Got everything wired and started tonight. It works like a charm. The very pleasant surprise is that it reads from the instant of startup, with no annoying countdown calibration BS the Inovate one does. This means I can see the AF ratio as it is trying to stabilize after start up. Bythe time the Inovate was through doing its song and tap dance routine, the car was finally idling. So, I never knew if it was dying from TOO much fuel or not enough. I realize the sensor is not warm at first, and maybe I cannot trust the readout 100% but it clearly dies when it gets leaner.

ON first start up, it idled at 14.5:1 and then when the afterstart enrichment cut out, it went to 17:1 and died. Started it up a second time, and it idled at 12.5 this time, and did not die but went to 14.5 upon end of afterstart enrichment. This time it continued to idle, and as it idled further, the AF ratio then moved from 14.5 to about 13.5:1 at idle, I guess as the air warmed up. AFter maybe 45 seconds it settled in at 13.5-14:1 and hung there.

I did not drive it as the seat is still out from the wiper repair. Tomorrow I will take it on the road and see how it does.

I measured the distance from the turbo to the sensor, and it is 50". This should be plenty to keep it out of harms way from heat. The manual says 36" is a minimum.

Thanks for the link and the advice. What to do with this old Inovate? It's not heavy enough for a boat anchor. I think its weakness is its complexity. It just tries to be too many things. This same gauge is used in many different applications. Too cute for reliability.

Sam

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Excellent. Wow, 36" minimum... Mine is about 12" from turbo exit. 5k miles so far, so we'll see how long it lasts.

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Have you looked at the sensor tip. The old Innovate one was covered with carbon, but do not know if that is normal. I suspect this engine was running richer than the Innovate gauge indicated. The tail pipe tended to get carboned up too.

Sam

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Leaning out is because engine combustion chambers are not hot enough to keep mixture suspended and helps to ignite and engine is not spinning fast enough to keep mixture from falling out by help of raised gases velocity.

You really need to raise start up RPM to at least 1500 RPM for a minute or so to help things keep moving. Too low rpm engine dies out at that juncture. Did this megasquirt is set up in that fashion?

Carb kicks off the choke instantly when enough vacuum develops leans the mixture out some. But choke mechanism have cam that keeps RPM up. That is what behavior you are seeing without raising and holding RPM for a minute to two.

You will see that carb and newer vehicles always raise the RPM to around 1,500rpm for at least 1 minute via the tach.

Cheers, Wizard

Thanks Wizard for that excellent description of what happens when a cold engine first starts. I will try to get some system, some what that will raise the RPM when it is first started. For reasons that must be entirely different, the engine also wants to stumble and stall for a bit when started hot. It reads lean in the 17:1 range for 20 seconds or longer. Raising the RPM then also seems to solve the problem. AT that time I would call the manifold heat soaked. Do you suspect any of the same dynamics then?

Sam

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You are welcome, carb and injected vehicles does this all the time to make sure engine is live by spinning higher for short time.

Watch the IAT sensor that it is within reason on hot engine restarts if it's too high than real outdoors temps, it slews the mixture too. Relocate that IAT farther from the heat source and best place is on aircleaner or along a intake hose if you have one.

Cheers, Wizard

Thanks again. The IAT sensor is in the intercooler tube right before the TB. I could put it under the fender, outside engine compartment in the the same tube. Read my post on Greg's thread this evening.

Sam

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Matt, I must apologize for being so hard on the INovate gauge. I know you sell them, and that there are many happy campers out there with them. One strength of the Inovate over the AEM is that the Inovate read all the up to 25:1 and maybe leaner, while the AEM simply flashes lean dashes after it hits 18:1 or leaner. While you would never tune that lean for cruise, there are some guys who do tune their high vacuum settings that lean for coast down fuel economy.

As far as knowing the absolute AF ratio during warm up, I do not think that matters. Seeing how the car reacts to relative changes does. And that is easier to do early with the AEM. IMHO.

Sam

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Well I have had the Dutra duals on the duster for over 7 Months Now - I still like them and they will never rot away like the headers did..


After Dialing my timing back a bit to compensate for the shorter tube runners that A manifold will provide I started to develop a miss..

I thought a cap and rotor change will do the trick.

Not quite.. I found on Rock auto that The Stand Blue streak stuff was unavailable/ not produced any more so I bought the Closest thing to a premium brand of cap / rotor - Sorry I dont remember the brand name for this post

Anyway the rotor will not work in my setup due to running a pertronix inside my dist. for triggering.. So I put the (new) cap on and the replaced the old rotor back on the dist with the pertronix magnets underneath (the Fat rotor aligns the Pertronix magnets exactly) - This is why I could not use the other brand rotor..

Long story short I could not get the car to run correclty for about 2 weeks.. and I got stranded at a local restaurant when MSII flooded my slant with too much fuel..

