Racer F1: ECU help!

my 2 cents here. i found some stuff about haltech E6X for 20v. Obviously things are diffirent for 6-inline and other standalones,, i have a write- up, if you havent found this yet.
Step 1. the first thing I always do before starting a standalone ecu install is basically lay everything out so you know exactly what you are working with. This way you can see if there is anything missing and so you have a basic idea of what you are working with so later you dont question yourself about missing parts.


Step 2. the next thing I do is usually mount the ecu and fuse block, this is important because this is going to determine exactly how long your engine harness will be so you dont end up too short or too long.

Step 3. next I feed the flying loom through the firewall. This will be different on different cars, I just decided to mount the ecu directly in front of the shifter for easy access and because when passengers are in the car you want to keep everything away from there feet. Trust me, Im speaking from experience here.

Step 4. the harness is separated by labeled strands of wire with labels for the tps, map, ignition, injectors, crank, water temp, air temp, o2 sensor, idle air control, pwms (ill explain these later) and I might be forgetting some but you get the idea. So first I start by laying each sensor out around the area it will go and start forming what will be my harness. On this engine I decided to run no external map sensor, no idle control, no o2. basically im going for a really clean look in the engine bay and since I wont be driving this car everyday they wont affect the way the car drives.

Step 5. after you get the basic harness laid out I start taping parts that travel in the same area together. This can be done many ways but I like to keep the look of a stock harness so take as much time as you need to make this look nice. You will thank yourself later, trust me. The next thing is to start trimming the harness and soldering any plugs you might be using from your existing harness. In my case Im using the stock 20v injectors so I used the stock injector clips. I also used the stock tps and plug. My water and air temp sensors are Honda to I sourced plugs for these too. At first I wired the factory cam sensor in but later changed to a cam mounted hall sensor. Ill explain later.

Step 6. before you get ahead of your self and tape the whole harness up step back and decide if you will need any of you pwms in your harness as well. Whats a pwm?

A pwm is a controllable signal for just about anything. The e6x has 4 of these and can control things like: AC, fan relay, boost control solenoid, vtec, double butterflies, shift light, torque converters, secondary fuel pumps, staging signal, two step rev limit, nitrous, turbo timer (yes the Haltech has a built in turbo timer for all you turbo guys), rpm signal, electric water pump and a few more Im forgetting. Well yeah�E Im using two, one for my fan and one for my tach.

So if you need any of these things, nows the time to run them through the harness to where they need to go. also when crimping pins for plugs i like to solder them as well for extra security.

Step 7. mount or figure out your coil setup. Im using gm's ls1 coils I got from Haltech. There pretty cheap and they have built in igniters which makes wiring easier. I mounted the coils behind the ecu up against the firewall so I could run the plug wires through the firewall to the engine. Then wire them up following the manual.

Step 8. next is the fuel pump power wires. No need to run a separate relay for this its already in the harness. Just connect one fuel pump wire to the positive lead on the pump the other to +12V battery thats it.

Step 9. next I wired the power wires for the ecu. There is one 12v switched wire, one battery power, two grounds, and one signal input. Just hard wire the power to your ignition, no need for fuses they are already in the harness as well.



Step 10. well�Enot much more. At this point make sure your harness is all loomed and ready. You will now be able to switch on the ecu and communicate with your laptop. If you have a base map you want to run this is the time to load it into the ecu. If not the stock map in the ecu will start no problem. It did mine.

Step 11. now since the e6x has 6 outputs you can either choose 4 for the injectors or 4 for the ignition. I chose to run the injectors sequential and the coils with a wasted spark setup. after you feel you have set up your ignition and fuel settings where you feel they need to be simply turn off the injectors in the fuel screen and cycle the ignition. Next go to the ignition settings and lock the ignition timing. This will make it so the ignition timing stays the same no matter the load or rpm ( for setting the ignition timing only ). You can set the degrees of timing you want to be locked at, pick zero. This makes timing with a crappy timing light easy because you just have to line up the tdc mark.


Step 12. have someone crank the engine for you while you check the timing. If its off you can correct it using the trigger angle and tooth offset settings. First change the tooth offset to make large changes and then the trigger angle for smaller changes. Once you get the timing on then your ready to start!

In my case I ran into a few problems with my stock cam sensor. I was getting a lot of interference and wasnt receiving a steady home reading. After a few hours of pulling my hair out and messing with the gain settings ( the crank signal frequency, this helps clear up any interference in the signal ) I decided to chalk it up to a bad cam sensor. Even after removing the sensor and free spinning it away from the other wiring it still wasnt working right. Sooooo, I searched club4ag classifieds but came up empty handed. So I really wanted my car running and instead of waiting I decided to change to a cam mounted hall effect sensor. See pics.

Step 13. once you feel the timing is on you can go ahead and turn the fuel injectors back on and unlock the timing. Then you are ready to start. This is the fun part. After you get the car running you will need to adjust the idle. This can be done a few ways. The e6x has an option called �Ezero throttle fuel map�E Use this, it really helps for setting the idle. Just turn this map on in the fuel settings and adjust the fuel until the engine runs smoothly. Remember to calibrate the throttle by going to the calibrate throttle page, set zero throttle click OK, set full throttle click OK and your done.

Step 14. once the car idles you will need to mess with the throttle pumps. These give the engine an extra injector firing when it detects a quick change in throttle (like when revving). First turn them on then adjust accordingly. There are three pumps 0 rpm, 1500, and 3000 rpm. These are a percentage value from 1-100% basically 100% will add a full time of injection on the cycle directly after the change in throttle. There is also a decay setting, this is how much it dwells off after the first cycle ie: 50% will only half the 100% the next cycle, then half, then half until is done. You get the idea. Well for start the 0 rpm should be around 50% on the pump, the 1500 should be about 25%, and the 3000 should be left alone. Simply rev the engine then change these in one direction or another. You will notice the difference right away. Just set these about where you feel it revs the smoothest. These will be set better when the car is tuned. This is just a start.

Well at this point you can mess with the your fan relay turning on and off at the right temps.