go to this effort (there must be a cost benifit, but what else?:duh)
R
This got me to thinking and a good M8 of mine in Melb. is a development engineer at GMH so i asked him about this and he laughed heartily.
Evidently, not true!
l8tr
E
WRONG. Been doing it that way on the V8s for six years...
VWCOOL ·
tassupervee wrote:Oh, bty.
The guy at GMH who works as a design engineer requests VWCOOL to provide a detailed description, and where he got his information, of the static (non-returning) fuel supply systems, including the 2 hoses that come from the tank, apart from the tank vent, that have apparently been in use now for the last 5 years, surprisingly to him without his knowledge.
He also said he has had quite some years developing both those engines fuel systems both in and out of the cars and the fitting of that newer engine to the new Rodeos due out in a few years, and says he has a bit of a problem with not knowing anything about the fuel system that he actually designed and heads will roll in the R & D department for using a fuel system that he is not familiar with.
Thanks in advance M8.
Dont go flaming me, I'm the messenger.
L8tr
E
lol... Take a look at any GEN III powered Commodore - they have no line return to the tank. The now-redundant 'stub' is there (it looks like a nipple) on the upper near-side surface of the fuel tank. You can see it by kneeling down and looking - it was last used with the V8s on the Aussie-engined VT.
Gen IIIs have only one (pressured) fuel line, from the tank to the fuel rail. They have no return from the rail to the tank. They have no pressure reg on the fuel rail. Those processes are now taken care of within the fuel tank/fuel pump. Read the first few pages of the Holden-published Gen III engine service manual (blue cover, first edition 1999, VTII - before they went to CDs) and it explains the returnless system there, and its effect on performance and evap emissions.
It's been introduced on the V6s, too... I think with VY, definitely on the HFV6 in VZ
I heard about the HFV6/Rodeo development a while back - it should be a damn good truck!
[Edited on 22-2-2005 by VWCOOL]
VWCOOL ·
Baja Wes wrote:
ratty 63 wrote:or the return from the fuel rail is returned into the low pressure side of the fuel pump. Apparently this is becomming very popular with the hotrod folks as it saves them fitting return lines and fitting to the tanks (makes sense to me!:thumb)
Maybe it would work for the hot-rod guys as most of them don't run their engines for more than 10 mins 🙂
The problem there is that the fuel rail in your normal set-up gets quite hot. This in-turn heats up the fuel in the rail, and if you return it straight to the pump suction you simply recycle hot fuel around the fuel rail, which gets hotter and hotter...
That's why many EFI systems such as what is used on Holdens are now returnless - there is no endless recirculation of fuel through a hot engine bay, so the fuel in the tank stays cold... and the 'hot' fuel in the rail is easier to digest into a cold intake charge (most cars have plastic manifold these days - don't heat up the intake charge as much) for better emissions and performance. Top idea when you think about it...
OvalGlen ·
How is Ratty going?
Hope he has made further progress
ratty 63 ·
Hi Glenn,
I've been concentrating on getting the rest of the car completed so that I can drive it and complete the tuning stage of the install.
My test engine is still in running condition (although still removed from the car so that the Kombi gearbox install can be completed) - should have it re-installed and running later this week (perhaps even later today if I can drag myself away from this computer! 😀)
I have been looking at changing the spark distribution from a dissy to a crank fire (coilpack) style system so that I can fit my Air Conditioning Compressor as close as possible to the crank pully - ie: right where the dissy is currently located.... I have all the info to do the conversion, but I am having trouble finding the plugs to connect it (the only vehicle in Australia that they use this coil on is the last-of-the-line Lada Nivas :duh). I am looking for someone in the US that can sell me these plugs as they were used on dozens of cars over there....
I have also been keeping an ear to the ground on the Kalmaker forum and have picked up a number of useful tuning tips from others mistakes! This should make things easier when I get to this stage.
Thats about where it stands at the moment...I just wish I could make everything happen faster but it would appear that those that are employed to assist (by rebuilding or supplying parts) have decided that due to the fact that this project has been in progress for years now, it's not going to matter if they take 6 months or more to do what they have been asked to do :bounce
I have just changed to a different parts supplier (for my VW parts), but it now requires me to drive to Brisbane to pick them up.....
Hopefully I will have more to report in a couple of weeks....
R 🙂
tassupervee ·
Ratty
Try Petroject.
They may be able to help you with plugs.
Are you committed to using these particular coil paks?
If not just use some Bosch Commodore V6 coils and some Bosch 008 triggers.
All nice and common and cheap!
L8tr
E
[Edited on 23/5/05 by tassupervee]
Jeza ·
Ratty
Its good to see that your project is still moving along, all be it slowly- mine is in a similar boat.
I have just managed to aquire the last piece (I think?) for my EFI conversion- the Mexi Beetle alternator stand- I was going to modify a stock one but then realised how much modification it required, and figured for the money the factory part would be better and less prone to cracking / leaking!
So I'm now on the hunt for suggestions / info regarding MAP type tables (VE tables?) to get me started up and possibly running roughly? It would be nice to do this myself but I get the feeling I might be better getting the car to the dyno to tune it.
The ECU is a Haltech F9, so a basic fuel only ECU with no oxy sensor- although I bought the Jaycar LED kit and have an oxy sensor off a legacy to play with. The current engine is a stock (well used) 1600 tp. I've got a much fresher one sitting in reserve but I'm a little worried about using that in case I lean it out badly and toast something!
Any comments would be greatfully recieved.... except the ones about fitting an EJ motor- already given that some serious thought- and its not what I want at the mo 🙂
Cheers
Jeremy
VWCOOL ·
VWCOOL wrote:
Baja Wes wrote:
ratty 63 wrote:or the return from the fuel rail is returned into the low pressure side of the fuel pump. Apparently this is becomming very popular with the hotrod folks as it saves them fitting return lines and fitting to the tanks (makes sense to me!:thumb)
Maybe it would work for the hot-rod guys as most of them don't run their engines for more than 10 mins 🙂
The problem there is that the fuel rail in your normal set-up gets quite hot. This in-turn heats up the fuel in the rail, and if you return it straight to the pump suction you simply recycle hot fuel around the fuel rail, which gets hotter and hotter...
That's why many EFI systems such as what is used on Holdens are now returnless - there is no endless recirculation of fuel through a hot engine bay, so the fuel in the tank stays cold... and the 'hot' fuel in the rail is easier to digest into a cold intake charge (most cars have plastic manifold these days - don't heat up the intake charge as much) for better emissions and performance. Top idea when you think about it...
Hey Tassie, did you talk to your mate at Holden yet about he Gen III returnless fuel supply? 😉
tassupervee ·
Yes
He find the whole topic quite amusing.
l8tr
E
tassupervee ·
Whatever you think dude.
L8tr
E
ratty 63 ·
tassupervee wrote:Ratty
Try Petroject.
They may be able to help you with plugs.
Are you committed to using these particular coil paks?
If not just use some Bosch Commodore V6 coils and some Bosch 008 triggers.
All nice and common and cheap!
Thanks tassupervee, I'll go and talk to Petroject...
I am committed to use these coil packs and controllers as the Delco 808 ECU (the one I am using) does not know/control which plug fires - all it recieves - as far as spark timing is concerned - is a reference pulse from the Crank Angle sensor. The ECU then does a calculation to know when to fire the coil and times down until this event occurs. At this time, the ECU sends a signal to the coil unit to fire. This is all fine if you are running a Dissy as the rotor button controls which plug fires, but when you go to a distributorless system how does it decide which plug to fire?
