What a Rush

[The Horvaths]

I just got off the phone with FiTech support. Having once been lead engineer for a call center in a $5,000,000,000/yr company, I can say with some authority that Cody was prompt and professional.

He gave me new code for the unit. I’m to load it in and start from scratch before I do anything else.

Prior to starting, I’m to deliberately turn the front throttle plate screw in two full turns to accommodate the massive cam profile.

Idle speed target will need to start at 1000 RPM for the same reason.

Upon starting, tweak idle speed if needed, attempting to get the vacuum to a minimum of 6” hg. Then let it learn for a bit before making significant adjustments. Then try to get IAC under control. Then I can begin to twiddle with the beast.

- dad

 

[65Fury440]

View attachment 154112
I forgot to post this.
Total valve lift is actually .75 intake and .7464 Exhaust.

Wow you have a huge cam! (cam envy)

I tried skimming back through this thread but didn't find what stroker kit you used?

What CR did you end up with?
Did you go with the Trickflow heads?

That car is going to be a beast!
PS we are short one guy to buy a 5 lot of fiberglass hoods with choice of hemi scoop, would you be at all interested in getting a lighter hood with a taller scoop for $550?

 

[The Horvaths]

Wow you have a huge cam! (cam envy)

I tried skimming back through this thread but didn't find what stroker kit you used?

What CR did you end up with?
Did you go with the Trickflow heads?

That car is going to be a beast!
PS we are short one guy to buy a 5 lot of fiberglass hoods with choice of hemi scoop, would you be at all interested in getting a lighter hood with a taller scoop for $550?

The stroker isn't a kit. Compression is close to diesel territory. I did use ported TrickFlow heads.
Unfortunately, I can't afford the hood right now. I still need to change the trans, rear and brakes.
Sorry I can't splurge the details of the build. The recipe was given to me by a very successful retired builder/racer and meant to be kept some-what of a secret.

 

[The Horvaths]

The CNC-ported heads were hand massaged by a true artist. We’re probably going to be in the ballpark of ~730 HP. The right Indy heads, properly ported, would be a relatively minor improvement- for a hefty price.

This thing is going to be running on VP Fuels “Unleaded Extreme.” There’s a Sunoco fuel that would work also but might need less timing and deliver less power. It’s cheaper but I haven’t found a source yet. I had a drum of the Extreme shipped to our house. We’re in the ~114 Octane Unleaded zone. 110 probably isn’t quite enough. The O2 sensor calls for Unleaded. Some folks apparently change them out regularly and run leaded. However, this is an expensive engine and I don’t think that is a wise choice right now. Don’t want to run stupid AFRs just because we toasted another O2 sensor. That can lose a race - or lose an engine.

- dad

 

[65Fury440]

Oh wow did not realize you were building such an intense beast.
It will be awesome to see you wake her up!!!

 

[The Horvaths]

No start. Call to FiTech support again. I got Bryce after about seven minutes or so. He was having a hard day and was a little short with me at first. I let it slide. I’ve worked phones before.

He got the information on the build. When we got to cam specs, he kind of doubted the numbers at first. It’s big. Then he gave me some guidance. He suggested that it was probably asking too much of the EFI-8 to control timing and fuel for such a cam. He said that it may honestly be a bit more than the system can even handle in fuel-only mode.

His suggestion:
Lock timing or use another controller. Set initial timing highly advanced. Try to get the FiTech running in fuel only mode. Try a target idle speed of 1300 RPM or more. In addition, deliberately set the idle AFR target very lean, like 15.5 or so to start with. This will actually allow the FiTech controller to tolerate the inevitable oxygen in the exhaust due to the considerable overlap.

We drove to the new Summit Racing Equipment store in Grand Prairie and got an MSD Power Grid system and a crank trigger. We’re getting deep deep deep now. No turning back.

If we have to, we’ll run a carburetor. No worries.

However, it’s probably going to be this weekend before we get all of the parts in hand (controller is shipping from Georgia). So, another step forward and two more back!

- dad

 

[Jimmyse23]

Oh man that would blow suck to do all that work only to run a carb again. Not saying anything against carbs at all, just that you've done all the leg work for efi.

 

[The Horvaths]

Oh man that would blow suck to do all that work only to run a carb again. Not saying anything against carbs at all, just that you've done all the leg work for efi.

Yes. That’s right. It would both blow and suck at the same time. However, it hasn’t quite come to that yet.
The whole concept of being able to tweak for a hot/humid, or cold, day without pulling a carburetor apart is really desirable. Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean that FI would actually run faster. I’m assuming that Dylan will be running brackets. Consistent times is the way to win bracket races. Thus, FI has promise.

Either way, we’re going to get this thing running come Hades or high water!

- dad

 

[twostick]

Does that system have an Alpha/Numeric mode? I had to run mine A/N up to about 1800 and then have it switch to closed loop. That was the only way it would run at low rpm with all the reversion.

There is zero chance that it will idle closed loop with a cam that large. Also zero chance that it will idle at anything approaching stoic. Mine with just an MP509 with 76 deg of overlap wasn't "happy" any leaner than 11:1ish. It has a solid idle now but the exhaust stinks.

Get it to idle happy and let the AFR land where it lands.

Kevin

 

[The Horvaths]

Light at the end of the tunnel? There’s a FiTech Owner’s group on farcebook. It’s evidently not entirely impossible. I’m going to try something different before I give up hope of running with the FiTech controlling both fuel and timing.
Basically, I’ll need to rotate the distributor and increase the initial timing, possibly by quite a bit.

