[cgrey8]

This is a continuation of a discussion that got off topic from the original thread's contents. Here's a link to the original thread:
Has anybody injected an early Ford FE big block?

Here's the last comments from that discussion:

Gents,

Thanks for the kudos, but I'm still fussing with putting all the hardware together for this FE conversion. Mudog715 really deserves the round of applause, since he, and others, have been patiently mentoring me over the last weeks. Believe me, it's a real hard choice between EEC-IV and EEC-V. Both have many good attributes, but you gotta love that OBD2 capability. In researching a MAF sensor today, I had the chance to chat with a tech support guy at Standard Motor Products (aka Blue Streak). He totally endorses the EEC-V system and, even though many of the system "features" aren't applicable and have to be turned off, says it's still the best thing going. He actually works at the facility where they repair the computers, so he ain't no dummy. There are probably many of you guys out there that are really saavy on EEC-IV and can argue it's virtue over EEC-V. For me, I just think it's great to be able to use the OBD2 for diagnostics and programming. Think about it. EEC-V is 1996 technology. In electronic design years, it's already a dinosaur. I pitched my 486 PC years ago. Being one who has experienced the heartache of finding almost all of my 1973 truck parts to be obsolete, except through specialty shops at a tidy price, I'd like an EFI system that will be around for awhile. If I can get my conversion to run with the same "no more tweeking the damn computer" advantage as a stock truck, my mission will be accomplished. I just want to load the Harley, pack some clothes and the wife, hook on the trailer and GO!! I spent almost 29 years at my last job, now it's my turn to do what I want. This doesn't include fussing with the EFI. Anyway, a million thanks to all you folks that have provided mentoring. When I get this all done and running right, you can bet I'll share everything on this forum. 1973FE

I'd really like to know more about the EEC-V computers and what their capabilities are. Just from the screencaps that have come in, it sounds fascinating and you are right, there's a world of difference in technology between 1989 and 1996. The biggest marked difference is the upgrade from 64k memory space to 256k. Then of course faster processor/memory which allows the EEC to do more like control a tranny, be an anti-theft systems (PATS), and a few other things. With the setup I have now, it's all setup for the A9L (EEC-IV) I have. But for any future projects, I might just choose to go EEC-V using my 97 Explorer computer that came with the motor I have retrofitted for the A9L. It would be interesting to see what other tools are out there for tweaking and how well the knowledge from EEC-IV ports to EEC-V.

As for giving you a reason to choose one over the other, I obviously don't know enough about what EEC-V does and doesn't have to list out pros and cons. The one thing I do feel though is the newer EECs do handle WOT conditions a little more intelligently than the older ones. I have no clue if they have a better "transient" fuel delivery strategy or better learning capacity.

[sailorbob]

There's very little difference between the last of the eec-iv's and the first of the eec-v's when it comes to getting fuel and spark right. Most of the additional code is used for OBD (a lot!) and emissions.

TBH if you find the amount of parameters an eec-iv has daunting then don't go near a eec-v

Yes, the Tweecer has it's faults with spurious data when datalogging but it is easy enough to filter out and you can datalog anything OBD-II gives you and more if you know where to look.

[cgrey8]

There's very little difference between the last of the eec-iv's and the first of the eec-v's when it comes to getting fuel and spark right. Most of the additional code is used for OBD (a lot!) and emissions.

TBH if you find the amount of parameters an eec-iv has daunting then don't go near a eec-v

Yes, the Tweecer has it's faults with spurious data when datalogging but it is easy enough to filter out and you can datalog anything OBD-II gives you and more if you know where to look.

I know they added the secondary HEGOs after the CAT converters for emissions AND monitor those. But what other emission-related code got added?