To fix this problem, GM made their coilpacks 'intelligent' - the coilpack controller (a circuit board in the base plate, under the coils) actually recieves a number of pulses per crank rotation. From this sequence of pulses it knows where the crank is in relation to number of degrees of rotation. It does not know which of the two cylinders connected to a particular coil is in the compression position - but this is not important as it is going to fire both plugs anyway.
So, in short, the coil pack decides which of the two coils to fire, then sends a reference pulse to the ECU to start the 'countdown' to ignition. Because of this method of coil selection I am restricted to use the GM style coil pack controller, which is the same unit as the last shipment of Lada Nivas, the Chev Cavalier, the Buick Skyhawk, the Pontiac Tempest, etc, which all use the Delco 808 ECU.
The Commodore coil controller is not suited due to the fact that it is designed to be used on a 6 cylinder so the crank pulses are different to the 4 cylinder units. However, the coils are exactly the same. Of course, the plugs on the Commodore coil packs are different to the coil pack that I must use.... couldn't be that easy could it! One of the plugs that I need (three pin) is available off the shelf from Global Auto Spares, the six pin plug is fitted to the '92 - '96 Jackaroo coil pack, so all I need is a wreckers willing to just sell the plug/loom from a wrecked vehicle (not as easy to find as you might think - most want to keep the loom with the engine! :duh. The two pin plug is the hard one to find - no GM vehicle in Australia was fitted with it (except the Niva) so no-one that I can find carries it, and the chances of finding one in a wreckers is.....
Thanks for the tip on the Bosch 008 sensors - I'll have a closer look at them.
R 🙂
ratty 63 ·
Jeza wrote:Ratty
Its good to see that your project is still moving along, all be it slowly- mine is in a similar boat.
I have just managed to aquire the last piece (I think?) for my EFI conversion- the Mexi Beetle alternator stand- I was going to modify a stock one but then realised how much modification it required, and figured for the money the factory part would be better and less prone to cracking / leaking!
So I'm now on the hunt for suggestions / info regarding MAP type tables (VE tables?) to get me started up and possibly running roughly? It would be nice to do this myself but I get the feeling I might be better getting the car to the dyno to tune it.
The ECU is a Haltech F9, so a basic fuel only ECU with no oxy sensor- although I bought the Jaycar LED kit and have an oxy sensor off a legacy to play with. The current engine is a stock (well used) 1600 tp. I've got a much fresher one sitting in reserve but I'm a little worried about using that in case I lean it out badly and toast something!
Any comments would be greatfully recieved.... except the ones about fitting an EJ motor- already given that some serious thought- and its not what I want at the mo 🙂
Cheers
Jeremy
Hi Jeremy,
Good to hear that your car is still coming along - so much to do!
Yeah, your right - sometimes, although it may be possible to modify something to work, it is easier to just purchase the genuine article and save yourself from possible problems in the future....
I understand your concern in regards to causing engine damage due to incorrect mixtures - an EFI 'expert' (worked in an EFI workshop) told me to set everthing to maximum rich then reduce the values to get them right - in this way it reduces the risk of 'toasting something'...of course I didn't do it this way - I just loaded the factory VE table for the JE Camira and attempted a start...if everything had been working OK mechanically this would have worked, however due to the prevoiusly listed mechanical failures the engine ran super lean (exhaust pipes glowing red is not a good sign). The engine did survive and is still running strong - the Air cooled VW engines are tough!
Perhaps you could try the suggested method to get your car to run first - I'm not familiar with the Haltec F9 - is it a computer tune (laptop) ECU? If so, perhaps someone may have a file of their VE table that they could send to you by email....? I can do this for anyone planning on using the Kalmaker/Delco system, but I doubt that the Haltec would be compatible with the Delco info....
Keep us up to date with how you are going with your system.
R 🙂
1303Steve ·
Hey Tassie, did you talk to your mate at Holden yet about he Gen III returnless fuel supply? 😉
Hi
The non return system basically works like this, the presuure relief is in the tank, excess fuel returns straight back to the tank from the the tank mounted pump, so fuel is stored in the rail at the correct pressure all the time, its being constantly used, so heat would not build up as it would flowing through a rail and returning to the tank.
Someone else might have said this but I couldnt find it in the thread.
Steve
Steve
Jeza ·
Thanks Ratty
I figured I would try to track down a screen shot of a VE table for the closest motor and load the figures into the Haltech ECU. I've got a number of tables off Shoptalkforums (before it started acting up again), but most of these are guys planning to turbo their 1916's. For now I'll be happy to get the car road worthy with a 1600 EFI motor... then I'll worry about making it go quicker.
The haltech is laptop programmable.
The super rich suggestion is one way to go about it I guess 🙂 I wonder if it might struggle to start though from being flooded with so much fuel?
The coil pack you are trying to track down- will this give you "wasted spark", as it is firing 2 plugs at once? That could be quite a distinctive sound your car is going to make.
Cheers
Jeremy
ratty 63 ·
Jeza wrote:Thanks Ratty
I figured I would try to track down a screen shot of a VE table for the closest motor and load the figures into the Haltech ECU. I've got a number of tables off Shoptalkforums (before it started acting up again), but most of these are guys planning to turbo their 1916's. For now I'll be happy to get the car road worthy with a 1600 EFI motor... then I'll worry about making it go quicker.
The haltech is laptop programmable.
The super rich suggestion is one way to go about it I guess 🙂 I wonder if it might struggle to start though from being flooded with so much fuel?
The coil pack you are trying to track down- will this give you "wasted spark", as it is firing 2 plugs at once? That could be quite a distinctive sound your car is going to make.
Cheers
Jeremy
I just tried to take a screen shot of my VE table, however it refuses to work - sorry - not sure that it would have been much use to you anyway.... hmmm I've just had another thought....OK, theres more than one way to skin a cat - still not sure that it will be much use to you....I'll attach it at the bottom of this post
If you start with it set to full rich and you find that it floods, reduce your settings and try again - it's a fiddly way to do it, but in the absence of a better way....
I actually have a supplier of the coil packs here on the coast - funny story actually, he was browsing an on-line parts list when he noticed that these coil packs were listed as a Daewoo part, so considering we have Daewoos here in Aust., he ordered a batch so that he would be able to supply them .... it is true, they are listed by GM as a Daewoo part, but unfortunatly no-one knows which Daewoo - not even Daewoo themselves know which car! :duh - so the eager supplier is now stuck with a batch of these coil packs that don't suit anything in Oz! As a consequence, he is getting rid of them cheap...but without plugs 🙁
True, it fires two plugs at once - the plug in the cylinder on compression and the plug in its companion cylinder, which is on its exhaust stroke. This is how many production vehicles are now set-up - as for it sounding different...only if I fire the wrong two plugs! 😀 :duh
I'll post a pic of the coil pack as soon as I have a pic of it!
R 🙂
ratty 63 ·
....If you think that this may be of some use, just let me know and I will email you the full sized (uncompressed ) pic....
Of course, my engine has not had any 'under load' time as the car still isn't finished so it is not likely to be 100% accurate...but it's a start.
I have just found a pic of the coilpack that I will be using. Those of you familiar with the coilpacks from the Commodores will recognise the coils used with this pack - they are the same ones. You may also be able to see the 3 connectors along the bottom of the controller plate, the problem connector is the one on the left.
