3.0L MegaSquirt w/ EDIS, starts and idles... what next?

After four years, I've finally turned the key on my EFI conversion. This is based heavily on Josh's conversion (not to mention the various parts I got from him):

• 3.0L PRV from a 1989 Eagle Premier
• EDIS
• Motorcraft EE03A coil-on-plug
• Megasquirt II
• XRSE-C5B Injectors (I think that's 19 lbs/hr)
• TPS and MAP sensors installed
• LC-2 wideband O2 sensor
• Stock automatic transmission

I've been documenting this conversion with a decent amount of depth, all of which can be found here.

I'm using a tune I set up myself from the MS docs and specs I was able to find online. This is in part because I somehow didn't notice that people had posted their tunes here.

After cranking for a bit, the engine started, and stabilized in the 600-800 range for idle. To be honest, I was pretty surprised it started at all. It pretty much sat there as long as I didn't touch anything. However:

• The idle feels rough -- the entire car is rocking a bit as the engine idles. It's not clear to me what the problem is there, if a cylinder isn't firing, or what is going on. Although I get the impression that a cylinder not firing would be pretty obvious, I don't necessarily know what I"m looking for.
• The exhaust smells very rich (at least I think that smell is "rich"). The exhaust looks a bit white to me, but I'm not good at picking out exhaust colors (attempts at taking photos failed completely).
• I tried giving it some gas, and while it revved a little, it stalled soon after that. I'm not surprised by this, since the engine isn't even remotely tuned.
• When cranking, I'd hear a bang sometimes, like metal against sheet metal. I think this was the starter hitting the fly wheel as the engine tried to catch but couldn't quite do it, but still started turning faster than the starter, which caused the starter to smack into the tooth instead of meshing with it. Or something like that. I didn't hear this sound once the car was actually running, so it's probably just the starter.

The thing is, I'm not sure what exactly I should do next.

I did think to turn on logging for my second start, but I'm not really sure how to read the data so that I can make adjustments. These logs are attached along with my tune:

• Attachment 54778: Second start, includes cranking, idling and stalling
• Attachment 54779: Third start, begins when already idling, ends with stalling
• Attachment 54780

On another note, my attempt at a quiet exhaust isn't really very quiet. I used a sound meter on my phone, which isn't exactly a great test, but it showed ~72 dB with the engine off, and ~92 DB when I was standing next to the exhaust, and in the low 80s when I was about 10-15 feet behind the car. I'll have to do some more scientific tests with a calibrated meter later. Also, the car is in a garage, which is surely amplifying the sound a fair bit.


Here is a video of it running (11 seconds). It sounds rough to me, or at least it sounds more like an air compressor than a car engine, like it should be smoother-sounding:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFTM...ature=youtu.be

Thanks!

-- Joe

First of all, are you sure the wires are correct on the coil pack?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Independent of this I read your blog start to finish over the last two days. I was going to send you an e-mail saying how much I've enjoyed it, I've learned a ton already about all kinds of stuff (hey, Lowes rents trucks, who knew). But since you've posted this thread I'll just wave hello and watch for updates.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dn010

First of all, are you sure the wires are correct on the coil pack?

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I'm PRETTY sure they're hooked up correctly. The garage I rent to work on this is about 25 minutes away; I might be able to get some time to pop back there this afternoon and check just to be sure, but otherwise I can go tomorrow morning and look.

I made a fairly detailed wiring diagram based off of the one Josh provided me, mostly because I needed to wire up the DB37 connector, and because I wanted to make sure that I really understood where all the wires go. I've attached it as a PDF.

Attachment 54781

I'm using wasted spark here, which I guess is what most people do...?

Thanks

I mean, the spark wires from the coil packs, are you sure they're going to the correct plug? I screwed up my coil pack / plug wiring by thinking it was A-B-C on the coil pack - it is not so.

Try to use simultaneous setting instead of alternating for fuel under engine settings. It will lower the MS but you can try it like that (they fired simultaneous on the stock engine). You can also make a some small changes there (14.5, 14, 15 in the box) to see if that gets you to idle better, for now. Did you time it while cranking to make sure you don't need timing correction? Mine was off 3 degrees so it is good to check.

I am also running EDIS with MS3X quite successfully however I am running MAF based. Do you want a picture of the spark wires to compare?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dodint

Independent of this I read your blog start to finish over the last two days. I was going to send you an e-mail saying how much I've enjoyed it, I've learned a ton already about all kinds of stuff (hey, Lowes rents trucks, who knew). But since you've posted this thread I'll just wave hello and watch for updates.

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Thanks. Just be aware that I'm basically making everything up as I go along, and haven't actually done a lot of this stuff before, so you might want to check other sources. :)

I just added another posted to the blog about the initial tune setup, creating brackets, and a few other odds and ends. I think that catches it up to today, where I finally turned the key.

-- Joe

Absolutely. I was actually going to ask you what the formal title of the Monaco motor manual was so I could keep an eye out for it and get a copy of my own to do my own reading.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dn010

I mean, the spark wires from the coil packs, are you sure they're going to the correct plug? I screwed up my coil pack / plug wiring by thinking it was A-B-C on the coil pack - it is not so.

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I see, so I might have just plugged Coil A into Harness Connector B by mistake? I'll take a look when I run down to the garage again later today.

I sent the video to a mechanic friend of mine who has helped me in the past, and he immediately suggested it was way to rich (possibly due to my comments about the smell and the white smoke), and also thought that it's misfiring, and that it might be that the plugs aren't in the right order, just like you said.

Quote:

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Try to use simultaneous setting instead of alternating for fuel under engine settings. It will lower the MS but you can try it like that (they fired simultaneous on the stock engine). You can also make a some small changes there (14.5, 14, 15 in the box) to see if that gets you to idle better, for now.

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Cool. I saw something about simultaneous, although it also suggested that you need a new VE table? Easy enough to save a new tune file and try it out.

Quote:

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Did you time it while cranking to make sure you don't need timing correction? Mine was off 3 degrees so it is good to check.

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I did not try to time it yet; I wasn't sure if I should do that once it was idling already or not (that and I forgot my timing gun at home). What's the best way to time a coil-on-plug? Best I could find in my searches was to pull a coil and run a jumper from the end of the coil to the plug, and clip the timing light to that.

Quote:

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I am also running EDIS with MS3X quite successfully however I am running MAF based. Do you want a picture of the spark wires to compare?

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That would be great -- thanks!

-- Joe

Quote:

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Originally Posted by dodint

Absolutely. I was actually going to ask you what the formal title of the Monaco motor manual was so I could keep an eye out for it and get a copy of my own to do my own reading.

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I scanned all the manuals and OCR'ed them so they could be searched. You can find them here.

-- Joe

Great, thanks. I have most of the DMC stuff already from another source but didn't see the 3.0 manuals you uploaded. One of the few parts of your site I haven't perused yet. :thumbup2: