Black Top low idle issue

[bigbacon]

it won't pass an inspection and it bogs SO BADLY under 3k RPMS it is nearly impossible to get into first gear without bouncing the clutch around and slipping it until the RPMs get high enough.

it is like raising the RPMs artificially doesn't solve the problem.

[bigbacon]

no go on the temp sensor. no change

Videos of what it does, hopefully you can hear how bad it runs.

this one is cold to warm and you see how turning the lights on changes the idle and the rough sound. there is also that scratching squishing sound as well

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rk6QAj7FGW0&feature=youtu.be

this is starting it up again warm and you can watch it get worse and worse
http://youtu.be/9g_YrCESA3o

you can also see the weirdness in the oil pressure gauge as well.

I will also admin...that I think it sounds wonderful even though it doesn't work right. One of the reason I would love to get it working right...

[Jeonsah]

Does the engine run good other than the idling issue? Revs fine, etc?

If the engine does not run correctly, it may be worth doing a compression test on it. Other than that, I feel like there is something strange with your wiring. Have you followed Morgan's 20v swap guide? You could see how everything should be wired and you could test some of the wiring for the ISCV, TPS, Dizzy, etc just to verify that your wiring is correct.

Also you are on the stock ECU correct? Have you tried swapping ecu's with someone?

[bigbacon]

you'd need to read back through all the pages...

it bogs under 3k even if I raise idle by say unplugging the ISCV

compression test was 205-210 across the board. i've tried 2 ECUs, replaced plugs, wrise, cap, rotor, temp sensor. tested ICSV, adjusted TPS and throttle stops, tested STA wiring

[Jeonsah]

Lol. My bad, I didnt see this thing was 3 pages long!

[bigbacon]

Lol. My bad, I didnt see this thing was 3 pages long!

sadly..i've been fighting this thing for months....

[Jeonsah]

Dont give up on it! I give you credit for hanging in there. Atleast after this is over you will know exactly how to test everything on the car haha. So from reading this here is what you have done (correct me if I am wrong):

1. Checked TPS
2. Checked O2 Sensor
3. Swapped Temp Sensor
4. Compression Test
5. Swapped ECU's
6. No Engine Codes?

Can you describe the weird sound you are getting more and when it happens? I just want you to document when you hear it and what it sounds like and where you think its coming from. The next step I would do would be to pull the harness out of the car and start checking the wiring with a multimeter. I would follow Morgan's 20V swap guide and verify that your wires are correct. I would even consider taking the loom off to start checking for shorts.

EDIT: Lets make sure everything else is working tho. You can still test the harness with it in the car. It just makes life easier if your not standing on your head testing wires with it in the car.

[bigbacon]

I have a new O2 sensor on the way even though the one I have seems to test out OK. No engine codes ever unless it was my doing.

If I pull the harness I am just sending out to wiregap to have a brand new one made. I'm not going to mess with that myself. I did have two repairs to it that I had to do, one being the O2 sensor wiring and the other to hook up the MR2's engine bay fan temp sensor.

I've done most of the BGB tests for checking voltages and whatnot at the ECU.

I am going back to using the stock airbox setup and popped in some new plugs. The only issue I really know of other wise is one of the intake valves on #4 has a leaky valve stem seal. I posted 2 videos above in first post on page 3 showing what happens and what it sounds like. you'll notice also things like turning on lights makes the RPMs job quite a bit and you hear how it starts to run worse and worse and idle worse and worse. In the second video you'll see what I mean you can hear the car start to sound different, like a switch or something went off and told the ecu to do something which is incorrect.

[Jeonsah]

If I pull the harness I am just sending out to wiregap to have a brand new one made. I'm not going to mess with that myself. I did have two repairs to it that I had to do, one being the O2 sensor wiring and the other to hook up the MR2's engine bay fan temp sensor.

^^^ How did the engine run before you did those wiring fixes? Did it have the same idling problem before?

[bigbacon]

It didnt as they were made before i put the engine in. Previous owner said it was all good.

[jondee86]

Have you tried running it with the VVT solenoid valve unplugged ? Might
be worth a shot just in case there is something funky going on with that.

Cheers... jondee86

[Jeonsah]

It didnt as they were made before i put the engine in. Previous owner said it was all good.

Im assuming you mean the engine did not run because it was not in the car. So you made wiring fixes while the engine was not installed?

What happened when you had the engine running and you unplugged the iscv? I have a BT20V In my car so you can use me as a reference to help figure out what is going on with yours.

[bigbacon]

It didnt as they were made before i put the engine in. Previous owner said it was all good.

Im assuming you mean the engine did not run because it was not in the car. So you made wiring fixes while the engine was not installed?

What happened when you had the engine running and you unplugged the iscv? I have a BT20V In my car so you can use me as a reference to help figure out what is going on with yours.

if I unplug the ICSV idle goes up, which it should because when it is unplugged it opens by default. ISCV was tested as per BGB tests and it passed although i've been trying to source another one to test with. I have cleaned it as well.

Even if I unplug it, car still bogs at low rpms.