R 🙂
VWCOOL ·
1303Steve wrote:
Hey Tassie, did you talk to your mate at Holden yet about he Gen III returnless fuel supply? 😉
Hi
The non return system basically works like this, the presuure relief is in the tank, excess fuel returns straight back to the tank from the the tank mounted pump, so fuel is stored in the rail at the correct pressure all the time, its being constantly used, so heat would not build up as it would flowing through a rail and returning to the tank.
Someone else might have said this but I couldnt find it in the thread.
Steve
Steve
Yep, that's basically it. No recirculation of fuel means it doesn't get gradually heated up by a hot engine bay and try and escape from the fuel tank as vapour, or cause drivabaility problems (stumbles, vapour lock etc) But wait, there's more... the fuel IN the fuel rail DOES get heated so it's actually more easily digested by the engine at part throttle. Win-win! Many new cars (eg recent Holden Commodore) us this style of fuel system
Jeza ·
Ratty
Thanks for the graph... I'm not sure I could extract figures from that, even at a high res- those 3D graphs are tricky blighters!
I guess even a table version of your VE is quite tricky as it also includes the ignition. Or does the Kalmaker software do a MAP vs revs and a separate ignition (advance) vs MAP and combine the two tables itself?
Anyway I'm still a wee way off as I actually have to bolt the parts onto the engine which, figures crossed. will go smoothly. Sensor fitment and wiring I suspect may be slightly trickier.
The method of slowly winding the fuel map down until it runs might get me started, especially if I compare things to some of the example tables I've got.
Cheers
Jeremy
ratty 63 ·
Jeza wrote:Ratty
Thanks for the graph... I'm not sure I could extract figures from that, even at a high res- those 3D graphs are tricky blighters!
Yeah - I thought that it would be a little hard to read - I can do a series of 2D graphs too, they would definatly be easier to read...I'll post a couple so that you can see what I mean.
I guess even a table version of your VE is quite tricky as it also includes the ignition. Or does the Kalmaker software do a MAP vs revs and a separate ignition (advance) vs MAP and combine the two tables itself?
Kalmaker uses two seperate maps, one for fuel (VE) and one for spark - the ECU combines them. It makes the system very flexible!
Anyway I'm still a wee way off as I actually have to bolt the parts onto the engine which, figures crossed. will go smoothly. Sensor fitment and wiring I suspect may be slightly trickier.
Yeah, this section takes a bit of time - I spent a fair bit of time looking through service manuals for other models of cars, checking to see where they fit the sensors. I'm not sure which sensors you have on your system but mine are:
TPS: Part of the Throttle Body
Idle Air Controller: Part of the Throttle Body
Intake Air Temp sensor: mounted in the manifold, just below the Throttle Body - most manufacturers fit this sensor closer to the head, however I felt that the air temp is not going to change all that much between the TB and the head.
Engine Temp sensor: After much debate I fitted a head temp sender from a factory Type III and Type IV EFI system. It screws into the hole in the head beside the intake manifold
Heated O2 Sensor: In exhaust, just before the 3 bolt flange.
Crank Angle sensor: Part of the Dissy
MAP sensor: bolted to firewall and connected with a length of vac hose.
...just take it one wire at a time until everything is connected and then test the whole lot again with a multimeter before connecting the ECU. Make certain that any earth wires are connected to secure locations too.
The method of slowly winding the fuel map down until it runs might get me started, especially if I compare things to some of the example tables I've got.
Yeah, I agree - probably the best way to do it in this situation. Always better too rich than too lean.
I can't wait to see how it goes...don't forget the pics - its always more fun for the rest of us when you show the pics of your hard work! 😀
R 🙂
ratty 63 ·
...er...fellas....I don't want to be yelled at, or appear to be taking sides in regards to the 'returnless' fuel systems, but:
A friend of mine has just purchased a VX Commodore - its a bog stock V6 (at the moment 😀). I had a quick look under the bonnet - particularly at the fuel line situation. It is quite difficult to see where the fuel lines go as the V6 has what appears to be a cover over the top of the manifold, however there was definalty TWO fuel lines running from the firewall to under the cover....as I just said, I couldn't see what they connected to under the cover, but it does look like they have a return fuel line at the engine end.....
R 🙂
OvalGlen ·
may be just the v8 one at this stage.....possibility.
Thanks again Ratty , your project is an inspiration.
VWCOOL ·
yeah, the V6 had a return line. The Gen III has always been one-way... now the new 'alloytech' V6 is too
ratty 63 ·
OvalGlen wrote:may be just the v8 one at this stage.....possibility.
Thanks again Ratty , your project is an inspiration.
....oops, didn't think that it might just be the V8....I'm off to have a look - I'll take my camera too (this time!)
Thanks for the kind words OvalGlen, I just wish I could get the rest of the car finished so that I could drive it.... 🙁
...who knows, maybe soon....
R 🙂
OvalGlen ·
Now it appears to me that Ratty 63 is in the
Gold Coast VW club, Now this Fine bunch of
enthusiasts might see the Huge benefit of
assisting this gentleman to get his car to
a road registerable state : - which would
of course be of benefit to all VW modifiers
in Australia (so we could see the Culmination of this EFI project):thumb
How about it guys / girls ?
Very worthwhile project.
(if no joy there, any chance youd move near Sydney?)🙂
ratty 63 ·
😀
...thanks for that Glenn - it seams that the harder I try to get things done around here, the less that actually happens! Been beating my head against a wall - just to get parts again (two weeks ago: Yeah, I've got them somewhere...I'll have a look for you when I remember and see what I can find Yesterday: what parts did you need? Did you ask me for those before? I can't remember that....? :bounce
On the positive side, my Brother is in the middle of rebuilding his Baja (again, again!), and this time it will be running the same EFI setup as I have been 'playing' with. His Baja is powered by a 2.1 litre Type IV, which he fitted the factory EFI (from a Bay window Kombi), however, whilst it was far more fuel efficient, and much more driveable, there were a large number of small problems (does that make sense?:duh) - the major one being the warm-up cycle... After months of fiddling with the factory system, it was decided that it was just not going to do the job....
I'm not certain that the engine will still be a 2.1 litre (there are rumors of it growing in capacity), but this shouldn't be a challenge for the Delco... He is actually going to borrow my ECU to get his car on the road, but has collected all his own EFI parts from Kombi's and Camira's. I have been put on notice that I will be required to tune it for him... I am looking forward to experimenting with his engine so that when (if 🙁) my car is finished I will have a better idea of what I am doing with my engine!😁
Whilst it won't be the completion of my project, at least it will be an Air Cooled VW engine that will be connected to my Delco ECU, and as this engine was connected to a Factory EFI system, it should be a good comparason between the factory and aftermarket systems.
I'll let you know how it goes as it happens....
R 🙂
(I actually did consider moving to Sydney not-so-long-ago...and although not high on the agenda, it may still happen (the IT industry in Queensland (particularly on the Gold Coast) is ...er...not so healthy!)
[ Edited on 1-11-2005 by ratty 63 ]
ratty 63 ·
Hi all,
Just thought I would let you know that we (my Brother and I) are in the middle of converting his 2.1 litre Type IV (in his Baja) to EFI using the Delco/Kalmaker set-up...I am updating my Website with the progres reports - hope to have it running by the end of the week...perhaps even drivable.
The car has undergone a complete rebuild, including a conversion to IRS, so everything has been removed, modified/rebuilt/replaced and re-installed. I am only responsible for the EFI part of the rebuild, but Dave has a stack of other things to get done before the car can be driven.... he is, however, planning on leaving for Frazer Island on Christmas Day, so it has to be driveable soon!
