YankyMate

New to MS. Bought a MSPNP2 MM9697 v1.1 with 3.3.1 firmware and physically installed the unit with GM AIT sensor and deleted MAF on my 97. Car is all stock except a an MTX-L grounded to throttle body post.

Followed vendor's instructions on physical install and before starting car loaded the stock base tune, changed thermistor setting to read GM AIT, O2 sensor to Innovate LC1 and set timing to fixed advance 10 degrees to set base timing. Car will start up but sputters and dies after a few seconds of running rough. Rich fuel smell is present after it shuts off. Afr bounces between 11 and 16 with the reading in TunerStudio being about 0.5 above what is on the gauge.

I was told that the car should run for me to check the timing and get that set but it's not. Is this normal and should I wait until I have another person present to help me set this timing before I should be worried?

Car ran perfectly fine with no codes on stock ecu.

Attached the tune I'm using as well as a log of start up.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

YankyMate

Update: Updated firmware to 3.4.2 on the MS. I now get a some errors when loading the base tune. Is there a MM9697 base tune for the 3.4.2 firmware?
Anyway I got the timing set to 10 degrees on fixed. I was hoping that once the timing was set the car would run but no go. Idle rises to about 1200 with a 12.7~ afr then starts to lean out and the idle dips to 400 then rises again. Giving it gas will cause it to hesitate bad and won't rev past 3k.

Not really sure where to go from here at all. I was under the impression the car would run fine since the car is healthy and stock. My plan was to just tune for bigger injectors myself and then send it off to be tuned professionally when I had all my turbo parts. Could my MSPNP2 unit be bad?

ryansmoneypit

iTrader: (6)

It's not bad. This is the unfortunate learning curve of ms. I won't have access to a laptop for a few days. Otherwise I would look at the tune.

Check everything. Are you batch ignition, and sequential fuel? Run spark and injector tests.

Matt Cramer

There's not much difference between the 3.3.1 and 3.4.2 tunes; it's generally safe to load the earlier tune into the later firmware.

YankyMate

Only thing I can find that matches what you are saying (sorry not familiar with batch ign and seq fuel) is under Fuel Settings - Sequenced Batch Fire which is turned off on the base tune I am using. Nothing in the tutorials I have read online said anything about that so I have not touched it.

Tried open and closed loop idle, using stock narrowband O2 and double checking every setting from the tutorial I used tonight and nothing has changed. Tried the stock ecu and the car still runs fine. With the MS the car behaves as if the MAF sensor is unplugged on the stock ecu. The base map is set up assuming you have deleted the MAF right? I have calibrated thermistor settings for the GM AIT correctly and under MAF settings everything is turned off.

Edit: Another thought - I noticed my MTXL wideband does not output during the HTR (heater) phase. The power I have it hooked up to resets upon start so it's alway in HTR for the first 10 seconds after starting. This outputs afr to max rich (7.5 iirc) while heating up. Should I wire it to an always on source and let it heat up before start? The wideband manual says not to do this to preserve the life of the sensor so I didn't think it would matter when I originally wired it.

Matt Cramer

The MSPNP ignores the O2 sensor for a while after start, for exactly the reason you describe.

Have you checked timing with a timing light?

YankyMate

Yes. Timing was set to 10 degrees advanced in fixed timing as per instructions then set back to use table once the trigger offset was set correctly.

After spending this weekend changing various closed loop idle settings I have been able to get the car to stay running. The idle isn't smooth or as consistent as I'd like it to be but I suppose it will take more trial and error to get past all that. I'm using various articles try and iron this out but it's much more complicated than I originally thought it would be.

How Do I Tune My Idle With A Standalone? - Guides: Forced induction - MX5Nutz Forum
https://www.diyautotune.com/support/...ng-megasquirt/

I was more concerned with my initial setup and unit I purchased being installed incorrectly or the unit being bad but it seems those aspects are fine. After talking with some other users I was told that getting idle set correctly is a very difficult task and that is normal.