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tfrasca's 142 Turbo Project

An MS2 v3.0 will do sequential injection and COP spark.
Put in a Peak&Hold board and use any injectors you want.

It won't do high res injector scaling, boost by gear, or be particularly fast. Just because the features exist doesn't mean that the implementation will be good, per se.
 
Yes, I'm running semi-sequential fuel and wasted spark on my 242. 1kcc injectors paired on two outputs in conjunction with (4) d514a coils. I ran batch fuel the first year with micro then changed.

I was having a persistent issue with an rpm specific lean swing around 3k rpm. I cannot tell you how much time I spent chasing this, both through tuning and with hardware troubleshooting. You can ask Kenny how many emails we exchanged on the subject. After some discussion with Bobxyz on here I switched to semi-sequential on the fuel side. After making that change and doing a bit more tuning the issue is not completely eliminated but smoothed out to the point it is negligible for me. I did not notice any other major changes in the way it ran, but was also very focused on a specific issue.

It's worth noting that the issue above was not present when I ran the car with batch fuel and stock spark on a stock block. It presented after I put in a built motor and a big ported head with 48/40 valves. My well-running batch fire setups were just as smooth as the current semi-seq configuration in my opinion.

I spend a lot of money on my hobbies but there's other places on the car I think the $900 would have bigger payoff. If I keep the car I'll upgrade the micro eventually, but in the meantime I believe that all of my current minor complaints about the way the car runs are the result of my own lack of interest in tuning rather than any sort of inherent limitations with the setup as built.

That's good info, thanks. I'm with you on spending a lot on hobbies, but preferring to spend it efficiently.
 
Another thing I just realized - the ms3x is only like $700, vs $1300 for the ms3Pro. If ms3x does all the sequential stuff I might want, why wouldn't I get that. I guess I didn't realize there was a step between Micro and Pro.

TL;DR: Listen to Erik?

Just do ms3x. It's expensive yes but the car will just be so much easier to deal with. 300-400 bucks extra over micro. What will that amount of money net you? Is 400 dollars worth tearing your hair out over? Lol
 
Just do ms3x. It's expensive yes but the car will just be so much easier to deal with. 300-400 bucks extra over micro. What will that amount of money net you? Is 400 dollars worth tearing your hair out over? Lol

Yeah, but I'm not totally psyched on the DIY style of the ms3x compared to the sealed case and nice connectors on either the Micro or the ms3Pro.
 
Yeah, but I'm not totally psyched on the DIY style of the ms3x compared to the sealed case and nice connectors on either the Micro or the ms3Pro.

Then do this
https://www.efisource.com/wp/shop/ms3-gold-box-stepped-option/#ecu-option

950 for the box and wayyyyyy better customer service then diy autotune. Also I don't know if you have been on the Ms forums but they seem to have been having alot of issues with the ms3 pro and Evo boxes lately. Even issuing a recall on them
 
I use the gold box with trans control on my 244, currently setting it up on a lt5 and going to start on a f20c swap with the gold box as well. They are great and Mike is so awesome to deal with
 
I use the gold box with trans control on my 244, currently setting it up on a lt5 and going to start on a f20c swap with the gold box as well. They are great and Mike is so awesome to deal with

That's super cool to hear. It looks like with a harness, it ends up still over $1000. But like I was saying, it's not necessarily the money, but spending money on something that isn't great. Like an ms3Pro that is unreliable.

To be honest, I'm pretty sure I'd be happy with a Micro on semi-sequential, but for the amount of stuff I've had to redo on this car, I'm sick of cutting corners. I'm going to look into the Gold Box thing.

Luckily, I've got my LH running 12ish psi and it's liveable. That gives me some time to collect all the parts I'll need.
 
I will extend this offer as well, I have made good power with lh, depending on what you decide to do I know for a fact lh is reliable for a 300hp combo and I know how to wire and setup the Ms. If you want help with what is currently in you car I am more then willing to drive up and spend a day with you on it. Same goes for the Ms as well. :)
 
"It won't do high res injector scaling" LOL, what the hell is that? :p

Tfrasca, sequential is heavily overrated. If you tune the injection timing it can produce a preferred result, depending on your preference, but if not timing-tuned then you might not get what you want.

On the flip side, if you have randomly timed (but timed, not oddball, not sure if MS does this) semi sequential injection, AKA bank/batch of 2 twice per cycle, then you get some fresh fuel mist and some vapour off the hot valves, and you get smoothness by default.

The biggest genuine reason to run sequential injection is having huge injectors where doing two pulses per cycle really hurts your real world error size.

Also, make sure you use something with the modern VR circuit, the stuff in old microsquirts was the same as the V3 board (ms1/ms2, what terrible naming) and is pretty much useless. The modern circuit (as used in all of my projects) is automatic and if configured correctly on the PCB pretty much perfect for any scenario.

