FAST wideband o2 question

[Lonnie]

My wideband is not operating. It suddenly stopped. All connections were checked & seem to be clean & in good operating order.

The WB symbol is present on the main screen, but no correction will show & the actual o2 reading does not vary.


The values are as follows.
UEGOR(v) 3.08
UEGOS(v) 1.02 in red
UEGO 3.63

Does anyone have an idea of what to check wiring or voltage wise or does something indicate an o2 sensor failure? Not sure where to start.

 

[V6 Beast]

Just checking the obvious... but you didn't turn it off under closed looped parameters did ya.

Steve

 

[Lonnie]

It stopped on its own. The reading coming up in red indicates a problem with that value being out of acceptable range. I just need to know what is causing the problem or what to look for first. Craig where are you?

 

[norbs]

Looks like the sensor packed it in..mine went the same way overnight

 

[Lonnie]

Norbs,
Thanks for the help, but I was hoping for good news.

Now I have to throw another $400 of my Christmas money away. Any idea of the expected o2 life on pump fuel? Currently my o2 sensor cost per mile is almost double my gasoline costs.

 

[norbs]

From what i have researched the sensor is rated to 2500 hours on unleaded fuel and 250 hours on leaded fuel. If the sensor is unplugged and left in it will last shorter, oil contamination from bad turbos, sensor mounted before the turbo, sensor mounted upside down or more than 30 dergrees from vertical, antifreeze from a blown head gasket, all can shorten life quite a bit.

 

[bruce]

WB's deaths are in large part about particulate matter (oil and carbon fouling).
Chemical poisoning is another source, unleaded fuel, and silicone.

Lots of cold start routines seem to be awfully rich, couple that with a sensor still in warm up mode, and you'll shorten the life alot.

 

[norbs]

Would it be a good practice to leave the ignition on, for about 20 seconds then start the car when cold? I know i stated that you shouldn't leave the key on for a long peroid of time, but i don't think a minute or so is going to do damage?

 

[ijames]

You also have to worry about liquid water droplets from condensation on a cold start hitting an already warmed up sensor and cracking it, if you fully preheat the sensor before firing the engine and starting to warm up the exhaut pipes. Innovate recommends putting the sensor in the top of a horizontal pipe to avoid this; not sure where is best on an angled downpipe.

 

[bruce]

Originally posted by norbs
Would it be a good practice to leave the ignition on, for about 20 seconds then start the car when cold? I know i stated that you shouldn't leave the key on for a long peroid of time, but i don't think a minute or so is going to do damage?

Other then testing one, and trying to abuse it, I always give it 20 secs or so, to warm up.

And I have 10's of thousands of miles with them.

 

[bruce]

Originally posted by ijames
You also have to worry about liquid water droplets from condensation on a cold start hitting an already warmed up sensor and cracking it, if you fully preheat the sensor before firing the engine and starting to warm up the exhaut pipes. Innovate recommends putting the sensor in the top of a horizontal pipe to avoid this; not sure where is best on an angled downpipe.

It's condensation forming inside the sensor that's the problem.
It just needs mounted so the sensor is pointed slightly downhill.
The areas of large surface areas and condensation are all post O2 sensor, ie the cat and muffler, there's not alot of condensation taking place ahead of them from what I've seen.

Once you get to OBDII, then the post cat O2 does at times get dosed with condensation, but they go to great lenghts to heat it, and the exhaust as fast as possible.

 

[S10xGN]

Ruh-roh! I put my WB bung in so's the sensor body will be parallel to the ground - positioned at '3 o'clock' looking from the rear. Will I be doomed?

 

[ijames]

Russ, Innovate recommends between 10 and 2 o'clock. The bung we put on my friend's car (who I tune for), we put at just above horizontal since that's what fit, and mine won't be angled upwards much more than his, if any. So far so good. Bruce, I've seen an awful lot of water spitting out of the 3 bolt flange on my turbo, when that flange was warped some and leaked when cold, when I did a cold start. All that condensation had to happen in the exhaust manifolds and crossover and collector, and I'm sure soaks the stock O2 sensor each cold startup.

