Just installed a used wideband last night and it seems to be giving some weird readings. We also wired it into the e-01 and they are a consistant .4 off. But the problem is at idle the aem is reading off the charts like 18.8. We plugged in another controller and it read the exact same thing. It is responding to throttle and everything and goes way rich on throttle so here's my question. Could the car really be idling that lean? What are the signs of a bad 02 sensor? Do they quit all together or just start giving false readings. It is installed in the test pipe about 6 inches after the stock 02 sensor. I think we're going to take it down to the dyno just to use their 02 and compare the results.

 

aaahhh the cause of my number one phone call from customers. widebands..


this is common, i tune my cars with weekly changed brand new bosch sensors hooked up to a turbo xs tuner reg, an innovate datalogging wideband, or just simple take that same sensor and run it through my dyno.

i think that 50% of the widebands that people install are a bit off.

the aem unit in my eyes is one of the worst units, it simply jumps around too much and we have had many issues with them in the past. i would lean towards a Innovate or PLX devices for wideband. also the new Autometer widebands work really well too...

 

well I woudn't mind going with a innovate eventually but this unit was functioning just fine when removed. We also tried another unit and same thing. So do you think it could just be the sensor? Are there any off the shelf 02 sensors that you can use?

 

you can order them from anyone who sells AEM, which is A LOT of people.

its just called their uego sensor. probably right under 100 dollars.

if the sensors get banged around or dropped, they will mess up, i have noticed that most sensors rattle inside when they are bad...

 

alright, we may trying installing my friends aem sensor and seeing what it does or else running down to the local shop and seeing what they're sniffer reads.

 

The question remains, can a car idle smoothly at >18.3 a/f. I know you eventually reach a point where there simply isn't enough fuel for combustion (North of 25:1 I believe).

A little background on the car - It was bought with a blown motor. The motor was replaced and we don't know how well the car was tuned. It never had a wideband on it. The used AEM came out of my G35 and worked perfect - it is an older one that only reads to 11:1 and I switched it out with a newer one that reads to 10:1.

However, during installation we had a little wiring problem and thought we had damaged the actual guage (a little smoke came out of it). But, we swappped guages with the guage in my car and my guage read the exact same thing. It starts out idling right around 14.7 then it slowly climbs off the chart.

So, we have verified that the actual guage works, but we are now thinking that the sensor may be damaged or that the car really is running lean at idle. When we got done last night, we weren't in a position to drive the car, so all we have is idling information. If it is possible that the car can idle that lean without any obvious signs then it may just be in the tune.

 

bump

 

How much for the Bosch sensor, I'm pretty sure I need one now...

 

well we switched the sensor and controller so evidently my car just idles at 18/1 and no matter how much we add injector at idle it won't bump it up much. Also we fried the controller so if anyone has a uego gauge/controller they're selling for a good deal let me know, sensor is ok.