Stock ECU VS Dta 80 VS Omex 710

Advice needed on these,
The DTA seems to offer it all and has had very accurate results and tests on well known cars on here.

The Omex however isnt as straightforward and from what i have read for the last few hours a few folk have removed it or the previous version due to there issues.

SO at the moment im 99% towards the DTA but the Omex is convenient and can be mapped locally and fitted by someone i know.Hes very good but has never mapped a coupe before so on that basis i dont want to use him.

Im going for Stand alone as im sick and tired of all the running faults with the stock ecu and im getting nowhere other than continually throwing money at it and having the same issues.

sounds to me like you've already answered your own question

I have made up my mind,but rather than my usual approach of doing something and regretting it later i thought i would just get peoples opinions on the Omex just in case im wrong.

I have had both ECU's on my car, I switched from DTA to OMEX because of issues. (Quite the opposite from what your suggesting)

I have an OMEX710 and there are no issues. OMEX ECU's are made by GEMS which is a proper motorsport company. I refuse to look at any further DTA products because I had to threaten them with legal action over their P8 PRO ECU NOT supporting the 5 pot fiat engine. (I assume your looking at the S80 now)

To be honest both these ECU's have pretty much the same features not sure on price these days probably about £850 + VAT. What I will say is the OMEX customer support is outstanding and the DTA support is non existent.

Suppose its your call but glad you finally see that the STD ECU has its limitations.

you don't know the half of it! it's been genuinely sad to see a mate throw good money after bad trying to get the car he loves and has spent so much time and money on to run right ,only to speak to him the day after the latest attempt or solution has cost him another fair sum and not sorted the issue..i have heard him say he has had enough a couple of times then when he gets over it , only to have his hopes raised again with a possible solution which doesnt fix the issue again!
the fact there are 2 reasonably priced ecu's both with 5 cylinder set up and both with a high power car running perfectly on thier system is inspirational for us all but especially for john! as the motec, although quality, is an expensive option..
i have even been looking into mega squirt but i think you would need to be a little more hands on than with dta or omex..
so theres now a couple of competent mappers for the big power 5 cyl, which makes this the only option worth entertaining for these type of cars, its straight forward proven and offers so many set up options the original ecu can't as well as the traction control,launch control etc that i am suprised more are not running them
as john can no doubt testify they work out far more cost effective than trying to run standard and iron out the issues it throws up..in fact i am sure john wont mind me saying if he had gone this way from the start he could have paid for the system a few times over already but at least you'll have her running properly and get the best from her now mate i'm sure it will all seem worth it when you can finally run a reasonable amount of boost and have the cars potential running on road...
i hope you don't mind me saying all this mate but its been a frustrating time for the friends that have been on the phone with you trying to keep your chin up time and again..and to have a car capable of so much yet being unable to even run moderate power properly then go from one running issue to the next has been frustrating to watch!
for me john in carlisle has done an excellent job with robs and seems to be a real genuine engineer/tuner that can not just offer solutions to the issues the cars throw up but has the skills and knowledge to build and fabricate everything from brackets to complete throttle bodies (has proper engineering skills and machinery on site) and robs car runs flawlessly
i am sure j will give you whatever help you need to go omex if its more convenient to go local but the main thing is you will finally have the drive you deserved all along..
fair play to you for loyalty mate but get it sorted asap so i can finally run rings round it.. wouldn't have been any fun turning my boost off and whipping a coilpack off to beat your sub400 at least when its done i will run all 5 cyl and maybe half a bar

Thanks Rob,yes it has been a push to stick with the car despite all the faults,but seeing 390 bhp and 410 bhp after near 2 years of faults and issues pushed me to question the reasons for keeping the car.
Lets be right,400 can be achieved on stock internals.

The car is and has been running way underpowered for its potential and if throwing more money at it to finally be able to release its potential then im all for it.

Turbo J-i was hoping this thread would attract your attention.
I heard you had an Omex but went to megasquirt,but coultnt find the thread of as to the reasons you changed.
Wasnt aware you were running the Omex./

That said Rob40 has had fantastic and long lasting results from the later Dta setup.
As for stand alone i have never been one for reccomending these as alot of the safety features dont need to be ran like they do in the stock ecu.
But the safety features seem to be stopping my progress on this.

This isnt in my case a dig at anyone nor is it passing the blame.
I have spent money of my own doing to push the boundaries of the stock ecu,which in turn has seen its own new issues.

My car is very fast,and the fuelling is near perfect,but with the restrictions of various sensors I.e the AFM its hard to achieve a setup that doesnt cause issues after time in my case.

Well I know you have mused about it before, so if you feel you should try a stand alone ecu then go for it! Contrary to what some may think, I have no problems with stand alone ecus, and have mapped many including DTA, Motec, Emerald etc, on lots of different cars including full racers over 500bhp.

