My O2 senor was installed about 35,000 miles ago so it is getting on time to replace it. It was moved from the stock location to just downstream of the “Y” in the Y pipe when the headers were installed. I have Heddman shorty headers. My car is a 1989 GTA with a 5.0 liter TPI engine. I have located the Bosch part number 12014 as the O2 senor for this car. Could someone please provide some comments to these questions?

1. I understand that wide band O2 sensors are better, is this Bosch part a wide band O2 senor?
2. My current O2 senor is a single wire as is part number 12014. I have read that the three wire heated O2 sensors are better especially when the O2 sensor has been relocated due to the installation of headers. Has anyone installed a three wire O2 sensor on a Thirdgen? What is the sensor part number? Is so please describe the procedure.

Thanks for your comments.

 

Wideband sensors are a different beast altogether and aren't compatible with the ECM, unless you use some supporting electronics. If you're not going to be doing your own tuning, you probably don't need a wideband.

 

Get the 3 wire heated

 

I use Bosch p/n 13077 which is for an LT1 Vette. You can find a 3 wire pigtail on ebay or from TPIParts to make it an easy install.

 

I bought one for a 92 c1500 and got the pigtail to connect it from tpiparts.net.

 

Thank you. Does the pig tail from TIPS come with instructions on how to install it? Currently, I have one wire going to my O2 sensor. How will you hook up a three wire pig tail to the one wire?

 

The other two wires are power and ground for the heater, you'll need to connect them to a source of +12v power that's on when the car is running.

 

To clarify, one of the wires goes to an ignition source. That's a pink/black wire. The other one goes to any ground. They're both the same color and it doesnt matter which is which. The third wire is your signal and that goes to the O2 sensor wire leading back to the computer.

 

a universal 3 wire allows you to make your own harness and is sometimes cheaper, just keep that in mind

 

Thank you all for this. I am going to install a three wire O2 sensor as soon as the weather warms up around here for me to work outside.

I suspected the other two wires would be power wires. I was going to hook the wire up to the battery or some other constant power source. However, this would cause the O2 heating to stay on even when the ignition is shut off and run the battery down. What you need is a power source that only comes on when the car is running as mentioned above.

I imagine once the exhaust heats up enough the heating parting of the O2 sensor shuts off.

This heating of the O2 sensor must permit the ECM to go into closed loop sooner thus improving gas milage especially in cold climates.

 

The ECM won't go into closed loop until the coolant temperature rises. Any difference in mileage between a new heated and new non-heated sensor due to faster warm-up would be minute, if there was any difference at all.

 

Ok. Then what is the benefit of installing a three wire heated O2 sensor on a thirdgen?

I imagine the three wire O2 sensor has the same threads to screw into the bung in the Y pipe?

Thanks for all your input on this. Best to collect as much information up front before under taking a project. This will also be available to others with the same questions in the future.

 

When the sensor is cold, deposits of soot and other nastiness can form on it which degrade the sensor over time. Heated sensors heat up more quickly, so they spend less time cold forming deposits giving an increase in lifespan. A heated sensor should also maintain a more constant temperature in operation so it's readings should be more accurate.

 

The O2 sensor works more accurately when it is 600 degrees or hotter. When the engine is cold and idling, it will not hit 600 degrees, and so it will not go into closed loop. This problem happens more often with headers, as they move the O2 sensor further away from the heads. The heated O2 sensor keeps the sensor hot enough to work properly and accurately no matter what temp the engine is at.

 

Ok, thank you all for this.

Will there be an noticable drain on the electrical system given that I will now be heating an O2, sensor some of the time, up to 600 degrees? I imagine the wires that come with the O2 sensor and the wiring harness from TIP Parts would be right gauge to handle this, but would this tax my alternator? I have an MSD blaster coil which puts out more voltage. I also have extra bright halogen headlights. However, I also have an good Optimum battery.

I have been calculting my city gas mileage before this and it is about 16.5 miles to the imperial gallon. I will post my results after the parts have been installed; however, it will be hard to isolate the effect of a heated O2 sensor from just replacing one with almost 40,000 miles on it. I have ordered the parts which should be here in two weeks.

 

It won't put much of a load on the electrical system, it doesn't take much power.

 

Well the parts arrived and I am at my mechanic right now having them installed. They had a difficult time getting the existing O2 sensor out, they had to heat it up several times. I doubt I could have gotten it out lying on my back in my driveway. They are going to put in a new bung.

The existing O2 sensor was put in in 2003 and had a lot of soot on it. Several of the grooves were filled with soot.

I have given them your advice about splicing into the pink and black ignition wire. There is a pink and black wire near the ignition coil. As these O2 sensors do not draw much current is there any particiular place to splice into the pink and black iginition wire?

