Started Tuning the Razor Kit.

[BRAD_PADGETT]

I followed Julio's directions to a T and addressed my last gremlin. I needed to check every vacuum line and zip tie every one except the one off the fuel pressure regulator. This does make a difference. I had a bad vacuum line to the three bar MAP. This is a bad situation because the MAP controls the Alky Controller.

I made two runs in second gear and got zero knock with 18 lbs boost on 93 octane.

Next three runs in third gear. No knock whatsoever on building speed. Only one false knock on a down shift into second gear.

Next- reconfirm my readings tomorrow night and if ok I am going to 19 lbs boost for a retest. Keep you posted. Brad

ad

 

[cool 84]

It's good to hear results, there's not much data these days with the hotairs. I bet you can get to 20psi on 93. I've managed 22psi on 91 octane in my dad's daily driver but I don't like pushing the limit on alky. It seems like it transitions from no knock to a lot of knock much faster than gas or race gas. We got 22psi with a little knock and then backed off to 20psi for daily driver trim. The car still made 420 something hp and just under 500lbs of torque in pure DD trim.

 

[cool 84]

I would also like to add just how nice Julio's kit is. Those that came along before the progressive kits came out can appreciate how easy the tuning is.

 

[SLOW_85]

Makes it alot easier.
I made my kit back in 1998 and just picked up a progressive controller.
Going to dual stage or just upgrade my old system.
I can only get 91 octane here now.

 

[BRAD_PADGETT]

Slow- I am using a Turbotweak chip designed for my car with a range of 91-93 octane. I get either 91-93 octane here-It doesn't matter in my case.

Back to the thread-I am at 18 lbs with no knock last I posted. The last remaining hookup on the Razor kit was a resistor between the boost gauge LED and the grey wire. Julio sent me this last week and I put it on tonight.
My cars performance was degraded because the resistor was needed for the Alky controller to work properly.

I made several runs tonight and all is great. The resistor changed the performance of the car alot. Next I will go two 19lbs. and retest. Keep you posted. Brad

P.S- I have concluded that an intercooler on a hot air is not necessary besides the piping looks awfully ugly. I do not drag race. IMO

 

[cool 84]

Slow- I am using a Turbotweak chip designed for my car with a range of 91-93 octane. I get either 91-93 octane here-It doesn't matter in my case.

Back to the thread-I am at 18 lbs with no knock last I posted. The last remaining hookup on the Razor kit was a resistor between the boost gauge LED and the grey wire. Julio sent me this last week and I put it on tonight.
My cars performance was degraded because the resistor was needed for the Alky controller to work properly.

I made several runs tonight and all is great. The resistor changed the performance of the car alot. Next I will go two 19lbs. and retest. Keep you posted. Brad

P.S- I have concluded that an intercooler on a hot air is not necessary besides the piping looks awfully ugly. I do not drag race. IMO

Alky is not a substitute for an intercooler. Alky plus an intercooler is great but if I had to choose one or the other, it would be an intercooler hands down.

 

[BRAD_PADGETT]

Cool- I disagree with your opinion because I have a different goal. In my case Alky does completly remove the need for an intercooler.

My goal is to build 20 lbs boost with no knock -check my mods. I am at 18 and climbing and my car is really kicking ass now. I have zero knock at 18.

I have been studing how to get my Hot Air up to speed since last August. I do not drag race but I want a toy which can go easily into the mid twelves. I am there.

My goal was to get 20 lbs boost on 91-93 octane. The only way to get there is an intercooler or Alky. Race gas is an alternative but is very costly.

I came to the conclusion that there are no after market intercoolers availabe and that I would need a custom built one. Too much money and labor because I am not a mechanic.

The Razor Alky kit gets me to my goal and I do not need an intercooler( this really made my trans guy happy). The Razor kit is a replacement for an intercooler for my needs and a myself a non-mechanic was able to install it.

I am going to turn up the boost one turn and go for a test. Brad

 

[Squid4life]

Brad, what kind of alcohol are you testing with? Sounds like you are making great progress! I went to start testing mine the other night, my tranny was getting weak and I lost second gear. Got it torn apart and found out everything was baked from slipping. It is now in for a total rebuild with all the goodies. :biggrin:

 

[BRAD_PADGETT]

Squid-I am testing with denatured alcohol just as Julio told me to do if methanol is not readily available. In my case it is a sixty mile roundtrip drive in order to get methanol. I will readily pay the higher price for alky until I can get there.