However, I will disagree profoundly with most of the above points relating to the standard ecu and also state categorically that the Bosch Motronic ecu is 100% not the cause of any of your current problems. I know you wont mind me saying that you admit to understanding only a little about ecus, dynos and tuning, therefore I can only assume that someone has been trying to advise on the “ins and outs”, and most likely pointing towards the ecu as a problem. Well I have heard this a lot from many different tuners i.e. you have to go stand alone, the standard ECU cant do this or that etc etc. Well frankly this is just plain misinformation and misrepresentation, as has been proven otherwise and is usually based on two motives:

1. They have zero knowledge about the Bosch/Marelli/Siemens ecus, and therefore have zero ability to map it. Some may have basic knowledge/software, but simply can’t achieve more than a basic remap for a standard or mildly tuned car
2. They are trying to sell another solution.

Your car is no different to any of the other 400bhp+ coupes out there i.e. it’s not pushing the boundaries of the standard ecu any more than these other cars, or indeed what I have been doing for 4+ years now! As it stands, I can think of 15 or more 20v turbos running 400bhp+ via the standard ecu, and simply hundreds of 350bhp, 300bhp…

The facts on the ground are we have many more cars, especially big power, running via the Bosch ecu than any other system. These cars have proven themselves over thousands of miles, not just in terms of performance, but also fuel economy and reliability. I would note as well that ALL these cars have only been tuned by me once unless they have received further upgrades. The notion that you have to come back for constant tweaks is simply not true unless there are mechanical problems as was with your car. One map, that’s all it takes. Look at the massive miles that Nigel has achieved, coupled with many drag races and TOTB wins. People like Watz drive their 400bhp+ Coupes every day for work, all without doing anything more than turning the key and filling up with petrol! I remember Eldinho commentating how boringly reliable his 429bhp car was for the full 18 months he had it before selling up, that’s with track days and an Auto Italia magazine feature taking it over 175mph at Bruntingthorpe, some 20mph faster than the other 400bhp cars! In fact, the fastest cars to this day are still the Bosch cars and they will continue to go faster.

Flea – 11.9 @ 121mph (Bosch)
Mavric – 11.9 @ 121mph (Motec)
Barbz – 12.35 @ 121mph (Motec + NOS)
Jari – 12.36 @ 118mph (Bosch)
Nigel – 12.38 @ 115mph (Bosch)
Westcoupe – 12.5 @ 120mph (Bosch)
Eldinho – 12.6 @ 113mph (Bosch)
Markus – 12.7 @ 112mph (Bosch + NOS)

We can all debate dyno figures until the cows come home, but what you can’t do is debate pure hard times as achieved on the tarmac! I have also done many airfield days and mile drag races as my Youtube videos show, and of course countless track days… as they say the proof is in the pudding and these cars have proven it over and over and over. Only recently at the Donington track day I flew past an RX7 not obviously knowing what his power output was. Later that day Marco spoke to him where he revealed his rex had 430bhp, yet he said I went past him as if he had the handbrake on! I was only running 1.4bar

We also have two fantastic 2.4 conversions running via the Bosch management now, Taz (2years) and Barbz more recently. Speaking to Barbz just this morning, he especially commented on how great the car was to drive every day around town, and the fuel economy was as good as his 1.8 car, that’s with 720cc injectors and no problems to pass the MOT emissions. Of course it’s also now the most powerful 2.4 he has built, and is certainly the quickest according to his brother! I think Taz is looking into some further upgrades

The Bosch ECUs are very sophisticated, they have to be to work in all conditions around the world. Whenever you see a 600bhp AMG Merc, 500bhp BMW Alpina, 700bhp Porsche Ruf, 800bhp Novitec Turbo Ferrari… all these tuners rely on the factory management system to make their cars as perfect, fast and reliable as possible, there is no substitute. A 500bhp Fiat Coupe is certainly no different.

I know you have had a lot of problems John, three engine builds due to low oil pressure, a slipping/contaminated clutch, multiple blown diffs, boost leaks/control issues, manifold/surge issues, brake issues, wiring problems, rocker cover oil leaks, water in the ecu… that would drive anyone up the wall. However, whoever says air flow meters or safety features are holding back your engine, well I would say they actually help hold your engine together! I can’t imagine Ferrari or Porsche limiting their engines with "safety features" or any other manufacturer, as alluded to above. As you also mentioned, your local tuner said your fueling was the most perfect he had seen for such a high power car and he could spend two weeks and still not get it as good as that… well that was a nice compliment. A different ecu cannot improve on that, or any other parameter be it boost, ignition, VVT.

Anyway, that’s coming from someone who knows these cars and ecus pretty darn well. It’s a real shame you have had a hard time with it all, I’ve had my fair share over the years with mechanical failures, but I just hope you find what you are looking for as despite your problems, you are very much the exception to the rule.

???? I've got an OMEX 710 in my car right now and always had since the day I fitted mine and Squids. I run a megasquirt ECU on an Audi 20VT engine in a test cell. I'm testing firmware and software and might consider changing my 710 to megasquirt or something else later in the year.