I'll try to keep you all up to date.... 🙂
R 🙂
[ Edited on 5-12-2005 by ratty 63 ]
humpty ·
Not sure if this is the right place...
But has anyone had a look at the 'MEGASQUIRT' EFI kits available in the US?
It seems the early versions were fuel only, but could be upgraded using either locked 009/hall effect dizzy or EDIS crankfire ignition gear that is commonly found on Ford products and such... There is now new version that has some of the needed ignition outputs built in....
This stuff intrigues me no end, as Im in the market for a solid EFI set-up for my 2276 Turbo/intercooled project.... But what is currently available here in Oz is costly or seems to present no end of hassles and expense to set up...
So what up with 'MEGASQUIRT'? Anyone here in Oz had a shot at it?
[ Edited on 28-12-2005 by humpty ]
ratty 63 ·
Hi all,
Just posted a monster post about my latest EFI project - the result has been good so far, but fingers are still crossed!
Humpty, I have looked at the MegaSquirt systems in the past, but not recently. Does it allow the use of an Oxygen Sensor and can it self tune? This is the reason I went for the Delco. There are other brands around that also include these features, but look around and ask heaps of questions before you buy.
R 🙂
[ Edited on 29-12-2005 by ratty 63 ]
humpty ·
Hey Ratty...I have been following your posts for a good while now...
to anwser you questions....
Yes it does use an O2 sensor and no its not closed loop...As far as I can tell...
But then few aftermarket systems are.
Still looking into the whole shebang...
There seems to be a lot of infor out there about the system and loads of positive feedback about them too.
Just have to sort the wheat from the charf...
GeorgeL ·
ratty 63 wrote:Humpty, I have looked at the MegaSquirt systems in the past, but not recently. Does it allow the use of an Oxygen Sensor and can it self tune?
Self-tuning is quite a difficult thing in an aftermarket ECU. They are designed to support a wide range of engines, coniditons, and fuels, so they would have a heck of a time even finding "ballpark" settings from which to start.
One aftermarket ECU that can (but doesn't have to) run in closed loop is the Canadian SDS unit:
It gives you the option of allowing the engine to run in closed loop mode when the operating parameters are within the values you set. Outside those parameters, the ECU operates in open loop mode, just like factory ECUs do. You still have to program the ECU for your engine, though.
I like this particular unit because it does not need a computer for programming. You do it all from a small handheld unit that comes with the ECU. No OBD-II interface to deal with, just a simple display that shows operating parameters and programmed values on a little LCD display.
Another nice thing is that they have complete manuals for their products on their site, so you can see what you are getting into!
George
Judsons4eva ·
I used a Gotech ECU from South Africa. Works well closed loop and narrow or wide band O2 sensor. Good support and less than $500 with wiring harness and map sensor. Does spark and fuel. MAP or TPS or mix and can handle turbo. www.gotech.co.za
ratty 63 wrote:Humpty, I have looked at the MegaSquirt systems in the past, but not recently. Does it allow the use of an Oxygen Sensor and can it self tune?
R 🙂
Yes, and yes.
MS can use a narowband plugged straight in, or a wide band with a controller.
The MegaTune software has an Autotune feature, with the laptop plugged in, or the Data Logging pakage can analyse you tables from the logs.
Megasquirt II has Automatic Mixture Control, with a wide band sensor, and 12x12 AFR Target tables. (Or two tables, with two sensors.)
The software for MS/MSII is free, open source, and worth taking a look at.
Newt ·
Hi guys,
There is an Ausy company that makes a heated O2 unit/controller that is compatable with Megasquirt. I jhave there name somewhere.
With the single fuel line, would the same effect be achieved if you had the fuel pressure regulator just after the pump by the fuel tank which siphoned excess presure back to the tank ie only a short return?
> I guess im asking
> - Is this unit compatible with Megasquirt
Yes, We were the first low cost unit that Megasquirt people used.
> - Does the unit need calibrating (using diferent gases etc).
No, it is a Lambda controller that works with many different fuels.
Note that:
AFR(x) = Lambda(x) * AFR(stoich)
where AFR(stoich) = AFR at stoich for the fuel used
Newt ·
No takers on more info for single fuel line for fuel injection?
On a system that circulates fuel pst the injectors, wouldnt that provide the injectors with a measure of cooling?
Also, if you didnt circulate past the injectors (ie only one line) wouldnt the fuel end up boiling at the injector and would this be an issue?
A pondering.
Newt
marty_08 ·
Hey guys thought this the best place to post my question - not trying to hijack the thread.
I have quite tall manifolds from a set of twin IDF webers and have nearly complete a FI conversion. I have a set of injection perfection throttle bodies http://www.injectionperfection.com.au/content/view/21/71/ (didn't pay as much as stated thankfully). Great bolt on TBs. 😍
THE PROBLEM: It's for a manx buggy, the tall manifolds are port matched to TBs and to my CB performance wedge-ported heads (so want to keep them + tall = more torque apparently!!) but i'm having difficulty with throttle linkage.
I have a hex bar linkage and a scat pivot linkage from carby setups. Due to it being a manx buggy there's not much room above the TB because of the body combined with the tall manifolds = difficulty with crossbar linkage. ALSO because of the tall manifolds the pivot linkage is "too low" and it doesn't turn the throttle arms in the opposite directions (needs clockwise on left and counter-clockwise on right/drivers side!!!).
What should i do!!!!?!???????? 😵💫
This is the last major difficulty i have with my conversion. Is there somewhere in sydney that does custom throttle linkage work like this that i should be chatting to (Carby services at burwood perhaps)?????? been on efihardware.com.au and they have the gear but not the bracketry to mate to the new TBs (need to talk with the guys from injection perfection too but thought i'd chat to you all!!!!)
Any help would be greatly appreciated - so close but soooooooo far!!!!. 😢
Marty
pete wood ·
have you looked at berg linkages?
very similar, where the crossbar setups all come from. as you pull on the throttle the links go lower. just might fit better.
on another note, from what I understand it's not just the length of your manfolds that increase torque but the length of the ram tubes on top as well.
Other thing worth saying is, an airbox setup makes a lot of difference in terms of torque and drivability. have a look at some of the BTCC engine bays and see how much airbox there is...
there is a specific proportion of engine capacity related volume that makes an airbox/filter system work well. From memory it's something the the vicinity of 16 x CCs of the motor. So many performance motors compromise slightly on length of runner for space reasons but add lots of airbox and make up the torque. Now I know you're gonna tell me you don't have any room for a big airbox system, but you do have a large empty space in the back of the manx. I've spent a lot of time thinking about building an airbox system in the back of my J&S. The added bonus is that it brings down the noise of the engine too. Race mag has had a few stories on this sort of thing. http://www.racemagazine.com.au/
anyhow, a few things to think about there.
tassupervee ·
Ive been using a Adaptronic 420C ecu with a TechEdge 2CO WBO2 controller for some time now.
Not fitted to a Kraut tho.
Im running it in closed loop mode now after months of Adaptive learning mode..
AFAIK, Adaptronic is the only aftermarket ECU that runs FULL TIME adaptive tuning as opposed to temporary "Autotune" functions or many others, or plain closed loop fuel control in the vast majority of ECU's.
By inputting engine capacity and injector flow rates and a starting point of 85% VE.. A bit of time running around in fast learn mode and eanough load sites are written to be able to "predict" and smoothen up VE tables by hand.
