cuts out after 5mins idle **fixed**

Think Iv killed my engine..?

I will start from the beginning, please bear with me..

Friday drove to work all was fine, come to go home and my gfb boost solenoid was buzzing constantly (turns out its some how out of calibration) controller was 0.6 at idle but I had another gauge which was reading correctly @ -20

So I drove off boost until I could pull over and check vac hoses and solenoid. Left the engine running, popped the bonnet and there was quite abit of heat and fuel smell then all of a sudden engine died?

Cranked engine.... Nothing.... Tried again.... Clickclickclick Iv been having starter motor/battery issues for a while now so my theory was the starter motor needed overhauling that's why my battery keeps dieing??

Anyway overhauled starter motor and while it was off I decided to remove the vacuum canister since I'm running the TT FFIM.

So starter motor back on, noticed the fuel damper bypass pipe was wet so nipped it up jump started car and it ran fine! Checked the fuel pipe but it was spraying fuel out half way down the line so I got hodge to make me a new one and I ordered a new fuel filter.

Managed to fit them today started her up and all was well then 2mins of idling and it started hunting and nearly cutting out so I manually pulled the throttle cable and noticed thick black smoke out the exhaust! Then the engine died!

I then went on to check the:

Turbo - no shaft play

Engine codes - strange one this, nothing is happening when I bridge te1 + e1 engine light, oil light and water light are on but no flashing???

Spark plugs - black and VERY slightly wet worrying thing is I pulled no2 1st and smoke started coming out of the chamber..??

Swapped my 2week old NGK Spark Plug Iridium BKR7EIX 2667 back out for my old NGK BKR7E 6097

Started the car but no change.

I'm confused why the diagnostic check isn't working this time and if

Its normal for the oil and water lights on the right instrument panel to stay on while checking for codes?

Probably not as important but I should add I first checked for codes with jump leads still connected?

Could it be flooded and air in the system causing the hunting and black smoke or worse?

Sorry for the essay guys

Found out black smoke is fuel so maybe just overfueling because the ecu has been reset? Or flooded because Iv had a few failed starts due to the starter motor issue? What il do is see if its drivable tomorrow and clock a few miles.

Diagnostic check I'm still unsure about?

feel rotten for you mate! Sounds like whatever variables you've changed are causing the issue... is it possible that the fuel damper bypass is allowing too much fuel in? Also the hunting issue suggests a vacuum leak somewhere. Why don't you eliminate the guess work, go back to the standard fuel supply pipe with damper and reconnect the vacuum canister, see if it cures it?

Nothing wrong with the fuel bypass, I had another one fitted before this happened so just swapped it out for a brand new one.

Really I need to get it up to temp so I can check afr's.

I could have missed something when removing the vac canister? Check this tomorrow, I just yanked it out!

if you have an immobiliser or alarm fitted before you turn the key to the second position and bridge the diagnostic points you have to deimmobilize it first I had that problem 2 weeks ago and I finally realised what I had done.

I do but Iv not been using it because at one point I thought this was draining my battery so disarmed it and haven't used it for atleast 3weeks now but il certainly look into it, I wonder if a low charge battery is what's causing it not to code read??

Don't like the sound of your boost solenoid going on a weird one.

That controls boost and if that goes wrong your be leaning out or over fueling to a dangerous state.

I'd get a compression test on no2, and compare against other cylinders considering you had smoke on it.

I always shudder when someone says get a compression test I was kind of hoping the smoke was because I'd ran it 2mins before pulling the plug..?

As for the ebc my other gauge is reading -20 but when I tried to re-calibrate the controller / solenoid it's had a hissy fit and won't even let me navigate through the settings, so possible faulty controller?

Test drive today with the ebc disconnected wish me luck..

Mate I did wonder about that controller you had. I've seen them before and never really known if they was any good (not saying they aren't, but my first thought when you started saying solenoid went faulty was wondering what the AFR's went like before your engine shit itself).

What are the AFR's doing when its going tits up. It sounds like mechanical damage, not that it's running rough

I was only saying the other day that it's been brilliant, and now this!! from what I remember the afr's at the time were fine! I'd only just started the car so it would have been running rich, I then drove for about 1mile. If I get a run today il note down what I'm getting.

Don't go running it with fuelling so rich it's producing black smoke, you'll soon do bore and ring damage like that. Find the problem first.

Where should I start chris..? Iv took the battery off for charge to see if I can pull any codes with out the jump leads connected? But it wasn't working before so I'm not convinced its going to work this time?

Is it a TT engine and TT ecu in an N/A shell? If so check MAP sensor hoses and wiring, and if it has a FCD remove it and put wiring back to stock for that area for now. Check wiring to ecu water temp sensor (2 wire sensor).