My OMEX is good as gold no real reason for a change just fancy learning an new software

.

Failures i can cope with as i can sort that,but why am i the exception to the rule.
Im well out of pocket with the mapping and its not a nice car to drive.???
I dont want to shell out £1500 on management but the car isnt drivable.
And im not going down to Bristol yet again to have the same results on the way home.

Why dont you try someone else that can map the standard ecu?

Ross

The standard ECU imo is not capable of accurately running my power for prolonged periods.

Ahem, Ahem!

You forgot to mention the biggest contributing factor.... 5 out of the 8 coupe's are running TI engine platform's

Flea – 11.9 @ 121mph (Bosch)
Mavric – 11.9 @ 121mph (Motec)
Barbz – 12.35 @ 121mph (Motec + NOS)
Jari – 12.36 @ 118mph (Bosch)
Nigel – 12.38 @ 115mph (Bosch}
Westcoupe – 12.5 @ 120mph (Bosch)
Eldinho – 12.6 @ 113mph (Bosch
Markus – 12.7 @ 112mph (Bosch + NOS)

When I looked into a stand alone ECU I spoke to a lot of people, and concluded that an Omex 710 would have been the one for the 5 cylinder engine.

This was before Flea could map the stock ECU, A cheaper option for you would be a unichip piggyback ecu - I ran one for ages with no issues (though just under 350 bhp rather than over 400!)

Would that be the same one i repaired with a cracked piston not long ago Simon .

Seriously though,
Dyno run at 410 bhp @1.65 bar
Watch this space.
Standalone ecu replaced in next few weeks,and results i will post here for comparison.

It ran well while the unichip was on the car.....it was well after it was removed.

Have you still got the Rx mate?

yep - it's going very well at the moment on the single turbo.

What's a ti engine platform?

torque italia..
barbz built them and most of the other quick ones.. if he didn't build them they have a head,turbo,sip or at least something he has designed/made/built..he has also built the first 2.4 i think.. built all the 2.4s in uk so far ,sold the kits worldwide (though now, as is usually the case, people see what he has done and copy it) and basically single handedly took coupe tuning from a couple of basic mods to where it is now..he was building 500bhp+ cars 6 or 7 years ago before he left for dubia..now he is back he has just built probably the fastest coupe in uk and when mapped next week another which will likely be the fastest in the world..
as you can tell i am a barbz fan/groupie and have his name tatooed across my breasts

barbz does that get something off the bill?

forum disclaimer

before anyone takes it all seriously and gets the hump i know he didn't build every one and there maybe a couple of cars with nothing of his on

I should mention that John and I are still friends, and should he choose to go standalone he still won’t be as fast as me on track

Obviously my concerns with a thread like this is that misinformation and hearsay dictate the general consensus and knowledge regarding ecus, especially the factory Bosch system. The reason why your car is the exception John is simply that, these problems are unique to your car and are in no way correlated to the ecu. You have to remember these are logical systems, in short they either work or they don’t. The ecu doesn’t determine that it likes one car but not another, therefore what is good for the goose is good for the gander. We have many 20vts running without problem day in day out, and these are with similar or more power than your car. It would be a bit like saying you can’t rebuild a 20vt engine because it will suffer from low oil pressure. John’s engine has been rebuilt three times and most recently with a new crank and oil pump, but still the oil pressure is very low. Of course we know this is not the case for 99% of other Coupes which have good oil pressure after a rebuild, but for whatever reasons his engine is proving troublesome. The trick is to find out why!

In the early days of Coupe mapping there was another respected tuner who purchased some very expensive commercial software/hardware in order to allow him to tune the 20vt. Anyway, he mapped quite a few Coupes and subsequently determined that you could not possibly go bigger than 400-420cc injectors and even then that was with them idling pig rich, anything more and they couldn’t be controlled! Was he right? Hell no, here we are today running 720cc injectors and passing MOT emissions with better than factory fuel economy! The problem was that despite being a very prolific Jap car tuner with standalone managements, he simply didn’t have enough knowledge about the very complex Bosch ecu. When you make statements about something technical, you should do so from a position of knowledge and experience, otherwise it is misguided opinion. I can say now that we can go bigger than 720cc (equivalent to 900cc on a 4 pot), whether we will need to is another matter as these can flow enough for 600bhp. @ TurboJ, I think you need to change “The Knowledge” post as the injectors advice is way out of date

On a slightly different note regarding the 16vt ecu, it has been mentioned/questioned a couple of times (and most recently to me today) on whether there are enough breakpoints in the Marelli ecu for accurate tuning. Well the simple answer is yes there are, despite there being “only” 16, this is more than adequate for very high powered cars with no issues whatsoever. To date the highest powered Marelli car I have tuned is a Sierra Cosworth at 440bhp & 400lbs/ft. I did this last year and he will be coming back for an update as he has subsequently upgraded the car in pursuit of more power! The 16vt is no different, and I have seen over 360bhp with this engine tuned from 1bar all the way to 1.7bar, and I will say it now, that map was perfection! Of course, for the doubting Thomases amomgst us, well Ferrari tuned their F40 to 480bhp with the very same Marelli ecu and just 16 breakpoints

As many who have met me will know, I have a very pragmatic approach to tuning. There is a reason why I can tune someone’s car on the other side of the world very accurately like Hani in Qatar or Jari in Finland (460bhp!!). To date I have tuned cars in 38 countries, some with no more than a basic chip, others to a very high power. These are logical systems, they are proven, and ultimately should not be open to conjecture.

epic thread!