I ran it around in slow learn mode (fine tune) for a time and let the thing tune itself for some time and hand trimmed the VE tables again to sort out load sites not visited and rewritten by the ECU.
its a time consuming process to find a good enough and quiet road to be able to strap the engine at a given load site and rpm point when no dyno is handy!
Im fortunate i have some very long hills and I add the speedboat on its trailer to the back to increase weight for "strapping". Its a bit hard to hang on to this engine with throttle/braking alone! Brakes burn up pretty quick! Wheelspin can be a problem as well with the trailer and boat on!!!!!
Finally written my AFR's into the AFR lookup table and the entire show including idle and boost is now handled in closed loop but still using the WBO2 and controller. I added a further 5% increase to the entire fuel table in event that the WBO2 controller fails and the system reverts to open loop just as a sort of fail-safe.
It drives like OEM and i cant praise the Adaptronic enough. Australian made as well.
I cannot live without my TechEdge and was well worth the investment if serious about tuning.
Pete.
Induction tuning improvements (accoustics, volume/lengths etc.) and power increases are incremental at best and tend to favour a narrow range of power and often at the expense of the rev ranges either side.
Tuned length runners and funky airboxes are well and good if your chasing incremental increases over a specific rev range but are almost a woftam for just about anything everyday.
Hence high end clobber utillises variable length trumpets/and/or variable volume plenums to try and extend the torque peak over a more useful rev range.
Its so much time and effort for such little everyday gains is all! Looks good on a dyno but in practical use can often result in being actually slower even tho the figures say higher!
C'est la vie!
L8r
E
BennVenn ·
Hi guys,
Great thread on VW EFI. I thought i'd add some info for anyone interested.
We've recently purchased our first VW Beetle, 1972 1600cc SuperBug. After a few months of Cutting rust and welding new pannels its almost ready for rego. It was sold to us as a 1600 so during the engine rebuild i'd been ordering parts for what turned out to be a 1300cc motor. I've discovered the 30/31 carby jetted for a 1300 runs pretty poor on a 1600 Twin Port so we decided to go EFI to get rid of Flat spots, Fouled plugs, Rough idle, fuel consumption etc...
After a bit of searching through forums, pricing for a complete ready to go kit would be around the $1500-$2000 kit. Some might consider this reasonable for the convenience though i was thinking a figure around half that.
Our EFI conversion is currently 90% complete, All fuel hoses plumbed, all hardware fitted, Sensors attached and all done under our initial budget. I'm expecting the PCB's for the ECU to arrive over the next few days and begin tuning it on the road. With my temporary Breadboarded ECU the car is running great but the real test will be on the road, hopefully this weekend.
I'm planning on selling a few of these complete kits as soon as our bug is finished as proof of a successfully converted VW. We're thinking around the $650 mark and that includes everything to convert your VW to EFI - EFI fuel hose, clamps, surge tank, EFI Pump, Injectors, throttle body, manifold, sensors, ECU with Real-time tuning software, Relays, wiring loom, connectors etc...
Some of the details:
ECU
- Manifold Absolute Pressure Sensor & RPM based mapping. 16 x 16 Load table (256 cells) from 600rpm to 5000rpm , Manifold pressure from 30" to Atmospheric (Boost sensing possible)
- Accelerator Pump Table for enrichment under throttle change
- Throttle Position Sensing
- Engine Temperature Sensing for cold start enrichment
- Idle Air Control Output for stable Idle
- Fuel based Rev Limiter and Deceleration Fuel Cut
- All tables and values are adjustable while the motor is running for quicker & Easier tuning - Load cell tracing.
- O2 Feedback will be added in future revisions of software/Firmware
- Can use Air Flow Meter instead of MAP Sensor
- Leaner mixture under Cruise conditions for greater Fuel economy
I know if i was offered a complete kit for around $650 at the beginning of this project i would have jumped at the opportunity. Now i'm giving you the option to upgrade to EFI.
Once this setup is complete, i'll be starting on a Coil-Pack Adjustable spark ECU. This should remove of the Distributor to let me put the AC compressor in it's place.
Let me know if you're interested in buying a kit, or ECU or whatever!
Ben.
humpty ·
Certainly sounds interesting.... And would definitely like to see and know more.
Look forward to the future updates.
matberry ·
650 clams is VERY CHEAP. I'd say increase your rpm limit a little for a wider variety engines.
BennVenn ·
matberry wrote:650 clams is VERY CHEAP. I'd say increase your rpm limit a little for a wider variety engines.
The RPM Range is set by a 'RPM Table' so there is no reason why it couldn't be set to 15 000 RPM+. There is certainly enough CPU overhead for the coding (Assembly language). I've bench tested the ECU to 8000 RPM and the pulse widths are spot on with enough spare processing for communication with the PC
I've read that 5000rpm for a stock motor is the upper reliable limit before crank bearings begin to destroy themselves?? Because the crank isn't balanced? I would think that anything over 4000rpm you would loose a lot of power trying to spin that cooling fan...
humpty ·
BennVenn wrote:
matberry wrote:650 clams is VERY CHEAP. I'd say increase your rpm limit a little for a wider variety engines.
The RPM Range is set by a 'RPM Table' so there is no reason why it couldn't be set to 15 000 RPM+. There is certainly enough CPU overhead for the coding (Assembly language). I've bench tested the ECU to 8000 RPM and the pulse widths are spot on with enough spare processing for communication with the PC
I've read that 5000rpm for a stock motor is the upper reliable limit before crank bearings begin to destroy themselves?? Because the crank isn't balanced? I would think that anything over 4000rpm you would loose a lot of power trying to spin that cooling fan...
Rpm at cruising is still where the optimum cooling will be.... Most peeps that are into stock, stay with stock.... Carb and all.... But most everyone who would be interested in efi are also performance people.... Hence Matt's call for higher rpm capability.
BennVenn ·
Good point Humpty, What is a performance built motor capable of Revving to? If the customers were to use it for a turbo/supercharged motor you would probably want more resolution in both the RPM and Load range. My Nissan ECU running my RB25DET uses 256 Load sites (16x16), which is the same as the Microtech ECU i have in my Van (4G63T) so maybe accuracy isn't that important?
I've designed this ECU so the Load and RPM values can be biased in such a way as to provide maximum accuracy and resolution for particular areas on the map such as Cruise where you want the AFR spot-on and sacrificing resolution around Idle and WOT where it isn't as important to economy. It can just as easily be linear or biased for greater/equal accuracy on boost, all depends on the values you load into the different tables.
Thanks for the input guys, Keep the info coming! It will be much easier to add features to the Software/Firmware/Hardware now than to try modify it all to support extra features later on. Anti-lag? :-)
BennVenn ·
Update!
My Wideband O2 Sensor and Gauge came in the mail today! 3 Things i've learnt from the 4hrs trying to fault find why my AFR's were all over the place...
1. Due to the narrow exhaust and small length between the cylinder head and exhaust tip, a lot of air gets sucked back into the exhaust after every power stroke, throwing my AFR's out...
2. Points bouncing at certain RPM's trick the ECU into thinking it's revving higher than it is. Even with software de-bouncing it still adds error to the rpm counter. I ended up using a Hall-Effect sensor on the base of the ignition coil. Nice neat waveform on the oscilloscope, no ringing, ECU loves it!
3. I've read VW's prefer to run slightly rich. Mine seems most comfortable (idle) at 14.7 or slightly leaner rather than 14.0 or lower. Anyone know what their motor is running at idle?
