1G ECU Questions for upgrade.....

[grpracing]

Hi Guys, Ive been reading up on how to change over to a 91-94 ecu in my 90 Laser. I plan to make it awd in the future because this car is just for racing. I am wondering if I can install my 91-94 awd ecu into my 90 fwd after doing the the wire switch as seen on vfaq and still drive it as a fwd until I have collected the rest of my parts. I want to send out the ecu to be socketed and then install it so it would be one less thing to have to worry about later. Will I have problems with cas or any other sensors using the newer ecu or should I just trade this one off and look for a 90 ecu instead. I'm well trained in automotive electronics (certified for almost 10 years) and had electronics in my trade school so I have no problem with automotive electronics. I've been told its easier to get an awd car instead of the change over but I really like this car and it was one of my first DSm's so I dont care about the work invovled. Any tips or reasons why this would be a bad Idea would be very helpfull right now. Thanks guy..

 

[oldman]

The car will run but the tach will not function properly, This is what you need to do to make it work.

 

[grpracing]

The car will run but the tach will not function properly, This is what you need to do to make it work.

Thanks Bruce. The link was allot of help and I am going to sit down and think about it before I do it. I just picked up a 93 Talon FWD and I may do the change over to it and keep the 90 as a fwd. I'm looking to get my ECU's socketed and was wondering if there is someone that you recomend or have had dealings with that you trust. Seems a eprom is a better way to go than to mess with individual upgrades to get most of the same affect.

 

[moliver]

honestly you should just buy a awd chassis and drop an engine in. It will be alot cheaper and faster then converting.

 

[steve]

I am going to sit down and think about it before I do it.

Jeff's method should work great. It leaves the '90 tech gate wiring alone and uses the '91 PTM to source a new tach signal for just the ECU pin 109.

Steve

 

[grpracing]

honestly you should just buy a awd chassis and drop an engine in. It will be alot cheaper and faster then converting.

I understand your point but I switched from V8 oval track race trucks to the DSM's after purchasing this turbo car and plan on keeping it for a while. After trading off parts and parting out one other car so far I have more than paid for this one and am just looking for pride in building this car to the max as it was my first turbo dsm and its not my daily driver. I picked up a 93 Talon to dress up for the street. Of all the cars I've owned over the years the dsm is the first I have found that really feels comfortable to drive cause they handle like they are on rails. I probably sound like an Idiot but Ive built kit cars, dune buggys, go carts ect.. I've had everything from a 63 olds F85 cutlas w/ a 215 aluminum v8 to a 84 Firebird that I wedged a 69 olds rocket motor into because they said it couldnt be done. My final goal is to take a dsm down to Bonniville and get my over 200mph T-shirt so I dont mind spending the time to built it how I want it. I mayfind it better to leave it as a FWD for that purpose to cut the drag from the extra drive train but I was looking to do some changing up on this car and wondered if it was a possibility.

 

[steve]

I was looking to do some changing up on this car and wondered if it was a possibility.

Converting a 1G FWD to AWD is quite involved. The unibody is different between the two cars to start with, so there is a bit of cutting and welding involved. Since you need an AWD donor car for the sheet metal, suspension, rear diff, axles, driveshaft, transfer case, transmission, etc, it's usuallt easier and cheaper to start with a good AWD.

If you have the time, energy, and cash to swap then go for it. One of the more radical AWD conversions was done by a friend of mine, it's a twin engine AWD using two automatic FWD drivetrains. One is in the normal spot up front and the other in the hatch. The whole backend of the car is custom. I'd bet for the right money the car would be available if you really want that 200 mph shirt.

Steve

 

[grpracing]

Did he do that off one computer or did he add another harness to manage the second motor? Now that would be a great project.! It would seem quite involved to log if he was running 2 ecu's.

Another question on the ecu's and chips for you would be what advantage is the double logging frequency? I havent been able to find any real indepth info on what its purpose is. I built my own logger cables and have been using mmcd for my logging but will this double freq be more useful with that system or does it even affect it?

 

[steve]

1 - Each powertrain have it's own ECU and TCU. The throttle and shift linkages are shared..

2 - Internally the various airflow variables are 16 bit values but the logger interface uses 8 bit values. With the way the Hz is scaled it caps out at 1606Hz and most modified cars will have higher actual airflows even using a 1G MAF. So using the half rate allows Hz upto 3200 to be logged.

Steve

 

[oldman]

Thanks Bruce. I'm looking to get my ECU's socketed and was wondering if there is someone that you recomend or have had dealings with that you trust. Seems a eprom is a better way to go than to mess with individual upgrades to get most of the same affect.

You're welcome. As for referrals, you have been speaking to one of the best I know. "steve" have fixed and socketed both of my 90 eprom ECUs last year.