I'm not sure what burning oil does to a wideband signal, but I would guess it would be detrimental to your tune.

He mentioned he isn't burning oil, so we don't have to focus on that anymore.

However there are a few things to bring up:

You're throwing a coolant circuit malfunction CEL. You're coolant temp is working, but something is wrong there, clear it and see if it comes back. (I doubt it has anything to do with your tuning unless the numbers were pegged negative or ridiculously high)

1.Your MAP is saying your vaccuum is fluctuating between -11Hg/in and -14Hg/in at idle. This would constitute a leak somewhere, be it a poorly adjusted BISS, malfunctioning fiav, or a boost leak somewhere in the system.

2. Base fuel pressure should not be 48psi. Base fuel pressure on a 1g without vacuum pulling (car off fuel pump on) should be 37psi. (This right here is enough to throw off your entire tune.

3. with 1100cc injectors on e85 you global fuel should be closer to -38 or -39 and 350 -> 450 deadtime.
(A good trick to get this right is to set your fuel pressure on your afpr with car off and fuel pump on. Then set your global to -39% and start your car locked in open loop. let it get to operating temp and adjust your global (With deadtime around 360 to start) until your wideband is showing 14.7. Doing this makes sure your global is set correctly by matching your target afr with what your wideband is showing while in openloop.
(Remember to reset your SD table back to stock since you're starting over with your tune)
Once that is all done, get your airflowperrev close to 25 by adjusting your SD cells that it is targeting at idle then correct your fuel trims (which will be wild at this point im sure) by adding deadtime if your CombinedFT are >0% and subtracting deadtime if your CombinedFT are <0%

Now that your idle is tuned in, go cruise (AND STAY IN CLOSED LOOP) up and down hills, in and out of throttle up and down in speeds for 10-15 minutes. Stop the log, right click and select SD adjust (CombinedFT). interpolate the cells it suggests to change if there are big jumps and save.

Now you can do a WOT pull at low boost and see where it sits, but dont do this until the above is done and 100% no boost leaks.

I'm not even going to give you feedback on the WOT pull because at this point its useless, you need to redo your tune with correct base pressure and global fuel settings.

I also want to mention that your IAT's are frick'n hot. 120* on start and settling at 104* when cruising? Where are you located? Ethiopia? IAT's should be maybe 10* above ambient temperature so if it was 70* degrees outside when this log was taken, you need to get some cooler air in your bay. But if you're in Ethopia, ignore this part of the post.

You can keep your MaxOctane map as it is as it doesn't look too bad, but put back to stock your adjustments (Like your InjBatteryAdj) and anything else that will fudge your AFR's while setting a base tune.

Please read through this entire Wiki that ECMtuning has (especially setting base fuel)

http://www.ecmtuning.com/wiki/start

Thank you so much.

The BISS is adjusted to make ISC position as close to 30 as possible - with the unsteady idle, it oscillates 4-5 +/-
I read that the FIAV either has to be disabled or a new TB put on, if it's the issue.

And as far as leak tests go....I just did a BUNCH of testing and found 5 tiny leaks and fixed them - but that did nothing noticeable for vacuum or the idle.
This was done at the throttle body elbow, as opposed to the last two times when I did it on the turbo. [I didn't notice any differences between doing it here or there...though I didn't time it like this time.]
I can bring it up to 25 psi and it will drop to 18 in almost 13 seconds.
18 psi to 11 psi takes an additional 24 seconds.
Does that sound like enough of a leak to cause my vacuum issue?
The only thing I can find that may be an issue is the hissing through the oil cap. I disconnected and plugged the PCV line and it still happened. When I cup my hand over the hole, I can feel the cool air very lightly as it comes out. So the crankcase is getting a decent amount of air. And this is after 3 different times doing BLT's, so it's not some chance fluke where the engine stopped at one of the 4 points where intake valves could be open.
But then I read that some intake valves are always open at least a little bit, so you'll always get air in the crankcase.

Any thoughts on that?

Oh - and the coils on my ISC (newer model) measure between 42.7 and 43.2. http://www.dsmisc.com/dsmweb-dw/faqs.html says that they (the newer black ISC's) are supposed to measure 40.0 +/- 0.25. Is the window truly that small?

I don't want to do any tuning until I get this vacuum issue figured out...but I'm excited to get to it. I've never done any tuning so the step by step guide is extremely helpful and appreciated. And I've read a good deal of what's found through that link - just haven't really messed with actually tuning yet.