Also, base timing on my RB25DET and 4G63T are around the 15Degree mark at idle. I advanced the Dizzy to around 12degrees and the motor seems much happier running than it did at 7.5. Other than the fact that Full advance will be too high and the timing curve would be out, is there a reason why VW decided on 7.5degrees? I would say timing being that far retarded would stress the exhaust valves more than running advanced timing ?
Has anyone been involved in tuning an EFI VW??
ratty 63 ·
7.5 degrees was only used as a base setting for simple old-school mechanical advance dissys to ensure that there is not an over advance situation at high revs with WOT - if you are running an engine management system that can control the spark advance you can use whatever spark settings you want. The system in my brothers Baja idles at around 24 deg (which smooths out the lumps in the massive cam), but backs off to around 14 deg when you open the throttle. It runs out to over 47 deg at high speed cruise.
The setting will depend on just how your engine 'likes' advance and your head temps.
R 🙂
BennVenn ·
Update,
The boards(ECU) finally arrived. After an hour or so of soldering it went into the bug, and the problems began...
i'll give a brief history of this motor:
Not knowing much about vw motors, we purchased this bug with what was told to us a 1600cc Twinport motor. The drive home was interesting. Running on 3 cylinders and would barely make 60km/hr. The next morning we pulled the plugs to see what was going on inside the motor. #3 wasn't running and the others were oil soaked. We dropped the oil and it could have been the original 1972 oil, thick black with lumps of solidified/coked oil.
After ordering all the parts we needed for the rebuild we begun dis assembly and noticed our new much larger diameter pistons than what were in it. After a measurement and a google, it turned out that the motor was a 1300 TP. Many people say its as simple as swapping the cylinders and it will run fine.
There was almost no play in the crank, it turned freely, rods were the same, so we decided to rebuild from the crank up. New valves, springs, sleeves, seats, the works. A 1600 piston&barrel set. New plugs, gaskets, rubber intake boots. New SVDA distributor.
Now to the problem...
It just won't idle right! The injector spray is nice and atomized, I pressurised the intake manifold to 6psi to look for any leaks around the heads/throttle body but nothing. Slight hiss past the butterfly valve but that is expected. I have full control over the AFR via my laptop and it still won't idle below 1400rpm.
It is not a consistent miss either, it will miss randomly on any cylinder. It was beginning to backfire and afterfire too, even on an AFR as rich as 10:1. That normally only occurs on a very lean mix?
I clipped the timing light to the Ignition coil output and there was no skipping of the flash when the engine misses so im confident the coil and ignition electronics are all ok. I know the Fuel supply is fine, steady fuel rail pressure, and the O2 readings confirm that too.
Valve clearance has been checked and rechecked. As has the timing.
The heat riser tube that runs from the cylinder 4 exhaust up to the manifold and down to the muffler is hot to the touch on the left side and ambient on the right, Im assuming it is doing its job as the intake runners are warm while the motor is running.
All i can think is the fuel is pooling in the intake manifold, leaning itself out unless there is enough flow from the higher rpm to carry it to the cylinders. If this is the case, why isn't the heat tube doing its job? While the motor was in pieces i checked if there was airflow through the piping and it seemed fine.
Would a build-up of carbon in the heat tube prevent it transferring enough heat to the manifold?? Maybe the exhaust muffler is blocked up somehow? Has anyone had similar troubles?? How hot should the riser tube be? Too hot to touch??
I'm going to head back outside and start removing the intake manifold. Its a bit of a pain because the Alternator has to come off to get it out...
Any help would be MUCH appreciated!
Just a thought, after a long idle to try get it up to temp i gave the throttle a quick push and it gave a puff of sooty exhaust, i guess the O2 meter wasn't quick enough to catch it, but im thinking fuel is pooling inside the manifold...
1303Steve ·
Hi
Does your motor have a stock exhaust?
If it does the exhaust gas should flow through heat riser tube and out one of the tail pipe holes, if it has extractors it never really gets exhaust flow it just heats up.
Either way you can do the sizzle test, lick your finger and touch the heat riser, you should get sizzle. The heat riser tubes are very prone to blocking, the later 1600s had very large tubes to prevent this, then they went to dual heat risers on later cars
Where are your injectors located?
Steve
BennVenn ·
1303Steve wrote:Hi
Does your motor have a stock exhaust?
If it does the exhaust gas should flow through heat riser tube and out one of the tail pipe holes, if it has extractors it never really gets exhaust flow it just heats up.
Either way you can do the sizzle test, lick your finger and touch the heat riser, you should get sizzle. The heat riser tubes are very prone to blocking, the later 1600s had very large tubes to prevent this, then they went to dual heat risers on later cars
Where are your injectors located?
Steve
Steve
Steve
Hi Steve,
Yes, stock exhaust. The heat riser on the left bolts to #4 cylinder and heads alongside the manifold then into the muffler. It isn't hot enough to sizzle anything. After 10min of running at 1400rpm the left one is warm, the right is cold and the manifold below the throttle plate was forming condensate. I think it is the source of my troubles...
Just had a read of the manifold removal guide with the motor in the car. What a pain!
I'll pull the exhaust off tomorrow and try clean it out while it's still in the car.
It is throttle body injected, next setup will be multi point so I can remove the manifold and risers.
Thanks for the help,
Ben.
1303Steve ·
Hi Ben
Then you must have a blocked riser, its a very common issue. Have you seen the Mexican EFI setup?
Steve
1303Steve ·
Hi again Ben
You can make it easier to get the manifold off if you undo the cooling fan nut, then leave the fan & shims in housing and lift the alternator out, the unbolt the alternator stand to get the manifold out.
Steve
BennVenn ·
Yeah, I've seen a few photo's of the setup. I worked it out to be over $2k after you include injectors, fuel lines, pump, wiring, ecu etc..
Our setup has cost around 450 so far including everything. And if it were not for this idling issue we'd be driving it from Melbourne to Sydney this weekend! There is still time I suppose.
BennVenn ·
1303Steve wrote:Hi again Ben
You can make it easier to get the manifold off if you undo the cooling fan nut, then leave the fan & shims in housing and lift the alternator out, the unbolt the alternator stand to get the manifold out.
Steve
How would I remove the fan nut while the alternator fan is still in the shroud? There isn't enough clearance behind the motor to fit a socket and wrench in there
1303Steve ·
Hi Ben
I fitted a Autronic SMC to Kombi motor in a Beetle, big dollars by the time you buy all the other bits let alone the ECU.
I'm seriously thinking about going with the CB kit on my sons bug, about $2000 (edit + freight) for the lot with twin 48 mm throttle bodies.
Steve
BennVenn ·
1303Steve wrote:Hi Ben
I fitted a Autronic SMC to Kombi motor in a Beetle, big dollars by the time you buy all the other bits let alone the ECU.
I'm seriously thinking about going with the CB kit on my sons bug, about $2000 (edit + freight) for the lot with twin 48 mm throttle bodies.
Steve
Its a lot of cash for not much hardware. We have the equipment to cast our own manifolds, so once we have a little more time we'll fabricate the twin throttle bodies, multi point, turbo etc... but for now, throttle body injection, homemade ecu, and a blocked heat riser!
What is the reason you'll be going EFI with your sons bug?
1303Steve ·
Hi
Its got a 1904 in with twin 40 dells. Im collecting parts for 2442 Oxyboxer now.
