I decided to start a new thread just to keep things fairly clear.

I’m trying to get ’89 $6E style code to work in my ’87. I’ve gotten past the initial “won’t run at all” or “doing really weird stuff” hiccups, but I can’t seem to keep it running now. If I let go of the throttle eventually (it could be right away, it could be in 5 minutes, there’s no real pattern to it) the engine stalls. I also have to “2 foot it” putting it into gear or it stalls. Once the RPM starts dropping there is no stopping it, giving it throttle doesn’t help, and the car runs very well with either of the 2 ’87 chips that I’ve got (possibly ruling out a mechanical/adjustment issue).

What I’ve done/found:
- disconnected the CSI, but it doesn’t really make a difference for starting in this weather.
- VATS flag- doesn’t make a difference one way or the other. Set or not the engine runs the same (shouldn’t it not run at all with the flag set and no vats goodies in the car?)
- Compared my stock ‘87 ABWT (350, AT, 3.27) bin to the ARAP, AUJM (’89, same combination) and an ’89 305 with the same combination. I was surprised to find that the AUJM had very little timing and a significantly different shaped advance map then all the others. The ARAP had the most, and my ABWT and the 305 bins were within a degree or so of the ARAP in most cels. In many places my stock bin had 7-12* more timing, AND it had less retard in some of the other tables. Does that make sense at all? Why would an ’89 L98 have that radically different a timing map then the rest? Actually, after looking at it a second time, besides the high rpm/low load area, the ARAP and my stock bins are virtually identical. The 305 is similar for most of it but it ends up 16* down in the high load/low rpm regions.

I could use some suggestions here:
- how do I trace down what is causing the stalling?
- what bin am I best off starting with for experimenting with the $6E goodies? I’m almost leaning toward going with the ARAP since in most ways it’s the closest to my stock ABWT bin. I’ve also considered starting with the AUJM and importing the timing and fuel tables from my ABWT, but I’m worried that I’ll end up with a very unhappy combination since most of the modifiers (like coolant temp…) are significantly different. For the most part I can’t complain how my stock bin works at the track (13.5@100 out of an L98 with cold air and cat back), but it’s pretty questionable at idle and part throttle (it runs fastest at the track at 54psi fuel pressure which makes it do just about everything else badly, and I’d like to experiment with some of the features in the $6e).
- the ever popular LV8 question… I know that it represents load as a product of rpm and airflow, but can someone give me some indication of range? From where to where can you expect the values to go? What is it at idle and WOT at redline, and maybe normal cruise?
- is there any way to make some sense of an ’87 hypertech stage 2 chip for the same car? I’m surprised how similarly it runs to the stock chip and would like to compare the 2.

 

To continue from the other thread over in DFI&ECM:

My bet is the memcal you removed the original prom from has got an intermittant connection to the new prom. That memcal IS a '165, V8 memcal right?

Unless you've got a bad 6E bin you shouldn't have this trouble. I've run AUJM in '87 cars with no trouble.

I'd start with the AUJM since you've got iron heads.

 

Since I’ve yet to find a good source of random V8 Memcals I took apart the stock one that was in my ’87, so yes, it is a 165 V8 memcal. Since for now I just cleaned the solder off the factory socket and am just dropping the prom into it like it is, I wouldn’t be surprised if I ended up with a messed up connection, but what would surprise me about that is that the idle is dead steady and smooth until it dies. It actually idles much smoother then it ever did with the original or the hypertech prom (aways a little rough, like its missing every once in a while).

Would a loose prom connection run well except for when it dies? I would expect it to run rough when it's not making contact and light up the check engine light.

I’ve been wondering about that also… I wouldn’t be surprised considering how easy it is to open a bin, edit something and save it. I’m not sure how I would guarantee that the bin is in good shape/unmolested, and the only bin that’s everywhere is the ARAP. AUJM that I started wit is off of Mike Davis’ site that is labled as being read by him (I assumed that this was a safe place to start).

Anyone want to point me at a copy of a stock L98 bin that they know is good?