I would think that air leaking past your valve stem seals and piston rings fast enough to drop pressure in a BLT and come out of the valve cover as fast as you are saying, wouldn't produce the numbers that you found with your compression test.

Your BLT is ok; it should drop 1 psi ever few seconds. Don't rely on shutting your car off by chance to be where you need to be to close the intake valves. You need to turn your crank by hand (1/2" ratchet) until you are where you need to be.


It's not about having the intake valves closed, you need to have the engine so that none of the cylinders have the intake and exhaust valves open at the same time (overlap).
And you're always going to have some sort of blowby past your rings even on new motors and ESPECIALLY if you're doing it with the car not warmed up. Which is why diagnosing from the oil cap is tough.

This is also why we focus on boost leaks that go to the atmosphere (like loose couplers on pipes and TB gaskets.) They are the ones that hurt performance and unless you are burning oil (valve stem seals or turbo) then you shouldn't have to worry about any leaks.

You can BLT the thing to death, but you still need to setup your base fuel settings and globals to begin moving forward.

Oh, ok I'll get that going then.

And as for IAT's, it was 90F that day (Illinois). The logs were done when the engine had already been run for a while and yeah, it just gets really hot in the engine bay. I even have a homemade aluminum ducting system for the intake, running down to the front bumper. And the manifold, downpipe, and O2 dump are wrapped. Planning on getting a manifold and turbo blanket when I can.

Coolant temps get up to 210 pretty easily after driving for a bit on a warm day. Even with a mishimoto radiator, 2 aftermarket electric fans, ducting between FMIC and radiator, and an air dam pushing air up in front of the radiator. (the air dam definitely helped, but it'll still get up there after a while)

Few questions about your tuning post- is all of #3 before the closed loop cruise/SD adjust done locked in open loop?

And, since I didn't make any of the changes in the tune I'm not sure what all I'd need to reset besides the one you mentioned. (InjBatteryAdj) I read that I can easily reset the direct access section to stock, and that I can reset the ECU config section by downloading stock files. Or are you just taking about adjustments on the maxoctane map....sorry I don't have access to Link now otherwise I'd explore and hopefully figure it out on my own. But I hope to be able to get this taken care of tonight so just trying to get info ahead of time in case I need it.

Ok I started with your tuning suggestions.

First off, I was wrong - base fuel pressure is 37. Maybe I looked at the gauge wrong last time...I dunno.

Anyways, I set global to -39 and deadtime to 360. Car would not stay running in open loop. Sounded bad and was running extremely rich - maxing out the AFR gauge at 18+ - and then dying.

To achieve 14.7 (ish - bounces around from 14.4-15, sometimes going as low as 14.1 and as high as 15.2 - never stable) with deadtime anywhere near 360, I had to set global to -11.7.

Idle is very unstable - is it wise to be changing cells in the SD map that wouldn't even be being used at idle if the idle were as it should be? What I mean is that I found the spot in the log with the highest airflowperrev (28) and tracked the log in the SD table and the cell it showed was for 1000 rpm. Why change this to get the idle tuned if that cell shouldn't even be being used at idle. (which should be 850 rpm) Cause the idle jumps around so much.

And - it will not run if I ground both the timing and diagnostic pins. I've mentioned this before in other threads/posts and never got a response on it, but I feel like something has to be able to be deduced from that...right?! The low vacuum, can't stay running with the pins grounded, BISS screw almost bottomed out, if I screw it in all the way the idle still doesn't go any lower...and no vacuum/boost leaks?! What else is there that could cause this? What am I missing.

leak down test will answer your problems.

ade said:

leak down test will answer your problems.

Click to expand...

This has been mentioned more than three times now. So nothing really valuable in this comment besides contributing to your 30 minimum posts to get passed probationary status. Please contribute something more than 7 words.

When you say it was maxing out "rich" at 18+ do you mean lean? because the higher the number the leaner the mixture.
Something is extremely off. Did you reset everything back to stock including the SD table back to ECMlink's original "suggested values."

Check your base and mechanical timing asap.

Having to set your global to -11 on 1100cc injectors is just ridiculous. Check to make sure they are in fact those injectors for peace of mind, zero everything back, verify your mechanical timing and then your base timing. Calibrate your wideband, again verify 37psi base fuel pressure with the car off or vacuum line clamped. Forget about airflowperrev and all of that, you can't even get it running right on the setting it needs to be so something is out of place. Either mechanically something is missing (timing is off) or something is mismatched (the numbers you are entering are wrong for the parts you have)

Walk through every step in setting up ecmlink starting back to square one and verify all parts are true and mechanically everything is running properly.