A Chinese set of 48 mm Webbers is around $1400, I would rather go the extra bit for EFI
Steve
BennVenn ·
Ok, Got the exhaust off and poked an old speedo cable through the heat riser. It was Clear! Gave it a clean out with wire on a drill then noticed the flange between the riser and exhaust was leaking. replaced the gasket and rebuilt it all. Started it today after putting a new set of plugs in and it is much better. The manifold sits at 44degrees C, the riser sizzles and the idle mixture is much more stable. I did notice the mixture leaning out after idling a few minutes and it turns out the IAC valve sits around 4mm above the closed butterfly position. So im guessing the throttle plate gap is closing up due to icing (12degree air temp at intake) causing the fuel to pool on the butterfly until it reaches about 4mm and starts flowing through the IAC solenoid bypass, where it restricts the air flow a little and lowers the revs. The IAC does its job and opens a little, pulls more air, same fuel, leaner mix etc etc...
I adjusted the throttle stop so the IAC solenoid is barely being driven which has opened up the clearance on the butterfly valve and all is well. Thinking about routing some of the motors heated air up to the intake. Atleast until summer arrives...
Thanks Steve for pointing me in the right direction.
Do you know how much fuel your stock carbies accelerator pump would add on a single stroke from idle to WOT? I thought i saw it in the manual somewhere but cant seem to find the exact figure
Huffypilot ·
I can see this thread is a little old but still an interesting read.
BennVenn can you tell me which part of Australia your in ? Im building a Manx and interested to learn if I might have icing issues also. It will run twin 36 IDF's while I gather the remaining injection parts.
BennVenn ·
One year later and it's only starting to come together now... Work has kept me busy. I'm writing a sort of build log on my webpage. Lots of pics, step by step stuff. Check it out if you're thinking of going EFI on your VW
BennVenn wrote:One year later and it's only starting to come together now... Work has kept me busy. I'm writing a sort of build log on my webpage. Lots of pics, step by step stuff. Check it out if you're thinking of going EFI on your VW
Very cool so far... Clearly there is some skills being used here... Your development of the ECU is most interesting...
Props to you BennVenn.
BennVenn ·
Cheers Humpty!
I've tried to keep it relatively non technical. This is my first build log so any suggestions are welcome!
-Ben
BennVenn ·
Ok, The distributor-less spark system is complete and running! Need to add the code for the MAP sensing, should only take an hour or so. There are heaps of ECU's left over from the minimum order from the Fab house so If you're a DIY'er and want to get rid of your Distributor and replace it with a fully programmable ECU - for low $$$'s come and check it out.
Next up is getting the injection hardware sorted... And then the turbo!
If anyone has a twinport head or manifold easily accessible could they post the port dimensions? After the port sizing and stud location etc...
I'm stuck out at sea with work until early December and with all this spare time I want to make up some injected manifold patterns to cast up when I get home.
I think single point injection is useless without a heated manifold. Might as well do it right and go multipoint.
Thanks guys
BennVenn ·
G'day,
Im back in Aus for a couple of weeks. I thought I'd get stuck into the new multipoint manifolds. Just about ready to be cast. Check out the latest at www.bennvenn.com/Casting.html
-Ben
tassupervee ·
Hey Ben
Nice to see a totally home grown setup.
Single point (TB) injection is always a nice thought, especially on an x-flow engine with short inlet runners but on a Kraut boxer, it becomes more or less an "electric" carby with all the annoying issues that beset the carb setup such as fuel condensation and separation in the pipework blah.
Im sure this is what has prompted you to go to multi-point, straight onto the back of the valve injection.
As a matter of interest, have you grouped your injectors in banks, sequential or batch fired them?
I see you have cast your own TP manifolds which is a bloody nice step! A simple pair of cable pulled 40mm TB's on top of those and your grinning very widely. No need for funky and expensive linkage setups designed for clunky old carbs.
I love this kind of imagination and initiative. Well done M8.
E
BennVenn ·
Hey tassupervee,
I'll be going with full sequential injection. I'm re-designing the whole setup, yet again. This time i'll be using a RB20 Cam Angle Sensor which provides both 1degree pulses and 90degree coded position markers. Having this kind of precision, fed into an FPGA for direct hardware control of Dwell, Ignition timing, Injection timing as well as injection pulse delivery will off load all the timing restrains from the micro controller, giving it plenty of time for accurate MAP based fueling, self learning, etc. Having an FPGA control all the hardware gives me as much IO & PWM channels as i want, will allow a complete re-flash of the MCU while the motor is running, have lots of nice features like precise control over when the injection will occur and not have a trigger wheel and VR sensor to fiddle with when things start to go wrong. Reliability is priority with this build.
I'll also be removing the doghouse cooler and fan and going with a custom electric cooling. I've read this simply won't work, as it doesn't have the 'pressure' to cool the cylinders and head effectively. I think it will, if it can pull the rated flow through a radiator core with 1mm gap between fins, it'll push through a VW head with 5mm gapped fins. I'll be fitting a large after market oil cooler through the firewall and mount it in an enclosure behind the rear seats, dumping the hot air under the car or inside the cabin in winter. And as the oil cooling has increased, a secondary pump will provide bulk oil to the heads for additional cooling, as well as feed the turbo when it gets fitted. I've seen some nice variable geometry turbo's coming out of china recently...
I'll add a new page with this new build shortly to my website. I'd love to hear from anyone who has fitted a cooling system other than the standard!
tassupervee ·
RB20 is a 6 cylinder so trigger slots are at 120 degrees (crank) So not too much use to you.
Im guessing either SR20 or CA18 will be what you need!! Thing is by using tha kind of digital CAS, and account for crank to cam and cam to dissie gear trains, you introduce timing scatter issues associted with cam driven CAS's which kind of cancel out the precision your after by using such a high count rate on the synch timer to begin with.
Nissan is pretty peculiar with using such a high resolution synch timer and the rest of the automotive world seems perfectly happy with far lower timer counts.
After all, its only a reference timer. System triggering is still a function of the 4 trigger slots and their accuracy along with scatter from gear trains!!!! Do you think you might be over thinking this a little??
For simplicity, why not just stick with a simple digital 60-2 or 120-2 direct off the crank. Or if you want to be real pedantic, use the starter ring gear as a synch timer (assuming the tooth count divides correctly) and a single crank trigger slot on the front pulley.
Im using a dissie out of an E15ET in mine with the timing wheel flipped due to the opposite rotation direction of the Kraut dissie. I dont really care for absolute precision!!!! Function over form! Actually, the old EMS system im running does not have provisions for sequential triggering so i have to use a dissie anyway but it keeps everything neat and tidy!!!!!
Otherwise a simple 60-2 wheel and a 2 bob Ebay Hall trigger would be more than adequate for a zillion rpm and HP.
You can't really compare the air and water cooling systems in such a simplified way with regards to an electric fan.
Heat transfer from metal to water and back again is far in excess of what metal to air can achieve and the radiating area and volume (heat sinking) of a typical radiator/watercooling system is such that even a small electric fan can move sufficient air keep a system cool.
The air cooled setup requires CFM, and a fair bit of it to transfer heat off the heads. I get the addition of the oil cooling setup but...external, enclosed coolers, fans, an oil circulation pumps, oil squirters in the heads pipes and hoses..... shit man, its getting awfully scientific just to say "I did it" (with electric only). Its really kind of a mod purely for mods sake which is largely pointless.
The Porche style shrouds with a belt driven fan are perfectly adequate for the job. Simple and effective and look cool!!! (No pun)!
Just me tho!!
E
Camo ·
Sorry if off track here as I think you are trying to build this stuff yourself, but what about this setup. States this is for sequential injection.
Kev
Hes (Ben) going a totally home grown kit using his own ecu and coding.