Main thing is..the car didn't start doing this initially. I got the engine installed in may, had to wait a month to get an exhaustthat could fit the car so I ran it in the garage with some crap exhaust and although it sounded kinda lumpy it didn't do this idle stuff. Even after i got the new exhaust it didn't do this. It started when I actually went to drive it for real for the first time to get it inspected. All prior drives before that day were to let it idle and then down the street to a parking lot to drive it it around at bit and get everything warmed up. I would have NEVER attempted to get it inspected if it was doing this. On that trip I got about 4 miles in and saw white smoke from the engine bay (NOT THE EXHAUST) pull over, open lid, nothing. turn it back on after 10 minutes and BAM bad idle. limp it home, no more smoke at all. Been trying to track it down since.

[bigbacon]

Here is something I just noticed.

So i put back on all the stock airbox stuff and new plugs.

#1, this made the car idle higher than with the stacks. cold idle was 2000, warm was 1400.
#2, after is was warmed up it actually sounded better
#3, revving it into the 5k range or so would sometimes produce a backfire or a nice popping sound
#4, IF i unplugged the ICSV idle would drop to 1000-1100, plug it back in, idle would go up to 1400
#5, turning on the lights still caused the idle to drop 200-300 rpms
#6, upon shutting it off and turning it back on, idle was 1000-1100 and if I unplugged the ISCV it owuld go up to 1400
#7, would still run rougher when warmed up.

What it really seems like to me is something is either telling the ISCV to not close all the way but upon starting the car agani warm it actually will close.

So for one, I think having the stacks on with the filter on the ISCV inlet tube was causing not enough air to get into the thing as I noticed that the filter opening was like 9mm ID where as the airbox barb for the ISCV in is like 14mm ID. Pretty big difference.

I also wiggled around the ISCV plug to see if anything would change but no change there.

I didn't actually try to drive it again, I am going to wait for the new O2 sensor just so I don't need to lower the car down and do everything just to do it all again.

Also, does anyone know the part number for the PCV valve on these engines? I know it is porbably not a cause of anything but I know they are cheap and I would like to replace it.

I know the ISCV is supposed to open/close to maintain idle and that sort of doesn't seem to be working does it, the light thing is what makes me feel that way. Either that or my alternator is on its way out and can't supply enough power to run everything.

[jondee86]

According to this.....


http://www.padandwheels.com/mr2/blacktopproject/wiring/wiring.html

... the AE111 20V has four electrical idle-up inputs (ELS1 thru 4). Each of these inputs
presumeably generates a small amount of extra opening from the ISCV to hold the idle
steady when the electrical load is activated. If turning on the lights causes the idle to
drop then you are probably missing an input ?

Cheers... jondee86

[bigbacon]

i guess i really need to just pull the harness and look at it and/or send it away to get a new one made. that really seems to be where everything is leading.

[Jeonsah]

Before you pull the harness you should replace your o2 sensor and see what that does just incase. Also you could try testing all the other sensors on the engine and verify they're all ok before pulling the harness. I dont know exactly where to get any of the testing stuff for the BT20V. So if you find it let me know. Otherwise I can measure stuff on my engine and tell you what I get.

I believe on my harness I had the ELSE1 through ELSE4 floating at first and then grounded them and that did not make a difference.

[bigbacon]

Before you pull the harness you should replace your o2 sensor and see what that does just incase. Also you could try testing all the other sensors on the engine and verify they're all ok before pulling the harness. I dont know exactly where to get any of the testing stuff for the BT20V. So if you find it let me know. Otherwise I can measure stuff on my engine and tell you what I get.

I believe on my harness I had the ELSE1 through ELSE4 floating at first and then grounded them and that did not make a difference.

http://mr-2.info/blacktop.html

The only tests for ELSE# are voltage tests.

[Jeonsah]

The only thing I can say is that I would try grounding the ELSE wires. Then I would finish testing whatever sensors you havent tested. I would follow the manual for the rest of the sensors. Then if those tests pass, I would be checking wires to verify that your dizzy, tps, etc wires are going where they're supposed to go. You said you saw smoke so that has to mean something. The harness itself is not that hard to test and it may be worth the time and patience before shelling out 500$ for a new engine harness... especially if that does not fix your problem.

[bigbacon]

i'm going to replace the O2 sensor and then one of two things as I'm pretty much done messing around. I will pull the harness give it a once over and have it replaced OR talk to a local guy that fixes MR2 for a bunch of people and see if he will take it and figure it out.

I'm 3 months in and pretty tired of dealing with it. My other option is drop the engine and sell it and find another 16v and just go back.

It really just needs someone else to look at it.

[jondee86]

How much oil is in the engine ?

The ELS pins get voltage when the relay turns ON. Grounding them
won't do anything except maybe blow a fuse.

Cheers... jondee86

[bigbacon]

thing is I really don't want to be messing with wiring. I don't even know how to "ground" those wires.

[bigbacon]

ok....

I have no ELS wires... none of them...

