From Hero to Zhiro (1999 Sixbolt_16g)

[SixBolt_16G]

Capped and ziptied the vacuum ports on the throttle body.

Easy pull of fuel rail and injectors since throttle body is still out. Filled out paperwork to send them to FIC for cleaning and flow test... Honestly... Its taking me longer to find a smaller box and some packing material than it took to get the injector out....

 

[SixBolt_16G]

February 2025

When its not bittercold, its snowing...and still cold. Cant believe I use to work out in this weather and not be cold... anyway, enough bitchin'...work continues at a much slower pace. Injectors were shipped off to FIC for cleaning and flow testing. I followed the fuel feed line down to a fuel filter that I have no idea the age, but its at least 12 years old and figured I might as well replace it and the fuel feed line while I've got everything else out.

Breaker bar on the top 19" banjo bolt and a 3/4 wrench to hold the top of the filter from twisting made it simple but the bottom nut was a pain even tho I definitely didn't have to struggle nearly as much as others have.

I took the leftover A/C line out to get more room to work and then tried to muscle my way through it but it was only making me angrier instead of bringing me closer to breaking it loose.

Getting some penetration fluid on the nut was difficult due to the lack of room, but was able to get a good look at it from the clearance above the passenger axle. 14" flare wrench and 2 tries the next day broke the nut loose. Drained the gas into a small bowl and actually avoided making a mess.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

Injectors came back from FIC. Weather is suppose to turn around soon.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

Global warming is back from vacation as its been in the high 50s the last couple of days, so Im listening to the company meeting in the garage while I put my injectors back in. Multi-tasking.

Fuel filter is in too, so gonna hook up the battery later and check for leaks.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

1. New fuel pump is overrunning the stock fpr.
2. Car still cold starts at 2300 rpms.
3. Excessive, loud creaking from the rear end.
4. New clutch is dragging.
5. Fuel Injector 1 seal leak.
6. Unsure how much of the tune was actually finished.
7. Wideband not logging in ECMLink
8. Rpms hang/raise during shifts or any revs close to 3000 rpms or above..

Three years ago, my wife came home from work and asked me if she could quit her job. Didnt really matter to me at all because I know what its like to work for a trash company and how every day feels like a slow death. She was out of work for way longer, but since she found a job that she really liked9 months ago, she ended up getting me a shitload of presents for Christmas. So many that she forgot to give me this one until a month or so later that one of my friends helped her pick out.

Fast forward to yesterday as weather was approaching the 60s, I finally got around to testing my car after putting the injectors back in and changing the fuel filter. No leaks! Came back from a short trip to the school down the street and decided to swap the BOV...

I quickly discovered that the rising RPM problems that has been plaguing me since May of last year is no longer a problem. The old Greddy that I had mustve been sticking shut and cause a surge. The shift from 2-3 after getting on the gas a little reminded me that all the previous times that I had gone for test drives over the last few months, I dont remember hearing the bov as distinctly or just hearing a passive flutter, but I would always forget to check it out when i pulled into the garage.

So big thanks to my wife for inadvertantly fixing a huge frustration in my life that I was running out of answers to. Even tho I cant get on it like I want to since the car isnt tuned for anything more than idle, it felt good to go for a problem-free drive even if it was just a 3 minute trip around the 'hood. Still trying to get over ""i feel like I forgot something" from all the other work ive done on the car over the last 6+ months and expectation that something is going to fail due to "I dont know what I dont know" and just enjoy the fact that I diagnosed and fixed so many things on this car and its all working... so far. On to tuning this bi***.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

1. New fuel pump is overrunning the stock fpr.
2. Car still cold starts at 2300 rpms.
3. Excessive, loud creaking from the rear end.
4. New clutch is dragging.
5. Fuel Injector 1 seal leak.
6. Unsure how much of the tune was actually finished.
7. Wideband not logging in ECMLink
8. Rpms hang/raise during shifts or any revs close to 3000 rpms or above..
9. Idle holds at about 2000 rpms when coming to a stop.

Everytime i put this throttle body back on it seems like a new idle issue. Work has been hellacious... along with some nasty storms on warm days followed by consecutive rainy and cold days. Winter Road salt is definitely long gone and hopefully in the next week or two the cold weather will go away too. Ive been out with the wife twice in the last 3 weeks on Satureay mornings, and both times have resulted in a return trip to the house to investigate what was wrong. As soon as I got to the end of the driveway the rpms just stayed slightly elevated.On warm up, the car eventually settled to around 1k rpms, slightly higher than my idle set in ECMLink. Drove around the neighborhood and shfiting into neutral and sitting at a light, the RPMS would start to climb to 2k-2.5k by the time i got back.

