ECMlink Unstoppable Knock... need help

[Shooty]

Since I've upgraded ecmlink from v2 to v3, I am not able to stop the knock.
Was running perfectly last summer at 20psi on 91 octane
This year, the car knocks at stock boost pressure

1). Any boost, vac, or exhaust leaks?
Boost leak tested 5psi above your max boost with no leaks?
No problem there
2). Verified mechanical timing?
Everything is aligned
3). Verified base timing?
5*BTDC
4). Ignition system
COP or Stock Coil: Stock
Wire brand and Age: ACCEL 8mm 150omhs/feet - 2013
Spark Plug brand, type and Gap: NGK BPR7ES 0.028

5). Motor health (Compression Test)
Cylinder 1:155
Cylinder 2:155
Cylinder 3:155
Cylinder 4:155

6). Performed basic throttle body adjustments?
Idle Switch: Adjusted
Throttle Cable: Like it should be
TPS: 0.63 volts closed
BISS: Around 30 at idle

7). Compression ratio
8.5:1
8). Any known bad sensors or brittle wiring?
Nothing that I know
9). Any DTC/CEL codes?
Nothing
10). Electrical system
Car off (not running): 12.2
Car running: 13.5-14

11). Base fuel pressure and injector values
Base Fuel Pressure: 44psi
Injector Size (cc/min):780cc

12). Properly calibrated and configured wideband sensor
Sensor Brand: Glowshift
Calibration Date: 217/06/03

13). Type of fuel
Type: 91 Shell V-Power Nitro+
Percent of Ethanol: 0%

14). Watched ECMlink how-to videos?
Yes

Also,
The knock sensor has been changed
The o2 sensor is new
Old fuel has been flushed
I've richen the air/fuel mixture from 11:1 to 10:1
I could not perfectionate the tune since the knock is stopping me

 

[SasaniFab]

Since I've upgraded ecmlink from v2 to v3, I am not able to stop the knock.
Was running perfectly last summer at 20psi on 91 octane
This year, the car knocks at stock boost pressure

1). Any boost, vac, or exhaust leaks?
Boost leak tested 5psi above your max boost with no leaks?
No problem there
2). Verified mechanical timing?
Everything is aligned
3). Verified base timing?
5*BTDC
4). Ignition system
COP or Stock Coil: Stock
Wire brand and Age: ACCEL 8mm 150omhs/feet - 2013
Spark Plug brand, type and Gap: NGK BPR7ES 0.028

5). Motor health (Compression Test)
Cylinder 1:155
Cylinder 2:155
Cylinder 3:155
Cylinder 4:155

6). Performed basic throttle body adjustments?
Idle Switch: Adjusted
Throttle Cable: Like it should be
TPS: 0.63 volts closed
BISS: Around 30 at idle

7). Compression ratio
8.5:1
8). Any known bad sensors or brittle wiring?
Nothing that I know
9). Any DTC/CEL codes?
Nothing
10). Electrical system
Car off (not running): 12.2
Car running: 13.5-14

11). Base fuel pressure and injector values
Base Fuel Pressure: 44psi
Injector Size (cc/min):780cc

12). Properly calibrated and configured wideband sensor
Sensor Brand: Glowshift
Calibration Date: 217/06/03

13). Type of fuel
Type: 91 Shell V-Power Nitro+
Percent of Ethanol: 0%

14). Watched ECMlink how-to videos?
Yes

Also,
The knock sensor has been changed
The o2 sensor is new
Old fuel has been flushed
I've richen the air/fuel mixture from 11:1 to 10:1
I could not perfectionate the tune since the knock is stopping me

Your car is running very hot, after a pull your car is close to 220. Have you done a leakdown test, my car acted similar when my headgasket was on its way out. If your headgasket is solid try lowering your timing, running 20 psi on 91? Lower your timing from 4k+ several degrees, add timing until knock returns and back it off.

 

[Shooty]

Your car is running very hot, after a pull your car is close to 220. Have you done a leakdown test, my car acted similar when my headgasket was on its way out. If your headgasket is solid try lowering your timing, running 20 psi on 91? Lower your timing from 4k+ several degrees, add timing until knock returns and back it off.

