Bobs buggered engine thread

[pulsarboby]

just recieved a phone call from gards engineers
ok basically he said what has happened to my engine is unusual.
the piston end gaps were checked and were correct, the bores were also within spec as previously confirmed. however the pistons had ovalled (all 4) off the thrust side ie side to side of engine.
they carried out tests on the engine oil and found that it had 7 parts to 1 petroleum mix so in laymans terms if the engine oil was on max on the dipstick and you poured half a litre of petrol in it, thats what was in the sump:shock:

this had caused a breakdown in oil and allowed metal to metal friction to occur which had expanded pistons to such a degree that they melted on the wrong side so to speak.

when i asked why the gudgeon pin side, he said that this is the point where most heat is generated due to it being an edge or hole where gudgeon pin sits, so heat is transferred to this point.
the main bearings had suffered from metal particle damage due to the foreign bodies present in the oil from the melted piston, although he could not explain why the big end bearings were un effected.
no 3 piston was the first to sustain damage as it was most underload, so generated more heat. the others would have soon followed suit in his opinion.

so his prognosis is that it was infact a serious overfuelling issue which had caused the failiure of my engine, he advised me to get all fuelling related items fully checked before installing rebuilt engine, to avoid the same thing happening again.

so when its rebuilt the emanage and wiring installed will all be ripped out, and horsham developments will be carrying out a full remap on the standard ecu.
i will take car there on a low loader as soon as its running and he will install a safe map with the 700cc injectors (which ive already had checked) and z32.
then once its run in it will be mapped (probably on track) for full power.
and hopefully then i will have a good reliable engine.

the only good thing to come of all this, is that i will now have a quaiffe fitted, and will give me more time to setup car for next years racing schedule as ive completely missed this years:sad:

 

[Braveheart]

Looks like a good and viable explanation Bob.
You must feel a bit more comfortable to find this out and you will be able to keep a closer eye on things when the lump's back in and your AEM UEGO A/F gauge is fitted.
Still very upsetting though to have to spend much time and money to go through another rebiuld, map, run-in and re-map. :evil:

Hope it all comes together and 2008 is a good one!!!

 

[pulsarboby]

tbh scott, its what i had suspected anyway, as it was all to much of a coincidence! but you live and learn so to speak.
and yes your quite correct regarding the aem wideband, not gonna get caught out on this happening again, so can keep a check myself.
ive also got all the software for the standard ecu so can keep a check on ignition etc myself too, just a shame im not clever enough to do the mapping, or i would do that aswell, but i dont really know enough about it to chance it, so best left to someone who knows their job.

have you recieved the kite for the wideband yet scott? sent it last week, thursday i think!

 

[Dooie Pop Pop]

just a shame im not clever enough to do the mapping, or i would do that aswell, but i dont really know enough about it to chance it, so best left to someone who knows their job

dont you get the impression though that these days mapping could be a much more user friendly p+p type thing?

 

[campbellju]

dont you get the impression though that these days mapping could be a much more user friendly p+p type thing?

Its called a PFC and I still can't convince Bobby to fit one :doh: :lol: :lol: :frusty:

Mapping is not difficult though in fairness it was Ross who convinced me in the end to do it myself. Although I was an industrial control engineer, there always seemed to be too much "dark art" associated with mapping.

Once I got into it and you've got the basics setup, its a case of driving watching and modifying. If your lambda is 10% too high you need 10% less fuel and you make your injector open for 10% less time. That's the theory but inpractice there are quite a few physical and software varibales that mean at that point in the map the 10% is actually 7%. The easiest way to find this is driving and testing lots.

I developed an excel spreadsheet that does semi-automatic mapping for me as you can't map

So I borrowed an excel spreadsheet from the net that did the basic plus 10% calc. I then did some sample filtering to remove all the samples I was interested in. I put in some hystersis/gain/smoothing (Basically a PID loop in excel) so all the analysis I used to have to do with the logs in the spreadsheet it does for me automatically. Now I just check the changes and if I don't agree with them I change the assumptions.

It isn't perfect so you need to have knowledge of how mapping works to use it and it would be too easy for the novice to make a mistake.

The reason why its difficult to automate and the key to making it work is good data in the first place. So If I'm at part throttle in the map then I want to ignore the bits where I boot it or go on the overrun. I believe AEM can do some automatic mapping but they have the same problem as my spreadsheet in that if you don't understand how mapping works, its easy to make a mistake and damage the engine. IIRC, this function is for getting cruise and steady state stuff right.

The standard ECU will work but like the E-manage IMO its a cheap but imperfect solution for different reasons.

A PFC is old, simplistic and clumsy around the edges but it does enough and is still a good one box does all.

 

[stumo]

Have to agree with Jim, a PFC seems pretty easy to setup.

There's one or two things to get your head around for the initial setup but nothing that can't be sorted out with a few PM's.

I've got no idea about Emanages etc.

