Abarth X1/9 Road testing.

just an opinon

if the travel time from the thermos (opened)to the front radiator is causing you and the motor fits, how about taking out both rear trunk panels, building a panel with a 30% slant rearward cant (exhaust heat)and use a snorkel to feed air over the radiator. of course the rad would have to be horizontal, but you have overcome most obstacles making this install, it should be doo daa for you.
just thought I might throw that into the mix.
mikemo
 
I don't think his issue is heat but an electronic glitch where the system is looking for something it can't find and as a result is forcing the car into limp mode.
 
More information

The forms being down did not help here in posting.

I took the car to a Chrysler Dealership where we felt at the time that the issue was that the BCM was not reading the Keys. The Chrysler dealership does not have access to all diagnostic tools that Fiat dealerships have. The Tech was lost and I had to guide him. Since the modules are in the back of the car, ( rear engine car) and the key is in the passenger compartment I extended the wires for the Key switch. Around the Key is a SKIM antenna ( Security Key Immobilizer) apparently the wires must be a certain length and cannot be altered as the time for the signal to go from the Body Control Module to the antenna is timed. The dealer wanted to $313CND for 2 wires that are 2 feet long, I am an electrician and this is plainly stupid. I went to the wreckers and pulled them out of a wrecked car installed them and returned to the dealership. At this time the Keys could be programmed into the BCM, but the problem persisted. The Tech thinks it could be the ECU as there were some in early 2012 that had issues and this car only had 2745 miles on it. So for now I have moved the Key switch to the back of the car and have it on the trailer. I have an appointment on July 25th to take it to a Fiat Dealer. Bob Martin will be at my house on Saturday the 23 to give me a hand and then on Tuesday the 26th we will be in Pontiac Michigan for FFO 2016. The Abarth X1/9 will not be at the show. I am expecting the worst that the ECU is damaged, ( big $$$) word is that a replacement must be programed by the Fiat Supply source to the VIN on the car or I must change a lot of modules from a wrecked car to get back to square one. While at the dealership I asked the Tech to do a master reset which he did, we tried to start the car but it still has the O2 sensor heater malfunction and O2 sensor not reading. The tech said we haven't even got the car running and we have these 2 DTC's, for that reason he suspects the ECU. So for now it is a wait and see what the dealership can tell me and go from there.

TonyK.

Grimsby Ontario Canada.
 
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Sorry to hear...

Sorry for all your trouble Tony...

One of the first and foremost reasons I chose the Ecotec platform was it's simplicity... It utilizes a "Speed Density" system for driveability. No CANBus... Parts are local and cheap as cheap gets. A little bigger than most jap motors, but solid.

"Speed Density" for those who do not know typically refers to the operation of an engine using an estimation of airflow based on pressure, temperature and some idea of the engine's volumetric efficiency... Intake Air Temp, Map, Wideband O2, TPS, Knock Sensor... Simple as simple gets and an absolute breeze to tune with HP Tuners or EFI Live... It is not as precise as having a MAF, but very tuneable none the less. Nothing you would notice as far as driveability is concerned. ECU's??? They are 50.00 to 75.00 on Ebay.

I wish I had some answers for you... After 25+ years in the Automotive Industry I've had my share of ghosts and gremlins... Chrysler is notorious for their CANBus system failing to "go to sleep" and running a battery down overnight. Could be the body control module, could be the a/c control module, could be the Audio unit, could be the cluster... etc, etc...

I used to have to unplug a fuse at a time then go from module to module until the CAN went to sleep.... Then it was still a crap shoot as to whether or not it was fixed... The manual used to state at the end of the diagnostic tree... "Replace with know good part and retest"... Hahahahaha... Yeah, like I had a $1000.00 BCM just layin around.

I would not doubt it being the ECU... Then again it may not be... I think you are on the right track with the VATS... I'll tell ya, this Abarth swap of your is WAY more than I'd ever attempt... Hope you get it figured out...

And to think, I gave up working on cars to move over to Access Control... Now I spend my days in deafening high rise mechanical rooms installing and wiring control panels...



:mallet:
 
Abarth X1/9 Started and Running.

After leaving the ECU disconnected from the battery for 12 days and moving the Key Switch from the front of the car to the back trunk with the modules the initial trial was the same.

The engine would start, run for 10 seconds and shut down. Disconnecting the battery several times still did not resolve any issues. I then checked wiring that proved to be futile.