There is a legion of aftermarket goodies around to make what is as close as can be to a plug and play efi setup. I get where Ben is coming from. Hes making it a project, rather than just a bolt on.
Thats a nice bit of clbber there but it still can suffer from what i have mentioned above if REALLY chasing the ultimate in system resolution. And high resolution is what b
Ben is shooting for by specifying the goodies he has.
Somthing that i dont think is really worthwhile when relying on a distributer drive for accuracy. Crank triggers FTW!!!!
Cheers
Evan
BennVenn ·
Ahh yes it is a CA18DET CAS. Which strangely enough looks exactly like my RB25 CAS... Either way it wouldn't matter as the trigger slots are just there to keep the 720 degree counter in sync. There is no actual triggering done off those slots.
Over thinking? of course! Its a hobby/project and i'm more interested in the technical challenge than what is 'convenient'. Speaking of convenient, CBperf has some cool toys, but $100 for what is essentially a 009 distributor with one cam lobe??? I was originally going to add a hall sensor set-up to the fuel pump push-rod. It is cam driven too and that will satisfy the sequential setup with my Trigger wheel. And while my trigger wheel setup worked great, there would always be a point where accuracy would drop as the RPM increases. As the RPM goes up, the micro controllers pulse-width count decreases, along with its resolution. This could be solved with using a 36/48bit resolution counter running at a ridiculous clock speed, but then the complexity and delays start to introduce High RPM errors too...
Lots to think about... Maybe i should just use my working trigger wheel set-up. Like you say, good for a zillion rpm.
As for the cooling, I really like the look of the VW engine. At the moment all you see is fan shroud. And while it does what it does, very well, it is very inefficient. My RB25's fan clutch is stuck at the moment. It makes an enormous difference in power output of the motor. Just off idle, there is no boost, the engine is working hard against the exhaust back pressure trying to spool the turbo, and engine power is more or less linear with RPM. Having the clutch stuck sucks valuable power from the motor when it needs the HP the most. It is the same for the VW. Ever started and revved your VW without its alternator/generator belt on? A completely different engine! That is what i'm trying to achieve with the electric fan setup. If supplementing the cooling with oil squirter's will do the job, it seems like very little outlay for big gains. As you said, Metal-Liquid heat transfer is far more effective than Metal-Air, and 80% of the heat is generated in the heads, i cant see why forced oil cooling wouldn't be more effective and efficient then forced air.
With the end goal of running ~12psi boost, i need as much cooling as possible where it counts, as well as a supplementary oil system to feed the turbo after the engine as been switched off.
Its good to talk with someone as enthusiastic as myself with this sort of stuff. Do you have any pics of your build?
tassupervee ·
The RB/CA/VG30de/t/tt cas's all look pretty much the same externally.
No denying the power loss associated with an engine driven fan but im still predicting trouble keeping temps in order running just an electric fan.
Hah, in our Formula Vees, we run the belt as slack as possibl just so the belt stays on but slips as much as possible!
The oil squirting might certainly help but will there be sufficient area of ally inside the rocker box to make a lot of difference??
I reckon machine down the cooling fins somewhat, box it up and pass oil thru there as the cooling medium
Turbo oiling after shutdown? Might have been relevant in the 80's but times have changed and turbo tech improved and after shutdown turbo oiling is pointless really. No reason not to but again added complexity.......
Sry M8 I dont have any pix. Its an ongoing project that stalled a few year back. Its a ghetto setup using hastily modified, T3 injector housings. They use a typical Type 5 Bosch hosetail injector and Im using a set of 240cc injectors right off an E15et.
The dissie is stock E15et other than I drilled the shaft and added the drive foot off the stock VW dissie.
An old T02 off the E15et remotely mounted on a bracket on top of the gearbox and a T-piece off the oil pressure sender for oiling. Drain back to the rocker cover.
Its just a shits and giggles thing.Ill get back to it eventually.
Evan
BennVenn ·
A guy I went to school with races Formula Vee, wonder if you know him. Adam Brook? I know my RB25DET has squirters under the pistons, and they have as little surface area as you can get (flat surface). Strange you mention it, I was looking at the heads yesterday thinking about welding them up and running oil through them. Also looking at how little the cooling fins on the cylinders are, compared to the heads. Definitely something to look into.
As for the oiling after shutdown, modern cars have water cooled turbos, and are positioned in such a way that a thermal syphon kind of pump keeps water circulating. A VW without a water system doesn't have that luxury. My 2014 Turbo diesel SUV has a secondary water pump for running after shutdown if the turbo is too hot. I believe Mini a few years ago recalled a heap of cars due to the shutdown coolant pump failing and causing engine fires after walking away from the car. Oil is still oil, and oil at 400degrees will coke regardless.
Is there enough room on top of the gearbox for a turbo? is this all in a stock beetle??
You've convinced me to do away with the CAS. Added complexity to a system i know works with just the trigger wheel...
Ben
Ther turbo issue just isnt a drama to begin with.
Yep lots of watercooled OEM turbos setups employ thermosyphoning but purely to prevent boiling of the coolant in the turbo core. Now think about every big truck engine. Apart from some very recent Euro engines, they universally use non watercooled turbos and diseasels run consistently higher exhaust gas temps for longer periods of time. What about every other Hi-po non watercooled turbo arrangement. They live long long time just fine!!!!
It just isnt a drama. If your really pedantic, a turbo oiler setup, pretty much a small accusump can be employed to run a bit of oil thru the turbo...... nobody uses them anymore but you can use one if you wanted.
None of my many turbo cars has ever coked up a turbo due to oil burning on the hot side and this is all your bothered about. Modenr oil tolerate the heat pretty well without burning.
Now, the turbo engine I have set up is for the Formula Vee as a shits and giggles thing just to play around with at club days and perhaps do a hillclimb or two!! All the room in the world since my gearbox has been flicked and reversed!!!! On eof the issues is finding a fast enough diff ratio to use.
Im predicting around 120Hp but the 1600 Im using is bone stock wont see much more than about 4500-5000 rpm I predict it will hit those revs very quickly on a 4.1 diff @ 450 kilos combined so i have to get on top of that. Fried tyres anybody!!!!!
Adam Brook... yes the name is familiar. Dont know him personally. Im down in southern Tassie.
Ill check your link.
Cheers
E
BennVenn ·
I guess i've just had bad luck with turbo's. This is the 4th in my R33 since owning it. The stock rear seal failed, upon inspection there was a LOT of coke all through the bearings/bearing housing. The replacement was an aftermarket KKR, This lasted around 350kms before the rear seal failing. It was replaced under warranty, with an additional oil restriction fitted in the feed line. This turbo lasted around 20thousand km's before the front oil seal failed, filling my intercooler with oil. And now im onto my fourth, 100k kms later and its still going. Only the original and the current are water cooled. The manifold and turbo can be seen glowing on the dyno, indicating well in excess of 700deg C, so i have no doubt that shutting down with a hot turbo will cause failure...
Question on fitting an external cooler, i was planning on removing the stock cooler and fitting a manifold there to send the oil elsewhere. Further reading suggests leaving the stock cooler there and getting a feed from the pump itself. Any ideas??
Is it just a matter of reversing the diff centre to give you 4 reverse gears and 1 forward?
tassupervee ·
I think you have just been unlucky with turbos.
With out vees, the stock cooler ports are blocked off completely and a full flow setup off the pump.
Yep just pull the diff out and flick it. Single sideplate bozes might be a challenge but ive never investigated that.