The Project Pad

e-mail sent off into the wilderness of the internets



Its been a productive day for me though.

Put all the stock ECU stuff back on. (I think the fact that I got everything right the first time [firing order on dizzy correct, crank trigger wires in right configuration, O2 swapped out, MAF plugged in, stock ecu hooked up, etc] means that I've done it one too many times.)

Got an alignment this morning (was like .65 degrees off on both fronts), and the car feels much better now, and I have peace of mind about my new tires not going bad early.

Also picked up some Royal Purple and a Mann filter along with a low side R12 to R134 a/c fitting.

I tried to fill with R134 to no avail. I had the low pressure switch jumped in order to have the comp spinning while trying to fill it, but it didn't seem like it was taking it. I think maybe the fitting I have didn't seat right or something. Darnnn

Oh well, A/C is a luxury.

At least the rest of the car is solid enough for me to feel comfortable driving it for 4 hours 2x this week.

a/c is a pain in the ass

loxxrider wrote:So 6 inch springs compared to...

and you need shorter strut inserts than say a bilstein sport?

A 7" or 8" spring isn't going to get you low enough in the front, use a 6" spring and a Bils Sport, there is still plenty of travel, unlike a MK1 VW...I run 400f and 450 rear w/Sports and 35 series tires on the crappy northeast roads and they are firm w/o being harsh...On better roads you can def run a higher rate, ask wainwright what he has on der V8
I mistakenly ordered an 8" (was told they were 6's) and ended up taking the collars all the way out and letting the springs rest directly on the bottom perches, and I still had a 1.5" wheel gap in front..

Hope you get those VEMS issues worked out, I was definitely leaning towards one for my daily (and the 034 IIC for my all-out build on the white car)..

Ah OK OK, thats good to know.

Yay I'm quite excited about coils if I can get them soon!

So if/when Kevin gives me my money back...anyone want to help me out with getting a decoder for Motronic?

um a decoder ring for motronic? better eat a lot of cereal haha :bashtard:

lol I know man...but whatever ben swann or 034 or whoever the hell uses to write their chips. I need that chit mang! I have the rest of the resources to make custom big turbo tunes...just need to figure out a better ignition situation. (S1 dizzy is one option )

Save your money and buy a fully programmable stand alone. Makes it lot's easier to troubleshoot and not blow up.

He did save his money for a fully programmable stand alone, and look where its got him months later.....

Hey at least you won't be the only one without a/c at the apartment (if i can take my car. in the middle of switching the tank now, i have to take a torch to some of the header nuts, they're seized up real good and would rather assume the shape of a circle when the socket gets near them. at least i have access to a lift, YAY!)

Honestly a refund does sound like the best course of action with the VEMS, although I do have a feeling that it will come down to something really small and stupid like bad wiring/traces or config values. but who knows how long it would take to find. I kinda feel like you would have better luck if you redid wiring harness for it, but somehow that doesn't sound fun.

Nah, I wont have A/C, you wont, and Eric wont either lol. I am going to try and put the rest of that can in tomorrow though. I need to know where the high pressure port is so I can see if there is some air trapped in there for me to let out.

You mean if WE redid the wiring harness

You do realize how effing ridiculous my wiring harness is though. Ugh haha.



OK, so I think I got the issue with MT remedied.

I think when it got downloaded onto my other computer one of the profiles was not set up correctly or something. Now it doesn't get scrambled on my computers at least.

I guess I'll give it one last try...but I'm sure the backfire will still be there :(

Might have to try a few different tunes (old and new) to see if the backfire is in the tune. If not, then its time to look into other things.

I am pretty confident that the issues with it stalling, etc. were from the .msq file getting fudged with because of the profile difference.

If it makes you feel any better I screwed up mine with mismatched profiles. Funny thing was, mine ran better after I screwed it up and gave me a hint as to what was wrong :wink:

loxxrider wrote:Nah, I wont have A/C, you wont, and Eric wont either lol. I am going to try and put the rest of that can in tomorrow though. I need to know where the high pressure port is so I can see if there is some air trapped in there for me to let out.

You mean if WE redid the wiring harness

You do realize how effing ridiculous my wiring harness is though. Ugh haha.



OK, so I think I got the issue with MT remedied.

I think when it got downloaded onto my other computer one of the profiles was not set up correctly or something. Now it doesn't get scrambled on my computers at least.

