Alright so its been along time since an update. If you have me on facebook (jacks txcoupe) you might have a few extra little updates but its mostly been lots of small stuff which has added up to lots of work.
So last time I updated I had painted the manifold, since then the manifold has been fitted with some fittings for fuel pressure reg, brake booster and a MAP sensor which is fitted in the ecu.
After the threads were tapped it made a bit off a mess of the paint work so it was repainted.
I got my standard accelerator cable lengthened a little so I was able to use it instead of getting a complete custom one mad up, made a little bracket for the accelerator cable but it still needs a little bit off work .
I got stuck into more wiring, I’ve fitted 2 x 9inch thermo fans to the back of the rad, I’ve fitted in oil temp, oil pressure and boost gauge finding a fitting for the oil pressure and oil temp sensors to go in to a Y piece was a challenge in its own!!!!. I’ve wired in an O2 wideband sensor (innovate MTX-L).
All the interior has been fitted back in and unfortunately I’ve had to scrap my fully siq subwoofer from the boot as its to tight and takes up to much of the little boot space I’ve got, it might go back in later on when I work out a good way to mount everything.
I tried to space up my seat rails on the scheel seats after talking to susgem (paul) as he has the same seats and said it worked for him and enable him to run the door jams, it work a little but its still not high enough so need to work something else out for it.
I went to the wreckers to try find a shifter boot as I’m now remote shifted, found one that fitted the auto console but its way to tall and looks stupid so currently not running one.
I finally got to the stage of where I was ready to try turn it over and get it started. Was very nervous because I was worried id blow it up somehow. Anyways so off to the servo with a jerry can to fill her up with some e85. Plugged in the computer and there were a few wiring issues. The coolant temp sensor was wired in the wrong way so I had to re-pin the connecter and it worked fine, the tps was wired around the wrong way so had 100% throttle when my foot was off and around 0% throttle when I had my foot flat to the floor so repined that too.
Cranked it over and it seemed nothing was really happening, there was a little bit of coughing and it would back fire after cranking it over for a while.
Looked at some diagnostics and I had the home pick up and the trigger wires around the wrong way. All these wiring issues are the joys of doing things with no diagrams and just semi winging it haha. Educated guesses don’t always work out so well
Anyways so I got on the phone to Matthew Crosby as he offered to help me out after some other people I tried to message directly didn’t have time to try help me out. He was a great help but still no go.
So I played around with the CAS settings trying to get the bastard to start and the 30 year old oil feed to the turbo decided to let go so there was a nice pool of oil which has now soaked in to the drive way and made a royal freaking mess of my engine. So down to the local proflow shop to get some stuff to make a braid line to try again.
Still had no luck so I emailed haltech and didn’t hear anything so thought my chances were limited. I then got an email back with a few things to try and it still wasn’t taking off. The suggestion was then to let them remotely access my computer and have a look at the ecu. So gave them a call, they jump on my computer and had a look. He said everything looked fine with the settings an the mad so time to play around with the CAS settings. Tried a few different things and he adjusted the trigger wheel settings until the timing was right.
Then he said to give it a go with the key and try start. Excited I was eager to give it ago, if this guy couldn’t help me get it going I was sure it would be something id done with the wiring and that would be a nightmare.
And, drum roll please, she started!!!!!! Ran like a turd but it run. It didn’t want to idle and would retard the timing when you stabbed the throttle. But the smile on my face was enough for me. Immediately on to the phone to tell the people who I annoy with the amount of time and money I spend on this car and I was done for the day.
Book in to the tuner for as soon as possible and of course there was a 3 week wait none the less it was booked in. so few things to do before a tune but it was booked in.
Also booked it in for an exhaust the day before the tune so I only had to borrow a trailer once. Took it down got a 2.5inch mandrel system with a muffler and hot dog and 3 inch tip. After dealing with a 1 piece exhaust in the past I was not going down the road again so went with a 3 piece for easy removal. Going to make everything from changing a clutch easier right through to taking out the exhaust.
Initial thoughts when I picked it up is its way to loud (remembering the car isn’t tuned and is running very well) it looks sexy as all hell as its made out of doughnut pipe so lots o little cuts and welds to bend it.
Straight down to the tuner and dropped it off to be tuned the next day.
Went back down the next arvo and still nothing was done….. GRRR
Was supposed to be picking up the following day at like lunch time
Anyways he was admit it would be ready to be picked up the following day so et him do his thing.
Got to lunch time the following day and I hadn’t heard anything. They called me a few hours later and the receptionist said do you mind if we have it over the weekend, he hasn’t had a chance to finish it. I thought not like I want it not running so left I there
Anyway got to Monday lunch time and they called me up. Said we have had a few issues tuning it. The issues are a follow;
1) The fitting in the back of the manifold for the heater core popped out. And leaked water this is the major issue.
2) The next trouble he had was the boost controller I have has a t piece with a ball bearing in it to make it one way, the ball jams and he said he tested it and it took 50psi to open. He was able to just run it on waste gate pressure and tune it to 12psi
3) The air filter would suck inwards when the car got to about 4500rpm and the spring inside would stop the flow of air. So he took it off, ran a 90 degree elbow with some pipe sticking out the bonnet
4) The boost gauge line melted on the exhaust so he just tapped it in else where.
5) And last but no least the wideband sensor was only reading 14.9, said occasionally it would drop to like 4.9 but that was it. I think from talking to corey and googling it just needs a calibration.
So that left me renting another trailer to pick the turd up and still not really able to drive it. None the less its closer and hopefully I can drive it back to the tuner next time.
As for results due to the issues he said it was making around 130kw at the wheels or 176hp for those who work in ponies instead of wasps. This isn’t a final figure as it still needs to go back on the dyno, and it still needs 2-3psi of boost (this is when the turbo runs out of efficiency) after everything else is fixed.
Stage 2 of the update. So after driving it around for a couple days on the weekend after getting it tuned the first time, I broke down with no batter/charge. The alternator wiring was the wrong way around so driving at night time the lights all went out and then I just stalled on the way home.
Called dad to come save me, so he came and gave me a jump start and then died again because the alt wasn’t charging. So lucky dad had a spare battery (dual battery system) and we hook it up to get me home.
Then again I broke down a couple days later, was boosting around and the standard ports I blocked off for radiator coolant let go and I was left going to repco to dodgy fix my car to get me home.
So after these dramas got it to the tuner the week later, crossing my finger that nothing would break again.
Picked it up a couple days later and it was all good!!!!!!!
Dyno sheet is in and got 149kw at the wheels or 202hp at the wheels.
Its tuned on 15psi, 533nm of torque. He said he would of keep going but the turbo wasn’t really responding to more boost and he was worried with the plain bearing turbo it would let go and disasters would occur haha
Anyways so it’s a wholee lot of fun to drive, goes pretty hard
Probably going to get me in trouble because when your in 3rd gear you can just stop when you get to 60kp/h you need to hit boost but that occurs around 60-80kph haha. Good fun though
Now it seems one of the issues im having is I cant get het innovate mtxl to work through the ecu, it just seems to give a constant reading of 10.1 even though the gauge is working. I imagine its just settings in the ecu but cant find anything as yet to fix it. The other issue I have is my thermos don’t seem to engage. This is no doubt just wiring that need to be sorted out.