- dad

 

[The Horvaths]

Does that system have an Alpha/Numeric mode? I had to run mine A/N up to about 1800 and then have it switch to closed loop. That was the only way it would run at low rpm with all the reversion.

There is zero chance that it will idle closed loop with a cam that large. Also zero chance that it will idle at anything approaching stoic. Mine with just an MP509 with 76 deg of overlap wasn't "happy" any leaner than 11:1ish. It has a solid idle now but the exhaust stinks.

Get it to idle happy and let the AFR land where it lands.

Kevin

Thanks, Kevin. I don’t think that it’s possible to control it by the numbers. But, there are some settings that might effectively do the same thing- sort of.

There’s a set of after-cranking settings that I’ll probably need to learn to play with.

- dad

 

[twostick]

Light at the end of the tunnel? There’s a FiTech Owner’s group on farcebook. It’s evidently not entirely impossible. I’m going to try something different before I give up hope of running with the FiTech controlling both fuel and timing.
Basically, I’ll need to rotate the distributor and increase the initial timing, possibly by quite a bit.

You need an adjustable rotor to rephase the pickup.

The ECM needs about 10 degrees lead time to calculate the timing so that the rotor is in the correct position when the ECM triggers you ignition box.

I assume your distributor has the timing locked out?

You .might want to consider doing fuel only until you get it running decent and then tackle the timing after. If you lock the timing at 36 degrees any fuel changes you make that adversely affect how it runs won't have anything to do with timing.

Kevin

 

[The Horvaths]

You need an adjustable rotor to rephase the pickup.

The ECM needs about 10 degrees lead time to calculate the timing so that the rotor is in the correct position when the ECM triggers you ignition box.

I assume your distributor has the timing locked out?

You .might want to consider doing fuel only until you get it running decent and then tackle the timing after. If you lock the timing at 36 degrees any fuel changes you make that adversely affect how it runs won't have anything to do with timing.

Kevin

Rotor is phased. Timing locked out. I’m getting a general feeling from the Farcebook group that it’s potentially somewhat quasi-feasible..

..sort of. If you’re lucky.

The MSD Ignition Control Unit is looking like a reasonable idea. It’s also really well designed for bracket racing. It’s got a lot of good engineering and thought put into it. It’s also downright expensive, but, racing’s not exactly cheap.

- dad

 

[The Horvaths]

One thing that I’ve noticed that FiTech seems to do oddly is that you set the distributor to trigger at base timing and then they try to interpolate advance from there. The MSD does it differently. On their system, you set the distributor to trigger just ahead of the maximum advance ever desired and they delay firing from there.

So, to guesstimate advance from base timing, FiTech must use the previous cylinder’s base trigger as a reference. This will work fairly well when the engine is running at a steady RPM. However, at crank, the RPM is inconsistent and the only reliable information about timing is base timing. This is what FiTech uses at cranking, so, it seems to work. However, at about 200 RPM, they start to advance the spark to reach the idle setting. However, there’s roughly 90 degrees of crank rotation since the last (base timing) crank trigger. So, if the engine isn’t smoothly rotating, then this approach could “backfire.”

When setting trigger at max advance and delaying from the trigger, there’s about one third the crank rotation (~30 degrees or so). Thus, erratic rotation speeds will have markedly less impact on actual spark timing.

Hmmmm..

- dad

 

[65Fury440]

Watching this thread daily for progress.
Your work and knowledge are super impressive.
Can't wait to see the start up video!

 

[The Horvaths]

Watching this thread daily for progress.
Your work and knowledge are super impressive.
Can't wait to see the start up video!

Believe me, we’re on the very edge of our seats!!!

 

[live4theking]

Believe me, we’re on the very edge of our seats!!!

Don't fall off. You'll leave the rest of us in suspense.

 

[65Fury440]

 

[The Horvaths]

Well, one step forward. I hooked up the Crane Fireball to the MSD Pro Billet distributor. The Fireball doesn’t trigger at all. It was originally running with an HEI distributor. So, it’s going to be a matter of getting the MSD Power Grid system online. It’s probably possible to trigger it (the Power Grid) via the MSD distributor until I convert to the crank trigger. To mount the crank trigger, I’m going to have to replace the Mancini Racing-supplied low mount alternator bracket, that I recently bought, with the one that also has a crank trigger sensor mount option. That’s right. I saved $10 by buying the one without. Now it’s another $119 (plus shipping) to do it right. Two steps back.


I managed to get the MSD drivers installed on my laptop that seems to recently have self-regressed from windows 10 to windows 8. Thus, I had to disable the windows driver signature check to get the MSD drivers loaded.

I’ve got an initial setup that is locked timing at 30 degrees advanced with the trigger point occurring at 40 degrees advanced. I’m now going to install this beast of an ignition and see if I can get it to dance and sing. Wish me luck!!!


- dad

 

[The Horvaths]

For
Crying
Out
Loud!


This distributor has been intermittent from the start. It’s brand new, not hacked, the magnet/reluctor gap is right, and it’s still badly intermittent. I noticed that the chromate plating has ALREADY developed “whisker” corrosion on the reluctor wheel. That’s a sign of poor process control in the plating process. It’s also possible that some of the corrosion is magnetic and has corrupted the gap. I’d return it but I’d quite possibly just get another problem child. The only function of a distributor, when using a crank trigger, is to physically point the rotor to the correct cylinder for spark timing. It’s not doing anything else and Dylan won’t even have to buy the more expensive phasable rotors. He can simply rotate the distributor body to phase a standard, fixed, rotor.

It’s looking like I’ll have to wait for the crank trigger mount version of the alternator bracket to be shipped from Mancini Racing.

On a positive note, I did get the fancy ignition installed. One step forward..


- dad