Great minds can disagree... ...but I would highly recommend soldering. Especially since that rats nest of ECU wires are so tight and confining...I'd want the abosolute best connection possible...and soldering is the answer. Crimp connectors on mission critical electronical work is a short-cut I am not willing to risk. If I was doing stereo installations or guages or something..no big deal..but not for ECU or F/I related work. It's kinda like the difference between using zip ties to secure vaccum lines vs. safety wire. Both will work, but the safety-wire is the stronger and safer method.

Hth,
Sharif

 

Well, although you can use crimp type connector to connect the wires, it is not advisable. You will not get as good of a signal using those as you would with soldered splices. It's great that it's worked for you, but I would seriously get those connections soldered.

-Chris

 

NASA, and most of the communications industry, disagree with you. NASA mandates crimped connections because they are higher reliability than soldered. TV broadcasters, who have thousands of cable terminations inside their plants, won't use anything other than crimp connectors. The reliability of the old solder style connectors wasn't good enough, there was always a flaky connection somewhere in the plant. With crimp connectors, properly installed with the proper tooling, those issues disappeared.

A properly done crimp forms a gas tight cold weld. It is far superior to a soldered connection mechanically and electrically. Of course you need to use the right crimp fittings, and the right crimp tooling. Just squeezing with an old pair of water pump pliers won't do.

 

To each his own. I'll stick to soldering all my electrical connections.

 

back on topic; have you tuned the emanage to your mods, if so what kind of performance gains?

 

Unfortunately not. I have hit somewhat of a roadblock in that I can't do anything without a Wideband O2 gauge and since the cheapest one that I have been able to find with the necessary features is in the $450 range, it may be a while before I am able to afford one and tune the eManage.

Anyone have a Wideband O2 gauge with datalogging capabilities laying around that they want to get rid of fairly cheap?

-Chris

 

I have an AEM Wideband but still find it better to tune on a Dyno !! I guess if I had datalogging capabilities it might be different.

 

you could always buy some dyno time. its better to get numbers rather than just target a specific af ratio.

 

Well, I plan to dyno my car at a local shop before I start tuning and then again after, but my main goal is to adjust my A/F ratio so that it's got a nice smooth line in the safe range. If I gain power in the process, that's just a bonus!

-Chris

 

Well, I finally got my wideband setup delivered yesterday. I decided to get the Zeitronix zt-2 unit mainly due to the price and functionality. I didn't get the gauge because it's pretty ugly IMHO plus I e-mailed Zeitronix and they told me that they are working on a round gauge that they should be releasing soon hopefully.

I am planning to install the wideband today when I get home and then in the next week or so I will begin tuning. Once I get it all tuned and working well, I'll get a dyno of both with and without the modified fuel map and see what kind of gains I get. As I mentioned previously I am not as concerned with hp gains as I am with getting my A/F ration down to an acceptable level (nice smooth line in the low to mid 12's under WOT).

More to come soon...

-Chris

 

i still don't understand...do we need the injector harness to adjust the A/F ratio? and the RPM signal adaptor? what's that for?

My shop told me i only need the main harness that came with the unit and that's good enough for N/A
what other stuff do i need exaclty to tune my a/f for N/A??

 

Well, in order to tune properly, you need to get the Injector harness. This allows the eManage to actually control the injectors to add more pulse width where needed to richen up the A/F mixture. Without the injector harness you can really only tune by adjusting the MAF voltage (exactly like the S-AFCII) which works by adding or removing air from the mixture and is IMHO not the best way to tune our cars. Will it work? Yes. But I wouldn't recommend it.

You must have the RPM signal adapter in order to hook up the eManage to our Z's due to the way the rpm signals are handled by the ECU. Without the RPM adapter, the eManage will not get a proper RPM signal (if it gets on at all) and therefore will not work.

-Chris

 

thanks ChrisMCagle
very detailed info
i'm waiting for your dyno resutls too!

 

Well, my first snag has appeared. For some reason my Zeitronix unit is showing some really strange numbers for the Throttle Position Sensor. I have it hooked to the same location (Pin #50 on the ECU), but for some reason the numbers are weird. With the throttle completely released it it showing "13" on the display and when I go to WOT, it only goes to around "40". E-mails to Zeitronix have been no help because their response is

I don't see anything about a self calibrating TPS routine in the software anywhere. Maybe I am just doing something wrong? Who knows. I have sent some other members that I know are running the Zeitronix Wideband a PM so hopefully one of them will be able to shed some light on this.

-Chris

 

wow Chris...you are really starting to sounds like a eManage guru....couldnt have said it better myself.

Correct me here, but why does your wideband need a TPS input? What am I missing? My AEM just has power, and the wideband probe..and a ground.

 

Sharif,

Well, I guess that I want to have a TPS input to make it easier for me to tune. When I export the run data into Excel, I can see immediately what Throttle % was used in order to generate the A/F graph for the entire duration of WOT. I suppose that I could just base it off the RPM, but there would be no specific point that I would know when I went to WOT or ended it. I would just see the RPMs increasing and then decreasing, but not know the exact point that I started and ended WOT.

The other problem that I am experiencing is that the RPM numbers are very sporradic. Under normal accelleration it will read as follows:

A/F RPM TPS
14.4 821 14
14.4 821 14
14.4 822 14
14.4 794 14
14.4 794 14
14.4 806 14
14.4 806 14
14.4 825 14
14.4 824 14
14.4 824 14
14.4 829 15
14.4 844 16
14.4 844 16
14.4 818 16
14.4 818 16
14.4 826 17
14.4 834 17
14.4 834 17
14.4 832 17
14.5 832 17
14.5 854 17
14.5 894 17

If you look at the number for the TPS, you see that there is a gradual increase in pressure on the throttle, yet the RPM number jump up and down constantly. It will go from 822-->794-->806?? As I said, I am getting the RPM signal from the GReddy RPM Signal Adapter so perhaps it only works with the GReddy equipment? I have heard other people say they got an RPM signal from ECU Pin# 62 which according to the service manual is "Ignition signal No. 1". Do you think that a more steady RPM signal can be received from there as opposed to the GReddy RPM adapter? I am willing to try it, but if it will produce the same results then it really isn't worth doing.

What cha think??

-Chris

 

Well, I did some research and created a formula in Excel so that when I export the data into it, I can run the forumla to convert the funky numbers from the Zeitronix into the correct TPS%.

Basically the conversion range is:

Zeitronix TPS% = 12 (Throttle closed)
Real TPS% = 0

Zeitronix TPS% = 82 (WOT)
Real TPS% = 100

I think that the Zeitronix reading of 82 for WOT is actually somewhat accurate since I have not performed the TS 100% throttle fix so the throttle is only opening up to around 85%. But... that's still WOT for the sake of tuning.

-Chris

 

Well, after talking to a few people, I found out that connecting the RPM signal wire of the Zeitronix to the GReddy RPM Signal adapter was not the best idea because it was causing my RPM numbers to be extremely jumpy. I hooked it directly Pin#62 of the ECU and BAM! Signal is good now. I did a couple WOT 3rd gear runs last night and imported the data into Excel and created a graph of my current A/F ratio under WOT. The red line is what the A/F currently is, and the Green line is what I am aiming for when I start tuning the eManage this weekend.

Now I just need to determine how much I need to add in the eManage Injector map to make a difference in the A/F at specific points.

 

looking good, keep us updated

 

can you or are you using the emanage to tune timing at all? if i remember you can tune the ignition with the optional harness, cant you?