How is this done Flea? By correcting the current maps based on rolling road graphs/wideband lambda readings etc?

Ross

I'm using a Gotech Pro-X ecu on mine
http://www.gotech.co.za/productprox.html

it only coughed into life last night, and needs to be set up before we send it to be mapped, but I'll report back on how it works

Amen,and(no disrespect) the 16vt management has been taken MUCH further by others as well.most of the people i hear blaming an ecu and advising buying a newer "race" ecu are being paid to do so.

Just re-read that. Not wanting all your magical tricks out in the open, just want to know if its based on customer feedback, that the changes are made.

Ross

its usually done with a good idea of whats needed in the first place then tweaked using datalogging for reference.

No you are right, there are/were some very powerful 16vt engines out there, unfortunately these days this engine is very much in the Autumn of it's life so they are few and far between.






Yes it does require customer feedback, coupled with extensive experience and the all seeing eye/ear! Obviously I would prefer to see any car for live tuning, but for those that can't come to me, especially overseas, well it's the next best thing. Last year at Spa there were three French Coupes (380-420bhp) flying round with my maps that I had never set eyes on before! If you are interested send me a PM

oh,i didnt mean on coupe 16vt engines,just the management on other cars(cosworths,f40s etc),but theres a few out there coupe wise,i run one of your chips currently and am very impressed

On driving the car hard on boost with the oscilliscope connected on live date the ecu randomly shuts down 2 cylinders.
Around 5k this flatlines on boost @1.45bar.
This has all been recorded.
The feed and the earth are still live.

So theres an open circuit instead of the pulse earth.
Wait 5 minutes.Go again and it shuts down another cylinder on hard boost.
This is controlled by the ecu not oil pressure.

So in this case im going elsewhere for better results rather than excuses.

Moderator: no racing posts please





its been tuned be kream development and is running 580bhp "supposingly" and i honestly thought there was no way in hell his coupe would even keep up with it! total shock and iv got the video for proof

flea.........not too bad mate!

Is that your mate with the Blue 420bhp?

I'm not sure what you mean by a 'live earth' but it seems to me that you have a problem with the electronics - or the 'hardware' - of the ECU. This is quite different from a problem with the mapping, which is 'software'.

True, but they are using 2 ecu's to control each bank, so only 240bhp per 4 cylinders

Is it the original ECU to the car John ? If it is, maybe give another coupe ECU a chance in the car. I am sure it's not a big or expensive job to try that out.
Or am i blowing from my bottom ?

true but i know of a couple of 700bhp escorts running p8

no,sounds like a MUCH cheaper option,ecu could have a fault,so all the mapping in the world wont help.

i was going to suggest but thought

a) it must have been tried, or
b) it's far too simple a solution, or
c) i'm too thick to grasp most of what the hell you're all on about

i settled on c)

laymans questions...
does this ecu have limits?
will they be reached by highly tuned cars?
could this be the case with johns(reaching some sort of limit)?..
are we talking from a perspective of knowing all the maps and codes therefore being able to say for certain john you have got an ecu issue not a softwear one?
or could it be that if all is not understood fully his car could be throwing up some fault/limit code as yet unable to be interpreted (software)?
could it be due to pushing the limits of this systems unknown(un read/uninterpreted) parameters or causing an issue in an unknown one?

I would say that if there are any limits, as Flea has surpassed the power output of this vehicle with other cars, he would know if that was an issue......

One thing that did occur to me, is what the OEM software does when it detects low oil pressure? I would expect it to do something to protect the engine from destroying itself.......

It does absolutely nothing; and for good reasons.

First, it doesn't know; there's no input from the oil pressure sensor or switch to the ECU.

Second, if it were to see - for example - a short term low pressure caused by, say, oil moving in the sump during hard cornering, it would be in the invidious position of damned if it did and damned if it didn't. If it stopped the engine, there's a significant chance of dumping the car in the nearest hedge...

An input which inhibited *starting* the engine until sufficient oil pressure had been reached would be beneficial - I think Jaguar did this some years ago - but it should never stop the engine if it's running.

You have taken my wording the wrong way.
With 2 lives it obviously wouldnt start not to mention the car would catch fire.

