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3 soldering iron tip changes, 2 and a half hours, 1 numb bum and a moment of blind panic later.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you an almost complete Speeduino NO2c ecu.


Almost complete because I have to wait for the daughter board to turn up in the post, so I can solder some extra long pins in to pass through to the Arduino and I need to get the long pins from my local friendly electronics shop, yes I have one it's called switch electronics, Website thing hereits run but a really nice guy called Ben and i totally recommend them, I'm off down there tomorrow, ill warn him he's about to receive a ton of orders from the Retro Rides crew.

Anyway shameless plug over, my first mistake was deciding the tip on my new iron was too big as all the pads are smaller than the last project, not enough heat transfer not even for the lovely juicy lead based solder I'm using, I didn't even manage 1 joint with it, then i went for the small chisel tip that looked like a good choice and that was almost as bad as the first one, so I went back to the original bit to big one, which worked OK ish, then I just sat there for 2.5 hrs, picking a bag of components and fitted them one by one, yes my bum was numb.

Then I took it off to the kitchen and cleaned the flux off with some break cleaner and an old tooth brush, bought it bach to the dinning table work bench and noticed 2 surface mount component spaces, just under the edge of the MAP sensor panic set in, as I went through the bag of components trying to find them, then through the stuff on the table, when I couldn't find them I lifted the MAP sensor only to see printed on the board, only for surface mount map sensor.......

Another small step forwards.

Dan

With so many Speeduinos to choose from why did I choose the NO2C, price, price and size but mainly price.

At the time of writing, diy-efi.co.uk are selling the V3 or 4 kits at £119


or the NO2C vD1 for £89


As you can see the kits consist of the PCB, all the components and the connectors (all from reputable UK suppliers apparently), add on an Arduino for £16, a VR conditioner (for the VR crank sensor) for £19, special delivery postage for £8 and a 20% cut for the government, and you're out-of-pocket to the tune of £192 for a V3 or 4 or £158 for the NO2C.

As for the size, it's about the size of a pack of cards, which is the same as the Microsquirt I had previously except the cables don't have to exit in the most awkward place possible.

What can it do, I can't hear you ask,

2 injector output channels
2 coil output channels
Dedicated tachometer output
4 medium/high current outputs (idle, boost, VVT, fuel pump, fan, etc)
IAT, CLT, TPS, and O2 inputs (protected)
On-board MAP sensor

Add on boards
Stepper idle control through board mounted DRV8825 accessory PCB, ready to fit £3-8 on eBay, Amazon etc
VR conditioning through board mounted VR conditioner accessory PCB, ready to fit £19 diy-efi.co.uk
Bluetooth adaptor HC-05 accessory PCB, ready to fit £3-8 on eBay, Amazon etc
DB2 daughter board 2, bare PCB £4 eBay, not sure about components but prob £10 ish

DB2 adds a lot of functionality
2 additional coil output channels (through hole)
4 low current outputs
2 general digital inputs (protected)
1 analogue input (protected)
Flex-fuel input (protected)
Barometric pressure sensor (adds constant correction to the map)

With the low current outputs, you could reconfigure two of the medium/high current outputs on the NO2C to act as injector drivers. To do this, you will have to make minor changes to the firmware before programming the Arduino.

In short, it will run batch fire injection and wasted spark ignition:
4cyl engine with a lot of functionality.
6cyl with reduced functionality, you lose 2 of the 4 medium/high current outputs, or use DB2.
8cyl with the daughter board

If it's as good as they say it is, that's a lot of bang for ones £.

So what's the plan? Several things bugged me about the Ms install, although the engine bay side of the installation was fairly tidy the mess behind the dash wasn't neat it had cable tucked behind the carpets, there was no fuel pump cut out switch, the Vauxhall coil pack always looked out of place.
Although for now It's going to run ignition only for now, I'm going to build it for EFI.

I picked up a VW polo 6n4 coil pack with leads for £25 and a bag of 4 plugs to fit it for £11, an Ardustim i/o simulator kit for £30 and a new solder station for £47.

Total spend so far £276 I should comfortably come in under £300 and have a new soldering iron an ECU tester and a load of fun and learnings to boot.
Dan

Speeduino NO2C is in the post

I've just heard back from Trigger Wheels and it's dead, £400 for a replacement Microsquirt, I don't think so. I'm off on a speeduino adventure.

Good luck DS, I want to lose some weight and the Mrs is in training for 2 mammoth bike rides this year, Mallorca 312 and chase the sun, so we are on a diet and exercise plan, we have used many recipes from this book and I'm trying to get to the gym 3 times a week.

hope it helps.
Dan

Warning, long, boring, dry, rambly, stream of consciousness type post.

