Engine Troubles

[ydawak]

Hello all,

I just had a quick question i would like some opinions on.

I have a 26/30 in my Vl calais and it is running twins at 18psi. A haltech 500sprint is the Ecu that is running it all.

Just quickly because i get any responses about talking to my tuner about my issues, I have done this and am in the process of continuing this, however with the new year upon us things are a little slow on the response end and i just wanted to get a few more opinions so i don't feel like a total useless twat when talking about whats going on.

So basically whats happening is that the car is running a bit rich (i was told by my tuner) as the haltech does not have a pre mapped cold start function (told by tuner). Now the car keeps fouling the plugs. I have changed the plugs 3 times in 500kms. Admittedly i dont drive it very often. Initially i was told that my car alarm was draining my battery and the haltech doesnt run well off lower voltage so that was causing things to malfunction. Now that i have a trickle charger in the car the battery is always topped up, but things are still amiss. Also another thing i have trouble with, is that the car stalls under deceleration. When i change gears from 3-2 or 2-1 in town it stalls between gear changes. Unless i keep the revs up.

The car idles at 1250 rpm when warm, however i had to up this a little because it was idling at 400rpm when cold.

My question to the forum is:

Is this all related to the tune? AF ratios and so forth?

or could there be something else im missing???

The engine is pretty much brand new. every bit in and on it are new except the rods which are off the dirty 30.

Thanks in advance

If i have left out any info just tell me what i might need to add to give you gurus a better idea on things.

Cheers

[admS15]

I find it hard to believe that a haltech sprint wouldn't have a cold start function. I had a fuel only haltech in the early 90's and even that had cold start. Premapped? Your tuner should have set this up. If the issue was only related to cold start, everything should be fine once warm, clearly its not. It sounds like you need a better tuner. Sorry I couldn't be of any better assistance.

[Kinks]

Basically the tune is not finished. It sounds like the tuner has tuned it at operating temp but he hasn't done the finishing touches like cold start, idle control, and your decel issue.

Depends on what you agreed on with the tuner. However, if he is blaming the ECU for not being able to do something that is a bad sign - setting up cold start is something the tuner should normally sort out for you and there is absolutely no reason why any modern ECU can't be set up to run properly when cold.

[KiwiRS4T]

The tuner may be right to say it doesn't have a "pre-mapped" cold start function but that just means he has to set it up himself. You will have to leave the car with him overnight so he can start it from cold.

What plugs are you running?

Have you got the best tuner in Tasmania (no point in cheaping out)?

And out of interest what power does it make?

[Daz]

Time to find another tuner I'd say.

Do your research on the tuner first - best advice I've given this year so far

[Trex]

a - get your money back

b - leave it with him and let him finish the tune correctly

surely he could do something remotely for you?

[ydawak]

Thanks for the advice guys.

For privacy reasons i dont want to publicly complain about anyone and what they do, if you really want to know who has tuned my car i have no issue in letting you guys know via pm.

I have had the car looked at by Confidyne also, and they said that the tune looked ok at the time before i got the car back. Having said that, the car was only there for about 30mins to an hour so i imagine that it was a glance from Confidyne.

KiwiRS4T - I am just running NGK plugs and they seem to be doing the job fine. I just cleaned them again the other day and it starts again now. The car makes 310rwkw on bp98 @18psi. Its running -7's

my tuner is happy to check the tune again, I just have to wait till hes free again. Hopefully that'll be end of Jan start of Feb.

I just hope its all resolved once and for all

[GTRPSI]

Most tuners ask for the car to be left overnight, they do the dyno tune on day one and the first thing they do on day 2 is the cold start, they then may go on to touch up the day 1 tune.

Yes it does have coolant temperature correction......