Help needed

[Hafod]

Just finished the build of my 2.0 Zetec with Jenvey ITBs and Emerald ECU. Standard Raceline engine with just 30mins run time but the kit and engine was purchased in 2016. I purchased it just 1st week of Jan. 
 

Engine seems to run ok but was really Smokey to begin with. This morning took the car round the block for its first run and the engine ran ok in 1st gear, bad in 2nd, and wanting to stall in 3rd. Came to a steep hill, slowed down in 1st and it barely ran, popping and banging and wouldn’t go up the hill. Seems like fuel starvation. Later on took it for a longer run on the flat and after about 0.5 mile it was running really badly missing all the time and we had to push it up the last hill. 

 

The electric fuel pump seems to have a whine now so might be an issue with this. I guess the 1L of fuel that was in the car for a long time might have put some crap in the in line filter. Also not touched the fuel pressure regulator which I think is a standard one. 
 

Any ideas and does someone have a good road map for this engine. 
 

I was hoping to book the IVA tomorrow but need to get the engine running first. 
 

As always I really appreciate the support from the forum. 

[TableLeg]

Just for clarification, has the engine actually been mapped yet?

Are you running a Lambda sensor and if so, wideband or narrowband?

 

[Hafod]

Hi, running the map that was in the ecu, not not properly mapped. have 2 other maps on a memory stick named MOT and road but these were worse than the map already uploaded. Would not start on these maps. 

 

Have a lambda sensor in the exhaust  but not sure if it’s wide or narrow band, how can I tell?

[Hafod]

Lambda sensor is pretty sooty so not sure if this is normal, car was really smokey when first started. 
 

Lambda sensor has a part number M884P but not sure if it wide or narrow band. It has 4 wires. 

[TableLeg]

If you load up the Emerald software, have a look a look at the lambda setup and see if it has been set to wideband or narrowband.

 

I would suggest you don't drive it until you've had it properly mapped. You could destroy your engine. If you have one of the later Emerald ecus then you could at least self tune it to make some improvements over what you have but you need a wideband sensor for that. A narrowband will only help for idle control.

 

[corsechris]

Firstly, make sure there is plenty of fresh fuel in it.

 

Make sure you have performed the throttle pot calibration routine too.

 

If it was popping and banging it was probably rich, not lean TBH This might relate to it warming up and becoming increasingly over-rich as it warmed.

 

The base map for something like that should be pretty good, assuming it's the Emerald one. One thing that you MUST do though, is to calibrate the map to injector flow relationship. Basically, I'm saying that the map is probably the right 'shape', but the wrong size, you need to adjust the size to match your exact setup as you may have different injectors or different fuel pressure to that used to create the map you are using.

 

Using your base map, start and warm the engine to normal temperature. You may need to nurse it to achieve this. One bit is warmed up, go into the live adjustments page on the Emerald management software and start adjusting fuel until the engine tidies up. Don't save any changes, just apply an overall adjustment.

 

Once you have the engine basically idling OK-ish, ideally being able to monitor the Lambda as well, make a note of how big a correction has been made to the fuel. For example, map site says 20, you are operating at say -5  correction. This equates to a -25% adjustment. Go to the injector scaling page and note down the MSPB number. Calculate a new value based on this starting value plus or minus your correction value then put in the new MPSB. This re-scales the entire map by that amount in one go.  eg MSPB is 200, you applied a -25% correction to make it run better, new MSPB will be 150

 

Go back to the live page, zero out your adjustment then try it. This method will quickly get you to a reasonable situation but absolutely, you really need to get it properly mapped.

 

I've used the above method a number of times now with no problems. In fact, I ran a base map on the Zetec for quite a while before getting it mapped.

 

Even with a wideband lambda, there are limits to how effective it will be in the short term to sort out a fundamental error. It's not designed as a fully self-mapping system.

 

 

Ultimately though, best advice? Contact Emerald.

 

 

ETA  I should say, and this is not intended to sound bad...if you don't understand what all the above means, respectfully, you shouldn't be messing with it until you do or can find someone that does. It's way too easy to mess with these things and get incredibly frustrated as well as causing damage to the engine while doing it. 

 

 

[tex]

I know it sounds obvious but 1 litre of fuel? If you fill fuel through the lines and filter there's not much left. As it sloshes about your going to have starvation issues... Easy jobs first, stick a few gallons in... 👍 

[Hafod]

Thanks Corsechris, I will try this tomorrow.  The Ford injectors are fitted so they fit the original connector so the base map might be based on the Jenvey injectors. 
Thanks Phil