A leakdown test will be on my To-Do list, for now I don't have the right quipment to do it

I did some more pulls, today:
13psi, I can see about 4 to 6 of knockRet
15-17 psi, I saw around 3.5
20psi, saw 3 again

All of these test were done on an untouched stock timing table
Can something vibrates to the knock sensor frequencies?

 

[SasaniFab]

A leakdown test will be on my To-Do list, for now I don't have the right quipment to do it

I did some more pulls, today:
13psi, I can see about 4 to 6 of knockRet
15-17 psi, I saw around 3.5
20psi, saw 3 again

All of these test were done on an untouched stock timing table
Can something vibrates to the knock sensor frequencies?

Again, lower the timing in the 4500+ column several degrees and see what happens. how old is the gas in the tank?

 

[SasaniFab]

Your going to be limited with 91 octane gas either way unless your a really good tuner. What I would do is A: lower your timing B: leakdown test C: Run higher octane fuel - see if knock goes away..... most importantly figure out why your engine is running so hot? Have you checked your coolant level? My car acted similar when my headgasket was leaking. My compression was perfect at the same time....go figure

 

[Shooty]

Your going to be limited with 91 octane gas either way unless your a really good tuner. What I would do is A: lower your timing B: leakdown test C: Run higher octane fuel - see if knock goes away..... most importantly figure out why your engine is running so hot? Have you checked your coolant level? My car acted similar when my headgasket was leaking. My compression was perfect at the same time....go figure

Unfortunately, 91 is the highest octane rating I can get, I've decided to go with methanol injection but I cannot get the car to work properly first. I will run a datalog with a good amount of timing pulled and see what it says. My coolant level inside the system and in the reservoir have not moved so far. I will let you know for further results!

 

[Shooty]

So I've lowered the timing considerably but nothing changed, even at stock boost. I tried methanol injection and still see knock. I will look into buying a leakdown tester next

 

[richardlapalme]

Your car is running very hot, after a pull your car is close to 220. Have you done a leakdown test, my car acted similar when my headgasket was on its way out. If your headgasket is solid try lowering your timing, running 20 psi on 91? Lower your timing from 4k+ several degrees, add timing until knock returns and back it off.

220 degree is very hot, when i was on track day, i experienced overheating, and the number of knocks were growing in proportion with higher temperatures.

 

[Shooty]

I always see 200 degrees and more even when cruising... This is with a 154°F thermostat and a two row radiator.

 

[SasaniFab]

So I've lowered the timing considerably but nothing changed, even at stock boost. I tried methanol injection and still see knock. I will look into buying a leakdown tester next

Do you have a bad temp sensor? If your headgasket is good and your not loosing coolant you shouldn't be overheating. Figure it out....I start looking when my car goes over 210....my temp only get this high when I'm doing pull after pull.

 

[Murdertalon]

This temp thing sounds like what I experienced with a brand new thermostat that wouldn't open. The car would get up to operating temp, but the lower radiator hos3 would still be cold and my fans wouldn't come on. Thinking maybe it was my thermostat all along I removed it and my temps dropped so low that I had to use cardboard to block off the radiator for the drive home. Two things I found wrong with my system:

1. Grab your upper radiator hos3 when its warming up can you squeeze it/ collapse it? if so your cap isn't holding pressure.

2. Feel the lower radiator hos3 when your car is warm in your case around 154 or whatever your thermostat is set at is it still cold?

 

[Shooty]

Do you have a bad temp sensor? If your headgasket is good and your not loosing coolant you shouldn't be overheating. Figure it out....I start looking when my car goes over 210....my temp only get this high when I'm doing pull after pull.

Coolant sensor was changed last year, it's still reading correctly according to ecmlink
I have not forgot your advice of doing a leakdown test, however no car parts stores have the tester in stock. It can be order tought, one week delay at a fair price of 90$

This temp thing sounds like what I experienced with a brand new thermostat that wouldn't open. The car would get up to operating temp, but the lower radiator hos3 would still be cold and my fans wouldn't come on. Thinking maybe it was my thermostat all along I removed it and my temps dropped so low that I had to use cardboard to block off the radiator for the drive home. Two things I found wrong with my system:

1. Grab your upper radiator hos3 when its warming up can you squeeze it/ collapse it? if so your cap isn't holding pressure.