You have a permanent earth,which i have bypassed and made direct to the chassis then battery to rule out brittle wiring to the coil packs.At first the voltage dropped to as low as 7 volts on full boost.
So the earth was altered to allow a constant 14.5 volts on hard boost.

You then have an ignition 12v which reads on a voltage check on the oscilloscope 14.3 volts when the relative voltage is 14.5-6.
So nothing to worry about
The third wire is a pulse earth from the ecu.Almost impossible to meter unless using a laptop and oscilloscope.
This is where my issue lies,and its clear as day that at random the pulse earth is being lost.
Theres less than .001 Ohms resistance in the wiring.

Theres nothing wrong with the electrics,the issue is what i have mentioned above.
This is the 3rd stock ecu i have tried,3rd lot of coils,2 types of plugs,5 times i have done a boost leak test,4 comp tests and 2 leak tests,all the plenum donuts are new the afm voltage reads correctly as does all the other live data.
I have even checked the live data of mine to another coupe running the same power and similar setup and there near identical on the oscilloscope.
Theres no issues what so ever with the car.

As for oil pressure its fine and holds over 2 bar all day long.The issues with the oil pressure are with increasing oil temps on the track which drops the pressure to around .5bar hence why the shell clearances are being checked and a new uprated cooler is being fitted.

I spent 7 years working for Peugeot and 3 years as a Mastertech working solely on electrics.
I worked from a dealer but was also active at the factory in Coventry,.
I used to work on all sorts of faults which defied belief.
Anything from pumps injecting 1600 bar on idle to rear wipers activating during driving.
They were some seriously complicated multiplexed electrics that used 2 wires with a digital signal.
But then changed during the same model.So they were different by a build code.
Coupe electrics are very straightforward,and on the whole very reliable.
The design offers durability and reliability.
As above my issues may be exclusive to my car but all cars are different hence the live map.
Similarities are few and far between even on identical cars.
Each responds differently to mapping.
My motivation here is not to undermine or criticize but to sort an issue that no one seems to be able to get to the bottom of.
I want to reach the potential the car has to offer without the gremlins that it brings.
For me losing the Maf is a bonus as its a huge restriction to modifying both in its capabilities and its inaccuracies between intake and manifold.

JBT - nobody is going to argue that you're clearly having ignition-related problems. To have a couple of cylinders shut down on boost is a severe symptom, especially when its a different couple of cylinders the next time.

However, I'm struggling to believe its the mapping. As you know, I've been running a Flea map for ages now - I was one of the first. Leighton definitely struggled at first with getting my car just right, but he persevered and eventually, it got to 99% correct (the transition from dead throttle to a tiny bit of throttle is still a bit sudden for my liking, but Leighton can't make it any softer and I can live with it).

My point however, is that Leighton hasn't touched it for a couple of years now - I haven't changed anything, so there's no need for it to be mapped - I reckon the engine has done 50,000 miles since he last worked on the ECU and its well over 100,000 since he first started playing with it.

I think you may have coil issues - when I was trying to run a big plug gap, I was getting random misfires on one or two cylinders - it was never the same cylinder twice running - just completely random. We proved the issue by running a small plug gap for a while (0.6mm) - it dropped the power quite noticeably (smaller spark, less burn) but the misfire went away completely. The other thing that contributed was the wiring loom. The copper had broken down and was causing resistance issues - I spliced in a new loom and the misfire never came back, even when I opened the plug gap back up to 0.75mm

Another small mod that I'm convinced made a difference was the doubling of the earth leads from the block to the chassis, and the chassis to the battery. I left the standard cables in place and ran a fatter cable from the gearbox to the chassis leg and another one from the chassis leg to the battery. It might have been a placebo effect, but I'm convinced it ran a bit smoother afterwards

And just a final thought - have you considered trying you engine in a different chassis? My rusty old Sprinty as plenty quick enough, but when all the bits were transferred into my lovely Moonie, I'm sure it went quicker. I wonder if the conductivity of the chassis changes as it gets older and rustier - you never know....

Good luck anyway - don't give up

Nigel,the post above states i have done all the above mate.

And dont worry i wont give up.

Do you have a current dyno graph? What happens at 5k when it runs ok, is is there a steep increase in power?

Does it do it at even low boost settings?

You didn't mention it above, but have you checked/swapped the cam sensor?

Having done a quick read-up on your ECU, the spark system relies on the cam sensor to decide which plug to fire. Without that signal I am guessing you won't get a spark.....

Erm.... I thought you were talking about the fault condition. But how would it catch fire?

I would say that if there are any limits, as Flea has surpassed the power output of this vehicle with other cars, he would know if that was an issue......

thats not quite true in so much as johns first run was 480bhp with a badly slipping clutch the cars potential is to be well over 500bhp and correct me if i am wrong has flea mapped 2l to more than this?

there are also other big power cars with misfires, though i cant say if they are the same.maybe the owners will join the thread? barbz had the same as johns but lieghton was able to cure it on barbz ..also the fact he has cured the misfire for a while only for it to reocurr lends wieght to it being a mapping issue if you look at that fact from a purely objective perspective..

