eCtune

I´m helping a friend with engine management on his Golf/Rabbit. My part of the project has worked smoothly until now, the engine starts nicely and already sounds better/different than before on the bulk-spreading Bosch crap. Engine is a weird hybrid between an 8v GTI engine, a stroked crank and a 16V head. All sorts of stuff has been troubling the mechanical build; diffrent keys on crank/pulleys, lack of PCV etc etc. But at least the eCtune/Honda parts have worked flawlessly until now We hope for an end result of about 250-300HP. I´m curious to see how differently a VW engine responds to ignition timing on the dyno. /Allan

cool, good luck with it.

one day if you'll have a time try to explain how did you wire it to VW as i am very interresting for similar project like this.

It´s much much simpler than you probably think, actually Leave the original starter/charging etc. harness intact. You need to make up some adapter so the Honda dstributor fits on one of the cams. Use Honda engine/ECU harness and other sensors from a scrapyard. As soon as everything is wired up correctly, make a guesstimate as to the distributor angle vs. TDC and start it up a basemap of sorts (use your imagination!). From then on, tuning is no different than on a Honda engine. Except of course you don´t have as many reference points as usual for the fuel and ignition maps. News: The car has been running and driving under its own power now. Until this point it has been pretty easy ECU-wise. We did part throttle and some 12-13´ish PSI WOT. Throttle response is much like a Honda now (probably because of the H22 throttle body) and power band is wider than I had anticipated. Hoping to do some dyno tuning within the next month or so. /Allan

tune the hell out of it. Remember the project with the gm, opel i did? A vw is on the way also... But i would like a K series on obd1. hint hint!

tune the hell out of it. Remember the project with the gm, opel i did? A vw is on the way also... But i would like a K series on obd1. hint hint!

Bindegal wrote:It´s much much simpler than you probably think, actually Leave the original starter/charging etc. harness intact. You need to make up some adapter so the Honda dstributor fits on one of the cams. Use Honda engine/ECU harness and other sensors from a scrapyard. As soon as everything is wired up correctly, make a guesstimate as to the distributor angle vs. TDC and start it up a basemap of sorts (use your imagination!). From then on, tuning is no different than on a Honda engine. Except of course you don´t have as many reference points as usual for the fuel and ignition maps. News: The car has been running and driving under its own power now. Until this point it has been pretty easy ECU-wise. We did part throttle and some 12-13´ish PSI WOT. Throttle response is much like a Honda now (probably because of the H22 throttle body) and power band is wider than I had anticipated. Hoping to do some dyno tuning within the next month or so. /Allan

Clear as mud.

Lovely job! I'm sure it is easy to wire since you have all your CKP CKF and TDC sensors in the distributor. What did you do for VSS?

No VSS so far. Gear 0 seems to work for now but we will try to hook up the speed sensor from the car, most of all to get the nice launch control, boost per gear etc. The owner is quite amazed at the throttle response and even the rev limiter, everything is much more... crisp now. Starting is already nicer than the VW ever was, even though it only has a FITV. ECU idle control will be added also of course. So we´re aiming for way better than stock driveability /Allan

Neat project. I wanted to do this on my friends 16v/ABA block setup but it never happened. I remember not being sure about the vss, but i'm sure you'll get it. I always hated how numb old VWs felt, that's cool that it works a little snappier.

Sweet project, i've done a bunch of cars w/o iac's. I normally raise the idle high, then pull a bunch of timing in those cells to target the idle i want. The strategy works very well.

sewell94 wrote:Sweet project, i've done a bunch of cars w/o iac's. I normally raise the idle high, then pull a bunch of timing in those cells to target the idle i want. The strategy works very well.

Excellent tip!