deanfootlong

iTrader: (10)

hello all. ever since i installed haltech, i have had problems with not just cold start, but hot start as well. so heres my cold start problem.... when i turn it on, it cranks and cranks then i get a tick/click and it halts, then starts cranking again and tick/click halt, then crank crank start. usually it only does the click/halt no more than twice before it gets cranking and catches. its like, crank crank crank crank TICK..... crank crank crank tick.... crank crank vroom. i know that looks silly but thats really whats happening with it. this is all with one turn of the key and held in crank position till it turns over and catches. what can i adjust on my map that might be causing this problem?
now, my hot start problem.... after i drive for a while and shut the car down for a moment and try to restart the car, it struggles to catch. doesnt do the "tick/halt" problem much if ever. just has a hard time catching.

which tables should i be messing with to correct this problem?

qqqqball

iTrader: (10)

try adding a good amount of fuel, into the post start enrichment tables

rcdash

iTrader: (18)

prime pulse, cranking injector time, post start enrichment. With the haltech, you should be able to get it to start like stock in any temp condition.

deanfootlong

iTrader: (10)

ok. i'll mess around with those tables tonight or tomorrow. i have a base map that hal sent me to get my car up and running but i ended up not using it. i also have the base maps that come with the ecu for a stock 350z. could i base my crank inj time and prime pulse off of that to get it to a more stock like fire-up?

rcdash

iTrader: (18)

Why didn't you use Hal's base maps? No on your question because the stock injector timings are for use with stock injectors. You have bigger injectors now I presume? So try Hal's base map values for prime pulse and cranking. Cranking injector time should be about half of what your idle IPW time is (if you've tuned using IPW vs VE then it's easy to carry it over). Or you can see the ms output while idling I think even in VE mode. If the car starts momentarily then dies, then play with post start enrichment.

deanfootlong

iTrader: (10)

ok. i figured. i'll try adjusting those numbers to somewhere near hals base map and report back. i'll report the progress. thanks for the info. i'll be back with more questions im sure.

djamps

iTrader: (1)

You probably should add fuel to your cold start, and take away some fuel on the hot starts.

deanfootlong

iTrader: (10)

update: i have been tinkering with prime pulse, crank inj timing, and post start enrichment. this seems to have fixed it. i copied off of hals base map and changed a few things here and there till i got it starting up how i like it. so, thanks for giving me the heads up on which charts to make changes on. I appreciate it.

mx594

iTrader: (4)

I also have a Haltech and spent some time getting it to start well. It still doesn't start perfectly 100% of the time, but it is much better than it was. I started with Hal's basemap and ended up reducing the prime pulse and the cranking inj time by quite a bit.

Tuning for cold starts is a lot more tricky than hot starts. It takes a loooong time for the coolant and engine block to cool down to ambient temp. You really only get one, maybe two cold starts per day.

What I do is turn the key "on" and let the O2 sensor pre-heat for about a minute. You can watch the WBO2 gauge flatline at 18:1 when it warms up. Then I start datalogging, wait 5 seconds and then start the car. That way I can get a decent idea of the A/F immediately after starting the car.

I wish Haltech would better explain how the prime pulse, cranking injection, and post start values interact. It's almost impossible to know which one to adjust. For example, if you see that it is extremely rich in the first 1-2 seconds after it fires, which one would you adjust?

binder

iTrader: (8)

it explains it very well in the manual.

Prime pulse: THE prime pulse. Prime means first therefore the first injection pulse. if it's cold you probably need more fuel, if hot you probably need less fuel. That is the first place to start. If it cranks and doesn't fire up then your prime pulse probably needs to be higher when it's cold. If it's a hot engine and you crank and it doesn't fire for a long time then reduce the prime pulse because it's flooding the system. With large injectors the prime pulse gets pretty small. I mine is down in the single digits.