I had a misfire problem for a long time which couldn't be traced - tried changing absolutely everything. Still not exactly what the issue was but sen the ecu off to flea for.fixing and now all sorted.

I'm sure he's done the same work on your car so.its a.shame your still having problems.

That maybe true and you have done well to make bigger injectors work but you still have a grey area when re-scaling the AFM at certain boost levels so not 100% just yet.

JBT, I'm confused with your description 'pulse earth' - can you be more specific? What are you losing - injectors or sparks?

i think he is losing spark!

JBT - off topic, did you go to Em-tech in nott's to do your course?

i think we have done the same pug course!!

any way back on topic...

Do the stock engine mounts act as an earth in any way? Just wondered if the Vibra-Technics mounts may be reducing the earth path

Its the pulse earth from the ecu to the coil packs.
This is random and irregular throughout the misfire.

Strangely enough if i pull over and stop the car,wait a few minutes and then retry, the earth then breaks to 2 other separate coils.

On the road,it gets worse the higher gear your in to the point where it wont even spool up in 4th.
Yes on the rollers it will boost but then flat-line at a specific rpm.

I've also just thought - if the ECU is shutting down a couple of cylinders (either by spark or by injector) then the ECU must be receiving a signal that it's interpreting as a reason to shut something down. IIRC, the work that Leighton does concerns the fuel and ignition maps - I rather doubt that he will be interfering with in-built safety systems

So - we have to possible causes

1) A component failure that is directly causing the sparks or the injectors to go down

2) A component failure that's telling the ECU to shut down the sparks or the injectors

Have you considered the knock sensors? I remember being told that they are a bit sensitive on the 20vt - I suppose this is where a map COULD be the culprit - if Leighton has given it a bit too much ignition advance, the knock sensor could be telling the ECU to intervene. However, I always thought the knock sensors simply retarded the ignition, rather than shut it down

we'll get there...

your pulse earth description really is pointing to a wiring issue or a coil over-load

Have you considered going for a better coil? The stock items are right on their limits at the kind of power we're producing. When I tried running at 2 bar, I was always blowing the spark out and had to back the plug gap right down

I replaced both the knock sensors and the crank sensor a few months back as this did cross my mind.
i also used OE Fiat parts following an issue with a NG crank sensor.
But that was good thinking Nigel as no one has suggested that yet.

As much as we can compare these cars,no one currently runs the same setup as me.
The power delivery as you can tell from my multiple gearbox failures is so violent and instant.
Even the apexi wont control the boost under 1.3.
With the apexi off it will still spike to 1.3 when in theory the actuator is 1 bar.
So not sure if this power delivery is a contributing factor.

With my electron pusher's (and programmer's) hat on, I can't see a failure mode that will cause intermittent failure of a simple transistor switch on multiple ECUs.

And yet - I can't find anything in the ECU description which suggests it does other than control revs by inhibiting the *injectors*, not the sparks.

I'm sure you've checked for it, but the only thing I can think of that would give that effect on a scope is the spark coils breaking down; if they go open circuit you could see anything on the groundy side from self inductance.

I'm sure that the power delivery is a contributing factor. have you looked into an ignition amp? these are used on all the big power jap cars:

http://www.nengun.com/hks/twin-power

You may have trouble getting one to work with the 5 cl engine though.... would need to be looked into.

ignition amps have been tried and didn't work..theres been 2 very competent people going over every possible thing it could be from uprated motorsport coil packs to ignition amps and testing every possibility and every part replacing everything more than once ..although everyone has ideas what it may be,you can be sure its been tried before getting to a point where john has had enough..the point really is that the type of cars pushing 500+ throw up so many different issues and power comes on so brutally on some that it really is unchartered teritory ..having to manufacture bigger and bigger maf housings, massive injectors etc and alter the timing to the degrees these cars need along with the amount of gasses flowing and all the other parameters like more air... more everything...is it not so that it is more likely than not that there will be issues as yet not seen on the likes of nigels which is a pretty straight forward set up with progressive power and a medium sized turbo?
pushing the boundries of any machine or system shows its weak points and issues up..there is no question about fleas competence and abilities but there was always going to come a point when the ecu became an issue and threw something up that unless every code and feature was fully understood couldn't easily be sorted
or am i talking sh1t again? it seems pretty likely to me it was always going to happen at some point

can someone answer this question ...has anyone yet cracked that ecu completely? is it an open book or are we playing with just the few bits of it we have managed to decode?

if as i suspect we know only part of whats going on then i am suprised there has not been more issues

as i have mentioned i have been told by a few people with experience that it becomes a problem for the real big power cars..they were not saying you could not get the fuelling oor ignition etc right but that the standard ecu threw up too many issues on these cars that were too much of a problem to easily iron out so they went to standalone getting rid or the maf for a map set up and a system where evrything could be seen ,read and altered ..the fact is they work and work well..the real proof that this is right or wrong is for john to go standalone and see if its all straight forward and easily mapped..

and pray it was the ecu all along.....

