My Engine Bay Renovation Thread, AE111 ECU conversion, wire tuck, and more... Options

[Coomer]

very nice work, this is my first post here but i have been on other forums before and currently own a 1987 corolla fx16 gts with an ae101 20v in it and was plannin on swapping to an ae111 ecu this is a great help to me

Glad it's helpful. I'll try to get my notes posted up here by the end of next weekend as well...those should help a bit more.

I just wish I could figure out my hesitation issue...I spent a good few hours reading stuff last night and still haven't come up with any solutions...I'm going to try some new things when I go home, so hopefully I can get it running well.

[jcbass7]

Good luck coomer,

I never realized how nice your engine bay looked. those ITB's are sweeet

[blazin674]

did you happen to get the ae111 manual i know there is a pfd file running around somewhere i have it on my computer if you want it

[Coomer]

did you happen to get the ae111 manual i know there is a pfd file running around somewhere i have it on my computer if you want it

Yep, I've got it, along with tons and tons of other saved documents from the web...I've got quite the collection going on.

Yesterday I finally got the car to idle perfectly. After seeing a Jamaican guy solve one of his issues with an adjustable fuel pressure regulator and a vacuum line going to it from the MAP sensor line, I figured I'd try T-ing into my MAP sensor line again and running a vacuum line from the T to the fuel pressure regulator.

This solved my idle. No longer will it sometimes stay near 1700-2000 RPM even when warm. It idles at a perfect 900 RPM all the time now once warm.

That said, I still have bad hesitation issues from before.

[95CelicaST]

Yep, I've got it, along with tons and tons of other saved documents from the web...I've got quite the collection going on.

Yesterday I finally got the car to idle perfectly. After seeing a Jamaican guy solve one of his issues with an adjustable fuel pressure regulator and a vacuum line going to it from the MAP sensor line, I figured I'd try T-ing into my MAP sensor line again and running a vacuum line from the T to the fuel pressure regulator.

This solved my idle. No longer will it sometimes stay near 1700-2000 RPM even when warm. It idles at a perfect 900 RPM all the time now once warm.

That said, I still have bad hesitation issues from before.

One step at a time Coomer

[Coomer]

Actually, my bad idle came back with the new vacuum setup once I reset the ECU again.

So I capped the vacuum line circled in yellow in my first post, which was going to the stock intake plenum. I reset the ECU once more, and the idle seems to be fine now. The car seems to rev a bit slower at idle however. I haven't had time to drive the car much to see if it will adjust and the hesitation will get better, but maybe this weekend.

By the way, I double checked all wiring again and everything tests out correctly, including the oxygen sensor wiring. And I'm still not throwing any codes.

Also, I grabbed my notes from home, and will be posting them up shortly. Just have to scan them in.

[Coomer]

As promised, here are my notes...they're not as clear as I remember them being, lol. But hopefully you guys can make some sense of them and they'll be helpful for someone.

If you have any questions, please ask while the info is still fresh in my head.

[Batman722]

^^ great scribbles Coomer. After reading this post top to bottom it just seems to me like you have/had some vac problem throwing the ECU in a tizzy and messing with the A/F mix. Have you checked your plugs/wires lately ?

[Coomer]

It's finally running right! Today I removed the factory plenum to see if I could access any more vacuum lines that might be damaged or open, and I found a really small vacuum line that was open. I plugged it, threw on the factory velocity stacks (no factory plenum though,) put the IAT sensor right at the cylinder #4 velocity stack entrance, reset the ECU, and fired the car up.

It immediately idled right around 1,600 RPM as it warmed up and learned (just like it did before with the AE101 ECU,) and as the car learned the idle dropped down to a solid 900 RPM.

I drove it, and it runs beautifully. Perfect idle, good torque and partial-throttle acceleration, no hesitation, and plenty of power (and noise) at WOT.

I drove it a good 25 miles with this setup and everything seems to be working beautifully now. The vacuum setup is a bit different than before, and I'll get some pics up, possibly Thursday or next weekend.

I have a feeling that it'll run well with the nice aftermarket velocity stacks I got as well, so I'll have to try that when I get a chance. But regardless, it's running awesome with open velocity stacks and I'm very happy.