I guess I'll give it one last try...but I'm sure the backfire will still be there :(

Might have to try a few different tunes (old and new) to see if the backfire is in the tune. If not, then its time to look into other things.

I am pretty confident that the issues with it stalling, etc. were from the .msq file getting fudged with because of the profile difference.

The A/C on these cars I did a lot of work on. I rebuild the entire system on my 5ktq, did a FULL R-134a conversion and at the end of the day had much luck. Go to my project thread and around page 7 you should find some good reading on the A/C system. If that does not help I can provide extensive techincal help

cheers

Thank you very much Corey.

I really appreciate the offer for support. I guess I'd start by asking where the high pressure port is and if there is low pressure port other than the compressor. I have to see if the fitting I bought is allowing the 134 to get into the system.

Thought I might chip in a defence about the VEMS ECU seeing as I have one fitted to The Mutant.

I have been running mine now for over 2 years without a single reliability issue.

I have encountered a few hiccups with some of the other looms I have been done for other projects and it is ALWAYS down to configuration problems.

The thing with VEMS (and pretty much all after market ECUs) is that they have heaps of I/O to be totally configurable as they can be fitted to any engine and hence can be set-up in a million different combinations. This allows for the possibility of having input/output clashes etc and these tend to be easy to program in and hard to figure out when present.

This means that the config has to be carefully set-up and tested to iron out all the bugs and when there is a problem it is very hard to spot where the goof is, and worse than that, when trying to fix it you can introduce more errors unless you are very careful and know what you are doing.

This happens a lot when a similar "working" config from someone else has be used to try and speed things up.
In my experience this tends to introduce errors as the hardware set-up is always marginally different between installs and as you have no idea why certain values have been entered (remember it is a config borrowed from someone else) config errors creep in when changes are made.
Hence I do not send out config filew to people (and I get a few requests) as all it does is cause more problems than it is worth.

I would suggest you re-flash the firmware and totally clear the config and then start again from scratch as you will know exactly why each entry is set to specific value which is invaluable when it comes to debugging.

Hilly

Yeah, I threw it on last night to see if the correct profile was a problem, and the car died while taking a log.

I'm not touching it again until I talk with Kevin.

Thanks for the info Hilly.

Talked to Kevin today and he said he is doing his best to bother the VEMS people about it today, tomorrow, etc.

OK, pretty interesting happenings here...

I have tested all the grounds on the car and they seem to be just fine (as suspected).

I drove the car A LOT last night and happened upon some really interesting information.

I drove the car about 20 miles to Ocala, FL without a hitch on my OLD "green" VEMS ECU without a hitch.

I then decided to hook the computer up to the ECU to play with stuff a little. As soon as I got into boost with the computer hooked up it died like every time it has when I've been logging lately.

I disconnected the computer and continued driving (after cycling ECU power), and it ran just fine all the way to redline quite a few times.

Then I decided to hook my newer "blue" VEMS ECU up. The first pull I went to make with that one (without computer hooked up) resulted in the terrible miss and backfire I was experiencing before (discussed earlier in this thread).

I then switched back to the "green" ECU and drove it HARD for the rest of the night (at least 40 miles) with absolutely no problems other than the fact that that ECU has the wrong MAT file in it.

I even have a video of the car ripping through first and second gear and hitting the limiter

sooooooooooo all of this has led me to believe that its all in firmware. Its essential to have the car NOT die while the computer is hooked up to the ECU though so we can tune...

I even have a video of the car ripping through first and second gear and hitting the limiter

Um, well POST it! :vids:

sooooooooooo all of this has led me to believe that its all in firmware. Its essential to have the car NOT die while the computer is hooked up to the ECU though so we can tune...

Yes that would be a good thing LOL...

ok ok...here's one :-D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AAUuukVADo

and another

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OF_UGnElNxw

Kevin said this is pretty significant so we may get squared away sooner than later. I CANT EFFING WAIT to have it done lol.

oooooooooooo i want launch control!

Chris,

Kevin emailed me asking for help, I've agreed to sort it out for you. Basically ship me the ecu and coil harness and I'll get the config and tuning software sorted out for you from here. I've got a local customer running VEMS on his 200 so I have a good test platform I can validate on. Kevin should be in touch with the details.

:woowoo: :woowoo: loving good customer service