Need help with an outdated MS1
 

Some of you may remember me from way back. Braineack built my MS1 for me around the time the forum switched owners.

I went off to college, got a job, etc and my car has sat in storage since 2009. I recently pulled it out and got it back into driving shape. I never finished tuning my MS before I put it away and the tune just blows. I bought a cheap laptop specifically for tuning and a serial to USB adapter that works reliably. I connected them up tonight and they communicated first try, and it looks like all my sensors are still working except for my wideband gauge.

The last time I tuned the MS I used Mega Tune. I learned today it is no longer supported but downloaded an old version just because I was familiar with it. I'm getting an error about the code numbers of the controller not matching, and something about expecting "0x14" and seeing "". It also says my tables will most likely be corrupted if I continue. I'm afraid to corrupt my files as my base tune is good enough to drive the car around and I would like to use it as a starting point.

I have been out of the scene for a long while and trying to sort through Mega Tune, Tuner Studio, and the tuning terms is a bit much all at once. This all leads up to my questions. Am I able to use Tuner Studio to fetch my current settings from my MS and use TS to tune? If not, what is the best way to switch from Mega Tune to TS? If I can't switch to TS what article should I read to fix my "0x14" issue?

Sorry if this comes off as spoon feeding but researching Mega Tune is difficult as most posts are very out of date with broken links. I will be reading up on everything I can this weekend but having an answer to those questions would be an extreme help.

EDIT: I had a chance to quickly read through the sticky above and it looks like TS will fetch the tune from my MS with just a bit of file moving and prompts correct? If so that would be great.

TS is just like megatune, except better. It's not a huge switch. It's like windows XP and vista, not vista and windows 8. Switch to it and realize the glory.

Ideally, yes. In fact, no file-moving should be needed.

One nice thing about TunerStudio is that when you connect it to the MS, if it finds that the software signature in the MS is one that it doesn't have an .INI file for, it will go out to the internet and automatically download one for you. This makes it somewhat more foolproof than Megatune was in this regard. You still have to configure the project appropriately (done from within TS), but even this is now partially automated. Once that's done, TS will download the complete config from the MS, and create a new MSQ for you automatically. It's really quite slick.

There is little risk in connecting it to the ECU and letting it do its thing. Worst-case it will corrupt the contents of the MS's RAM, but if that happens, just power-cycle it and try again. So long as you don't burn anything into the firmware, you should be OK.

I got Tuner Studio Lite running on the first try with no issues and managed to get a few data logs of my hard cold starts. I'll get the full version of TS in a few days after I play around with Lite and get familiar with it. I already found a few of my issues and I'm looking forward to getting it all sorted out.

Thanks for the help guys. It's a relief that I don't have to revisit Mega Tune and do some crazy file conversions. I'm off to read the tuning guides and such and get back into the groove.

Glad to hear it's working.

TunerStudio is such an amazing leap forward from Megatune. You can still screw it up if you try, but most of the stuff that used to be "difficult" (finding and editing ini files, setting up projects in MTConf, etc) is now either automatic or at least much more friendly and intuitive.

Another thing if you didn't know is VE autotune.
It's a pay to play thing but very worth it.

There is a beta download you can use to also autotune your cold-start,
for free.

Yup. having the ability to do realtime auto-tuning of the VE table while you drive justifies the whole price of the software all by itself.

O rly?

I did read into the VE auto tune which looks awesome. I plan to try it out but I really want to know what all the cells tables and graphs mean before I let it play on its own.

My LC-1 wideband sensor took a dump on me. It read 8:1 while warming up then went straight to 22.33. Did a free air calibration with the same results. Ran down to Autozone, picked up a Bosch 17014 which is plug-n-play with the LC-1 and its working great. I calibrated my TPS and got solid numbers and I set up flood clear and got it working just in case.

Now that my wideband is working I see I have some lean tip in, and I'm just waiting for a cold morning to see if the cold start is rich or lean. As long as it isn't too cold for it to start tomorrow it will be my first data log all the way to work.

I'm having some issues getting my idle perfected and I could really use some help. I've read through a bunch of threads in the stickied post and from searching but people use so many terms I don't know that I get side tracked researching those terms. Once I get to playing with the settings I get a good grasp as to what the threads are about. I could really use some input.

My biggest issue was if it was 30-40 outside the car idled at 2,000 rpm, when it was 50-70 outside it idled fine at 900, and when hot out 70+ it idled at 400 and would miss shake and stall if not given some throttle. I followed a post outlining how to tune your idle (can't find it right now) and it gave me great results when the car is warmed up. It sits around 850-900 rpm and only hunts a little bit. Best yet when I clutch in from any RPM it doesn't dip more than maybe 50 RPM. I'm still learning the settings but I'm really happy with where it's going. This is also all done using the warm up idle control. I have not done anything with closed loop yet as the post said it was best to get a solid warm up idle before going closed loop.

As of right now the car will not idle when first started. It revs to about 800 when started then slowly stalls out. After just a bit it will idle around 400 and it is strangely stable (no shaking, missing, anything). Once the car is up to operating temp it idles just fine. This all makes me think there is something wrong with a coolant temp related setting. Trouble is, I can't sort out what setting it is. I could really use some input as to which setting to research or change.


On a side note I had a small victory today. It was 35 degrees out this morning and the car started after cranking for 3 seconds. Before it would not have started at all. I added some more fuel for starting and will be tweaking it as I can. Progress feels good.



EDIT:

I think I have figured it out.

The priming table takes the VE table fuel numbers, then adds the % of extra fuel to help start the engine at the specified coolant temp. Cold coolant = more fuel.

The warm up enrichment table adds an extra % of fuel for the length of time specified decreasing over time (decay rate) to help keep the cold engine running.

My cold start issue was my priming percentages were too low, so my engine was lean and couldn't start. Increasing my percentages added fuel which allowed it to start. My current issue with cold stalling is due to my warm up enrichment being too low. This also explains the knock I was getting under load when the engine was stone cold. Am I on the right track?