This is only sort-of on subject, but it seems that the newer vehicles control fuel, even at high loads better. Many of the new trucks like the Toyota V8s have impeccably clean tailpipes as though they never burn below stoic. Is there improvements in the Closed Loop controls to more aggressively maintain AFRs? O perhaps is there something new/different about the motor design that allows them to burn at a higher AFR without driveability problems? It makes sense that if it is possible to run a motor lean, that they car mfgs would do that in an effort to gain some fuel economy and improve emissions.

As for the daunting number of controls in the EEC-IV...well, when I 1st started tuning, yeah it was a little intimidating, but I quickly found all sorts of things that weren't exposed in CalEdit that I needed access to. Add that learning curve to the frustration of also learning CalEdit's quirks and bugs. I couldn't tell you how many times I didn't see results after downloading changes because CalEdit hadn't really accepted that were right there on the screen. Then I moved to TunerPro and it was a relief to use a program I could trust, but at the same time a learning curve all over again with about 3 times as many things exposed for GUFB that were named something completely different than CalEdit. Eventually, I got used to them after exploring each one and tinkering with them just to see what effect they made on my engine. Then the move to BinaryEditor was simple since it pulled from TunerPro in the early days and I embraced using it as soon as it was stable enough to use. Then Clint got all the functionality of TunerPro AND the ability to abandon CalEdit/Calcon completely.

Being thrown into the EEC-V world now wouldn't be nearly as intimidating as it would've been back then. The one thing I would miss about being in an EEC-V world is the lack of familiarity and forum-support they have right now. There are some people here that run 96-99 Mustang EECs with the TwEECer, but rarely are they talked about. There's little to no support for the Explorer V8 EECs which is likely what I'd want to use. I guess it'd be all on me to develop the support for them like Frit did with GURE.

[sailorbob]

The emission stuff is the post cat HEGO (as you said), more stuff relating predicting/anticipating airflow rather than using MAF alone (this makes tuning an eec-v very hard as the DIYer doesn't have Fords resources/equipment for looking into these transient conditions and also fine control of EGR, purge etc.

The post cat HEGOs probably contribute a lot to the 'clean' tailpipe look.

[cgrey8]

That's kind of what I suspected. The 89-93 EECs do just fine at controlling during steady state which is where all the emissions tests occur. But the default settings in the 89-93 EECs don't handle transient conditions with any precision as far as I can tell. It seems when in doubt, the stock tune just keeps it rich so the engine doesn't let the driver know things aren't going as planned. Then to make up for its sloppiness in the transients, you have Mr. Smog Pump to help the CATs burn off the excess fuel delivered during transients before it hits the atmosphere. Just knowing what I've witnessed with the A9L and A9P on my engine, it seems that separate accel and decel transient tables would be nice so accel and decel transient conditions can be controlled independent of each other. Is that one of the things the newer EECs have? Please elaborate. Also how much of the transient control has been built into the CBAZAs since they were the last of the EEC-IVs?

Also, do the EEC-V EECs actually attempt fuel control based on the 2nd set of HEGOs or is that purely to monitor the CATS to make sure they are doing what they are supposed to? That would be really interesting to datalog those secondary HEGOs just to watch how they respond to different conditions.

[sailorbob]

CBAZA has the anticipated aircharge stuff in there. I think the post cat HEGOs are used to monitor/adjust for the cats performance.

[cgrey8]

Do you know any specifics as to what the control strategy is for maintaining the CAT performance? It can't be that complicated if devices can defeat them by just plugging to the secondary HEGO wires to keep the computer from throwing codes and turning on the CEL. But what I don't know is if the EEC is looking for the secondary HEGOs to always report a constant value or if it's looking for the values to change like the primary HEGOs do at Closed Loop. Thoughts?

[Frit]

I've been working on disassembling an EECV from a 2002 and all I can say is what a HEADACHE!!!!!

You mentioned 256k addressing, but thats not direct addressing. The processor has to switch between all four banks since it is still only capable of accessing 64k at a time just like the old ones. For RAM memory (writable memory) the EECV's still only have 2k just like the EECIV's, and there is only 1 bank of RAM.

