116 replies to this topic

[Bill USN-1]

I ran the radiator over flow hose to the thermostat housing.
The later 1275 housings have a small fitting next to the normal hose connection.

[fikus01]

my only concern was that once it gets up to tepmerature and under load, water shud flow up that overflow on the housing, into the radiator overflow cap but then it has nowhere to go unless you have a rad cap i havent seen before, it'll jsut fill up the cap and wont bleed water back in the top of the radiator!

[Bill USN-1]

Yep,
Actually it just comes out the top seal of the cap.

I'll eventually just cap the housing and run the overflow down the side of the radiator like normal.
Maybe a 16psi cap.

[fikus01]

hehe, sorry not doubting your knowledge, just thought it point it out, lol. we all could do with that second brain from time to time.

Edited by fikus01, 27 February 2007 - 08:11 PM.

[Bill USN-1]

Excellent!!!!

How did you get on with the stepper motor? I am nearing that point myself.

Well Sprox I can now report "Success"!!!

The IAC is working like it should.
I may have to tweak the throttle follower setting and the total quantity of steps but she resets to 145 steps when I shut down and provides a fast idle when cold that decreases with the rising temp.

When I goose the throttle the return to idle is a little slow for me. It will help with gear changes but may feel a little strange in city traffic.

So my last issue in completing the use of a GM 4cyl MPFI DIS sytem with a GM 8cyl TBI ECM all driving the Mini SPI system is to get the timing operating right.
It appears the timing signal from the ECM may be opposite polarity of DIS. I get max timing at idle.
So I am running in limphome timing mode right now and just set my max timing at 30°.
Base timing is 15°. Mid range kind of sucks since i can't tweak for map settings right now.
I'm thinking a simple switching transistor to invert the signal.....may work?
I really need to get a scope on it to look at the signal.

My first fuel check was 25mpg. Should do a lot better when I get the timing straightened out.

Edited by Bill USN-1, 11 March 2007 - 02:47 PM.

[Sprocket]

That really is good news.

Top man

I will have mine running on VEMS within the week, I hope

All I can say is you are the first to actualy do this with the stepper, so, top marks for making it work

[Bill USN-1]

That really is good news.

Top man

I will have mine running on VEMS within the week, I hope

All I can say is you are the first to actualy do this with the stepper, so, top marks for making it work

Well consider it a joint effort. It was your insight and link to the data on the 5th wire that allowed me to make the change.


:beers:

[nev_payne]

hey Bill you don't particularly know me well on the forum but I have been following this project very closely to give me some idea of what might happen to various MPis in the future. Do give us some video updates on idle and tick over it'll be nice to see the car in propper action - even if it is stationary tuning.

Thanks chappy and great work the pair of you!!

[Bill USN-1]

hey Bill you don't particularly know me well on the forum but I have been following this project very closely to give me some idea of what might happen to various MPis in the future. Do give us some video updates on idle and tick over it'll be nice to see the car in propper action - even if it is stationary tuning.

Thanks chappy and great work the pair of you!!

Will do.
I don't have a RR per say but I do have a G-tech accelerometer so If someone can give me a fairly close weight I can make a couple performance runs once my timing is all done.
Then I can give some calculated 0-60, 1/4 mile times and MPH as well as HP estimates.

Then we can start comparing timing specs!!

I have a lot of cleaning up to do now...we just had 5 days of rain and I found every leak in the mini. I also found out the A008's hydroplane pretty good on puddles!!

[Sprocket]

found out the A008's hydroplane pretty good on puddles!!

If you only had asked, i would have told you this

You need a set of the A032Rs

Grippiest tyre around thats still road leagal. Dont let the tread pattern fool you either in the wet.

[Bill USN-1]

If you only had asked, i would have told you this
You need a set of the A032Rs
Grippiest tyre around thats still road leagal. Dont let the tread pattern fool you either in the wet.

I think I will pull out my tire knife and add some grooves!!!


Well I did a little logging today.
Came up with a new timing table.
I started with one of the timing specs I got out of the TMF CD!!
Then I started smoothing and modifying it.

This is what it looks like now.

 minitiming1.jpg   98.56K   11 downloads
 minitiminggragh1.jpg   114.05K   4 downloads


In the cool evening air it was fine.
In the heat of the day today I had a slight ping at what so i pulled a little PE-power enrichment timing out.

Now for the initial performance numbers!!!

My G-tech logged a 18.21 sec 1/4 mile at 76.7mph

I then did a HP run but could only log 57HP on the road.

I took a couple videos and you can see the roads are not the smoothest for trying to hold a camera and drive at the same time.
I could only grab it after i was in 4th gear.
I did get it up to about 155KMH before having to hit the woe pedal!!!

But at least I have a baseline to work from and see what I can do.
I'm more interested in driveability then flat out 1/4 mile speed.

I still haven't hooked up my WideBand O2 sensor to really see where I'm at for AFR at what. Could be some more power there!!

I'll try to get the vids uploaded and linked.

Edited by Bill USN-1, 18 March 2007 - 01:20 PM.

[Sprocket]

Youre getting there bud

Im getting closer with mine as well. I need to buy another wideband lambda though as i had to use that on the wifes little car the other day. The engine loom I made up for the mini should plug straight onto the body loom. Its taken me almost a week to do it, and its been re hashed 3 times.

I am running Knock retard ignition control, Exhaust gas temp, Wide band Lambda and wasted spark ignition. There a lot of other things i need to sort out on the ECU such as shift light, aux outputs for the manifold heater and emissions purge solenoid. but im getting there.

Itching to get it done really, more so that you got yours running especialy with the stepper.

Dont supose you know which output phaze of the ECU coresponds to the pins on the stepper?? IE phase A B C D and pins on the stepper 1 2 3 4 ( coulor wire maybe).

Keep up the good work

I did find another document on using Unipolar motors in Bipolar configuration. It just doesnt seem to be that well documented in the first place when it is possible. The Meggasquirt forums dont say anything and makes me wonder what some people are actualy doing.

Edited by Mini Sprocket, 18 March 2007 - 01:44 PM.

[miniboo]

looks interesting...I really wish i could understand it all lol

[Bill USN-1]

As promised, here's the videos.
If your on dial up...sorry.

First one is on the first start up of the morning.
You can tell when I rev the cold motor that my IAC/throttle follower is a little slow so I may have to reduce my stepper counts.




The second video is on the road doing my 1/4 mile time run. There aren't many straight shots of road that I can start from a dead stop so I have to stop on the on ramp to the highway and hit go from there. So I lose some time there. I have no idea what other stock SPI's turn in the 1/4 mile so I have nothing to compare my 18.2sec to.



The third video is my HP run heading down the highway. I was able to get enough clear road to hit 155kmh and then had to slow down. I still need some more brake work. Even the cooper disc don't help much.

[Sprocket]

My 1400 SPi with a stage two head, Kent 274 cam, 3.7 diff, cat, in full road trim, and 200 miles on a new engine did the quarter at 17.5sec and 78mph trap speed. Part of that was down to C**p reaction times and lack of skill.

I'll let you know how i get on at Minis Vs Beetles easter week end with all my extra mods since then