another EFI decision making thread. enable me/talk me down

so, as some know, I had a major failure in the duster. this allows me to finally go EFI as I rebuild it.

the constraints: multiport intake, 1200cfm throttle body with GM IAC and TPS. LS1 injectors.

what im running up against now, is making a decision on engine management. it boils down to drivability for me. I don't want to screw with it. I cant tune worth a damn. its a fairly radical engine (solid roller, 12in manifold vacuum at 900rpm idle, indy heads, 3 inch exhaust, 390 at the rear wheels on pump gas)and I want it as docile and drivable as possible. it has never been this, no matter what carb and manifold I have tried. im sick of trying.

my options, really, are three: 1. ez efi retrofit kit. I can get it for 700 shipped brand new, self learning, no ignition control. spotty info on the retrofit, but mixed reviews on the full tbi style kit. I've installed a couple of the full kits, and they were a bitch to get right but were great once they were. 2. GM L98 (tuned port 350 corvette)computer and harness. cheapest of the options. I already have it all. I cant tune worth a damn, and no one I know of is still messing with them. at that point, I order a mail order tune and take my chances. 3. Megasquirt. can do anything. ever. and im almost completely on my own except for guys on the internet. no one around here will touch it.

so which management system? my gut says spend the money on the ez setup, but my cheapassness balks at that kind of cash.

up next is fuel system: two options. 1. pusher pump/surgetank/e2000 rail pump. already have this in my elky, and works flawless. little noisy. id have to put my surge tank in the trunk in this one, and run all my plumbing through the floor. don't like that. but I also already have all the pieces, so cheapest option. 2. tanks inc pa4. drop in high pressure/return module with sump tray. 225, but done, quiet, and clean. im leaning towards the PA4, but again, my cheapassness comes into play.

lastly is plumbing. I hate the look of braided stainless/red-blue AN lines. the push lock stuff scares me at 60psi of fuel pressure. on the elky, I used push lock AN fittings with standard high pressure line and fuel injection hose clamps to make my soft lines. ugly as hell, but functional. also not cheap. id like to do something cleaner and neater here, as it will be much more visible in the engine bay and other areas. ideas?

so help me out here, guys. I really need it.

Dusterbd13 wrote: I cant tune worth a damn.

Then you are limited to whatever your local tuner will use. I use to think street tuning was enough but the night and day difference of taking my car that I thought was running great and having an experienced tuner with a dyno let at it was enough to convince me otherwise. So much more driveable.

I was absolutely blown away by the AEM Infinity system we installed recently. We gave the software the basics and hit the key. It started rough but was tuning itself immediately and within a minute was purring away. We put a load on the dyno and ran it through the gears a few times to let it learn a bit more before the tuner jumped in and really started playing with timing to get the most out of the thing.

Dusterbd13 wrote: lastly is plumbing. I hate the look of braided stainless/red-blue AN lines.

I am with you on this. Glad to see someone shares my "unpopular" opinion. My image hosting is still down for a few more days so I can't share a pic but I have been using the black Jegs branded stuff with black cloth braided hose. Routed neatly it doesn't have that blingy look.

See if this pic works

How bad is that hose to use?

And the lack of tuners/tuning in my area is why the ez is in the front.

Dusterbd13 wrote: How bad is that hose to use?

It is so easy to work with you are convinced you are doing it wrong. Cut hose to length, slip collar over hose, press barb in place and tighten collar to barb. Supposed to be good to 300psi.

On my own cars I just repurpose 80's ford push locks.

Hmm.... does that hose have the ptfe liner? Definitely appealing.

And I might have found a tuner. Anyone have experience with pcm of nc? They can do my tpi corvette ecm and are pretty local.

Bump for the guys who only surf the forum at work.

I have seen a dyno comparison of one of those self learning deals and was flat out amazed. If I was doing something like you're doing, I would plunk down the cash for one rather than learn how to make fuel tables for three months.

Dusterbd13 wrote: Hmm.... does that hose have the ptfe liner? Definitely appealing. And I might have found a tuner. Anyone have experience with pcm of nc? They can do my tpi corvette ecm and are pretty local.

I pass PCM's shop at least once a week for work. I do not have any input on their ability, but will ask around. There is a shop about half a mile from PCM that has a 4 wheel dyno that does some tuning stuff as well. Can't think of the name...
I am located in Hutersville and have some of the fabric covered hose (Earls StartLite). If you want to have a look and put your hands on some, let me know.

Steve.

You CANNOT be worse at tuning than me, if I can do a megasquirt you can too. Vid look and see if there is much community support for what you are trying on the ms forums. If there is I would t be scared

I tune MS and I'm in Raleigh about once every 6wks if that helps the cause.

MegaSquirt with TunerStudio is self-learning. I don't understand what the problem is there.

I tunes my ITB, big cam equipped 924 by just driving it around my neighborhood for a couple of weeks before I started driving it to/from work and logging the data to fine tune things.

Hardest parts to tune: startup (very temperature sensitive) and acceleration enrichment (trial and error, think of it like a power valve).

I've never tuned before, let alone used MegaSquirt and this was the result:

http://youtu.be/4XgLYJVX3gQ

with only 12" vac at idle I dont see how you can even consider an option that doesnt have electronic control of spark if you want it at all drivable. On the other hand, I dont see why thats not a 500hp motor with cams that lumpy and "indy" (whatever that means) heads. Sounds like the carb and dizzy have been holding you back.

In reply to Leafy:

http://www.indyheads.com/

Dusterbd13 wrote: Its a fairly radical engine (solid roller, 12in manifold vacuum at 900rpm idle, indy heads, 3 inch exhaust, 390 at the rear wheels on pump gas)and I want it as docile and drivable as possible. it has never been this, no matter what carb and manifold I have tried. im sick of trying.

Are you sure it's not something else in the system that is mismatched. That does not sound like a 390 RWHP motor to me. I really doubt any of the off the shelf CARB based EFI systems are going to run that thing. MS would be my best guess, tons of support online.

The 390 was after having an 850 double pumper and ignition tuned by a good local tuner. Ran great except for no choke, no throttle response, piss poor fuel economy.

So what im hearing is that I shouldn't write off megasquirt. I should ignore the ez option, after digging quite a bit and finding primarily bad news on it.

Does this sound right? And paulvr6: you a travelling pro? If so, how much do you charge? Are there any tuners around Charlotte that I don't know about?

Dusterbd13,

I just spoke with some of the guys at work who had very good things to say about PCM in Mooresville.

Hmmm....

I talked with them yesterday and they won't do my car on the dyno, but will work with me via datalog and mail order. For some reason this kind of bugs me. Should it? I have found very little bad press on these guys anywhere. This seemsllike the solution. ..

If you don't tune it yourself you will never be happy with it and you will be dependent on someone else's skills.

A basic tune can be done very quickly, but the fine points take time to work out. Dyno guys just shoot for that big number, they don't address the low speed stuff or fine points.

The only thing about a Dyno that you can't do on the road is to hit some of the cells that you will never hit driving it.

Jumper K. Balls wrote: I was absolutely blown away by the AEM Infinity system we installed recently. We gave the software the basics and hit the key. It started rough but was tuning itself immediately and within a minute was purring away. We put a load on the dyno and ran it through the gears a few times to let it learn a bit more before the tuner jumped in and really started playing with timing to get the most out of the thing.

At the risk of thread-jacking, I have an Infinity and as far as I know there isn't any mode where it tunes itself while running. Perhaps you're referring to its "setup wizards", because if there's a true self-tune button I missed, I'll eat my hat.

Also, for the OP, the Infinity is fairly expensive, about $1800 for a V8.

kb58 wrote:

Jumper K. Balls wrote: I was absolutely blown away by the AEM Infinity system we installed recently. We gave the software the basics and hit the key. It started rough but was tuning itself immediately and within a minute was purring away. We put a load on the dyno and ran it through the gears a few times to let it learn a bit more before the tuner jumped in and really started playing with timing to get the most out of the thing.

At the risk of thread-jacking, I have an Infinity and as far as I know there isn't any mode where it tunes itself *while running*. Perhaps you're referring to its "setup wizards", because if there's a true self-tune button I missed, I'll eat my hat. Also, for the OP, the Infinity is fairly expensive, about $1800 for a V8.

Perhaps I am. It was hooked up to the laptop at the tuners and after I finished fixing fuel leaks we hit the key and pretty much as soon as the wideband started giving a signal corrections started happening. Not at all unlike Tunerstudio VE Analyze live with megasquirt. I will ask they guys a Garage 808 about it.

bentwrench wrote: Dyno guys just shoot for that big number, they don't address the low speed stuff or fine points.

Not my guy. He spent a lot of money on the eddy current load control, uses it well and I pay a premium for it.

Jumper K. Balls wrote:

kb58 wrote:

Jumper K. Balls wrote: I was absolutely blown away by the AEM Infinity system we installed recently. We gave the software the basics and hit the key. It started rough but was tuning itself immediately and within a minute was purring away. We put a load on the dyno and ran it through the gears a few times to let it learn a bit more before the tuner jumped in and really started playing with timing to get the most out of the thing.

At the risk of thread-jacking, I have an Infinity and as far as I know there isn't any mode where it tunes itself *while running*. Perhaps you're referring to its "setup wizards", because if there's a true self-tune button I missed, I'll eat my hat. Also, for the OP, the Infinity is fairly expensive, about $1800 for a V8.

Perhaps I am. It was hooked up to the laptop at the tuners and after I finished fixing fuel leaks we hit the key and pretty much as soon as the wideband started giving a signal corrections started happening. Not at all unlike Tunerstudio VE Analyze live with megasquirt. I will ask they guys a Garage 808 about it.

Sounds like closed loop fuel corrections, something like every decent standalone has done since the early 2000s.

Yes I think that's what's going on. That said, "tuning itself" brings to mind pushing a button and having the ECU completely adapt itself to a new engine. Closed-loop control sort of does that, but has to be "steered" towards the proper operating range before letting it go. Anyhow, we're talking about the same thing but also getting off topic.

If you can afford it, you can't go wrong with the AEM Infinity.

kb58 wrote: If you can afford it, you can't go wrong with the AEM Infinity.

Except that its made by AEM so something is going to be wrong with it in a way that doesnt show up on paper making its actual use exceptionally flustrating. Such as their failure prone fuel pressure regulators or how until the infinity their ecus lacked basic features that any self respecting standalone had since the late 90's and thats volumetric efficiency based tuning. Thats right, in the year 2015 you can still buy a brand new standalone from AEM (ems4 and series 2) that uses injector pulsewidth, I'm surprised I dont have to change the tune using the hex editor MS-DOS and connect to it with a parallel port.

So, yeah, I ain't gonna drop 2k on an ecu. Or 1500 on the fast xfi.

So kinda moot point for me. But great info for others in similar boots.