Fast forward to yesterday, worked from home all week because of a water main break outside the office, so had a chance to run out to the garage and play for half an hour. Figured I needed to loosen the throttle cable considering the rpms seemed to go higher the more the car warmed up, but didnt get a chance to take it for a drive until today. A short, but perfect drive. No more high idles, no more rev hangs. Adjusted my idle fuel trims a little more.

9. Idle holds at about 2000 rpms when coming to a stop.

Trying to come up with a new series of projects to tackle for the summer....
2. New Tires.
3. Find coupler to remove MAS and connect filter straight Injen pipe.
4. Relocate battery to get more room to work in engine bay
5. Replacement headlights taking up space in the garage to customize.
6. Paint hood (Oxidation spot has been in the middle of the hood since i bought the car.)

But up first...
1. Finish Tuning in ECMLink. (Not sure where I go from here now that i have idle fuel trims in line.)

 

[SixBolt_16G]

Ugh.... cars... Solve one problem, 2 more pop up. Solve those 2 and the original problem comes back. While the BOV solved a lot of the issue with the rising rpms... the issue didnt complete go away the harder i stepped on the gas. RPMS would rise during shifts, I was starting to suspect that the new clutch was slipping or the flywheel was out of spec.(didnt install it myself.) But was also getting elongated, elevated rise in idle rpms just by stepping on the gas to pull it out of the garage.

Throttle body off again.
Bled the clutch and adjusted it again.
Throttle cable adjusted again.

After taking a drive today... the problem seems to have been the orientation of the throttle body gasket on the manifold side. I found a post here that mentioned that the orientation seen in a certain graphic was actually wrong and I spun it 90 degrees like the guy in the post did. Disappointed when i started it up and and it idled at 1500, which I was excited because it was a normal start up, but after a minute or 2, the rpms never came down. I was about to take the throttle body off, thinking that turning the gasket made things worse, but then I discovered that I forgot to plug the connector back into the IAC.

No more slightly elevated idle when coming to a stop. Gave it a little boost and the rpms dropped as expected. Not sure how it was a problem during the BLT as the pressure was holding. Gonna give it a second drive before I get super excited about it being fixed. Glad its seems to be working out because last option was to suspect that the flywheel was out of spec

On the way out a newer Civic wanted to play while i was cruising along gave it a little gas when we went though the underpass under the highway, but not much cause im not tuned for anything other than idle... but it was enough for his girlfriend to get pissy and start fussing at him, but that didnt prevent him from grinning from ear to ear. I think my loud as Thermal pissed her off.

Back on the road. I shouldve made a log, but didnt think that was going to fix it and wasnt planning on being gone long. I think the car is running super lean on the cruise tho. Suppose to be dry tomorrow, so Im definitely gonna take it for a spin. Fingers crossed. I feel like ive gone though the every idle problem possible over the last 6 months.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

Took a cruise yesterday and finally got up some nerve to do wide open throttle. Getting past all the jitters to do so has taken a while. Put so much work into getting this car to run right that i just wanted to enjoy a running car for a hot second without wonder what that "noise" is. Forgot that I dont have a boost controller as the shop was suppose to set up ECMLink to manage the boost, so i zeroed all the cells. Went to home depot and got a pack of Lincoln .025 Mig tips to throw one between the line coming off the jpipe going to the 3-port solenoid. Seems to have worked as I was only getting around 10lbs.

Went out with the wife as she was testing her car since we finally got around to getting the crack in her header welded. Did a WOT right into a crew of cars as I hauled ass up the onramp and cruised with them for a while. Anyway, seems like Im ready to go. WOuld appreciate if someone could look at my log and give me some advice on how to proceed. Not sure if I need to start by making changes based on these two pulls or whether i need to make some changes to increase boost and take more logs closer to what the car will run..

WOT is at 400 secs and a second one at 1430 secs. Thanks!

 

[Justin DuBois]

Took a cruise yesterday and finally got up some nerve to do wide open throttle. Getting past all the jitters to do so has taken a while. Put so much work into getting this car to run right that i just wanted to enjoy a running car for a hot second without wonder what that "noise" is. Forgot that I dont have a boost controller as the shop was suppose to set up ECMLink to manage the boost, so i zeroed all the cells. Went to home depot and got a pack of Lincoln .025 Mig tips to throw one between the line coming off the jpipe going to the 3-port solenoid. Seems to have worked as I was only getting around 10lbs.