Thanks, I’m leaning towards just getting it running with that bin and then possibly importing all the timing tables off of my stock bin (I don't see the real point in worrying about the finer points about the tuning till I figure out what's wrong with the idle)

 

huh, taking another look at some of the numbers, the AUJM is idling with about 11-12* less timing then the stock prom.... Now if I just took a random car and retarded the timeing 12 degrees it wouldn’t surprise me at all if it didn’t want to idle.

That opens a whole can of worms. I remember that I experimented with the base timing at the track and found that it actually (surprisingly) ran exactly the same times with anything between 2 and 14* base timing and dropped off outside of that range. That makes me wonder:
- I’m betting that considering that I’m fairly conservative when it comes to blowing up my engine so I’m betting I left the timing set towards the bottom end of that… need to check that
- What could possibly be up with the stock tune that base timing doesn’t effect it at WOT at all. My instinct (especially after seeing the maps) would be that maybe it just has too much timing and the ESC is pulling back the timing to the same point no matter where it is (the only problem with that is that when I datalogged passes they all showed only 1-3 knock counts per pass and that was only on the shifts)
- I’m wondering if I might need to set the idle set screw further open to work with the AUJM

Did any of you guys that have converted their older TPI’s to newer code have to mess with mechanical settings (idle stop and timing)?

 

I suspect any kind of goofy thing can happen. I've had a bad '165 ECM run seemingly fine except for some twilight zone behavior here and there.

You need a way to rule out a bad connection in the memcal and to verify that your burner and EPROM are working properly.

You mention a hypertech prom. I had one that looked like a memcal, but the prom plugged into a "socket". Any chance yours is the same? If it is you could try your AUJM in it. That'll verify the PROM, BIN, and Burner are good.

AUJM has been sent to your email.

If AUJM doesn't like you current Min Idle setting the IAC should be staying way open.

 

yea, I’ve seen a bad 165 before…

Well, I did try making a bunch of jumpers to plug the thing into my prom burner while on the memcal and it read, wrote and verified the same as it did plugged right into the burner (I need to get a header to do this 28 little jumpers suck), I wonder if radio shack is open on labor day?

Yea, that’s what everyone says, but mine looks much more like someone soldered a socket to it, pulled the plastic part off, so it looks like just the pins are sticking up, and then solered the pins of the chip to those.

Almost as big a nassle as the OEM memcal, and I don’t see how to make it work reliably if I take it apart (I’m worried that the whole thing will just fall apart)

Thanks, I’ll try that in a couple of minutes as soon as I figure out why I can’t get the bin stacked properly for the chips I’ve got left…

Man, at this rate I’m ready to go back to messing with aftermarket stuff…

 

.

 

There is no doubt, you've taken the more difficult and patience trying route by desoldering a memcal. I've made it work but after using the Moates Adapter I feel desoldering just aint worth the trouble or dollar savings.

 

Brent, thanks for all the help… I could have saved myself a lot of hassle and skipped some of the fancy ideas and just took a freaking soldering iron to the thing and soldered a socket and saved myself (and all of you) 2 days worth of frustration and dumb questions.

I finally figured it out when I walked back out to try it again and got a solid check engine light and the thing running the same way. I ended up pulling the chip out of the memcal, and guess what… it ran the same with no chip…

Anyway, took the thing and a DMM and found that 7 of the pins were not making contact no matter what I did… Looked at my big pile of computer parts and noticed an anchient ISA nic that I already stole the prom from with a nice socket on it. 2 minutes later + a heat gun and I had a socket. I spent a few minutes making things ugly trying to stick the socket to the memcal with the heat gun before I pulled out the soldering iron and did it right.

Anyway, long story short, now I’ve got an ugly, but socketed memcal that works. Been running around for 2 days with the stock ’89 code with the egr turned off, fan temps changed and spark table copied from my ’87 bin. Runs pretty good besides a hesitation right off idle when the engine is cold (for only about 30 seconds when first running), and is much more responsive when warm (I’m thinking it’s a function of the more aggressive timing map with the rest of it left the way the ‘89’s got it… it was actually a bit touchy in the rain.

Nutshell… this stuff is much easier with working hardware