Unichip problems help?

[ChrisGB]

Hi to All

Had Unichip fitted today and have got probems in fitting and setup. First problem, Unichip does not detect engine speed (all wiring as per diagram and checked). Looking further, it appears there is no earth / ground through the ECU. Solution from Dastek, try directly grounding Unichip to chassis. This worked, however, we now have a CEL but no code logged.

Next step, try running the setup. The Unichip is applying changes to fuelling and timing, however, the ECU is cancelling these changes after a very short time, result being no gain in output anywhere in the rev / throttle range. Tried and ECU reset to no effect.

Best guess is that the ECU is pulling the timing (almost defienately) and the fuelling (probably) so the engine actually loses power.

Engine advantages reckon the engine will take more advance to benefit output, the knock sensor is keen to intervene early.

Any suggestions?

Chris

[Chris]

I'm guessing you didn't get the pnp harness when you got your unichip then, as I didn't have any of these problems when installaing mine, although granted I've not taken mine to be re/mapped as yet..

Without the harness then the install is a bit of a nightmare iirc, requiring a fair bit of fiddling with the stock harness, so all manor of possibilties for wiring gremlins..  Who did the install - you or a company (apologies if this has been covered already..)

[ChrisGB]

I'm guessing you didn't get the pnp harness when you got your unichip then, as I didn't have any of these problems when installaing mine, although granted I've not taken mine to be re/mapped as yet..

Without the harness then the install is a bit of a nightmare iirc, requiring a fair bit of fiddling with the stock harness, so all manor of possibilties for wiring gremlins..  Who did the install - you or a company (apologies if this has been covered already..)

Hi Chris

With the P&P harness, is there any soldering involved or does the unit literally plug and play? The reason I ask is that Engine Advantages, who supplied and fitted the unit, quoted me for fitting and suggested the reason it would work out cheaper than me supplying and them fitting E-Manage was as the PNP harness would save labour time. However, they did have to do quite a bit of soldering, so I am wondering if they are charging me for P&P harness but pocketing the cash themselves and doing the labour instead.

If this is the case I am a bit pissed off because A) It resulted in my wasting 4 hours of my only day off this week and B) If I am paying for Unichip and Harness, I expect to get both, the P&P haness being useful particularly when it comes to selling the unit at car change time.

To be fair, they have given me a full refund and they tried their best to sort it all out on the day but with no luck.

I have spoken to Dastek today, they tell me they have done at least 10 MR2 Roadsters at their facility with absolutely no installation problems. They have not had any issues with CELs or the unit not working when grounded through the ECU.

I am now thinking that EA have tried to bodge it and got it wrong. What I dont know is if the unit was misbehaving as a result of being wired incorrectly or if there is another issue with the engine advance.

Dastek suggested that (assuming the unit was wired  correctly and working properly) the knock sensor may be producing too high an output. The reckoning is that with V-Power, they should be able to comfortably pull timing forward by 5 - 8 degrees without knock and get very useful gains.

Knock sensor output can be affected if the sensor has been removed and replaced with too high a torque setting. Checking with Mr T, my car has had no engine work from new, so this is unlikely. I am going to talk to Torque Developments tomorrow (another local ish Unichip agent and known commodity in terms of the quality of their work) and see if they fancy having a go at doing it.

If that does not work out, I need to figure out why the engine is putting out too high a knock signal. The engine was not pinking before the ECU was cutting advance back, so there may be a problem with harshness or vibration from the manifold or the exhaust. I think this unlikely myself as the exhaust would possibly resonate, but would not cause an accross the board ignition timing cut. Also there are others running Unichip and PPE setup with excellent results.

Chris

[evileye_wrx]

With a Plug n Play harness there should have been no need for soldering at all. Fitting, even with drilling out of the security cover should take under half an hour. I did think your quoted price was very low when you posted it, and it lead my to drop the price on the unichip + harness I was selling by £50. Supplied and fitted with tuning I would expect to be around £600, although I have never had a quote for that, its just a guess. The cheapest harness I was able to find was around $300 from a seller on spyderchat.

At least if you've got your money back you could look out for an emanage/ Power FC over on SC and go to one of the established tuners such as Thor or Rogue. My emanage cost about £250 and I think Alex's was cheaper still. Hypersport at Wigan have quoted £275 + vat for fitting and tuning. Fitting emanage looks a little more complicated to me that unichip as there is more than one harness to plug in.

Incidentally, anyone who wants a unichip WITHOUT harness and wants to solder it in themselves I still have one for sale and I'm looking at taking offers to get it off my hands and money in the bank.

Phil

[ChrisGB]

With a Plug n Play harness there should have been no need for soldering at all. Fitting, even with drilling out of the security cover should take under half an hour. I did think your quoted price was very low when you posted it, and it lead my to drop the price on the unichip + harness I was selling by £50. Supplied and fitted with tuning I would expect to be around £600, although I have never had a quote for that, its just a guess. The cheapest harness I was able to find was around $300 from a seller on spyderchat.