The only benefits I see with using an EECV is the fact it has a faster processor, and yes you can reflash the ROM directly, and there is OBDII, but as sailorbob mentioned, you still get way more with a Tweecer or direct memory reading system. For tranny control, well the last couple of years of the EEC IV's control the 4r70w tranny so that not a big deal there.

The majority of the changes made to the system is for emmissions controls, which for most folks with the older cars would need to disable alot of it, so why bother with the hassle when the EEC IV gets you there just as quick if not quicker.

Just my opinion anyway.

[cougarnut281]

I have spent most of my time learning the EEC-V and am just now looking at the EEC-IV to help a few friends with fox bodies, I have to say that looking at it from my perspective that the earlier EEC-IV looks almost ancient to me. I am also rather young (22) so that may have something to do with my perception of it as well.

Looking at the CBAZA strategy I see pretty much everything that the earlier EEC-V cars have. Of course as the EEC's get newer they seem to adapt faster to changes (IAC, O2 corrections) and have more and more functions which are mostly emissions related but can still be helpful. A big thing I have noticed is that the COP cars have a few cool things like two step rev limiter for manual transmissions and individual cylinder timing control, though it is a global adder so any big changes may affect drivability.

[cgrey8]

I don't have a problem maintaining emissions equipment or the controls as long as emission-related decisions take back seat to fuel economy at cruise or performance at acceleration/WOT. If I decided to implement an EEC-V in a future project, I would try to maintain as much as I could (i.e. EGR, high flow CATs, and secondary HEGOs). However the moment I determined that some emission function (i.e. spark retard or fuel delivery) was killing fuel economy or performance in the name of emissions, I'd be tweakin' it right out. I'm just not that civic-minded.

It seems now that the OBD-II emissions tests don't include a sniff test. It's 100% connecting to the OBD-II port and asking the computer how things are going. So how does tweaking the tune affect your ability to pass one of those tests? I mean are they querying the EEC with a simple "Is all well?" Or are they querying to find out if things have been deliberately turned off and thus fail you for having a custom tune? I'm just wondering if part of EEC-V bin hacking would/should include "canned" answers to specific OBD-II queries that would always result in a PASS regardless of what you've really done in the tune.

Thoughts?

[cougarnut281]

As far as I know the states that do OBD readiness tests are just checking that the EEC has completed a full drive cycle (Code P1000 is not set) and that all of the moniters have passed (no fault codes or one trip failures). I am not 100% positive that is all they do because I don't live in a testing state but I know that is part of it at least.

[cgrey8]

So is there a good reason to hack the code to ALWAYS report that P1000 is not set and report all monitors passed?

I recall on my code scanner that it reports all possible things that can be reported, but displays NOT APPLICABLE when the EEC isn't making use of it. I would expect that would be the response if you disabled EGR or disabled the secondary HEGO monitoring. If the emissions testing station is verifying that these things are working, then NOT APPLICABLE may not fly even if P1000 comes back clear. Is that possible? If so, for people that do disable the EGR or secondary HEGO monitoring, I wonder if reprogramming the OBD code to always report those are a PASS would work.

[sailorbob]

Do you know any specifics as to what the control strategy is for maintaining the CAT performance?

Sorry no, I've never looked into it.

For RAM memory (writable memory) the EECV's still only have 2k just like the EECIV's, and there is only 1 bank of RAM.

I believe some of them may have more, there is a BANK instruction for switching between ram banks in a similar way the ROMBANK instruction works.

[BobCat]

My .02. :D

While the EEC-V is much more complicated it is 10x's easier to tune due to the power of control and the advanced datalogging capabilities. For the OBD-I cars the TwEECer/BE/EA combo is the best available IMHO and I've tried everything. For the OBD-II there are even more options but SCT's datalogging is absolutely amazing. For those of you who haven't had the oppertunity to see it in action I highly suggest checking it out. Having said that I HATE giving SCT praise for anything as they don't stand behind their dealers or customers but I must give credit where it is due.