At this time I took my scan tool and read the DTC's which stated that all ignition coils were bad. I disconnected the battery again and changed out 2 coils B & C as I have 4 spares. Reconnected the battery, turned the key and the engine started and ran without a miss to warm up temperature. At this point I switched keys and tried a start on a warmed up engine and I had a miss fire which stated coil 1 was bad. I shut down the engine and changed out a coil started the engine and it ran fine without a miss. I then changed all of the coils back to the old coils and the engine ran fine. Shut it off and restarted it and had a misfire on coil A.

I am beginning to think this may be an ECU problem, I will still be taking the car to the dealer on Monday. Checking here a new ECU is $765 CND or $585 USD. If that is all it takes to solve this problem then I am in. I will also mention that #1 O2 sensor still shows bad and the engine oil light is still on the dash cluster still states that I have no oil pressure. The switch checks out okay.

Making progress.


TonyK.

Grimsby Ontario Canada
 
Dealer update

Monday July 25th Bob Martin and I took the Abarth X1/9 to Johnston Fiat on the Hamilton Mountain Upper James Street. It was raining and we were in a Thunder storm. Taking the car off of the trailer, we got soaked.

With the Key switch now located near the modules in the rear trunk, starting the car is a two person process, one person pushes in the clutch to activate the clutch pedal switch and the other turns the key in the trunk. ( this will be addressed latter) I talked to the Tech Mark and explained the project, then drove the car into the work bay. Mark and the other mechanics were impressed with the project. The Tech connected to the WiTec tool and checked the ECU. The car idled flawlessly for nearly 2 hours and never dropped a cylinder, but did display a DTC for a bad coil. The coil was change and then the car was started and the problem rolled to another coil but the ecu did not drop a cylinder. Two problems remained that I currently still cannot explain, 1 no oil pressure indicated, the wiring was not changed for this pressure switch, but it shows that the engine oil switch is closed. 2) Number 1 O2 sensor, heater circuit, heater is not working. I have changed the O2 sensor 3 times and traced the wiring 2 times back to the ECU without any change. Prior to finishing up with the tech he asked what wiring had been changed on the engine harness. I told him only a tach signal generator had been added to the grounds on the spark coils. He asked have you ever taken the signal generator out of the circuit, I said no, he suggested that I do that and also cut the oil pressure switch wire at the ECU to prove that the wire was free from a ground, which is the same as a closed switch. Bob and I loaded the car on the trailer for the drive back home where once on the trailer the engine dropped a cylinder. Bob and I talked about the whole issue on the way back home.

The Fiat 500 Abarth dash is a CAN driven unit. Unlike older cars the tach does not count pulses to give tach indication. The ECU sends a CAN signal to the tach to give indication of the engines RPM. Nice but the Marshall tach in the Abarth X needs a tach signal. The Abarth uses coil over spark plugs and not 1 spark coil. In order to obtain a tach pulse I had to purchase a tach pulse adapter. I am not home now but will post a picture of it latter. The coil over spark plugs have a constant + , a trigger and a ground wire coming from each coil. What is required to generate the tach pulse is to have all of the ground wires connected to 1 common ground wire that goes through the tach pulse generator and back to ground. The Abarth ECU has a monitor that checks the voltage and resistance to each coil which determines if a mis-fire occurs. What I am thinking is happening and I can put a scope on it latter is that the tach pulse generator is inducing a spike or current that is tripping the Miss-fire detector in the ECU. That then causes the ECU to shut down that coil and injector to that cylinder. When the tech was working with us and he was most helpful at all times he saw the DTC shift from coil to coil. By starting the car what ever coil was first in the firing threw the DTC for Miss-Fire. It was random, as random as what cylinder is first to fire when you start the car. Who knows or cares what cylinder will fire first. None of the coils are bad, but the ecu is doing what it has been programmed to do.

When the engine was in the test body the tach adapter was not installed, it came latter in the road car and when first installed it was done is such a manor that to by pass it, it could be done in less than a minute. The Fiat Tech suggested that I try that and when Bob and I unloaded the car once home the tach generator was by passed. Bob and I took the car for a 3 mile circuit and pushed the car hard 3 times. The intake air temperature came up to 170 degress and the engine temperature to 200 degrees and the ECU backed off the boost and never dropped a cylinder. This looks promising.