2. Feel the lower radiator hos3 when your car is warm in your case around 154 or whatever your thermostat is set at is it still cold?

The cap was changed along with the coolant sensor, so it's still looking good and doing it's job
I took no chances and remove the thermostat. Tested it in booling water. Still opens like it should

 

[Murdertalon]

Hear me out on this one.. Pull the thermostat and drive it around for a day and see if your temps drop super low. See where the temps climb to driving for a while/ do some highway driving.. Mine would run so cold highway driving without a thermostat it showed me that obviously that was the bottle neck.

I should also add I just forced open the thermostat to the fail safe locks for my (without a thermostat test) so I knew it was full open and the rubber gasket was also in place. You are running a super low temp thermostat from the looks of things.. I don't think that is a good long term solution.

What I did was bought an Evo9 thermostat and cut off 2mm around the outside and run that now.. the inner diameter of actual flow area is much better than the anemic normal dsm one.

Mitsubishi Part No. MD363571

 

[SasaniFab]

Get that leakdown test done and let us know how it looks, check to see if your getting any air bubbles in your cooling system. If that checks out, throw in some race gas. Meth injection is a whole other beast, I noticed that if the setting weren't optimum the kit would trigger the knock sensor as it sprayed at lower rpms and would quickly tapper away. Once I optimized the setting it went away. Race gas is a quick easy way to rule it out phantom knock. If your knock doesn't go away on race gas......it could very well be phantom knock.

 

[Shooty]

So a long time have passed since I'vs updated this

I have menage to fix the coolant issues, it's now staying around 200F at it's maximum
The leakdown showed nothing critical
The next thing I fixed was a cracked turbine housing. I replaced it with a used one which i cut the flapper on it, welded it's arm in place and ported it.
I installed a tial 38mm on it, just to help with boost creep

Many days pass by, I load the wastegate with the 14.5 psi spring combination and goes on a road test
The wastegate opens around 15psi like it should but then rapidly creeps over 21 psi around 5k, which triggers knock.

My next quest is, how can I cure or at least reduce boost creep

Trying out race gas might be an future option

 

[Murdertalon]

Waste gate not being able to flow enough exhaust? can you do some porting work on your setup?

 

[SasaniFab]

So a long time have passed since I'vs updated this

I have menage to fix the coolant issues, it's now staying around 200F at it's maximum
The leakdown showed nothing critical
The next thing I fixed was a cracked turbine housing. I replaced it with a used one which i cut the flapper on it, welded it's arm in place and ported it.
I installed a tial 38mm on it, just to help with boost creep

Many days pass by, I load the wastegate with the 14.5 psi spring combination and goes on a road test
The wastegate opens around 15psi like it should but then rapidly creeps over 21 psi around 5k, which triggers knock.

My next quest is, how can I cure or at least reduce boost creep

Trying out race gas might be an future option

your running an oem turbo manifold with an aftermarket o2 housing? If so which o2 housing are you running.

 

[SasaniFab]

So a long time have passed since I'vs updated this

I have menage to fix the coolant issues, it's now staying around 200F at it's maximum
The leakdown showed nothing critical
The next thing I fixed was a cracked turbine housing. I replaced it with a used one which i cut the flapper on it, welded it's arm in place and ported it.
I installed a tial 38mm on it, just to help with boost creep

Many days pass by, I load the wastegate with the 14.5 psi spring combination and goes on a road test
The wastegate opens around 15psi like it should but then rapidly creeps over 21 psi around 5k, which triggers knock.

My next quest is, how can I cure or at least reduce boost creep

Trying out race gas might be an future option

Before you do anything you need to be able to control your turbo, throwing race gas in is not a good idea. Is this a real tial wastegate or ebay pos?

 

[Shooty]

your running an oem turbo manifold with an aftermarket o2 housing? If so which o2 housing are you running.