[cougarnut281]

. For the OBD-II there are even more options but SCT's datalogging is absolutely amazing. For those of you who haven't had the oppertunity to see it in action I highly suggest checking it out. Having said that I HATE giving SCT praise for anything as they don't stand behind their dealers or customers but I must give credit where it is due.

I agree with everything. I have a pro racer package for one of my cars and while I love the datalogging the tuning interface is no better than any other out there. At this point I use it on my one car and on everything else I only use it to datalog and then use Paul booths EEC editor to make a chip.

[cgrey8]

Man, I'm seriously reconsidering my stance on OBD-II after all this feedback. So other than just being more complex, what are the downfalls or disadvantages of EEC-V EECs? What do the newer EECs have that the original EEC-Vs don't have?

[cougarnut281]

Download a file for the CVAF1 stategy on Paul Booths webpage and look at it in cal edit.

[BobCat]

Man, I'm seriously reconsidering my stance on OBD-II after all this feedback. So other than just being more complex, what are the downfalls or disadvantages of EEC-V EECs? What do the newer EECs have that the original EEC-Vs don't have?

There are absolutely no downfalls....EEC-V is better in every aspect and is much much easier to work with.

For instance...for timing you have multiple spark tables and adders and you also have a source flag to tell you where these values are coming from. ISC you have a duty cycle and an integrator "long term duty cycle". So can see the adaptive strategy. On almost everything you have a base value commanded by the EEC and a corrective value that has been "learned" you apply the learned value to the base value until everything is exactly what is commanded.

[cgrey8]

With so much learning capacity, what is it that is restrictive in the tune that prevents people from doing mods to the motor without a tune? In specific, what I'm referring to is the Explorer EEC's inability to accept the E303 cam. I've heard the stock tune doesn't work well at all with this cam and that to run it in an Explorer motor using an Explorer EEC, you require a custom tune.

[BobCat]

With so much learning capacity, what is it that is restrictive in the tune that prevents people from doing mods to the motor without a tune? In specific, what I'm referring to is the Explorer EEC's inability to accept the E303 cam. I've heard the stock tune doesn't work well at all with this cam and that to run it in an Explorer motor using an Explorer EEC, you require a custom tune.

Almost all of the EEC-V's require a tune for even minimal mods and the reason for this is when it receives signals that are out of the norm it attempts to compensate. When the compensation reaches it's limits then it will throw a CEL. The older EEC's didn't have a clue what was really going on...yes you could install an E303 without it causing a ton of problems but you could also unplug an injector and it wouldn't know it lol.

[cgrey8]

That makes sense. I do recall that for the older EECs, it's almost impossible to get a CEL light to come on. You have to be ignoring some pretty bad symptoms before the CEL will appear.

So are the limits adjustable so you can widen things out during the tuning phase?

[sailorbob]

For instance...for timing you have multiple spark tables and adders and you also have a source flag to tell you where these values are coming from.

This is implemented in the late eec-iv's.

Don't get me wrong, I am not putting the eec-v down, it is just that the last of the eec-iv's had a lot packed into them, and I am considering the cost of the tuning options available for each.

[cougarnut281]

I have never had a need to adijust the limits. I always just looked at whatever adaptive value I needed and started calibrating the proper table/function to bring it back into spec and then it isn't an issue from then on.

[cgrey8]

For instance...for timing you have multiple spark tables and adders and you also have a source flag to tell you where these values are coming from.

This is implemented in the late eec-iv's.

Don't get me wrong, I am not putting the eec-v down, it is just that the last of the eec-iv's had a lot packed into them, and I am considering the cost of the tuning options available for each.

So sailorbob, are you suggesting that the CBAZA is probably a better EEC to work with? Historically most people have migrated their CBAZA-based cars to one of the GUFx EECs. But perhaps upgrading a GUFx computer to CBAZA makes more sense?