I have realized through great advice that every vacuum line must be zip tied and new rubber otherwise you will have problems-especially from the three bar MAP-This controls the Alky kit

I would fix all vacuum lines while you are getting the trans redone. I actually did this first-I am lucky that I live in IL and Jimmy does all GN's trans in the Chiicagoland area who really race.

I tested tonight and I am at 20lbs boost and zero knock on the Scanmaster as well as the Caspers knock gauge.

The car really is fast and flows great. I will keep you posted. Brad

 

[Squid4life]

20 PSI... WOW! I cannot wait. I ran 12.84 at 18 PSI with 10 degree of false KR. Can't imagine being able to run 20-25 psi.

 

[BRAD_PADGETT]

I will keep every informed as I slowly shorten the actuator one half turn at a time and numerous test runs. My goal is to safely determine where the boost creates real knock. Then I will back the boost one pound down and give Julio a call for the next step in tuning. Brad

 

[tenright]

Ok I am also tuning a PAC kit, I was fighting a high BLM issue..although it was not vacuum, looks like my chip is programmed for bigger injectors then I have. There is some controversy over my green stripes and what exactly they are. In order to bring my BLM's to 135 or so I have to set my FP to 45 line off, telling me the ECM is running it lean. With a new chip on order I continue with 135 blm, which is well within limits...

Also I can not stress enough what has been said in this post, zip tie every single vacuum line, and zip it tight. My car was idling a bit ruff, and just plain not acting right. I Zipped everything and she is smooth as glass. Pulling hard, and chirping my 295 50r 15's into 2nd and 3rd gear. So far so good at 18lbs boost...0 knock...she does seem to be flat from a WOT launch....But if I go to WOT while cruising she takes off like a bat out of hell....Since I just figured out the lean situation I will have to do a few launches to determine if it is still flat from a dead stop.

Razor- you told me about a relay my car might need, what should I be looking for as I get into boost exactly to determine if I need this relay??........

here are my #'s warm at idle

02- averages 750
BLM-135
INT-128
tps-44
iac-23
MAL-0
af-06

fp-45 line off

PAC is set to 5

Now the fun begins

 

[BRAD_PADGETT]

Tenright- I have the same problem about shifting from a dead start as if i were drag racing. There is not any even shift and the car balks. I have a new trans built by an expert 2004R guy here in the Chicagoland area(This guy is an expert.) who builds them for all the guys up here who really race. My trans is not an issue.

I have been testing as Julio said in second gear wind it out and check knock. Repeat in third gear while rolling and go. I am at 20 pounds boost and zero knock on both tests.

We do need to talk to Julio about our cars inability to shift under drag race type situations. I have scanmster numbers if you want them. Brad

 

[Jerryl]

....... Back to the thread-I am at 18 lbs with no knock last I posted. The last remaining hookup on the Razor kit was a resistor between the boost gauge LED and the grey wire. Julio sent me this last week and I put it on tonight.
My cars performance was degraded because the resistor was needed for the Alky controller to work properly. .......

Brad,
Can you post a pic? I have a hard time visualizing this. Is this something all the Hot Air PAC set-ups need?

 

[tenright]

I drove it quite a bit today farting around with FP and such trying to get the car to act right. I'm not entirely convinced my issues are in anyway from the alky. Which BTW I am running denatured alky. I think this is old school, for starters plug gap...I am pretty sure I gapped to a tight .032 as I read on this board somewhere. What I have feels like someone is pushing against the car. Like it's being held back. If this were a carburated V8 I would be looking at points timming and plug gap for such an issue. Since the timming is out of my control, and the car has no points, I may gap to 30 or even 28 and see how it runs.

I also noticed that while cruising along at 20mph (speed limit in my housing complex) it was having trouble figuring out what gear to be in. It was up and downshifting costantly, this I hope is my TV cable which I adjusted tonight and will give it a good long run in the morning.

BTW my new felpro pan gasket is weeping oil, so take razors advice and use the cork. I certainly will on the next oil change.

I am also back to 43lbs FP line off as the difference was minor at best with the higher FP. And the feeling of the car being held back was worse. Unfortunately this is also going to bring my BLM's up to 138 or so.

Status:18lbs of boost absolutely no knock readings at all, I am sure I could go well into the 20's before seeing knock but I am not going past 18 till the other 2 or three items are taken care of.

Last thought for tonight is maybe advancing the cam sensor a bit......