Oh, except twice today the car exhibited some weird issues when free-revving high. Once, when the car was learning, I revved it up from the engine bay and it was like a backfire, except the flame came through the velocity stack. When I revved it up, a loud pop and a flame shot out through the cylinder #4 velocity stack. The flame was just visible for a tiny moment, and I could feel the pressure shoot back against my arm.

Also, it popped again once when I was rev-matching pretty high (like 4000 RPM) to downshift to second when I was driving. Any idea what would cause that? I'm sure it can't be good. Maybe too advanced timing? (It was correctly set at 10 degrees advanced in diagnostic mode.)

[netrata]

Yeah I would recheck the timing again and readjust when necessary. It's great to hear that the ecu conversion finally worked out well. I'm itchin' to do the same, but since I need the car as a daily driver I know I won't be able to do the conversion and be done with it in a day or 2 even if I wanted to. Anyways, I wish I could see your car for myself, but it's too bad I live so far away to.

This post has been edited by netrata: Feb 11, 2007 - 8:05 PM

[OOBE]

Good stuff, C. It was really stressing me out knowing that your engine wasn't runing up to par.

[GTSOwner]

Now that it's running right, how about a couple vids?

[Bitter]

check the intake cam timing, usually when it back fires out the intake and the ignition timing is correct its because a valve is still a little open with the spark fires. or its possible that one of the valves isn't seating properly, is burned a little, etc. a quick compression test should rule that out tho.

[x_itchy_b_x]

awesome to hear! im sure that it sounds amazing.
normally combustion coming out of the intake is a timing issue being to far advanced. you may be at 10 degrees with the distributer but the mechanical timing could off a tooth or the crank pulley 0 mark indicator could be off due to the pulley moving. happened on my 3sgte, the 0 mark was actually 4 degrees BTDC. had to get a dial indicator on cylinder #1 to get the real BDC.

[MtyMseHarmer]

Glad to hear you got your conversion setup running right. I am currently in the process of switching my silvertop in my AW11 to blacktop electronics. However, I am kekeping the silvertop ITB's for now so hopefully I wont have any problems like you had. Oh and a guy who does MR2 harness's for the 20v's is converting the wiring for me so I just get to do the easy parts :-). I have a question for you. Where did you get your velocity stacks at and how much where they?

[Coomer]

Glad to hear you got your conversion setup running right. I am currently in the process of switching my silvertop in my AW11 to blacktop electronics. However, I am kekeping the silvertop ITB's for now so hopefully I wont have any problems like you had. Oh and a guy who does MR2 harness's for the 20v's is converting the wiring for me so I just get to do the easy parts :-). I have a question for you. Where did you get your velocity stacks at and how much where they?

I'm using the silvertop ITBs as well, just for your information.

And I got the velocity stacks from eBay. I just glanced and didn't find the ones I got on eBay anymore, but they look really similar to these. They required modification to fit, as you can see in my photo below.



I may be selling mine, but I'm not sure yet...I have to see how the car runs with them on.

[vsideboy]

nice work mate, alot of head scratching and sleepless nights though no doubt.

Glad its almost finally sorted!

D

[Drew-887]

Any vids???

[Coomer]

Any vids???

Not yet. I wanna make a really cool 3-4 minute video of the whole car, but I want it to be done first. And before it's done, I'm not sure how far I want to go.

What I'm considering is doing a wire tuck and cleaning the engine bay up a ton, so that it's actually presentable. This would involve the following:

• Remove sideskirts, fenders, front extensions, front bumper, hood
• Pull the Motor
• Replace flywheel with a lightweight one
• Replace tranny with an AT200 C52
• Clean block and manifolds (maybe polish header)
• Relocate battery, fuse box, ignitor, coil, MAP sensor
• Hide lots of wiring (requires rewiring harness for what I have in mind)
• Relocate fuel filter
• Remove power steering
• Grind off battery tray
• Hide coolant reservoir a bit better
• Hide windshield washer fluid filler spout
• Modify throttle linkage to run a shorter cable
• Paint engine bay yellow to match the car
• Maybe move radiator fans
• Re-install everything

What do you guys think? Would you do all of that just to have a better looking engine bay? I figure I could do it all over spring break and have quite the impressive engine bay, but that's a lot of work...especially pulling the motor (I HATE removing axles the most ) and relocating the fuse box. What do you guys think?

[x_itchy_b_x]

that would look CLEAN!! go for it, your work i always very meticulous.