Went out with the wife as she was testing her car since we finally got around to getting the crack in her header welded. Did a WOT right into a crew of cars as I hauled ass up the onramp and cruised with them for a while. Anyway, seems like Im ready to go. WOuld appreciate if someone could look at my log and give me some advice on how to proceed. Not sure if I need to start by making changes based on these two pulls or whether i need to make some changes to increase boost and take more logs closer to what the car will run..

WOT is at 400 secs and a second one at 1430 secs. Thanks!

I have a few suggestions.
Set an AFR target that's not so awful rich, and off the scale. You have a wideband - but you need to burn your fuel in a range you can reliably measure. 9.6 is stupid rich (stock) 10.1 is a little bit leaner target but still rich for pump gas - If you stay on 91 Oct start with 10.1, but since you are not seeing knock at 11's you might as well try for 10.5. It will be richer than you are now, and moving you closer to calibrated.

Next - actually hit your targets. If you are happy with your base fuel pressure, start by adding global fuel (go less negative) until you actually reach 10.1 AFR targets at WOT. Right now, you are hitting 11's without knock (low boost) - so you know you can do 10.5

Your Global Fuel is set to -55.1%, and your WBFactor is telling you that the mix is 16.3% lean (trying to hit a 9.6 AFR target), so (-55.1%+16.3%=New Global Fuel -38.8%). I'd go with -45% as a new global fuel and see how close that gets you to 10.1-10.5, and then make another move after you collect more data. You are roughing in your Global Fuel right now.

Capture more data:
Try and make a pull in 3rd gear starting ~2000rpm. Floor it - you will have a huge bog, and slow ramp up as the RPM's climb. Stay in it just a bit longer than you did last time - See if you can get to 6K without knock. Then see if you can get to 7K without knock. At 8-10psi boost, you can be very wrong and not cause a problem.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

I have a few suggestions.
Set an AFR target that's not so awful rich, and off the scale. You have a wideband - but you need to burn your fuel in a range you can reliably measure. 9.6 is stupid rich (stock) 10.1 is a little bit leaner target but still rich for pump gas - If you stay on 91 Oct start with 10.1, but since you are not seeing knock at 11's you might as well try for 10.5. It will be richer than you are now, and moving you closer to calibrated.
View attachment 763551
Next - actually hit your targets. If you are happy with your base fuel pressure, start by adding global fuel (go less negative) until you actually reach 10.1 AFR targets at WOT. Right now, you are hitting 11's without knock (low boost) - so you know you can do 10.5

View attachment 763552

Your Global Fuel is set to -55.1%, and your WBFactor is telling you that the mix is 16.3% lean (trying to hit a 9.6 AFR target), so (-55.1%+16.3%=New Global Fuel -38.8%). I'd go with -45% as a new global fuel and see how close that gets you to 10.1-10.5, and then make another move after you collect more data. You are roughing in your Global Fuel right now.

Capture more data:
Try and make a pull in 3rd gear starting ~2000rpm. Floor it - you will have a huge bog, and slow ramp up as the RPM's climb. Stay in it just a bit longer than you did last time - See if you can get to 6K without knock. Then see if you can get to 7K without knock. At 8-10psi boost, you can be very wrong and not cause a problem.

Thanks Justin.... not sure how i reset that map since you had it set to 10.1 before winter.... Set them to 10.5, posting for sanity check...

 

[Justin DuBois]

Thanks Justin.... not sure how i reset that map since you had it set to 10.1 before winter.... Set them to 10.5, posting for sanity check...
View attachment 763558

The screen shot i provided was just an example - not found in the log. Yes, your edits look good

 

[chrisman287]

I'd go with -45% as a new global fuel and see how close that gets you to 10.1-10.5

I suggested this some time ago. Go for it!!

 

[SixBolt_16G]

The screen shot i provided was just an example - not found in the log. Yes, your edits look good

Going to be a washout for the next couple of days, hopefully get to drive the car Sunday, but in the meantime, loaded the new OpenLoopMaxOctane which sent me super rich during idle. Adjusted deadtime to get fuel trims back to +/- 0.

 

[Justin DuBois]

Going to be a washout for the next couple of days, hopefully get to drive the car Sunday, but in the meantime, loaded the new OpenLoopMaxOctane which sent me super rich during idle. Adjusted deadtime to get fuel trims back to +/- 0.