[jondee86]

Time for a recap

1. The fact that you don't have any of the ELS wires connected is not a biggie.
The engine will run fine without them, but adding electrical load at idle will pull
the engine rpm down as you have found. Not an issue when driving.

2. Watching your video it looks to me that the ISCV is working, and generally
behaving as expected. However, your idle is high under all circumstances except
when the engine is about to die. I doubt if the small filter is an issue. If the bore
was too small you would not be able to get such a high idle.

3. The ISCV only controls the amount of idle air that enters the engine. It cannot
make the engine "run rough" as that is a function of fuel and ignition.

4. The car was running fine, and then you had smoke out of the engine bay. After
that the rough running and idle problems began. Changing the ECU did nothing
to improve the running of the engine.

From the above I would conclude that something electrical burned/wires shorted
and the result is that the ECU now receives corrupted or inadequate input signals.
All testing and replacement/substitution of parts to date has failed to improve
the situation in any way, so as you have suggested, it is time to pull the harness
and look for damage.

Cheers... jondee86

PS: If you have an A/C system, check what happens when you turn the A/C ON.
If you don't have an A/C system, make sure you don't have an A/C idle-up valve
or open hose constantly bleeding air into the common vacuum rail.

[bigbacon]

what is weird...is I do have working AC, now I haven't tried it lately but I do know I have tested it after this all happened and I am pretty sure it barely made the idle drop when it was on. I do not have any AC idle up devices attached although I have also tested it with the 16v/MR2 idle up attached with a line going into to feed more air and it also didn't drop in idle there either.

i guess what I don't like is, if I am just idling, why do I want the idle to drop so much? I mean lets say I had it running right at 900rpms and it is night time, its hot out and my rear window fogged up so I have the lights on, AC on, rear defogger on, fan on full blast with the radio jammin to my Duran Duran tape....how the hell is it going to idle? That is my concern. Worst case scenario but still.

[bigbacon]

it seems not having any of the ELS wires is normal for MR2 users with BT engines so that isn't the problem but yea, it is time to pull the harness I think.

It does seem going back to the stock setup though did help some but I don't exactly know cause I haven't tried driving it but yes, I assume if there is a wiring issue it cause weird signals and tells the ECU to do something it shouldn't which probably causes a whole slew of weird stuff. It is just strange that it is 100% consistent. I guess I would think wiring issues would be a bit more random but you never know.

[bigbacon]

the odd thing is pad and wheels says at least ELS3 should be accessible to the harness makers but again it looks like no one sets these thing up which I guess I don't get. the other 3 you need to run from the passneger side and tap them and run them to engine bay to set them up, obviously something you can't PnP.

[bigbacon]

ok so update:

I drove the car again today since I hadn't since doing many things like: moving the one ground, fixing that starter wiring issue, replacing the O2 sensor (replaced today), and putting the stock airbox back on.

It seems drivable now. There is a tiny bit of lag from a stand still when you mash the gas, it revs up and goes, hits a flat spot then takes off again. Idle is sitting at like 1100 or so warm which I'm not going to complain about. I think the idler pulley for the accessory belt needs to be replaced now, which I knew it needed to be. Only thing that seems to happen still is some clutch chatter every time I switch gears and a bearing crunch crunch sound as well (again, might be the idler pulley)

When massing the gas hard at like 4k rpms or so it does shoot out a nice cloud of smoke, looks black but just when you first mash it, it does'nt continue any other time.

It still isn't perfect but it seems way better than before but again, it was like this once until I actually tried to drive it.

Also, about how hot should the coolant with a BT be getting? Temp guage stays in the middle but damn those coolant lines seem to get pretty damn hot and I don't remember them with the 16v being that bad.

I think I could at least confidently do the ITB balancing now as well which might help some as well. I may still have someone look at it anyway and fix the valve stem seals since I know at least one is leaking. I would really like to get the stacks back on there...it sounded so nice but I'll work with this for now.

Any ideas on the clutch chatter thing? is that just me or something bad in the lines, not bled enough? Clutch plate, bearing, and pressure plate are all new, as is the slave. its pretty annoying as when it happens it also makes the engine lid rattle and some other bearing crunchy sound happen somewhere

[bigbacon]

with sync the ITBs, the BGB is cut off, anyone know what the HINT on page FI-46 actually says? "HINT: Do not loosen thre bypass screw unit it becomes [missing words] of flange surface of the throttle body.
What is missing there?

[bigbacon]

so I would like to try and do the balancing today so can someone confirm if I am going to do this right since the book is pretty vague and cut off.

1. I closed all the screws down to a point they can't move any further.
2. Turn on the car let it warm up.
3. Put the tool on all 4 ITBs and find the one with the highest number
4. Put tool on each of the others and turn the screw until they are all equal to the highest one.
5. stop engine, put on airbox stuff, turn on engine, check idle.
6. if not stable at 830-930 start over at step 3 and continue to adjust.

I read else where that as you adjust one, you may have to adjust the others again. I assume you may end up adjusting the highest flowed one as well at some point or is that one always going to stay with the screw all the way in?

btw, the BGB for the BT really sucks....especially the PDF version.