 

The O2 sensor has been installed and I just took it for a drive. Everything seems to work fine. There were a couple other glitches I wanted to report on for the benefit of others. First, the new O2 sensor was longer than the single wire O2 sensor which required moving the new bung an inch or two upstream from the previous bung location. This required welding off the old bung hole and installing a new bung. Second, my mechanic first found a pink and black wire which only produced pulses of electricity. Then they found the correct pink and black wire to splice into.

 

This is the last up date to this post. I have now had the opportunity to run two tank of gas under city driving with the new three wire heated O2 sensor. There was no change in gas mileage unfortunately.

 

That is unfortunate. I was curious if it would make a difference or not too. Thanks for posting the results.

 

code 13 after header installation on 1991 Z28 camaro tpi 5.0

 

I have just flunked my emissions test today with a very high HC reading. I have just installed Edelbrock headers and am still running a one wire oxygen sensor. I am anxious to install a heated unit to see if it rectifies my situation. Thanks!

 

I ran nickel/chrome coated edelbrock shorties, and y-pipe with a bullet muffler and a dump, and the car ran fine with a single wire 02 sensor, and I was able to knock down 22-25 mpg depending where I was driving and how.

However, I just converted my firebird to a 3 wire 02 because the long tube headers, I have been told by many guys, that at Idle, the car goes back into open loop, and got about 13.5 mpg, the car should be getting at least 16-18 mpg, so I am going to find it out this week, it should be a lot better.

 

any updates ppl?

 

I converted mine to that three wire o2 sensor. I used that fuel pump positive wire, so that whenever the fuel pumps running, the o2 sensor has power to heat it up. This works great. The car goes into closed loop with my longtube headers in under two minutes, and now I have a tune for my bigger injectors, and it works even better, more like a minute and a half.

The whole reason you can use the fuel pump relay is this. Relays use a small amount of current from the computer to turn the relay on, transistors can only put out so much current, so just enough to turn the relay on is perfect. Then the relay uses the higher current to run the fuel pump, and since its a relay, it can handle a little more to heat up the o2 sensor, there aren't any problems with it, it works great in my car, and doesn't stress the wiring or the relay, the stock relays can handle up to 30 amps, and the wiring is already thick enough to handle the current.

Just make sure you use good wires for the o2 sensor, at least 16 gauge for the heated side, and if you extend the o2 sensing side, make sure it has no resistance, or it will change the readings for the o2 sensor. Good luck with that swap, its fairly easy though.

 

This is what I went with. Already adapted for a single wire thirdgen.
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/CEI-103025/

 

what about when replacing it? would you need to go back to Casper for a replacement O2 sensor or would an AFS74 work with that harness?

 

How is this working for you? We both have the same LG4 engine. I put on SLP headers and my Walker single wire is just not cutting it. My SES light is on most of the time then goes off from time to time. I want to try the heated sensor.

I assume you have headers on your car too.

 

It's working great. Your light is most likely caused from the o2 sensor not closing the loop to the ECM. I got a three wire from O'reillys. Just make sure you wire the hot wire to a keyed hot 12v.

http://www.oreillyauto.com/site/c/de...edVehicle=true

This one was cheaper, just had to do my own wiring.

 

Ok, just bought this adapter on Ebay from TPI solutions. It should work with the above Bosch sensor.

 

That cool. I was trying to save money. I just clipped the plug off the old single wire, Extended the power and ground to exactly where I needed it, loomed it up and done. You can't see it anyway.

 

What is TPI solutions, did a search and didn't come up with anything

 

he might be talking about

www.tpis.com

 

If they sell on Ebay, then that's them. Btw, I decided to use the Caspers four wire heated o2 sensor from Summit. The installation was fairly simple and worked great. The lean code 44 and bad o2 sensor code 13 got cleared.

The third code 21, throtle position sensor, is still there. Have to work on that one but at least two out of three isn't so bad.

 

What does the fourth wire do?

 

Apparently, the way it's configured is the one wire to the computer for the readouts, the power connector I spliced to the fuel pump relay like most on here have been doing and suggested and the third and fourth wires are grounds. Why dual grounds? I have no clue. But it works.

 

Do you remember if the mechanics told you the location of the pulsed wire versus the constant?

 

Ok, this might be a strange question,but, I have bungs in both of my long tube headers. Can I run a heated unit in each side and compare results twith my DataMaster or Tuner Pro. Will the heated unit stay clean since it is heated and be able to register to the computer on demand?
Thanks for any answers.
Don
80 TR7 V8 running 91 Z28 OBD1

 

Yeah, the heated units tend to stay much cleaner than a standard 1-wire in a header.