 

[pulsarboby]

is true what your saying jim, but there really hard to get hold of for the right price! and me being a bit of a tight ass aint gonna pay £800 smackers for a dont know how old bit of electronics that could be faulty.

and besides that your clever and im pretty dim with anything like that, i dont even know how to put a photo on here yet:der: which says it all for me and pc type equipment:lol:
which just leaves me with the one option in putting my trust in someone elses hands!

if i could have got a pfc at a fair price then i would have been quite happy with you mapping it for me, as i really do believe you know your stuff and your a perfectionist8)
but as you now have other prior commitments and i need the car done, i wouldnt have trusted anyone else to map it except you!
which leaves me with horsham developments, and as previously stated the guy there seems to know what hes talking about, and have only heard reports of excellence regarding work which they have undertaken. and besides paulb's car, ive seen and driven a car with a standard ecu which has been mapped, and i couldnt fault the performance of it, so just hoping mine turns out the same way.

 

[GINGA]

The pfc is great for its price but suffers due to one major issue.....no knock control, without this, if you get one bad tank of gas or something then the chances are you will be kissing your engine good bye , the pfc does flash the engine light when it detects knock but whats the chances of you seeing it in time?
At least with the R's std ecu, if it detects knock it will retard the timing to try and save the engine and you'll notice a sudden drop in power to let you know something is amiss.

 

[KF79GTIR]

so what your saying is you were right and every one else was wrong about the bore wash

 

[Dooie Pop Pop]

so what your saying is you were right and every one else was wrong about the bore wash

leave the pudding alone man its been stirred enough:deadhorse:

 

[pulsarboby]

yep, i think we all know the answer to that one kev!
but as stu just said, lets just leave it at that, as il just get wound up again, and theres nothing to gain from it now.

its onwards and forwards;-)

 

[boucherie]

glad to hear that your starting to make a bit of progress on this now bob and like you said theres no point rushing it, you might as well get ready for next years events, although if you are up and running would be good to see you out on track at snetterton or somewhere with the others!

 

[campbellju]

@Ginga I don't know if you're bothered but...
At what point does the knock sensor kick in on the standard engine? Probably after det because if its anything like the nominal sensor on the PFC its so far above ambient knock its too late and I agree with what you're saying. For tuning its good though as you can set it above ambient knock so if it flashes at you whilst on a run you know to abort early and check the logs. All tuners maps I've seen leave the default so it only comes on once there 's a problem

Anyway, I know you've been there and done that Ginga so I just thought I'd spam up Bob's thread :lol:

@Bob, no sweat, Andy is cashing in on helping me take the engine out so I think my misses would notice if I did 2 maps in August whilst looking after the little one. The offer still stands if one comes up in the future cheap. Your basemap can always be copied through excel as a starting point.

 

[Keira]

I know you've been there and done that Ginga:
.

and we all know what happened there...:lol:

boohooo...i've broken it and am off to buy an evo

:lol:

 

[Rishi]

and we all know what happened there...:lol:

boohooo...i've broken it and am off to buy an evo

:lol:

This is why you are the 'Peoples Choice!' :rofl:

 

[pulsarboby]

cheers jim, the offer is very much appreciated, but think you have your work cut out at the moment, the last thing you need is to get the mrs wound up after giving birth. what do they call it 'post baby blues or something like that':lol: :lol:


and yes ian i will be in touch regarding snetterton, once the ol girls up n running il probably be on track every other week at least, getting car setup properly and learning to drive the bl00dy thing as ive hardly even driven it since the day i bought it:doh: :lol:

 

[GINGA]

and we all know what happened there...:lol:

boohooo...i've broken it and am off to buy an evo

:lol:

Just needed time for my skin to grow back not that Rishi would know anything about that, unless he's got a paper cut fromone of those blank cheques he keeps writing :lol:

 

[Rishi]

Just needed time for my skin to grow back not that Rishi would know anything about that, unless he's got a paper cut fromone of those blank cheques he keeps writing :lol:

I don't have time to get my hands dirty.. Its far easier getting someone else to do it all! Besides! I might break a nail or something catastrophic like that.. :lol:

 

[Keira]

thing as ive hardly even driven it since the day i bought it:doh: :lol:

i've never actually drove mine at all :shock: :lol:

mike put it in my garage when he brought it down and its been sat there ever since :lol:

i did sit in and pretend to drive it once but that doesn't really count

 

[pulsarboby]

i've never actually drove mine at all :shock: :lol:
i did sit in and pretend to drive it once but that doesn't really count

it does count actually kieron. look at it this way, you can jump in your car in the garage whilst your absolutely sh1tfaced, or when the ol womans nagging ya, and dream that you have just done a 9 second run at the pod.
and you can leave out the bad bits like getting there, queing up, fuel costs, crappy burgers and warm beer in plastic crappy glasses.
when you wake up youll be a 9 second warrior of the tarmac, and it aint cost you a bean;-)