Thats interesting. Base fuel pressure and deadtime are the right tools for idle trims. Global fuel usually has a small effect on idle.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

Thats interesting. Base fuel pressure and deadtime are the right tools for idle trims. Global fuel usually has a small effect on idle.

Snuck in a drive thiis afternoon while its dry. Theres something going on with my ECMLink... This is the 2nd time that ive gone out and I seem to be missing data now. I actually did two separate WOTs, but in the log there is only one and something strange going on at 609 seconds where everything takes a nose dive. I think it picks up again when im idling into the garage. At least 10 minutes worth of data is gone.

 

[Justin DuBois]

Hmmm, first thing I would look for is a loose connection in the obdii or usb or power cables

 

[SixBolt_16G]

Hmmm, first thing I would look for is a loose connection in the obdii or usb or power cablesI

I think i was letting the computer go dark for too long between runs and it was going to to sleep. I was doing runs while take a cruise. This time, went out with the specific intent on doing consecutive runs. Did 3 today.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

Hey @Justin DuBois @chrisman287 ..i was able to do a run up around 7K yesterday(havent posted that log yet as im stuck at the office today)...but now that i have about 4 different runs up to 6.5k and 7k, what am i suppose to do from here?

 

[Justin DuBois]

Hey @Justin DuBois @chrisman287 ..i was able to do a run up around 7K yesterday(havent posted that log yet as im stuck at the office today)...but now that i have about 4 different runs up to 6.5k and 7k, what am i suppose to do from here?

All good data - Notice in the area highlighted from your previous log - in the cells around 4-5k rpm you are off the scale rich, but later closer to 5500rpm you are back on the map OK. We are still roughing things in, and you have not achieved a pull through the peak VE spot. Your Global Fuel is still in question, but you are getting closer.

Wideband Factor is telling you the highlighted area is ~10% rich. At this boost level, I suggest lowering the highlighted cells by 10%, and also lower the surrounding cells (by 5%) Use a little interpolation to smooth out the transitions.

In order to get to a global fuel number - you will need to run a little more boost to get into the intake sweet spot.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

All good data - Notice in the area highlighted from your previous log - in the cells around 4-5k rpm you are off the scale rich, but later closer to 5500rpm you are back on the map OK. We are still roughing things in, and you have not achieved a pull through the peak VE spot. Your Global Fuel is still in question, but you are getting closer.

Wideband Factor is telling you the highlighted area is ~10% rich. At this boost level, I suggest lowering the highlighted cells by 10%, and also lower the surrounding cells (by 5%) Use a little interpolation to smooth out the transitions.

In order to get to a global fuel number - you will need to run a little more boost to get into the intake sweet spot.

View attachment 764222

Sanity check, please

 

[Justin DuBois]

You will be smoothing out more of everything eventually. - Good enough for another pull.

 

[SixBolt_16G]

You will be smoothing out more of everything eventually. - Good enough for another pull.

@Justin DuBois Was able to run off another log this morning. Turned up the boost a little but kept it under 20.

 

[Justin DuBois]

OK! now you are crossing the VE peak in the map, try and back off the boost a little more. The 99 column at 4.5k looks like it needs to shift to a higher RPM band, and expand. You won't know until the AFR's are above 10:1. I'll post a suggested VE table - You are still hunting for an AFR result somewhere around 5000-5500k, @14.7psi when the VE is 100. I'll want you to revisit a minimum boost pull to go back over the 4-6k spot later after we get Global dialed in.

Original Global: -55.1
Current Global: -44.9
Suggested Global: -51
SuggestedVE:

 

[SixBolt_16G]

OK! now you are crossing the VE peak in the map, try and back off the boost a little more.

@Justin DuBois
I dialed the boost back and did two different runs hitting 15 and 16 psi. Im still trying to get use to the boost control settings in ECMLink. But loaded the new global fuel and adjusted dead times as I went lean this time.

 

[Justin DuBois]

@Justin DuBois
I dialed the boost back and did two different runs hitting 15 and 16 psi. Im still trying to get use to the boost control settings in ECMLink. But loaded the new global fuel and adjusted dead times as I went lean this time.

This is good - really good progress. Not too lean at all. Your setup looks like it has a late VE peak! I'm going to look at both 15 and 16 psi pulls, but the way your intake is performing, it looks like we can slide 100's into the 5500rpm column, and lean out 4500-5000. The trick is to see how much more you need up top to confirm we are putting the peak in the best spot. Basically - one area of the VE map will have 100's and hitting AFR target just with global fuel. Every other spot on the VE map should go lower than 100. Lets see how this goes...