 

[bruce]

Originally posted by ijames
Bruce, I've seen an awful lot of water spitting out of the 3 bolt flange on my turbo, when that flange was warped some and leaked when cold, when I did a cold start. All that condensation had to happen in the exhaust manifolds and crossover and collector, and I'm sure soaks the stock O2 sensor each cold startup.

And the major reason there was that much air to allow for that much condensation was in fact due to the leak, IMO.
If the air had to enter at the tail pipe or thru the engine there'd have been much less moisture in the air by the time it got to the manifolds.

 

[ijames]

No, the water is the water produced by combustion not water from outside air. Remember you get several times more volume of room temperature liquid water than a given volume of liquid gasoline when it's burned. It leaves the combustion chamber as steam and then condenses in the exhaust system when it's cold and stays steam all the way out the end once the pipes warm up. The water was blowing out of the leaky flange because of the pressure inside the pipe; the system was not sucking in outside air, condensing water out of it, and then blowing the water back out the same leak it sucked the air in through.

 

[lwcato]

Dangit,

This is not what I wanted to read. Just got the ecu, and edist back in the car. fired it up, and have the exact same symptoms as posted here. Zero fluctuation in my o2 sensor voltage readings.

 

[bruce]

Originally posted by ijames
No, the water is the water produced by combustion not water from outside air. Remember you get several times more volume of room temperature liquid water than a given volume of liquid gasoline when it's burned. It leaves the combustion chamber as steam and then condenses in the exhaust system when it's cold and stays steam all the way out the end once the pipes warm up. The water was blowing out of the leaky flange because of the pressure inside the pipe; the system was not sucking in outside air, condensing water out of it, and then blowing the water back out the same leak it sucked the air in through.

All I know is from actually running them in my truck and car full time for the last few years. Anything above horizontial, and behind were the converter was, has been trouble free. And on the truck it's been about 20K miles and at least that on the car. The only failure was leaving the sensor plugged in for 3 days, which killed the sensor since the Op-Amps went coco at the low voltage. The sensor in the car survived headgaskets once early on, and then oil contamination from losing part of a piston dome, and again a headgasket failure, when the engine finally went TU.
From the sounds of the complaints here, it's almost sound like they are all mounted wrong, or the heater in the controller might be off.
I will say the sensor in the car with all the abuse it's seen is slower to warm up. That might be a sign the innerds are slowly getting coated with contaiminents. When testing one of the aftermarket early production WBs they had the heater wrong and it killed the sensor after a rather short life, instantly and completely.

The whole trick with WBs is in the heater.

BTW, upon closer inspection, the NTKs have really small sampling holes in the open end of the sensor so it would be more of a problem with the condensation occuring inside the sensor that would be a problem, not from an external source, because the holes are so small and venting is so limited, IMO.

 

[tazgn]

Did replacing the sensor repair the original problems listed in this post? I have some other posts where mine is doing the same thing, and now the ECU isn't even recognizing the WBO2.

Derrick

 

[Lonnie]

I have not changed the sensor as of yet. My car is waiting for new heads, cam & more boost. The pile of parts by the car is growing & no time to work on it. After everything is installed, I'll fire it & burn off the coolant & silicone etc. before it gets a new o2. Then I'll start tuning.

I was hoping from all the various posts on this similar topic, that someone could post the values to check for proper operation or at least some diagnostic procedure. I hate to buy a $400 o2 just to find out the o2 circuit is bad, or to send the computer back for testing needlessly.

Help us out Craig......

 

[bruce]

Originally posted by ijames
No, the water is the water produced by combustion not water from outside air. Remember you get several times more volume of room temperature liquid water than a given volume of liquid gasoline when it's burned. It leaves the combustion chamber as steam and then condenses in the exhaust system when it's cold and stays steam all the way out the end once the pipes warm up. The water was blowing out of the leaky flange because of the pressure inside the pipe; the system was not sucking in outside air, condensing water out of it, and then blowing the water back out the same leak it sucked the air in through.

Then if this is a problem, why don't the oems fail all the time?. They have ALOT of surface area, and run WB Os pre and post converter. If mounted correctly O2 condensation shouldn't be a problem.