the big benefit with the Maxx.
you don't HAVE to run the engine with it NOW... you can in the future

 

A bunch of guys I know are coming down for the Friday test day, but they're not staying for the weekend so they'll be gone before you get there. I'm staying at a hotel in Bakersfield -- camping at the track is not for me. I'll PM you my cell # and text you the paddock location.

That transmission had about 25 hours on it -- it went into the car in September after the Utah WRL race. I've gone through quite a few transmissions on this car (this is number 6). Usually it's the synchros that go -- we had a recurring problem where it was mushrooming the pushrods on the slave cylinders, especially in endurance races. That meant the clutch wouldn't fully disengage, and that's a recipe for eating synchros. When you race a car for 6-10 hours straight it just cooks everything under the hood and you get all kinds of weird failures

The slave cylinder pushrod problem has been addressed by switching to a Tilton hydraulic release bearing. No more pushrod!

The full power tune makes 330 at the wheels, but only about 270 ft-lbs of torque. For NASA ST4 I run it detuned to either 245 or 280 hp, depending on what tires I'm using. Same peak torque numbers, but it chops the top of the power curve off. No idea why the gear teeth failed, but these are all used transmissions (there are no new ones and you can't get parts to rebuild them any more either), so the previous usage is a big gamble.

--Ian

 

When I have some free time I'll probably pull the dead transmission apart and see if there's anything interesting in it (other than a bunch of bits of gear teeth). This one still had good synchros, so I may try to frankenstein them into one of my other dead boxes.

The guys at TCD said they've never seen a ZF 5-speed fail this way before. Lots of synchro failures and a few catastrophic gear case failures, but no teeth. So my guess is that whoever owned it before me put it to some dubious uses.

--Ian

 

You just threw a wrench in my plan so hard. The Maxx can be used as a standalone TCU as well? In all the research I saw, I never saw anyone using the MAXX that way, but then again, why would anyone? Definitely a niche situation on my end. I'll deliberate and look into it a bit more.

One of the guys on the FB groups posted a proposed PPF to 8HP adapter bracket this morning, but said his car won't be running until later in the year to test it. I volunteered to be a test mule if possible. We'll see what comes of that lol.

 

Sorry?

Plenty of people who have Haltechs and Links are using the maxx mini to run 8HP cause they don't want to buy a different ECU.
I'd suggest getting the Race over the street. and if you're baller, the raceGen2 has a TON more IO/power.

 

I was joking, mostly. Lol.

Thanks for the heads up. Dove into it a bit deeper and the MAXX options as a temporary standalone might work, might not. Looks like for the MAXX to work with an OEM CANBUS, engine torque needs to be broadcast, and the NC ECU doesn't do that. On Turbolamik, you can use MAP readings in lieu of calculated torque. I shot MAXX an email asking if that's possible on their platform as well

 

Another possibility is that if you've got a simple mapping between MAP/RPM and torque, you could use an Arduino with a CAN bus interface to do the conversion and retransmit the torque value that the MAXX expect.

--Ian

 

If you can control ignition cut from an external input on the OE ECU, then MAXX can control engine torque on demand.

 

I love how much smarter you guys are than me. Thanks as always for the input. I'll look into Arduinos and how in depth that would be to make happen.

In regards to OEM ECU ignition cut options, ECUTEK allows me to perform ignition cuts for flat shifting. Basically just cuts ignition with 100% throttle input and clutch switch disengaged. Upon typing this, however, I just realized I can change the minimum throttle input for the cut to occur. Score. Being able to lower this should make cuts much easier regardless of which controller is used.

 

Would the Maxx not be able to do a calculation like that?

 

I was kinda thinking the same thing but couldn't find documentation in their manual. I'm probably looking in the wrong place or not deep enough. The Turbolamik has this exact table that allows you to fill in estimated torque values with RPM and MAP as the x and y axis.

 

I don't see why not,
if the NC is a hall sensor crank then just tie into that so the maxx gets sync, then plumb the onboard map into the manifold.
then change axis source for torque to MAP.

OR, just tie into the TPS as well. and reference TPS vs RPM.
Edit,
Did more reading.