The housing is the dump version from ebay, wich I cut to weld the vband for the tial

Before you do anything you need to be able to control your turbo, throwing race gas in is not a good idea. Is this a real tial wastegate or ebay pos?

It is an authentic version, no doubt

Waste gate not being able to flow enough exhaust? can you do some porting work on your setup?

It's exactly what I did today. I remove the turbo again, ported the wastegate hole some more and I also removed some meterial so the exhaust flow would go easier through the wastegate port. I will bolt everything up and post the results

 

[SasaniFab]

The housing is the dump version from ebay, wich I cut the weld the vband for the tial


It is an authentic version, no doubt


It's exactly what I did today. I remove the turbo again, ported the wastegate hole some more and I also removed some meterial so the exhaust flow would go easier through the wastegate port. I will bolt everything up and post the results

What type of exhaust are you running? Are you running the stock turbo. Id setup a profile page so we can see what your setup is to better help you. That tial is more than enough to control your boost pressure. The only time I run into issues with boost control is when I run open downpipe. Why dont you run a boost controller? When I dump my exhuast I turn down my boost. So if you dont have a cat or any restriction in your exhuast you will see a boost spike. Why dont you run a 10psi spring and see how it does.

 

[bling5tatus]

The stock knock sensor and knock circuitry on the ecu cannot monitor for real engine knock once you modify the motor. Think of it as a microphone that can measure sound only within a certain hz range.... that signifies knock in a "stock speaker" (aka stock motor). Once you change how that speaker sounds by upgrading parts in it, the knock sensor no longer can accurately measure what knock in that motor sounds like.

Yes, I know you can limit when the knock sensor decides to read the sound, or what happens when it does read the sound. The point is that the stock sensor is "hard coded" to read only a certain range of sound and you cannot change that without changing the circuitry and the sensor.... which, to my knowledge, nobody has done.

With aftermarket engine computers you can control how the sensor reads knock and tune out noise that isn't real knock from modified engines. There is no similar solution for any ecu tuning product for stock dsm ecus.

I'd put a resistor in the sensor so it reads 0 knock all the time and make sane tuning decisions so you don't blow up the car.

 

[Murdertalon]

With aftermarket engine computers you can control how the sensor reads knock and tune out noise that isn't real knock from modified engines. There is no similar solution for any ecu tuning product for stock dsm ecus.

I'd put a resistor in the sensor so it reads 0 knock all the time and make sane tuning decisions so you don't blow up the car.

That is the first time I have heard that.. good to know. Ive done a lot of research on these engines and that's the first time I have seen someone talk about how the frequency of the engine can change so drastically.

 

[Shooty]

What type of exhaust are you running? Are you running the stock turbo. Id setup a profile page so we can see what your setup is to better help you. That tial is more than enough to control your boost pressure. The only time I run into issues with boost control is when I run open downpipe. Why dont you run a boost controller? When I dump my exhuast I turn down my boost. So if you dont have a cat or any restriction in your exhuast you will see a boost spike. Why dont you run a 10psi spring and see how it does.

I already have a up to date profile, feel free to check it out
The car has a complete 3 inch exhaust, with or without cat, the results are the same. I've also tried a 10 psi spring, the results were not so good, even worst
The turbo creeps close to 15psi and then knock sudently occur, over 10 knockdeg according the ecmlink. The car falls on its front end
I have linked a log to this

 

[Shooty]

So today I tried to perfectionate the tune, Mafcomp has now a smoother line, whitch didn't help
I raised afr from 11:1 to 10:1
This kind of helped, the car now runs at a higher rpm before knocking, again by a good amount

I must say, I'm out of ideas

Here's another log

 

[SasaniFab]

I already have a up to date profile, feel free to check it out
The car has a complete 3 inch exhaust, with or without cat, the results are the same. I've also tried a 10 psi spring, the results were not so good, even worst
The turbo creeps close to 15psi and then knock sudently occur, over 10 knockdeg according the ecmlink. The car falls on its front end
I have linked a log to this

Are you running a maf correct?