About time I got started...
I have a TVR Griffith 500. It's a great car, but could be so much better with the right engine management.
My aims are to:
- Increase my knowledge of engines and mapping
- Make the car easier to maintain and modify
- Avoid potential problems with obsolete parts
- Gain more power from the engine while using less fuel :-)
- Aid with the development of VEMS
A few words on the car
It's a light (1078kg) 2 seater convertable with a 5 litre Rover v8 engine (only 2 valves per cyl :-( ) made by a small company in Blackpool. There are no active safety features at all, so you have to drive it properly.
Modifications to date are uprated suspension, uprated brakes, polybushes and a large alloy radiator.
VEMS setup
Since I'm very time limited for the moment, I've gone for a fully assembled genboard 3.3 with all the bells and whistles.
I plan to have:
- the usual sensors (MAP, IAT etc...)
- fully sequential ignition and injection
- 2 WBO2s
- dual knock sensor (even having 1 is an improvement!!)
- 1 acoustic is supported, 2 channels require firmware mod
- Ion Sensing needs new hardware
- OK, forget ION sense for now. 1 acoustic is good enough.
- EGT (eventually)
Trigger setup
Primary: 36-1 tooth wheel on crank, and Ford VR sensor
Secondary: modified distributor with hall sensor - the advance and reterd mechanism will be locked and the factory sensor for the timing will be modified to produce one pulse per rotation instead of the usual 4. (I may make this neater in future and put something directly on the cam wheel as this will be 0.01% more efficient ;-) )
Order of work
- Get VEMS up and running in place of the Lucas 14CUX using the basic sensors. This will be injection only, running sequential ignition
- Replace ignition system with 8 coilpacks. )Shame Subaru ones don't fit - I've got loads of them.)
- Start to add the "extras" like WBO2
- Do some tuning :-D
Update on this:
- I'm through the first stage of basic sensors and running in sequential mode, but the injectors are not aligned with the valves.
- Coils fitted and working.
- Some extras added - single WBO2 fitted, waiting for the second one.
- Large injectors fitted for future plans. Much better than the standard ones.
- Some tuning of ECU done. Car goes quite well!
Tuning
New exhaust manifolds will find their way on the car as the original ones aren't the best design. Also, the intake system could be redesigned to use 8 throttle bodies. Plenty of scope when there's a nice ECU dealing with it all.
- New manifolds should be on by the end of the month.
- Working on a new twin throttlebody plenum. Not happy with the 8 TB solutions I've seen yet, so this will do until I have time to plan more.
Completion Dates
Target date for having fully complient system for UK emissions tests is March 2006. Achieved.
Have coils & big injectors fitted by May, running by June and fully mapped by July.
- Done the 1st on time, 2nd was finished late and 3rd is going to be challenging to get done...
Other plans
One goal is to reduce the cars fuel consumption. To this end, I will be investigating "displacement on demand" - ie not fuelling certain cylinders depending on the engine loading. This nicely ties in with the actuation routines for traction control - another thing I plan to look at next year. Also considering running on E85 fuel.
Update: Nothing new here, other than I've found (but not fitted) the sensors I need.
Fuel economy is pretty good. Now at 20+ mpg on local runs. An improvement of around 4 mpg so far.
Milestones along the way...
Fitting & testing the crank & cam triggers: MembersPage/DavidBlades/TrigTest
Fitting and testing other sensors: MembersPage/DavidBlades/SenTest
Injector Setup & Config file: MembersPage/DavidBlades/InjSetup
VE, Lambda tables & tuning the fuel: MembersPage/DavidBlades/FuelTest
Starting and Warm-up: MembersPage/DavidBlades/StartingWarmup
Acceleration Enrichment: MembersPage/DavidBlades/AccelEnrich
Idle control: MembersPage/DavidBlades/IdleControl
Cooling fan control & other ancilliaries: MembersPage/DavidBlades/FanTest
Fitting Ignition system: MembersPage/DavidBlades/IgnSetup
Problem page: MembersPage/DavidBlades/RegulatorProblem
Non VEMS related issues: MembersPage/DavidBlades/NonVems
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Firmware support
Page about dual channel wideband lamba: MembersPage/DavidBlades/DualWb
Page about getting TCS inputs:
MembersPage/DavidBlades/TCSInputs
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Other Projects that may happen
(Or if it moves, it could do with VEMS)
- "Plug and play" solution for Subaru Impreza MembersPage/DavidBlades/Subaru
- BBE Quark kit car. (You'll never have heard of it - I've not built the prototype yet!)
- Possible MGB GT VEMS Install.
- Possible Honda CRX Install.