EDIT. MAKE DAMNED SURE BOTH ECU GROUND WIRE EYELETS ARE CONNECTED TO THE INTAKE RUNNER LOWER LUGS!!!!

No its na-t na ecu / E-manage ultimate but running TT ffim will also be disconnecting the ebc

Found out there's another diagnostic port under steering wheel so il try and e1 + te1 from here instead.

Sorry, can't help with Ultimate stuff, my best suggestion is you see if you can find a good priced Syvecs or Motec, or similar, long term you will get far better results, support and reliability.

No worries chris.

So Iv just run out to see if I could pull some codes using the diagnostic port under the steering wheel and it worked? But no stored codes, but noticed with the ignition on my afr's was climbing, I saw 16 then switched off, now Iv got the fuel

Pump ecu wired so its constant 12v so I rewired it back to stock so now with ignition on it was 14.7 so disconnected ebc and chanced a quick start to see what oil pressure I had.

Started first time no smoke but idling low around 5-600rpm plenty of oil pressure and afr's @ 10.5 and started climbing, it got to 11.5 which is where the rpm dropped so low it nearly cut out which is where I crapped myself and switch off! Tried to see if there was any codes but again it wouldn't flash? I'm thinking this is due to the battery being flat?

I went for another start, it fires but I have to hold the revs to keep it from cutting out but eventually it stalled and there was a bit of black smoke.

As I say, I know nothing about the Emanage, but I doubt the stock ecu trouble codes are reliable with such a device also fitted. For some reason the injectors are being held open too long, so MAP signal, water temp signal are prime suspects. I hasten to add that unless you put zero value on your own time, these issues are usually best referred to someone who both knows the Emanage and has the right gear to diagnose the whole set up. You can fiddle for hours and not get anywhere without some decent knowledge of the Emanage and EFI in general. Good luck with it, I doubt you have done any mechanical damage to the engine at all. Yet....

Valid point but I do like to give it a go myself first plus I'd need to have it transported to the garage since it keeps stalling.

How would I test the map sensor, I hate to say it but I put a knock off cheapo 3bar map sensor on so id like to test this first.

Thanks for everyone's input so far.

The ecu needs mapping to read the output voltage V pressure curve of any MAP sensor it isn't already mapped for, so you can't just use any sensor. Has the trouble started since then? Most standalone ECU's will have selectable inputs that will read a popular type of knock sensor correctly, such as the Delco 3 bar sensor.

It was mapped again a couple of months back by lyndon and Iv had no issues, until Friday.

the knock off greddy map sensor has been fitted for over a year now but at £30/40 there's obviously a reason why there so cheap!

Found a genuine greddy one second hand I might take a gamble on?

How did you wire the emanage to the harness? Have you got an extension harness or hard wired?

Patch extension bud

I would measure the voltage from the MAP sensor signal wire to engine ground with engine off, but ignition on, and then with it idling and post the results. The other two terminals should be engine (ECU) ground and 5V. (Exactly 5V....). Check the ecu plug ground terminals, (there are at least two of them, maybe more), are actually connected to engine ground. This is via the two eyelet terminals I mentioned earlier, and shown in another thread by DavidP. I think it was in MattP's thread on bad running. Be very careful not to short anything, or feed voltage into anything. You just need a normal digital multimeter for these tests. Will the Emanage do any logging? Any additional add on ECU is only as good as its wiring, is it all soldered and done properly, as per Dazzi's comments? Something is telling the ECU to add fuel (or not telling it to control it properly). Or of course the ECU is knackered.

With these odd ball ecu kludges you are as well to make a note of sensor voltages with the engine running correctly at idle, and with ignition on, engine off, hot and immediately after a cold start. Then you can quickly do a sanity check on voltages when something goes wrong. This is why ECU's that will data log are a Godsend, you can just sit by the TV and read the log in comfort, comparing it to when things were running correctly

Data logging - maybe? I'm not sure I might see if lyndon would be able to take a look?

Emu harness has been soldered in, it was first mapped April last year by tuning developments then I went for bigger inj and TT ffim so got lyndon (Nodalmighty) to map it maybe 2 / 3 moths ago now and It was running awesome just with two issues first being it would take a while for the afr's to get to 14.7 from cold, usually a few miles road and motorway it would then settle, idle would then very slight have a bit of a wobble!

Just a thought would a large air leak lets say from the TT FFIM make the ecu add more fuel? After all the TT mani has been made to fit the na runners so could possibly be a poor fit?

To be quite honest I'm not very good with electrics / multimeters!! give me a spanner any day might have to let someone else look at the testing unless I'm given clear dumb down instructions.