Moto-P's AE86... Part 2
"The headache"
by Moto-P
So here goes more of what's happening... if you care, about my
AE86...
The last writing closed up with the part when I was trying to justify this
car with my wife, kids, and my dogs... Well, sort of all taken care of, I
go back to driving my "other" AE86...the normal one...
I now clearly have missed all, yes, ALL, of my summer events with the new
car. I was supposed to take delivery... Toysport calls me up:
"We have good news, and bad news...” that scary, overused phrase to
which I have no response usually... They give me the good news
first... It was the fact that my car was not stolen overnight as they sort
of forgot to put my car in the shop overnight... "What??? That
was the good news???!!!, " I sat thinking... Then they started on the
bad part...
It turns out, they got the engine to idle after weeks of doing all they
can...which could mean a day's hard work, or could mean they pushed it aside in
the morning... Luckily, it was the former... They spent half the day
to get it to idle. (Freedom's software and manual written in Japanese
didn't help them any...)
"What is wrong now!" crying in my now shrinking faith... So I
take my evening from work to go there to do what little I can short of shooting
myself -- every time people asked me "what's up with..."
By this time, I was really disgusted to even explain as I, myself, was clueless
as to time and date, or anything about this thingy I call Project AE86 #5.
I proceed to try everything I knew, and diagnosed all sensors, wires, lines,
everything! Which took another several days of taking lot's of time from
family. "Ooh! I can see my lovely wife's face now” But
Toysport's genuine concern now took a grip and I continued. (Thanks
Toysport for the extra overtime labor of urgency)
After trying many diagnostics and re-doing things, it finally got better than idle... Yes, it now climbs up the revs...but coughing and spitting flames backwards. I lose it... I impatiently and hastily try to drive it home, a 20-minute drive. The attempts lead me to my friend, and car nut, Taka's house just 5 minutes away. I judged that I was running way too rich and the ECU was doing nothing to adjust the mixture like it was supposed to do. Plus, stalling 5 times in the middle of intersections did no help for my confidence.
The next couple of weeks, it stayed at Taka's house while he guarded it with
his life and asked it to start behaving for me. He prayed and prayed...and
assisted me to diagnose it. (Thanks Taka...) He even covered it in his
premium car cover so as not to bake my fresh paint with LA ultraviolet.
I get concerned as his 4 cars were getting eager to take over my car's
occupied slot in his driveway. His rare US turbo MR2, TE27, and the 2 AE86
of his... Finally, last Monday, I called a flatbed truck to get my car
home so I can ask Jesus for help myself...and I'm not even
Catholic...
My wife sees the car for the first time and snickers... "Nice
color paint...so plain...and where's the windshield wipers?... what are
these hanging wires? Why is a PC hooked up to a car?...” I shrink
to a dwarf-size human as she continued with an ever-dissatisfied
face..."where's the passenger seat?...and everything else that's supposed
to be in there like carpet, radio, door panels, AC control..."
Yes I left my interior with an upholstery guy who sits on my fabric roll as he
sews another man's couch together. Yet she continues with the final
blow-me-away question..."DOES IT RUN?" ...Well you get the
picture...
Sitting at home I can do nothing but to wake in the middle of the night to
try harder. And decided that I call E&E Systems in Japan to see if
there was any suggestion or advice... Maybe I thought it was something
common with many do-it-yourselfers, something simple...and stupid.
So, here goes the funny part. After discussing and trying stuff over a
half-around-the-globe phone call to Japan, I was ready to give up on this
Freedom ECU thing, when.... the nice gentleman who's the creator and
founder of Freedom ECU, Mr. Asahara, said..."chotto matte" meaning
"wait a second...” He puts me on hold for another 5 minutes and
comes back to me with a list of shipment history... "You are Mr.
Miwa?" he asked as he remembers me as one of the few people to whom he had
sent and ECU to the USA... He continues and tells me that it was shipped
with a turbo 4A-GE setting and program. TUUUUR-BO????
WWWWHHHHAAATTTT!!!!!!! It finally hits me, as that's something I never
thought of... I have a normal 'old 20V natural aspirated
motor...right? He admitted that it was his mix-up as something we had
discussed over the phone as part of a future plan but I did ask specifically for
a NA setup. So he tells me a list of parameters, which had to be changed
on the ECU... Something, which is supposed to be an internal process but
he told me how to do it step by step. I guess he saw it as a hassle too,
to receive, fix, and send an ECU back to the USA...
So I proceeded to take notes and listened carefully to his parameter
modification process. Then after hanging up, my last hope for the project
ignites. It's 4AM, Wednesday night with a full day of work ahead and a
pending guest arrival the next night. I spent another 2 hours looking over
everything for what must have been the 100th useless time. I knew I had it
right the 2nd time.