Suba,cdi systems may be worth trying,in all fairness i have come to the end of my knowledge as far as the car goes.
What happens internal to the Bosch ecu is way out of my experience.
But i think i have written out everything so far.
Barnacle,i by passed the coils by using the Bmw 330 coils.
These fitted perfect and had the same internal .01 resistance on the earth trigger side.
With the coils held next to the original ones i found the spark to be more intense on the Bmw coils.
However i had to gap these right down to 0.5 on the Ngk's to be able to hold the boost consistently.
But still after 5-10 mins the 1.6 setting would induce the ignition misfire.

The weird thing was that it bought up a crank sensor fault at low revs.
So something in the ecu didnt like the coils.However they held upto 1.8 bar briefly before the issue.

As far as cdi systems go,there as costly as a stand alone and imo i dont think the ecu is capable of holding such boost.The stand alone has built in ignition amplifiers.,

I have even tried going up the revs slowly,so 5-6-7k then applying full throttle and the effect is still the same.
Unusual one


Great point Rob,behind the scenes with this problem theres some very experienced people who know the product very well and we have all being trying to sort this.
In my case its ok to generalize but i am not running anywhere near the same setup as another coupe.
Similar in cases but again not identical.

Theres a load of people that have been contacting me for the last 4-5 months keen to see my solution to this problem knowing all along that at best my car is underpowered and at worst its unreliable.

you can get hold of 2nd hand Hks twin sparks for a few hundred quid - no idea if they will work on the 5 pot though. If you want to try one I have a harness / loom for one that you can try - though this may be specific to a rotary...

I appreciate the offer Simon,but i ordered the stand alone on Friday,
So as soon as i have the car back i will wire up the new unit and post the results.

Suba, these ignition amps have been tried with someone with exactly the same misfire and it didn't work...thoough funnily enough Flea cured the misfire on that car even though it had exactly the same symptoms as Johns.

I'm not sure that statement is correct - IIRC, the ECU doesn't ever get to know what the boost is

If the BMW coils temporarily solved the problem, then I'd say you've found the most likely source of the issues. It would seem that you're experiencing the same problems that I had for quite a while when Perfect Touch were trying to get my car past 400bhp. On more than one occasion, I've had to leave my car with them, due to a complete breakdown of all five coils while on the dyno. New coils (and a reduced plug gap) sorted it, but the misfire came back eventually

Thinking about it, a BMW 330 coil would be no more powerful than a Coupe coil - the fatter spark was probably down to the relative age of the BMW coil

Speak to Barbz - pretty sure he's looked into direct replacement coils

I think you are correct. There is no sensor to tell the ECU what the boost pressure is. The ECU does control the Pierburg valve, so with the right values in the map (i.e. Pierburg not bleeding off pressure from the wastegate actuator at any time) the turbo will run uncontrolled and produce the maximum it is capable off.

Its not the fact the the ecu is sensing the boost, its more likely that will high levels of boost there more volume of air/fuel going into the cylinder resulting in a higher pressure in the combustion chamber when compressed. This higher pressure requires more power for a good spark, or if its not available a poor or no spark is produced

I have spoken to and seen Barbz and theres something in the pipeline for the future weeks.
What i do know is 3 people running good power have seen identical high boost misfire issues that were cured by the update of the ecu.
In my case it did the same for some time but then it came back.

I have no idea if the ecu can monitor boost,in theory it doesnt.
But the boost will determine quicker spool up and more rapid pulsing of the coils.
The BMW coils caused more issues that they solved.The temp cure of boost lasted 2-3 hard runs on high boost followed by some weird remote faults.

One thing someone has pm'd me about from abroad who had a similar fault is the biometric sensor that monitors the ambient temps.
My equipment doesnt have a parameter to monitor this in live data.
And it has never been replaced or touched.
I would think this would cause a fueling issue which as said above the fueling is perfect,even with the misfire present.

I think that the internal ignition amplifiers in the ecu are incapable of supporting the charge thats required for the sudden advance.
Or they are assuming the coils are at fault so are shutting them down.
Again dont quote me on this as the ecu complexities are new to me on this.So assume this may not be the case.

Starting at the bottom:

- the ECU performs no monitoring on the state of the ignition coils; it just provides a ground and lets the coil get on with it. If it doesn't spark, it will show as a rich mix at the lambda sensor which will probably be ignored as you're likely to be on full boost - i.e. mapped, not calculated.

- The ignition amplifiers in the ECU are darlington (high gain) transistors and while they won't be particularly high speed, even at full speed, they are switching at only 60Hz or so. When the coil is driven low, energy is stored in the inductor of the coil; when the input is released, the flyback voltage gives the spark. They're not being stressed; the limiting factor is the actual voltage generated by the *coil* and the plasma breakdown resistance in the cylinder.

