MS on a stock '99 - would it make sense?
 

Hi folks,

this might be a stupid question, but i'm curious:
Would it make any sense to put a MS in a stock 1.6 '99?
I mean regarding fuel economy and/or power?

I often read that people suggest to install the MS before adding boost,
in order to learn how to tune it.
Could one gain anything from this?

Cheers
Chris

I would definitely say it is worth it, it will be the platform for all your future modifications, plus you could probably pull a little bit of power out of the car just by tuning.

It would definately be worth it. I wish I would have done the same but, I installed my turbo and MS at the same time...big pain in the ass. Especially if you are new to the turbo and standalone scene.

dew itttt

by putting it on now while you only have little to no mods it will make it easy to learn from mistakes without having to buy a new engine from it :D

If you plan on getting a turbo I would install the MS now and properly learn how to tune it. Errors are less critical if you have no turbo yet :)
Give yourself a couple of months with it and than get the turbo.

If you're not getting a turbo, I'm not sure if it's worth it. You'll gain a couple of hp IF you tune it right (might have to go to the dyno to set it up properly).
Don't expect big numbers though. The gain will be a single digit number.

Gained about 15whp along with a Monsterflow intake. No dyno, just good road tuning. I need to find the sheet and post it. Yes, it was definately worth it.

Jim

15whp is amazing. What's your spark map look like?

Less aggresive than you might think. Max power 159bhp@7400rpm, max torque 18kgfm@4800rpm.

Jim

Ps. NOT whp, wtq obviously.

15 hp with only a intake and street tune.. not bad at all. stock exhaust?

If you have any plans of upgrading the motor in any way (internals, cams, COPs, turbo, s/c, nitros...) then certainly. I would imagine you could have some gains if you really went at it, and you will lose some streetability without care.

You might be able to get better mileage, too, and certainly have better support for alternate fuels.

I say do it, you could get a MPG gain, better response, and also more HP. Plus you get the experience of tuning. I say go MS-II with Abe's PNP board and use an LC-1 wideband. You won't get a drastic increase just by going MS, but you will have the perfect setup for if and when you go forced induction.

I would say that this is not your typical street tune, I was tuning the thing for a full three month before I was completely satisfied with it. As for the exhaust, back then, yes. Now I have a full header and exhaust and no noticeable gains.

Jim

Wow, thanks for your opinions!

Of course i'd love to go turbo in the future,
but it's not that easy in Germany, especially with a 1.6 M2 (maybe you guys have heard of the german TÜV ;-) ).

I think it will be worth a try, would be a nice christmas present to myself :-)

@Chris: Go DIYPNP for the 99/00.

Yeah, Zaphod has his NB 1.6l up and running. Not that I'm saying I prefer the DIY box over my board, there's still some circuits to build to really do it "right", but it does seem to work.

Either way, you can always make a turbo system, it only sounds hard. :-)

The thing I like about the DIYPNP is the OEM harness - one box solution, though it is a bit of soldering work to do.

Greets

It wouldn't be too hard to put a regular MS2 and Abe's board inside one box, just like DIY does. Just leave out the DB37 on both boards and use wires between the boards instead. Since Abe's board breaks pretty much every signal, you can still use the JimStim on it.
I don't know if Abe sells his board without components, but I find it a better solution than the DiYPNP at a lower price. Remember Abe has the alternator circuit on it. FWIW, no affiliation etc etc.
If you use both Jean Bélanger's boards, than the V3 PCB is virtually empty and you do not even have to buy the complete Ms2 kit. You only need the partial kit and a couple of components. Glens Garage sell the partial kit with map sensor and the difficult to find components. The other components (a couple of resistors and capacitors and an enclosure are easy to find in Ratshacks and the like).
I will be doing a new 99 build in the next weeks, but unfortunately I'm using a different breakout board (3SGE) than Abe's. Otherwise I could have done a complete how to.

I am really looking forward to your build.

And I do with no word say I wouldn't use Abe's board. I think Abe made a very neat product and I give huge respect to his work.

I have chosen the DIYPNP because it was there and because I liked the easiness of the DIYPNP build - I would have had to completely redo my old MS2, which I didn't want.

True, it's best to start with a 'fresh' kit.
These are the only component I'll be installing from the original MS2 kit. All the rest is not used.

http://img214.imageshack.us/img214/4...nentsempty.gif

You should post info on that board here. I think it's pretty neat.


I guess someone should look at the licensing on the MS-II. It's easy to piss off the wrong people and get threatened, at least, I've heard of it.

If you can run the MS-II code, maybe all you have to buy from B&G is the MS-II chip. If they are ok with it, I'd be happy to try to lay out a board maybe to use the MS-II daughtercard and the rest would be PnP miata?

Maybe it's more trouble than it's worth, but it would be small. :-)