scooby(puppy power)

after just owning my first imprezza for only 4 weeks the engine light has come on, a quick trip up to my local dealer (robinsons in rochdale) revealed what i thought (through reading on here), the car is completed decatted and its for the lamba sensor, they reset it for me but told me it will come back on, they gave me a number for pennine subaru and told me someone there could program the ecu not to read for this fault, he told me that whilst this is well and good the light being on is the least of my problems and that due to the decat it will be overboosting and then my engine will be going bang, the 3 options he gave me are

1 a remap so its fuelling correctly
2 refit cats (and make it slower lol)
3 wait for engine failure

he recommened the remap which will give me more horsepower buts thats 650 quid,

just waiting for the garage i bought the car from to get back to me and see what they say,

just wondered what peoples thoughts where the fellow i spoke to seemed to know what he was on about and seemed a decent chap from the phone call, but having just bought the car 650 quid is a lot to find at the mo, hopefully the garage i got it from will stump something up, its a main dealers ( not subaru ), so heres hoping

jame5evan5

i hav just bought a subaru impreza also its a 2001 wrx with a forge dump valve and a pro drive pack...i drove it 50 miles and my engine light came on the code they giv me after i put it on the computer was p0172 which they told me it is running to rich..does any 1 hav any ideas wot i cn do to sort this out..whilst my car is ticking over the engine rpm drops nearly to zero nearly stalling ther is definatly a tiny flat spot..any help would be greatful to thanks

Skooby53

iTrader: (1)

A full decat does indeed really need a remap, also what are you going to do at MOT time as the emissions will more than likely fail? I would certainly ask them about this. I would recommend a remap, a massive improvement over standard and it will mean your car will be much safer to drive, over boosting is obviously an issue. It will be the best £650 you have spent for a long time. I know some cars pass an MOT with no cats after being remapped.

Skooby53

iTrader: (1)

Possible MAF issue. Unplug the electrical connector while the engine is running, if it stalls the MAF is more than likely working. If it carries on running then the ECU has taken over the MAF's job and its failed.

jame5evan5

cud my dump valve cause this to..i unplugged the maf whilst engine was running and the engine stalled...what wud you recomend to do next...thanks for your help

Skooby53

iTrader: (1)

After market dump valves are not generally recommended on impreza's. The standard recirc valve is more than adequate for most applications. If the DV is leaking then it may well be a problem, if you have the standard recirc valve pop it back on and see. If not try the dealers, if there's not one close give them a ring and maybe they will post it to you. Having said that you could always try 'Fleabay' as a cheap source, not really recommended but you might be lucky and get a good one.

jame5evan5

i took the pipe of the dv put my finger over it to block the air and it does tick over alot better what sort of dump valve would u remomend ?..what else do you think i shud check for code p0172...also would u be able to tell me how often i shud get it serviced what shud be done on a service...any help wud be greatful thanks ver y much for yor time..im new to these cars

jame5evan5

has any 1 else got any suggestions what i cud do to solve this problem with the engine managemnt light code p0172..thanks

scooby(puppy power)

Cheers for the reply, I will be asking that question about the mot anyway because it came with a new 12 month mot somehow, ive already decided that im getting the remap, hopefully they will stump up the cash or a big wedge of it, like i say just bought the car so bit strapped at the moment, will be able to find it if i need to lol

scooby(puppy power)

on the plus side the chap at pennine subaru said today its a good job its a wrx as they run quite rich anyway, said if it was an sti it would have already gone bang

scooby-matt

iTrader: (3)

i have a 2002 wrx with a full de cat and NO RE-MAP. my engine mangement light comes on. i also have a boost gauge on it, it doesnt over boost. boosts 0.9 bar then drops off at round 5500 rpm to 0.7 bar. which is normal. by the smell of the exhaust it smells like its running rich, by the smell of petrol vapour. been like this for over 2 years now and no trouble.

The Dogs B******s

Not to sure if thats the same as the one i had,but my engine managemnt light was always coming on,turns out that i had a faulty exhaust temp sensor.

T1000

I had a similar issue with my '99 model Impreza. One of the Cats had been removed on the downpipe meaning that the exhaust system was less restrictive which in turn spools up the turbo quicker.

This then meant that the turbo kept overboosting and reaching fuel cut off which happened under hard acceleration.

To avoid fuel cut off you only need to have a boost controller fitted - preferably an electronic one.

However, if you do have emission problems (best to get checked out before the MOT) then you can either have one of the cats installed temporarily for each MOT, get the car remapped, or take the car to a garage that takes a blind eye to emissions - my favourite option

Midlife......

iTrader: (2)

It's not strictly necessary to re-map a de-catted bugeye WRX....the ECU can cope and the TD04 doesn't boost spike

However a re-map will give respectable gains in performance and get rid of the De-cat CEL (P0420)

Shaun

Midlife......

iTrader: (2)

As for the P0172 CEL....

OBD-II Trouble Code: P0172 System Too Rich (Bank 1)


I'd change the DV to an OEM item first before thinking about the MAF as the Bugeye MAF is pretty robust

Shaun