- There is no ambient temperature sensor (except for the A/C) but there is a pressure sensor; it's on the back wall by the brake reservoir.

- The ECU can't monitor boost pressure; it has no sensor. But it can keep an eye on the rate of change of revs, and of the engine load. I believe that this is how things are slowed down in a standard model in the lower gears - but it will do it by bleeding pressure to the wastegate, not dropping sparks. I don't know if your chip has removed this functionality.

- All ECUs keep track of the position of the crank/cams by extrapolating a timer between pulses from a rotating sensor. In a *very* rapidly accelerating engine, it can happen that the reference changes faster than the ECU is expecting; this makes timing of phase-important things like the sparks slightly delayed, which is probably self-correcting. Injector timing doesn't matter particularly; the injector pulse is far longer than the opening time of the inlet valve at high load. But the change in timing doesn't make a significant difference to the operation of the spark coil; on a spark to spark basis the change is probably less than a millisecond.

It might be down to the algorithm in the crank sensor and how the Bosch ECU determines position. The cranks sensor is so sensitive that you can see the crankshaft slow down and speed up on the compression then firing stroke. You can clearly see this in the example below. It's an R6 engine we use for racing in a single seater formula:



Really the minimal trigger wheel for a race engine is 24-2 anything below this and the engine will blow up. (seriously we map engines to 0.1 degree of spark right on det, you have to or you won't make the power.) We do this in a test cell and the ECU is so accurate we can see the engine out of phase when the rubbers begin to wear on the dyno's drive shaft inputs. The ECU must perform all its calculations and inject the correct amount of fuel and spark at EXACTLY the right time. On a race engine you can tell if you change ECUs. You shouldn't be able to but seriously you can. The crank signal is the BOSS and a lot of effort goes into getting this correct. I now only work on motorsport ECU's because they are so far advanced in the right areas (performance).

Below is a statement from one of the ECU manufacturers we use:

"Our core business is race engine control. In a motorsport environment time is everything and everyone is under immense pressure. Within our ECU, the main function of the 450,000-gate APA450 ProASICPLUS FPGA is to derive engine position from the engine's crankshaft trigger wheel signal. The FPGA generates CPU interrupts based on abstract crankshaft angles, rather than the physical trigger wheel tooth positions used in traditional designs, providing increased flexibility and accuracy. ECUs commonly schedule fuel and ignition actions as timed future events based on engine operating conditions at the point the scheduling code is executed. Changes in operating conditions that occur before the event can result in angular errors, and the scheduling code is often highly dependent on the crankshaft trigger wheel tooth pattern for the engine in question. In our ECU, the ProASICPLUS FPGA allows the scheduling code to be independent of signal patterns. The FPGA can also schedule events and continue to tune placement by monitoring engine operating conditions until the event occurs. This increases code efficiency and flexibility and improves control accuracy under dynamic conditions."

This sensor is so important yet people underestimate it and assume that it's just a crank sensor (don't worry i did too until about 3 years ago). The reality is get this algorithm wrong and you will encounter all sorts of control issues at some point. This might be the underlying issue of the Bosch ECU but then again it might not. The raw truth is that it will only be proved if you understand how the Bosch system FULLY works in other words fully dissemble the code and UNDERSTAND its limits.

John, When you change your ECU IF your problems disappears then consider the above statement as gospel. Good luck and keep us all updated.

Just to add,
This thread has gone a bit off track.

This is in no way an issue with Flea or Fc Performance this is my frustrations with an on going issue.
My car and its build like any have caused complications.Not many have straightforward runs in tuning despite technical ability or experience.

My car has been faultless at lower boost and still beat some bloody quick cars round the track including Fleas monster
The few times i took my car to Flea i had a engine with bad oil pressure.
The second i used a clutch that i knew was being put through more torque than it was ever designed to cope with.

I have also had issues with ecu failures,surging due to a manifold i fitted and a weak actuator.
Again nothing directly down to the map or ecu but remote faults.
My original post was to question the reliability of the stand alones and there issues.

So far lets not forget that Flea is the most famous direct ecu tuner on the coupes both in the Uk and abroad.
To date not one engine has failed as a direct result of his actions.

In my case i wanted to explore the pros and cons for stand alone as Flea isnt 10 mins away.And although anyone can sympathize with the distance issue its not a problem caused by him.
I have used him several times,and have used him directly to tune most of the cars i have built for customers.

My frustrations and impatience are my issues and shouldnt be confused with the person at the end of the mapping.
The cause of my fault could and may be a direct result of something i have done or something thats failed on the car.


I have a few things to try in the next few weeks then i will drop the car down with Flea to see if we can bang our heads together and see what exactly is causing my issues.


So on that note,please lock the thread.

Personal attacks are NOT allowed on this forum!