tmellott89

First off ill say I'm sorry b/c I'm not sure where this thread should belong.
Recently while trying to tune my car after putting in LC-2 wideband, Which had worked fine for just a little while that it was in (mabey 50 mile), I started getting very screwed up readings. I recalibrated twice and no luck, I was getting readings of in the 30's to 50's. I then called innovate about it and then gave me a test to do, with sensor out of exhaust hold butane lighter up to without lighting and I should get 10-14 AFR they said. I got a low of 19. and an error code 8, which is overheating or over cooling error. So he told me my sensor is either bad or its gonna take a ****. Alright that's fine, but why did it do it? I explained to him somewhat of my tune, where my placement was and he seen nothing wrong with it. couldn't tell me why I blew a sensor already. I cant replace these things 10 times a year. What my question is to the thirdgen members is placement. I have SLP ceramic coated TRI-Y headers. There long tube headers that the drivers side comes out and runs right behind oil pan to passenger side. Then another foot back they dump together into a single pipe. I have my sensor in the drivers side pipe right where it bends around and heads towards the back, before they are dumped together. Its roughly 2.5 feet from the cylinder head ports. I don't know if I'm too close or not close enough. I'm thinking of welding another bung completely after the headers, in the single exhaust. There is no CATS on this car.I just don't want to keep running into this problem.
Thank you.

RBob

iTrader: (1)

The Bosch WB sensors are sensitive to heat. I would put the sensor location further back. If you can locate it after the two pipes merge that would likely be a good spot.

RBob.

Larry

Maybe your sensor was defective or damaged before of during shipping or something like that. I have an innovate wideband and and the the sensor is about 18 inches behind the collector. I ran with it in the collector for about a year with no problems.

tmellott89

Thanks for the reply guys. I ordered a new sensor and bung. So I believe I'll weld it on farther down the exhaust stream,Mabey another 2 feet and go from there. Hopefully everything works out fine afterwards.

skinny z

I've always understood that the closer the sensor is to the source, the better it is. Ideal location in this application is in the header collector. We've run several this way and all of worked as expected and the units are not sensitive to heat as I understand it. They are designed to be IN the heat after all. There are applications where the sensors are installed in the primary header pipe. That's just my personal experiences with them.

What I have found is that the sensors don't last forever. I've had one that survived all of a couple of months, and another that's been going on several seasons.

Always be sure the sensor has voltage to it. It should never be run without it being "on".
Of course leaded fuel will kill it as will some oil additives.

tmellott89

Is that with a Isu 4.9? Innovates manual says 24 inches past collector but my tri-y headers are longer and dump together as one collector. So I figured where I was would be fine but the sensor hasn't lasted 50 mile. I do have it wired at key on though and someone told me it could ruin it if you have key on but not running the motor, while working on it anyway or whatnot. It worked fine when I first wires it and hooked it up.

skinny z

I have an older Innovate LM1 data logger however the Bosch O2 sensor is pretty much a standard part.
You raise an interesting point about having the key on but the engine not running. I'm not sure if that would cause an issue or not.
All of the installations I've been involved in have had the sensor in the header collector. In these small block applications, the collectors are typically less than 10" long. As I said earlier, I've seen them last for just a few months (and that's basically a weekend car) to several years (as in my current ride). The latter has just recently started to show signs of going away. I always try and keep a spare on hand.

tmellott89

Yeah I know I had key on a lot when I was trying to time the idle. It still ain't perfect bc it 16's open loop and closed loop it would idle at 14.3. But now you seem to be saying that my placement would be alright and rbob is thinking I may be too close, I was kinda thinking myself that I'm too close. The car is supercharged but it don't create boost until about WOT. Then it's 5-7 psi instantly. I am running a meth kit too but innovate seemed like everything is fine I just would like to catch my issue before I burn another sensor up. I only run 93 octane also. Also my try-y headers are designed differently than traditional sbc headers.