Falcon Fanatic's FI conversion

:beer: glad to hear your making good progress! But that link isn't working? :nod:
 
Allright, starts, runs, drives. Actually does all those things kind of well now. I have to say I've become a huge Megasquirt fan. Just drove around for a while with the auto tune feature on and guess what? It runs better now. I'll take some pictures tomorrow so y'all can see my sweet craftsmanship.
 
March 4, 2016. So I finally got it running right on the Megasquirt system. Have to give a shout out to DIY autotune for great customer service, and to Scott aka elutionsdesign on the MSEXTRA forum for helping me with the tune. Still more tuning to go, but it starts, runs and idles as well as it ever has, so that's a good starting place.

Moved on to beautifying the engine compartment. It's not a show car, more of a test mule, so don't expect miracles, but here are some pictures of the engine bay as it stands.

Okay, can't hassle with getting the pictures to work on this forum, so here's the link to the blog post: http://falconfanatic.blogspot.com/2016/03/fi-next-steps.html
 
Any way to get your msq file?

I've got a 250 2V head for my 200 and might be interested in reproducing your setup.
 
Smoky Explosion
So there I was, driving around refining the tune on my Megasquirt system and feeling pretty good about how well it was running when BLAM! I'm enveloped in a huge cloud of white smoke. Pull over, pop the hood and there is coolant everywhere. Fortunately I was quite close to home so I got it to the garage and put it to bed.

I'd suspected a weeping freeze plug which turned up immediately after installing this new head. Fast forward a few days and after pulling the header I find this freeze plug just lying in a nook of the header. Never heard of such a thing, but there it is. I'll be replacing this and at least one other in the next couple of days. I'll get it all back together, refine that tune a bit further, and post a new video here soon.

popped%2Bfreeze%2Bplug%2B.jpg
 
Welcome to the MS fan club!

You don't have to have the latest and greatest version either, it was good at the beginning and has only gotten better. The documentation and support is without equal. I'm still using a highly modified version of MS1 with over 100,000 of trouble free km on my daily driver, at least 30,000 km on my motorhome, and 4 seasons on my boat in a marine application that "shouldn't " have worked at all. Tuner Studio is an excellent product and a bargain at any price. My only complaint is that MS is no longer open source, but that is only an issue for people like myself who like to customize the firmware. The tuning is really the fun part, but I warn you, it is addictive.
 
Ugh! Just when everything was going great the engine started stumbling and hesitating. So far my diagnostics have turned up nothing. Really frustrated and tired of this project.
 
Hopefully something easy like a fouled spark plug ?
You've done a great job in uncharted territory, it's very impressive !
Keep us posted on your progress.
DannyG
 
Yes, hopefully something easy. Took the week off so I don't end up "accidentally" lighting it on fire. Definitely not a plug, though, cause I can tell your they've never run so clean!
 
After I got everything back together from the freeze plug ejection incident the car started overheating every time I drove it. It was also hesitating. Took it to a dyno tuner and they where totally baffled by both symptoms. At this point I was so frustrated that I just parked the car and went to Burning Man. Back now, of course, and I'm just going to yank the engine and take it to a local builder for a teardown and diagnosis. As background, i had this engine rebuilt about six or seven years ago and it has always been incredibly difficult to tune (and I do know what I'm doing).

At this point I firmly believe either the cam wasn't degreed correctly by the last builder or he lied about the CR and that's why I have such poor idle vacuum and it is so hard to tune. Also, I have no idea why it is overheating. So, it is probably easier and cheaper to take it out, tear it down, degree the cam during teardown to confirm installation, and do a straight rebuild with either a milder cam (probably 260h), or install this one correctly. Then I'll do initial tune on an engine dyno to be sure it runs correctly.

If it turns out there is something major like a cracked block or some expensive head damage I may just toss this and install a J20DET with a 5-speed and have something different.
 
OP, the problem you had with the Elctromotive Tec 111 was the trigger wheel, Electromotive uses a 60 tooth wheel. Keep working at it you'll get the thing working!
 
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