Post start enrichment: as soon as the car fires just 1 time this is what goes into account. If you look at the setup it starts at 1 second, so 1 second after it fires it is going to use that enrichment, then it goes to whatever you have it. I have 1, then 5 seconds, then 10 seconds, then 20 seconds then 60 seconds after start. Pretty simple setup actually.

cranking enrichment: enrichment during cranking (as the name states). I never messed with this because it's not as important as the others. So even with 1000cc injectors i didn't have to mess iwth my cranking enrichment.

the tables are in the help section of your ecu manager.

mx594

iTrader: (4)

yes, I know what they all mean. I have read the manual more than once. It doesn't give you much advice for how to tune those variables though.

Like I said, if you see that it is rich 1-5 seconds after it starts, how do you know if it was too big of a prime, too much cranking inj, or too much post start enrich? There isn't really any way to tell which one is the culprit.

I get all kinds of random stuff happening when I start it. 90% of the time it starts great, but the other 10% it will fire and then die, or fire and then misfire and then keep running, or it will fire and then run rough for a few seconds. The frustrating part is that one day it will fire up great at a certain coolant temp, and then the next day at the same coolant temp it will have issues.

Today it was 48 degrees F and it started up great.

mx594

iTrader: (4)

Either way I think it's safe to say that the prime pulse has by far the biggest effect on startup. At least in my experience.

binder

iTrader: (8)

Post start enrichment. If you said it's rich then your post start enrich is to rich in those cell areas. You mentioned it started fine at 48* today so that means that temperature cell is good.

You are doing the right thing where you get haltech loaded and connected then fire it up while watching post start enrich. Look at the cell it starts in and watch the tracer. If you fire it up and it's rich or it just dies then pull fuel in those cells and start over.

If the car actually FIRES then your prime pulse is fine. If your prime pulse is too rich or too lean then the car will crank and crank and not fire up. Sometimes it will attempt to fire but not even make it to the point of starting. That's prime pulse. It's only a SINGLE PULSE of fuel. Generally when it's cold you will have a good amount of numbers and when it's warm they will be small.

My post start enrich is set so the first 10 seconds or so i'm idling in the 10's and then it slowly goes to 14.5 which is my idle target. I've never had a problem with my car stalling or dying after it starts. Until i messed with prime pulse time my car would crank for quite a while before starting but now it cranks over and starts instantly. Took me a lot of going back and forth adjusting the prime pulse time by 1 point up or down and noting how well it fired up. You can continually do this for one sell if you shut the car down right after it fires up. The engine doesn't heat up too much after just firing.

I never touched my cranking inj. Leave that beast alone.

You can see how hard my prime pulse drops off as the temps increase in order for my car to fire right up when i turn the key.

rcdash

iTrader: (18)

It is my understanding that you can damage O2 sensors by heating them up for an extended period of time and then starting the car cold. Apparently the cold water vapor shocks the heated element and damages it. Just what I've read...

accordfreak

iTrader: (15)

binder- what kind of values do you have for cranking inj time?

is it the same as you posted in sept? https://my350z.com/forum/8638513-post6.html

djamps

iTrader: (1)

True for widebands, not so much narrowbands... but since they are before the cats (or no cats in most of our cases) water vapor isn't much of an issue.

deanfootlong

iTrader: (10)

im still having an issue here. its mainly just on attempt to start. crank crank tick. crank crank crank tick. crank crank crank start. its this SUPER COLD san diego weather. but really it is having an affect on my start up. i guess my car doesnt like 40 degree weather in the morning. shall i play around with prime pule some more? im not having so much a problem with post start. just initial crank and catch to turn over.

BlinkerFluid

iTrader: (7)

Tick?

Does the engine stop cranking at this point? You may have a bad battery and aren't getting the proper crank speed.

If a cylinder is lighting off too soon and stopping the crank, you may be able to reduce your cranking ignition timing and have it help out.

deanfootlong

iTrader: (10)

correct. tick, as in, stop. it pulls a lot of load from the battery when it does this. this is what i think killed one of my batteries. but, i put a new one in, and it still does it. i just hold the key in the crank position and it keeps cranking after it stops/ticks. but, like i said, it draws a ton of load from my battery when it does this. when my battery was dying a few months ago, this problem made sure my car wouldn't turn on anymore

BlinkerFluid

iTrader: (7)

What is the cranking ignition timing set at? It sounds like it may be too high.