The results will be of limited use with a NB O2. The O2 only really tells you if your running at stoich, rich, or lean.

 

Understand about the limited use. I haven't asked my tuner about WB yet as after adding cam,headers,and a better flowing heads the program got wackey and he has spent a little bit of time sending me updates.
Just wondered if the heated unit at the end of the headers would do better than the stock location by the head.
Thanks

 

In theory, the oxygen sensors should give you redundant information, so if it were me I pick the one that is easiest for me to get to and plug the other one. My headers only have the one port and my heated O2 sensor works fine.

 

Mine are easy to get to so that is not a problem.


I can put the connections up on top in the engine compartment so that's not a problem. I just like to know that both sides of the motor are running the same and the inj's. are firing correctly

 

When testing my TPS I wanted to check the ground resistance.
I hooked 1 side to the ground wire on the TPS and one to a body ground to the engine.I'm showing .0021.
The question here is ,Is it OK not to be at 0.0 or does this show some point in the wire that it might be a little screwy between the switch and the computer to the ground.
Anything else I should test to verify?

 

I wanted to post some pics of the wiring I did for the heated oxygen sensor spliced into the fuel pump wiring. I hope the images are clear enough to show what I did.

 

Instead of opening a new thread I figured I would ask this here..

I read a few thread about this topic and I know it's covered already, but I purchased the NGK 3 wire O2 sensor for my edelbrock headers because my car goes in and out of closed loop often and it's making it a hassle to tune.

I also purchased the wiring harness/adapter from TPI parts that make it a simple plug n play to the old 1 wire sensor plug, and then ground 1 of the wires to the engine block.

But even with this adapter you have to splice one wire with a 12v power source, that is wired to the ignition so it only gets power when the key is on the 'on' position, correct? So far, fuel pump was mentioned, as well as fan relay if you have a dedicated one.. What is the best and safest source of power to connect the wiring to? I would imagine it being risky to splice fuel pump wires?

Sorry if these are amateur questions, I just want to be sure!

Thanks!

 

I read a few thread about this topic and I know it's covered already, but I purchased the NGK 3 wire O2 sensor for my edelbrock headers because my car goes in and out of closed loop often and it's making it a hassle to tune.

-It shouldn't be going in and out of closed loop with shorty/midlength edelbrocks. I had them in my iroc, and I didn't even have a smog pump, and my car never went in or out of closed loop. Sounds like something else's wrong. IF you have any exhaust leaks or anything, that will also make the car come out of closed loop.

I also purchased the wiring harness/adapter from TPI parts that make it a simple plug n play to the old 1 wire sensor plug, and then ground 1 of the wires to the engine block.

But even with this adapter you have to splice one wire with a 12v power source, that is wired to the ignition so it only gets power when the key is on the 'on' position, correct? So far, fuel pump was mentioned, as well as fan relay if you have a dedicated one.. What is the best and safest source of power to connect the wiring to? I would imagine it being risky to splice fuel pump wires?

-I have attached my wire right to the fuel pump relay connector for the fp relay. I've put over 3000 miles with that setup, no problems, or over loading the fuel pump relay/wire's.

For you learners. The fuel pump relay is usually a rectangle relay, farthest forward on the drivers cowl, right by the MAF, FP, right off the firewall.

Theres a switched side, red+ wire, use that one, I'm sure its on the end of the connector. The black lead, goes to the black single wire for the stock o2sensor.

Then the other two white wires, aren't grounds, those two, are the leads to the heated circuit of the o2 sensor, you simply use them going to pos, its not a (+) or (-) sensitive, its a heater. The sensor grounds through the headers, attached to the motor, so the grounds fine.

Good Luck with it

 

Hi, thanks for the reply.. Are you describing a 3wire or 4wire sensor?

 

I ran the wire through the same grommet along with a couple other wires through the firewall by the brake booster, comes out pretty close to the fuse box. Then I wired it to one of the orange "IGN" wires by the fuse box, with an inline fuse holder that hung down right next to the rest of the fuses.

 

This is for 3-wire units. The ground for the sensor, grounds to the exhaust, through the threads. You can wire it in any fashion, if you wanna do more work, and even wire in a curcuit for it, but o2 sensors only make up to 1.0V so its not necesarry

 

Man now in my car, I'm gettin around 440hp, and getting over 16mpg, and on regular! My ***** fast, as soon as I get to the track again, new videos. My car running on regular, is the fastest car running on regular, I've ever been in, and wastes new corvettes, mustangs, imports, etc...on regular, lol. Heated o2 sensors great! Smartest MOD I did to my car, lol, right after I put HSR on, then muy bien!