Turns out the trigger(for pertronix) magnet was NOT correctly seated under the rotor and had been loosening up and flopping around on the distributor shaft causing hard starts, erratic timing etc..

Once I finally got my errors righted; i.e. The Dist advance point and trigger points re-set in Megatune/ MSII the car ran great!!.. I started with a bit of a leaner fuel map due to my eariler flooding problem.. and I tweaked from there..


I am using EGO Control And Automatic Mixture control (like autotune but It runs all of the time without the computer connected)
I have my target afr Values set in the 12X12 Grid..


And I got 20 MPG around town - with lots of hills / lights on hills etc. in Pittsburgh.



Maybe a Trigger wheel and an MSII Sequencer Next?? - Coil on plug too?


Greg

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http://www.youtube.com/hyperpack

That sounds pretty cool. Keep us posted. This is another example of how the most basic things are commonly behind what seem like exotic problems.

How long do you think the pertronix module had been loose?

Tell me about automatic mixture control. How does this work? Is it a feature on the version of MSII I have? VR 3.57. Also, how does this feature manage warm up enrichment?

Also, have you added a car or two to the fleet? Call me dumb, or unobservant, but I do not remember the station wagon or 4 dr, Volare/Aspen. Are those F body cars?

Sam

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Hi Sam,

Yes sometimes basic things can cause alot of problems - I just had to check and recheck everything.. i eventually fount my Idiot mistakes that I overlooked and corrected said idiot mistakes..

I shall attempt to learn from idiot mistakes to be a lesser idiot from this point forward.

I estimate that the rotor / Magnet assembly had not been correctly seated for about 2 weeks.. It all came together when I couldnt get the car started cold at a restaurant and michele rescued me with some tools and I had to pull all the plugs and I was able to de program all enrinchments to get the car to limp home

Automatic mixture control in MSII runs in conjunction with ego control..however ego control just adjusts the current fueling algorithm based on feedback from the 02 sensor and the parameters that you set for ego control essentially are the same for AMC.. however when AMC is enabled with EGO it re writes the VE table to tune automatically. I like it.

You can decide how many %+or - to adjust the table and at what tempature you want EGO/AMC to kick in.. I believe I have mine set at 160*... So from -40* to 159* AMC is inactive and will not rewrite the VE table..Enrichments work as they usually do.


As far as the cars go.. I think your memory is foggy.. Or you have been Playing Kopprasch #1 for too long at FFFF. :-0

I have had all those cars since 2008..

Yes they are all beige f bodys!


Greg

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http://www.youtube.com/hyperpack

It's just male pattern blindness at work.

How do you engage AMC? I suppose I should go look at the laptop tune program, but it is easier to annoy you.

Sam

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Hi Sam, Iam not sure where this migh be found if you are using tunerstudio..


I am using Megatune and I beleve it in the fuel setup menu.. under Automatic Mixture control.

EGO has to be enabled for AMC to operate - I also use flash update in the AMC settings. above 700 rpm.. below 95.00Kpa


Greg

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http://www.youtube.com/hyperpack

Dang, now I feel like a dinosaur. I need to get MSII on one of these cars...

I got only 20 MPG back from Pigeon Forge in the '68 Dart last Sunday (25 F weather, and speedo not working on new trans, so was actually doing 80+ MPH...). Dang wastegate diaphragm popped too, so no boost control - saw 18 psi briefly - WOW!

Lou

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Home of Slant6-powered fun machines since 1988

Hello Folks,

just a quick update.. About 3 weeks ago It was very Rainy around these parts.. And I drove from work to the bank to ca$h a check. I noticed the car was running very rich and very rough...

After I come out of the bank I cannot start the car.. - Thought I might have flooded it etc..

kept trying and it just would not start... So I had welding Class that Night.. Could not wait around... Walked 4 Miles Home in the rain.. got my welding gear and my truck and went to class..

I stopped back Later that Night with a new coil and tools... - I disconnected the Power to the injectors and Still nothing(to Prevent Flooding) - Swapped to a known Good coil - still nothing..

had to get it towed..

First Time in 16 years of driving I have ever had anything towed

Got It home and Finally came to the realization that the relay bord was not as weather proof as Diyautotune might have you believe it to be.













All the Connectros and relays etc were good but the PCB had issues... So a new one was ordered..

I may need to relocate it under the Hood and I am going to put a top on it - Working on that when I return from the Banquet.. Car is up and running again.. (remember this is my daily driver) It has over 206,000 Miles on it and Probably 30,000 Miles / 4.5 Years on Megasquirt..

New Relay board is installed and No problems yet.. Daily transportation again working. Still Need to make that cover for it.



Greg

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http://www.youtube.com/hyperpack