Needed for the protocol to work

•Populated and accurate torque table, indicating true engine torque. (table is TPS vs RPM, one populates this in MTune

•Engine RPM.(tie into hall crank sensor)

•Brake pedal/stop light active.(tie into brake light)

•Throttle Position.(tie into TPS signal)

•Intake air temperature.(could add this separate, or possibly get from CANBUS and OE ECU)

•Coolant temperature.(same with IAT, add separate, get from CANBUS, or just trick Maxx into thinking it's always 175deg, though IDK what that'll do by way of control)

•Battery voltage.(if the ECU is powered, it has this)

•Actual revlimit set in system. (setting In MTune)

•ECU runtime.(inherrent to the ECU)


I'd suggest reading ALL of this if you're seriously still considering the Maxx Route.
https://www.maxxecu.com/webhelp/adva..._protocol.html

A detriment for the Maxx route is, it would still need tuned. it doesn't come out the box shifting right, or smooth.
BUT the opposite of that is true, you want it to do LITERALLY anything different... just change that thing.

 

In principle, sure the hardware can do it easily. I have no idea if the software is set up to allow that feature -- there might be a math channel you can enable and use for it, but often those sorts of features are behind extra-cost paywalls.

--Ian

 

Maxx has no paywalls. If you have an ECU in your hands, you have every option, calculation, feature, and calibration available to it.

 

So I've read through that bit of the manual more than a few times now, but didn't know I could simulate the table in Mtune if I was only using the ECU to run the trans. Makes sense. If the table is simulated anyways, why would it matter if the MAXX or another ECU is running the engine?

The rest of the information needed should be readily available on the CANBUS so I'm not worried about that. I think the next step is for me to download MTune next week (got too much going on tonight getting ready to race this weekend) and play around with it to confirm I can grab everything but the torque table from the can, while also using the simulated torque table.

@Wingman703 , mind posting a couple screenshots of your 8HP settings? No rush obviously. I won't be delving into this until mid-next week at least.

 

If you are getting the rest of the values from CAN, you may need to consider what the OEM canbus is, if it's compatible with the buss in the 8HP, and whether the 8HP and NC will have conflicts if put on the same buss.
If they will have issues/conflicts then you pretty much have to get the Pro or Gen2Race, both have two separated canbus, where the Mini, Street, and Race have only 1 canbus.

And if you log enough of the messages, you may be able to pass them up to Maxx, and have them generate an OEM protocol where anyone with an NC can select and get all the values populated without having to setup each individual.

 

Ahh yeah you're right, I spoke too soon. Checked the document and the MAXX doesn't list having a communication protocol with the NC CAN. I'm getting my lines crossed, at some point I thought I read they supported it but I was probably remembering the turbolamik.

That being said, splicing into crank signal, CLT, IAT and brake signal and running them to the MAXX wouldn't be a huge job at all...



Edit: Yeah, what the hell am I thinking? Even if the MAXX doesn't support the NC CAN protocol, it's only a small bit of wiring to feed all the necessary data to the ECU, and that would kinda already start the job if I wanted to run the whole car on the ECU anyways. All in, the MAXX would cost around $70 less than the Turbolamik (Just over $2,300 after adding the 8HP internal TCU reflash and harness), and it would open the door to run the whole car on a standalone eventually.

 

What are you looking for? Our engine torque tables are going to be wildly different, as will blip, cut, and shift request settings. I can post what I have now(which is also a lot of guess work, as I don't have dyno data *quite yet*) but dunno how useful it would be for you.
If you just want to get a feel for what the UI is like, you can download Mtune and just open it to mess around even without a connected ECU.
FYI it's very easy to build the harness for the 8HP. Connector is like... $30? And then it's just 5 or 6 total wires. The flash tool can be rented for cheap.
Oh, while I'm thinking of it, pop the pan off your transmission and MAKE SURE YOUR TCU IS SUPPORTED. Maxx has a list on their website. All gen 1(which should be what your 8HP45 is) *should* be supported, but I've seen one or two fringe cases where it wasn't a supported TCU.

 

That was a spectacular case of not even knowing the right questions to ask Yeah, lemme download MTune then start asking questions.

I'll look into the harness then. SLG's is pretty expensive. Didn't even occur to me that the connector probably isn't too expensive. Also just saw that it's only 5 or 6 pins even though it's got up to 18 or 20 or however pin cavities. I only looked at renting SLG's tool but will look around a bit more.

Just saw that bit on MAXX's website too. I was under the impression that all 8HP45's were considered to be gen 1's, but yeah I'll pull the pan anyways and confirm it's supported first. My transmission should be landing here any minute now actually.

 

I'm no CAN expert so this may be a dumb question but I would *assume* the NC and RX8 use the same CAN protocols since they share so much. Like I assume the ECUs from both cars are similar. Considering the RX8 is listed on their compatibility sheet I would *assume* that would mean the NC ECU would be compatible also.