At least if you've got your money back you could look out for an emanage/ Power FC over on SC and go to one of the established tuners such as Thor or Rogue. My emanage cost about £250 and I think Alex's was cheaper still. Hypersport at Wigan have quoted £275 + vat for fitting and tuning. Fitting emanage looks a little more complicated to me that unichip as there is more than one harness to plug in.

Incidentally, anyone who wants a unichip WITHOUT harness and wants to solder it in themselves I still have one for sale and I'm looking at taking offers to get it off my hands and money in the bank.

Phil

Hi Phil

The whole reason for me not going for the E-manage (which I can import from Mokey Wrench racing for a very small outlay with harnesses), was that the Unichip would work out cheaper in labour because of the plug and play harness. I cheked with Dastek themselves who reckoned Unichip with harness fitted and tuned should cost somewhere from £375 depending on location (South = more expensive). They reckoned £450 to be about right. Looks like EA have tried to pull a fast one. Not impressed.

I emailed hypersport with a very specific request for price on supply, fit and tune of a piggyback ECU and they came back with an exellent price. It looked cheap, so I queried it and had the price confirmed. When I phoned to arrange a date for booking in, the price was all of a sudden to fit and tune only. This has put me off them a bit, but may still go E-Manage and get them to do the fit / tune.

Looks like most gains are from timing, Dastek reckon the fuelling on the '2 is pretty much spot on at all engine speeds anyway.

At the moment, the key question is: Is my knock sensor producing too high a reading? A decent tuning shop should be able to log the values from it and verify if they are in normal range. If it is normal, the Unichip / E-Manage should work out fine with a decent fitter / tuner. If it is high output, I need to find out why before I can get more power ot safely.

Chris

[northernalex]

phil, my emanage was about that price including the pnp harness.. although import taxes etc were a pain!

[Chris]

Hi Chris

With the P&P harness, is there any soldering involved or does the unit literally plug and play?

Yep it's literally plug and play - no soldering or anything messy at all!
As has been mentioned, it's a really quick job - i'd say it takes longer to get the cubby doors and plastics off/out that it does to move the 4 plugs from the ecu to the harness..  Afraid to say that it looks like you've been stiffed   s:( s:(

[evileye_wrx]

Hi Chris (GB)

Did Dastek put you on to EA? When I spoke with them they were going to look at who would be my closest approved fitter. It turned out to be themselves up at Fife. If EA have messed you about I would suggest letting dastek know about it, if not for your own benefit then for any other poor sap who might not have the support of an Owner's Club to fall back on.

Phil

[ChrisGB]

Hi Chris (GB)

Did Dastek put you on to EA? When I spoke with them they were going to look at who would be my closest approved fitter. It turned out to be themselves up at Fife. If EA have messed you about I would suggest letting dastek know about it, if not for your own benefit then for any other poor sap who might not have the support of an Owner's Club to fall back on.

Phil

Hi Phil

It would appear that EA have not messed me about, but have been a little less than straight. Originally, I was going to import an E-manage and have EA or someone else with Greddy programming fit and tune it. EA reckoned the Unichip would work out cheaper as it was P&P so quicker to install, saving labour cost. Dastek tell me directly that the Unichip they sell for the MR2 in the UK requires wiring and is not plug and play. The only reservation I have about EAs treatment of myself is that they inferred the Unichip would be a simple and quick solution. The price was good, the service good, the attitude good. Other work they have done for me is good, there was no problem with a full refund (offered to me, I did not need to ask) so I have no axe to grind and would use them again, just not for this particular item.

This leaves me with a dilemma. What to do next? I would prefer the Unichip route via another fitter to see if the problems were a result of EAs wiring (unlikely) a defective Unichip unit (remotely possible) different car ECU vesrion (very possible) or over active knock sensor (unlikely).

In view of the problems, I want whoever does it to supply and fit, that way if things dont work out, I am not stuck with an expensive box of tricks and a hole in my bank account.

Speaking to people who know:

Torque Developments share my opinion of piggyback ECUs but are happy to give it a go if I want to try it. Their reckoning is that the knock sensor is very unlikely to be the cause of the problem. The magnitude of signal is not the parameter an ECU clocks, but, as I originally thought, the timing of the knock event. Also piggyback is a compromise. Nice to talk to people who know what they are on about, downside is they are expensive. Had work done by them before and it was always good.

Another tuner in the frame is Clive Atthow Tuning in Norfolk. Experienced with Unichip / MR2 and sounded like he knew his stuff. Fair price. Downsides, rolling road upgrade means six week wait, not local.

Seriously under consideration, drive up to Dastek. If they cant do it, no one will I suspect. Downsides, two days out and £100 worth of fuel.

Any suggestions for other known GOOD Unichip install and setup folks within a sensible distance of Essex?