There is no reason your car should be acting like this without something completely off.

Ah yeah I meant lean, just typed rich for some reason. I didn't reset everything yet - I know I can reset the DA sections using a button in Link, but for the ECU Config side of things I'm reading that I need to download stock files - but on ecmtuning's page for these files (http://www.ecmtuning.com/wiki/v3configs) they only list files for firmware versions 3.19.49 and earlier, and I think mine is 3.2x.xx. (will have to double check to be sure though) In that case do you know what I would do? I haven't been able to find any information on the suggested SD table values from ecmtuning that you mentioned.

I'm hoping to check mechanical timing this weekend. I need a 1/2" drive ratchet to turn the crank...hoping we have one at work I can borrow. I have bigger sockets but only a 1/2" breaker bar, and that won't fit in there very well.

Link says timing is at 5* with timing pin grounded, so base timing should be good. Can I trust that? Or would it be wise to double check with a timing light...

I'll let you know as soon as I make more progress - thanks

I think I might have a major mechanical problem.

It looks to me like oil is definitely getting on 3 of 4 spark plugs. Here are pictures of the 4 new spark plugs that have been in the car for less than 50 miles....maybe less than 30. Cylinders 1, 3, and 4 have two pictures each. (one with flash and one without)

Cylinder 1:





Cylinder 2:





Cylinder 3:






Cylinder 4:

So luv2rallye thinks it looks more like glazing than oil which is great.

I did a hard reset with Link and got the idle tuned AND was able to start off with base fuel settings that make sense. So something was really off in that tune. Sounds better on startup now, though still have hard cold starts and unstable idle, and can't run with timing and diagnostic pins grounded. Gets idle surge with timing pin grounded, and with the diagnostic pin grounded too, the idle surge becomes so bad that I have to turn the BISS screw way out to even keep it running.

Still have low vacuum which explains that, and am making headway - cylinder 2 is running leaner than the rest from the looks of the spark plugs. So I'm searching in that direction - a leak near runner 2, or valve issues in that cylinder.

Did you upgrade your pcv valve yet link below http://www.dsmtuners.com/threads/the-4g63t-pcv-system.366890/

At this point it would help to know where the oil is coming from, also it has been mentioned somewhat, but make sure the fuel injectors are clean making sure they all have an even spray pattern, a bad coolant temp sensor can also make the idle a bit off so check it as well.
the cas could also have issues, if the timing is not correct or it is faulty, so that should also be inspected. along with all wiring connectors, start looking for any signs of wear or damage on all the wires on the engine control harness.

- Haven't upgraded PCV valve yet, but the problem exists with the PCV line plugged so it's not that.
- Looking like it may not be oil on the plugs. (see my post right above yours)
- I've checked the coolant temp sensor an it checked out ok.
- The fuel injectors are really new from FIC, less than 3000 miles on them so I'm hoping they're ok...I don't know anything about injectors but I'm figuring with the low vacuum issue it's more air related right? Or could a FI that's not squirting right cause low vacuum due to less power being made in that cylinder....I'll have to do some research on inspecting fuel injectors I guess.
- Haven't checked the CAS, but thanks - good idea. Base timing is 5* verified, but it jumps to just above to 1 T mark a lot. (with timing pin grounded) Could that be a CAS issue? The CAS looks pretty fresh...the guy who built the car replaced tons of stuff so I wouldn't be surprised if the thing is new(ish).

Thanks mitsubishikid



To all interested - I created a new thread with all of the information regarding this troubleshooting process consolidated here: http://www.dsmtuners.com/threads/my...new-perspective-still-troubleshooting.495724/

97gsxIA we can continue here or there, up to you.

Gremo87 said:

Well it's definitely dark, and with oil on the lower threads I just assume that's what it is...the plug with no darkness on the tip also has no oil on the threads. It's E85 tho, with new fuel filter.

As for losing coolant, I don't think so. I haven't been driving it since I noticed something was wrong.

Click to expand...

I have white smoke coming out my tail pipe. I'm pretty sure it's the turbo seals.
I was told it might be valve stem seals but I haven't really looked

White means coolant... so turbo seal or headgasket..