And what's the difference in cost between tuning an EEC-IV and EEC-V. I know what the TwEECer/BE/EA cost. But I have no clue what the tuning cost/options are for the EEC-V stuff.

I have never had a need to adijust the limits. I always just looked at whatever adaptive value I needed and started calibrating the proper table/function to bring it back into spec and then it isn't an issue from then on.

Sounds simple...almost too good to be true compared to tuning a GUFx unit.

[cougarnut281]

I am considering the cost of the tuning options available for each.

Almost everything I have seen is for either EEC. The only additional cost would be to get something to datalog which there are several options. Even then that is only needed if what your using doesn't offer dataloging.

Is there something I am missing?

[sailorbob]

are you suggesting that the CBAZA is probably a better EEC to work with?

Yes, it has better coding.

Historically most people have migrated their CBAZA-based cars to one of the GUFx EECs.

This is one of the reasons why I do not think that eec-v's have an advantage over eec-iv's. If people find it hard to cope (i.e. get satisfactory results) with tuning a late eec-iv (lets say 1200+ constants, 120+ functions and 50+ tables) how will they manage when there are even more parameters to play with? (and yes, I know that these many parameters are not exposed in any DIY editor - or at least none I have seen)

And what's the difference in cost between tuning an EEC-IV and EEC-V. I know what the TwEECer/BE/EA cost.

For SCT stuff, my guess (and it is just a guess) is at least 50% more for reflashing gear and 100% more for chip burning.

[cougarnut281]

For a flash setup it looks like it is $750. That includes datalogging.

For a chip setup that can datalog it looks like it is about $1050.

For comparision, the EEC-IV chip setup is $950 and it can't datalog.

These prices are from blueovalchips.com in case you guys are wondering.

I am not sure how much it costs for the whole BE/EA/Tweecer setup. Can someone post that up for me for comparision.

[cougarnut281]

Ok I got bored for a few minutes and priced it all out. The Tweecer/EA/BE comes out to $660.

That means a flasher setup is $90 or 12%
EEC-V chip is $390 more or 37%
and EEC-IV chip is $290 or 30%

[cgrey8]

If you get a new TwEECer RT, that's around $550...maybe a little more, but that's in the ballpark AND you can usually find used TwEECer for as low as $350.

The BE/EA package together is $100.

So a total investment of $650 will get you going on EEC-IV. This assumes that BE supports the EEC in question. If it doesn't, then you'll have to hope that CalEdit does a half way decent job of breaking out the tune.

I was also talking with Clint (86GT) and he said that EA can datalog EEC-Vs through ELM scan tools connected to the OBD-II port. However the update time for each sample is fairly slow. OBD-II standard specs response times no slower than 100ms/parameter but he's . Perhaps that's no big deal if a majority of tuning with the newer EEC-Vs is just transferring "learned" info over to the corresponding table. Using a TwEECer and an ELM scan tool, you could probably get everything you need. But that is one thing to consider is that datalogging through OBD-II isn't nearly as "real time" as the TwEECer RT is.

However SCT and others have some kind of DMA pass-through that allows them direct access to the memory. This is all new info to me, so I thought I'd include those details here in this discussion of EEC-IV vs EEC-V.

[BobCat]

For instance...for timing you have multiple spark tables and adders and you also have a source flag to tell you where these values are coming from.

This is implemented in the late eec-iv's.

Don't get me wrong, I am not putting the eec-v down, it is just that the last of the eec-iv's had a lot packed into them, and I am considering the cost of the tuning options available for each.

Kinda....... I have CBAZA in my personal car so I know all too well about it BUT with the late model EEC-IV you have almost all of the power of the EEC-V but hardly any of the Datalogging. Yes the CBAZA has multiple timing tables but to pull source values and/or Datalog you will have to have a Scanner capable of pulling the extended data stream such as that from Ease Diagnostic. Even then the amount of data is nowhere near that of the EEC-V as far as datalogging is concerned.