Chris

PS

Other stuff I found out along the way, induction kits can cause heavy overfuelling at lower engine speeds by messing with the airflow presented to the MAF. Think about this, pre / main cats will get over hot if there is too much fuel in the system. Toyota got the fuelling spot on with the MR2 so all gains will be from timing to utilise V-Power or similar. (Hmmm EManage and ingition loom?)

[roger]

Chris, WRC (I think thats right) at Silverstone Performance definitely tune Unichips (and IMO are good at it), you might want to contact them about installation etc.

[markiii]

firstly teh engine will run hotter when lean rather than rich

that aside

there is nothing a unichip can do that an emanage can't, so why not go for either? emanahe ultimate can do even more.

or PFC go complete standalone, not available from one place, but ebay have them for £395 last time i looked

[rtbiscuit]

rogue are in coventry, don't know if they tune, and there is thor again don't know if they do the unichip, but both have a very good reputation.

[Anonymous]

Or get an EMB, a P'n'P harness, a copy of the GReddy software and a clone cable, and tune the thing yourself  s8) s8)

[ChrisGB]

firstly the engine will run hotter when lean rather than rich

that aside

there is nothing a unichip can do that an emanage can't, so why not go for either? emanahe ultimate can do even more.

or PFC go complete standalone, not available from one place, but ebay have them for £395 last time i looked

Hi Mark

The engine runs cooler generally with a rich mixture, however, the EGTs go up when the mixture is rich.

I dont mind which system I go for. What I do want to do is buy from someone who will supply / fit / setup so that it is a one stop solution. That way, should the thing not work out, I have a clear route of refund. I really only need ignition timing adjustment by all accounts, so emangage blue and a P&P harness for ignition would do just fine.

To get PFC right over a lot of conditions is a lot of RR time.

Chris

[ChrisGB]

Or get an EMB, a P'n'P harness, a copy of the GReddy software and a clone cable, and tune the thing yourself  s8) s8)

If I had a rolling road of my own that would be an appealing option.

Chris

[ChrisGB]

WRC, Rogue and Thor are on my shortlist, none of them exactly local though.

Chris

[Anonymous]

Why would you need a rolling road? Ste tuned his car without one and it's been one of the more stable cars around here. Go on, suck it up and give it a go!  s:D s:D

[Chris]

WRC, Rogue and Thor are on my shortlist, none of them exactly local though.

Chris

The other option that I don't thnk has been mentioned yet is Millways, in Andover iirc.

[northernalex]

Why would you need a rolling road? Ste tuned his car without one and it's been one of the more stable cars around here. Go on, suck it up and give it a go!  s:D s:D

Oh maybe I should tune mine like that  s:) s:)  I got the emb and the clone cable  s:) s:)   Knowing my luck I'd kill the engine though !  s:) s:)   s:( s:(

[ChrisGB]

Why would you need a rolling road? Ste tuned his car without one and it's been one of the more stable cars around here. Go on, suck it up and give it a go!  s:D s:D

I know enough about tuning to not try significant advance setting without one. Save a few bob on RR time, cost a few thousand bob on flattened bottom end shells or a holed piston.

I know it can be done and I have reprofiled and adjusted dissys, but that was on cars that were cheaper to fix and back in the day when I had time to fix them.

Mind, finding the shelf edge with a datalogging device is viable. Hmmm....

Chris

[Anonymous]

Why would you need a rolling road? Ste tuned his car without one and it's been one of the more stable cars around here. Go on, suck it up and give it a go!  s:D s:D

I know enough about tuning to not try significant advance setting without one. Save a few bob on RR time, cost a few thousand bob on flattened bottom end shells or a holed piston.

I know it can be done and I have reprofiled and adjusted dissys, but that was on cars that were cheaper to fix and back in the day when I had time to fix them.

Mind, finding the shelf edge with a datalogging device is viable. Hmmm....

Chris

That's interesting, seeing as Ste (by his own admittance) didn't really know that much about tuning a car before he started on his, yet he has a very decent tune that happily copes with the 12psi he's running. He's had no issues with his tune that I can recall, so I would've thought someone with your experience would've seen something like this as a chance to get the exact tune you want and save some money in the process?

Still, if you want to spend your money on the Unichip then that's your call. FWIW, I've stood there in EA when they've tuned a 1ZZ Celica with the Unichip on and there was no issues at all, so I wonder exactly what's caused your issues.

[Anonymous]

bloody hell! didn't think anyone on this forum would remember what a distributor cap was!  s:wink: :wink: s:wink:

[Peter Wright]

bloody hell! didn't think anyone on this forum would remember what a distributor cap was!  s:wink: :wink: s:wink:

Unfortunately, I still remember my old valve car radio in my Consul Mk1, it was an extra of course, then I fitted a record player with transistors, now that was state of the art   s:lol: :lol: s:lol:  
Pete

[rtbiscuit]

i'm only 25 and i know what a distruibutor cap is.   s:D s:D

[northernalex]

me too



Its what thes eguys are wearing on their heads right.. as they "distribute" the food to the  iranian poor??

(GEDDIT??)