 

[tenright]

Trouble with the cars shift points,

TVCable fixed that altogether. Pulled it out, floored it, after it snapped back I pulled it out 3 notches, it snapped back, then 2, same thing, then 1 and it stayed. Good news is this also seems to have effected the idle somewhat. She is still a bit ruff, and has only a slight feeling of being held back, where prior to this is, it was as if someone where actually holding the car back, pushing against it so to speak. It was also having trouble trying to find the right gear at low speed cruising 20mph or so, that is also gone

FP and BLM

I adjusted the FP down to 43 line off and BLM's did not rise this time. Not sure why, I expected 138 and it is staying right at 135 at idle warm. Since this is the case I turned it down to 40 line off, because well....leaner is meaner As long as knock is not an issue, and BLM's stay low, the less fuel the better.

Time to tweak alky

From cruise speed it is fine, no real issues whatsoever. Gun it, boost builds quickly to 18lbs, alky comes on and away we go, however, I pulled into my daughters school parking lot to drop her off and saw that long empty stretch of pavement and thought hmmm...took the car all the way to one end. and from a stop..floored it, took a sec for boost to kick in (this is normal) and once it did she was lifting the front end, tearing down the lot, and trying to loose those massive rear tires on every shift. The look on my daughters face, (who BTW hates, and is embarrassed by "dad's" granpa car) was priceless. The problem came at the end. After I came off boost the car was stumbling, flooded with alky I'm sure. Easily fixed, needs less alky, so I have set the kit up to 6, which should advance the turn on point. If this doesn't help it from what I understand I will need to tweak it at the pump.

Conclusion:

The car not launching, (floor it and it goes nowhere) was apparently due to the TV Cable, that seems to be all but gone.

Still idling a bit ruffer then I would like, and has the slightest feeling of being held back, so I need to know what gap you are all using for you plugs as I am flat sure this will loosen the car up....

One more issue I need to address with the HOT air guys, there is a ticking sound from my passenger side, but it sounds like it is in the middle of the uppipe...since the header connects to the uppipe directly over that last cylinder I need to know if it is normal before I go tearing out the gasket.

I have Jay'sGN uppipe which has a briaded joint, and that is where I think it is comming from. So especially those with the stock braided pipe, is this normal...

 

[BRAD_PADGETT]

Tenright- I adjusted the TV cable and I have one more adjustment to make. The trans is really smoothing out now. I am still at 20lbs boost and no knock. I will finish up the TV cable tomorrow and continue raising boost. I have some numbers as to where my car is.

All are at idle-800 rpm, in gear and a hot motor.

o2-820
blm-127
int-127
tps-128
iac-29
mal-0
af-06
fp-46 off line

I also checked on your ticking noise. I have the stock braided uppipe(the one that does not have the steel pipe insert). I took a paper towel cardboard tube and listened to the uppipe. There is no ticking noise. I have sent you a PM. Brad

 

[tenright]

First thing I see is your TPS, that just can't be right...if it is it's way, way off. TPS should be 42-44.....IAC is also high....should be 20-25, both are very simple to adjust. You will need a multimeter to set the TPS. I don't think I would push anyfurther with boost till those #'s were right.

My status is waiting on Eric to send me a 93 octane chip I ordered Saturday, Also ordered some copper gaskets for my headers, I think...lemme rephrase that..I hope I have blown the felpro gasket out.....If the header is cracked I will scream bloody murder as it has less then 100 miles on it....and personally I would rather listen to my wife prattle on endlessly about how much time I spend on my car then replace that passenger side header.......

 

[BRAD_PADGETT]

Tenright- I will reset the TPS and IAC tomorrow. I will also finish up the TV cable as well. These settings were set before I zip tied the motor. Funny how they change.

I do have a pointer for you about the passenger side header. My mechanic removed the passenger side tire as well as the inner wheel fender when he put on my new heads as well as turbo. He attacked this problem from the side of the car. My mechanic is a client of mine and I happened to stop by while he was working on the car. Let me know if you would like to talk to him- he can save you alot of work. Brad

 

[tenright]

Actually there is no other way to go at that header. Unfortunately I cannot remove the fire wall, to much stuff on it. The biggest problem with it is torque on the header bolts. That is vitually impossible on all but 3 of the bolts. Have to guesstimate the rest....While I am in Chicago I will be looking into some torque wrench options so maybe I can get proper torque on some of the others....