Data point for you: I've been running semi sequential and pseudo wasted spark (4 Toyota COPs) on my B234F swapped 240 sedan for months now. Coils have held up to firing twice, once into a near-dead-short (highly ionised exhaust gas) fine despite only taking a guess at the dwell.

If a new style MicroSquirt has the new style VR, f*** the haters, and do what you want. I assume Deka 60s are 60lb, about 700cc/min, if so, you'll be okay at idle firing them twice, or even firing them once in a crappy pattern (can give an uneven idle due to different effective mixture from fresh fuel in some cyls and evaporated vapour in others, but won't wander and have error like the semi setup can).

As much as I hate all of those products for a thousand solid reasons, if you know what you're doing you can get good consistent results from the junk and enjoy your car for less dollars down. It won't be a redo scenario unless you do something dumb.
 
I will extend this offer as well, I have made good power with lh, depending on what you decide to do I know for a fact lh is reliable for a 300hp combo and I know how to wire and setup the Ms. If you want help with what is currently in you car I am more then willing to drive up and spend a day with you on it. Same goes for the Ms as well. :)

I really want to go MS after looking into it. I'd like to learn a bit of tuning, and I'd love to get rid of the distributor, coil, and clean up some wiring. I'm still considering just doing semi-sequential on Micro, so I don't need to set up a cam angle sensor. Either that or the Gold Box.

But I'll for sure hit you up once I've got it all wired up. I have no idea how to tune one of these things. Thanks in advance!
 
I really want to go MS after looking into it. I'd like to learn a bit of tuning, and I'd love to get rid of the distributor, coil, and clean up some wiring. I'm still considering just doing semi-sequential on Micro, so I don't need to set up a cam angle sensor. Either that or the Gold Box.

But I'll for sure hit you up once I've got it all wired up. I have no idea how to tune one of these things. Thanks in advance!

For sure man!
 
Not much in the way of updates for the car. I've been driving it and more or less enjoying its current state.

Last week, the brake booster went out. I think it's been on its way for a long time, based on my braking performance and some weird vacuum leak symptoms that I was never able to trace. That'll be nice to fix.

Astro informed me that the perfect .73 5th gear for the T5z is not available and there's no solid date to expect them. So that's a drag. That means me gear choices for that transmission are .82 and .63. .63 MIGHT be acceptable with my 4.3 rear axle, but it definitely wouldn't work with any taller final drive. The .82 will probably be pretty bad with my current final drive, but might work if I ever went down to 3.73 or similar. Not sure what to do about that.

Once I figure out the transmission thing, I'll get what I need for MS, and order a GT2871r or 3071r. That'll be fun.
 
Skip the 28, go for the 30. Also, .63 on a super short rear end would be fine. A lot of the time I wish my overdrive was taller.
 
Skip the 28, go for the 30. Also, .63 on a super short rear end would be fine. A lot of the time I wish my overdrive was taller.

Yeah, I'll do the 30 I think.

What's your overdrive now, .68? I think .63 on the freeway would be cool most of the time, but I know I'd get in some situations where I'm between gears. Actually, that only ever became an issue when I did that Coastal Range Rally, where we were on some pretty fast country roads, and moving pretty quickly. That's not a super common situation for me, but when it happens, it's annoying.
 
.68 5th, with 300ish HP on tap, not really an issue on the freeway I would think.

My current T5 World Class has a .68. The T5z has an even lower .63.

But I've been looking at the gear calculator obsessively, and my cruising speed at 3k would go from 73mph with the .68 to 79 mph with the .63. Not too big a deal. The gap just gets bigger with taller rear gears, though.

At this point, I'm just going to do it and hope for the best.
 
Intake manifold brace

When Noah and I fixed my cracked manifold, we put an M8 threaded boss in the plenum for some bracing. Today, I finally got around to designing and making a brace. What I came up with is a straight 1/8"x3/4" piece of steel, welded to a 90 degree bracket that bolts on using one of the oil separator bolts. The other end just bolts to the side of the plenum, near runner #3.

I'm wondering how stiff this needs to be. The stock one is thinner material, but has a rib rolled into it for stiffness. Still, it can't be much stiffer than what I've made. Is there such thing as too stiff for a manifold brace? How does thermal expansion play into all this? Should I try to make this brace stiffer?
 

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If it were under tension anything would work provided you didn't put it into yield. But that's under compression.

I'm guessing it'll be okay provided you can lock it with no preload so it's a brace not putting any force on anything in the resting position.

At the end of the day what you're trying to do is take the strain off the studs/bolts in the head with something like 6:1 leverage from the mass of the plenum. For that purpose, it should do fine IMO.
 
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