The Fiat Tech suggested the following for the oil pressure sensor and that was to cut the wire close to the ecu wiring harness to see if the oil light clears then ground it again to see if the oil light is displayed again on the dash cluster. If this does not prove the wiring then the ecu is bad. As for the O2 sensor he suggests checking all of the wiring again to the ecu and if nothing can be found then it is the ecu. The dealer is suppose to have a plug in tool to check the O2 sensor function, for this test and for some reason did not have this tool. I checked the price of this tool and it was $565CND. That is plainly insane. The tech suggested that I check the wiring 1 more time and if I cannot find anything wrong then the ecu is bad. This O2 sensor has 6 wires going to it. I have not been able to find a pin out of the O2 sensor to confirm the wiring to the heater and only have the Fiat wiring diagrams to work from. I will have to find somebody with more knowledge about testing this O2 sensor, as it sits I have 3 that don't have the heaters working on them for this car. The Fiat trouble shooting guide makes reference to the pins and test point on the tool and not on the O2 sensor.

We spent nearly 2 hours with the car in the shop working with the tech and the dealer only charged us $87CND.




TonyK

At FFO Pontiac Michigan
 
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I'm following ya TonyK,

So, what was the verdict when the Fiat guy hooked up the diagnostic rig? Also, what about the O2? What was the result of an open or grounded (?) circuit?
 
See above

Hi Bob, please see the post above for some answers.

TonyK.

At FFO 2016 Pontiac Michigan
 
Tach Pulse....

Tony,

Not sure if this is relevant to your situation but, I had sort of the same issue with my first VW Ecotec swap as I used a VDO tach out of a Porsche...

I tried using an "adapter" with limited success... I then found that I could generate the required pulse I needed by simply adding a wire to one of the three stator leads of my alternator and running it out of the alternator case... This output then became a pulse signal to my tach...

Most alternators provide a signal that can be used to indicate
how fast the alternator is turning. The signal is a half–wave
rectified output which has an amplitude about one–half the
DC output voltage.

My tach has 4/6 cyl selection along with fine variance tuneability. I was then able to match my actual tach rpms using my scan tool... Works like a champ!

Glad to see you making headway....
 
Interesting

I know I need to make a pulse generator of some sort, I was thinking of using the crank toothed wheel with another sensor, but their would be too many pulses per crank revolution and I would need to get some kind of divider circuit. I think there are 60 teeth on the crank toothed wheel.

As for the alternator, to my understanding the Fiat 500 and Abarth use a generator, not an alternator. Go figure.

Thanks for the ideas.

TonyK.

At FFO 2016 Pontiac Michigan
 
A lot of older diesel cars ran the tachometer from the "w" terminal of the alternator that Stingray250 is referring to, so you should be able to find an alternator so equipped.
 
Thanks

Thanks Steven, this is possible to do on this swap, the OBD2 port is in the back trunk with the the modules. I will look into it further.

TonyK.

At Fiat Freak Out 2016 in Michigan
 
Alternator swap

Although this could be done, I am unsure of how the ECU would respond to not having control over the alternator. Just about everything on this car is intergraded. At this time this could add to or produce other problems.

Thanks for the idea.

TonyK.

At Fiat Freak Out in Pontiac Michigan.
 
Thanks Steve


Steve I have ordered this unit and it will be about 10 days before I get it sent to me by the mail. I am going to try it as is and then if possible I would like to keep the OBD2 port open and not use an extender or Y connection. I am thinking that I will hard wire it into the OBD2 wire harness once proven.

Thanks for the solution.

TonyK.

Grimsby Ontario Canada.
 
Back to the drawing board

Steve I have ordered this unit and it will be about 10 days before I get it sent to me by the mail. I am going to try it as is and then if possible I would like to keep the OBD2 port open and not use an extender or Y connection. I am thinking that I will hard wire it into the OBD2 wire harness once proven.

Thanks for the solution.

TonyK.

Grimsby Ontario Canada.

It appears that this unit will not support the CAN Bus protocol of some Chrysler ECU's just my luck. I did not install it, but wired it up to see if it will work. Comes back and keeps scanning trying to connect to the CAN Bus. There went $150.

I will have to look into a pulse generator from the crank shaft to drive the Tach. I cannot currently see away around this.

If anyone knows of a pulse generator that I could use off of the Crank toothed pulley please let me know.

TonyK.

Grimsby Ontario Canada.
 
Reluctor...

I suppose the simplest way to achieve a rpm signal would be to fit a chain sprocket from a motorcycle or bicycle to the outboard side of the crank pulley... Most pulleys have evenly spaced holes for installing a puller... these can be utilized with spacing for the sprocket mount... The larger the sprocket, the more accurate... probably just a tad larger that the actual crank pulley...

Then, fab a standard crank sensor and mount from off of the front cover and adjust airgap accordingly... This will give you your square waveform to then calibrate/convert for a tach signal... Yes??? No???

I've seen your work... Shouldn't be a problem...

 
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