Well I had thought today I would be writing an update, albeit a small one on the Herald Estate project, but Saturday I awoke Thinking of Frank, due in no small part to the opening of registrations for the Club Triumph 10 CR.

About 18 months ago I was being a fantastic friend and stripped off the fuel injection and fitted a set of carbs from a mates acclaim that he couldn't get to run right, (they didn't) then I fitted a "known good" set of carbs to check them, it was at this point that every thing went a bit Pete Tong, there was a flash I know not what it was, but the Microsquirt ECU no longer liked its fuse, which it blew every time the ignition was turned on, so I reverted to carbs and a dizzy, at this point I stopped writing this and re-read my thread so many, half thought out ideas that I didn't get follow through on, what must you all think of me.....

So now for more of the same. But first a recap

Acclaim carbs, they run a constant manifold air leak for the positive crankcase ventilation, they are tricksy bike carbs, they have a "Power Valve" which I believe is what Mike Nixon refers tohere and hereas the air cut valve I'll come back to this bit later.

The vac advance unit for the distributor is unavailable new or second had I have an auto one which has the wrong advance curve in it for a manual, but it's all I have, this is why I went down the ECU route originally.

Frank has had 1mm skimmed off the head and high lift camshaft, as it's a OHC this has altered the cam timing ever so slightly, the dizzy runs from the cam, the cam is set up on the original timing marks (well as close to original as possible) setting up an Acclaim cam is a dark art, you set it up to the marks which is approximately half a tooth out on the belt then have to guess which way to turn it. The Newman cam is supposed to be set up on the original timing marks (but they have moved by about that much)

Frank is a total pain to start, he will only start on all the choke, and he just kicks into life then revs to 3-4k as soon as he's running, if you touch the choke be for he's warm he stumbles and dies, when warm he's OK. In an attempt to fix this, I've tried different ways to set up the carbs, with no joy.


So where to start? Pull out the ECU loom plonk it on the bench and test it, but just in case it's magically fixed its self, test the ECU in the car again, nope pops a fuse as soon as the ignition is turned on.



No issues with the Loom, it's definitely the Microsquirt, I've had the case apart and can see no signs of exploded components, so fingers crossed. It is now (as of 8.30pm on Sunday evening) with the post office on its way to Trigger Wheels LTD in Ely for testing and hopefully a repair.

So how to at least get this car to run nicely, at this point I'm convinced it's the carbs fault. Can I make the mixture richer earlier on the choke, it's only really warm up I'm worried about because he runs well enough when warm, there are 2 places i can see to do this the choke relief valve adjustment.




And the fast idle speed adjustment.



But of course me being me, I didn't look at the book first, I just thought I knew best and got the operation of the fast idle speed backwards and lost half an hour making a little clip on cover to reduce the gap between the forked arm and the operating leaver, which had the effect of revving it up to 4-5k, doh.

When I narrowed the gap the max revs came down revving up to 2-3k, but it was surging, slowing down to the point of stalling a repeating, making me sound like a prize prick, I think it's the Air Cut Valve, now thanks to rereading my thread I have a way of defeating them, if necessary.

But the other thing it could be is the timing, it's got an auto dizzy vac advance, and it probably has a different vacuum curve due to the raised compression and high lift cam, so I disconnected the vac advance.
I can't find the timing marks with my timing light, this is not helped by the crank trigger pick up that's in the way. I'm not 100% sure my timing gun is right as it's an adjustable one, and if I rock the dizzy it hits the end of the adjustment slot, so I check the static timing, Acclaims have a good way of doing this, set the crank to TDC firing, pull the dizzy and check the marks.



It comes out at factory settings, but the car wants to be somewhere else, so I lined up the body mark one tooth clock wise when viewed from the cap end.

That made a big difference, now it idles much happier, but it's lost its low to midrange acceleration, but at least it seems to start OK now, the test will be tomorrow morning.
Dan

Here we have the major parts
The bonnet


Tailgate, roof panel, rear tub and 2 doors


The bulkhead


The chassis


The engine and gearbox


And the interior and wheels

All the best for the cataract removal.
Dan

Well i went out to the garage, looked at the bulkhead, decided I couldn't be arsed, then messed about trying to find something to do and found a big box full of all the detritus you get at the bottom of cardboard boxes when you buy job lots and peoples abandoned projects. Which turned into this



By that time SWMBO had finished a 2hr zwift session and was ready for feeding, which ment the end of garage time and began the afternoon of shopping and house work. happy happy joy joy.
Dan