mikeGG

I have just got hold of a second hand ECU from a MY98 Impreza Turbo that has been re mapped with a Power Engineering Phase 1 conversion. I think the original PE customer was called Richard Rotter and he had it mapped on his car a MY98 with full decat and blitz cone filter. I thought this would be great for my car as I have a MY98 Terzo with full decat and Powertec cone filter. Almost like for like. Here is the rolling road graph with mods http://dyno.scoobynet.co.uk/uk/richard_rotter.htm

Anyway I fitted the PE ECU today and TBH I cannot feel any difference?? I would have thought my car was running aroung 240bhp. On the rolling road graph it took the original MY98 to 272bhp. Surely with nigh on identical mods I would see similar effects. Also Im sure the boost now only holds on 0.8bar rather than 0.9bar which it did on my standard ECU. The chap I got it off didnt fit it to his car as it turned out to be incompatible with his LHD car but has been helpful so far. I have seen pics of the inside of the ECU box and there does appear to be the 'piggy back' board in position. I know this is not the ideal way of doing things but after hearing good things of the PE ECU conversion felt sure coming across this ECU was a stroke of good fortune.

Please can anyone help with why this doesnt appear to have improved performance or could I have done something wrong? Can something be done?

Cheers for any advice or help

Mike

bruce

iTrader: (5)

I have a PE Phase1 on my MY97WRX,although it was installed to cure a fuelling prob rather than increase performance. I would get your car back onto a rolling road for comparative graphs to see whats happening. Also PE recently advised me that they could not remap Phase1's any more. Pat Herbourne from 22b sorted me out though.

AvalancheS8

Well, for a start, the dyno results for the original owners car are showing 251 bhp (on 95 RON petrol !!) with mods that will realistically have made about 5 bhp difference, so the car should have had about 213bhp at the that point. The second run, is a little more believable, but the first one throws a great deal of doubt onto those dyno results.

On your car, if you are only getting 0.8 bar, then something is up, it should be running about 1.2. You wouldn't really expect to feel any difference if it is running less boost after all. It could simply be something up with your boost control, but it could also be that the ECU is detecting a problem and going into safe mode. Best to see if you can get it checked out to make sure it';s not detting like crazy or something first and then you can look into getting the boost to hold at the right level.

I'm running a 2nd hand PE re-map on my MY'97 car without any problems, but I am running a MBC (Dawes type device) to control the boost as the stock boost control was a bit shaky, it was hitting 1.2, but it is far steadier with the MBC. I also have a knocklink and Lambdalink to keep an eye on things.

mikeGG

Thanks for your replies.

I was thinking could it be that as part of the PE conversion they change the restrictor in the turbo to a smaller one to create a little more boost. Obviously as I only bought the ECU this has not been changed so does anyone know if PE do this as part of their set up and what size restrictor do they change to?

Also does can Pat Herbourne definately work on these ECUs? Can anyone suggest somewhere that could diagnose and sort the 'problem' around the Midlands area?

Also it says on the rolling road that the reason the figures were high on the 1st run were because it was running 19psi boost due to some pipe leaking or something which was fixed for the second run.

Any other opinions/help on this please!?!?

Mike

mikeGG

BTTT

AvalancheS8

The restrictor is a possibility. Do you know what the restrictor that is in just now is ? Mine was hitting 1.2 bar with the standard restrictor, but it was a bit wobbly, possibly it was having to pull the solenoid duty cycle up and down to try and hold it stready.

Based on that, I'd expect that you would also see if not 1.2 bar, then at least more than you were before you changed the ECU unless you are running a larger than standard restrictor. Your restrictor wasn't drilled out to prevent overboost when you fitted the de-cat was it ? Sometimes a de-cat will cause overboost with the standard ECU and restrictor and the easiest way to fix it is to enlarge the hole in the restrictor a little.

Your best bet might be to speak to P.E and see what they reckon. Even if they can't fix it they might be able to point you in the right direction.

Hope you get it sorted.

mikeGG

No the restrictor is standard. I just dont know what to do now. I will try and speak to PE but don't expect them to be too helpful as the ECU is second hand and therefore I am not their customer really.