Adjustable fuel pressure regulators

[s5tuart]

I have heard varying reports about these.
Can anyone ally my fears that it will pop my turbo and blow up my ECU.
Finally, are they worth the £60? Is the improvement they give that good?
Thanks
Stuart

[Ultimatt]

My brother just 'invested' in one of these for his Honda Civic VTi, then again... He is a dick head Bit of a boy racer mod if you ask me.

The money would be much better spent as 60% of the cost of an Everest chip, being bespoke deigned for the Elan and working in perfect harmony with the engine and turbo capabilities. Ain't that right Alan!

Matt

[s5tuart]

Tks Matt,
Where would I get one of the Everest chips?
I did a search on WWW and all I got was Double Glazing!! Ha ha. (It might stop the leaks!)

[Ultimatt]

http://www.lotuselancentral.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4523

Take a look here for the discussion.

One of the forum members Alan (ESM) has developed a chip designed to modify the boost limiter and fuel cut of the standard ECU on the Elan.

The website he set up to provide further info is here:
http://www.astb91.dsl.pipex.com/MountainChipMenu.html

In a nutshell, he's hacked into the existing ECU coding and remapped it to make the most of the fantastic engine in the car. Performance with a standard engine, turbo and injectors is only really limited by the ECU to keep the boost to .6 bar (I believe) whereas, I is widely acknowledged that the engine is capable of safely sustaining boost as high as .99 bar.

The Monutain Chips (Everest and Kilimanjaro) were developed by Alan to overcome this limitation whilst maintaining all the safety features inherent in the standard ECU. I.e.... You won't blow up your engine, fry your ECU or burn out your turbo.

From what I remember, performance gains of 40-60 BHP are possible (with a larger bore exhaust being desirable) without making any modifications to the engine or adding 'Boy Racer' bolt-ons.

Start reading... There's a lot to get through, but the experience and knowledge base of people can be found on this forum.

Matt

[ESM]

There is no point putting one of these regulators in, it will just make the car run richer if you increase the fuel rail pressure- its quite rich enough already.

[Simon_P]

I would have thought that the engine management would correct the mixture - ?

Dubious - what are the suggested advantages?

Simon

[algirdas]

Dear Matt:

I think it is more accurate to state that Alan studied in depth the hardware and software that comprises the embedded systems in our cars and then created an add-on component which allows for unrealized potential in the existing embedded system to be utilized. From what I have seen of Alan, his work etc., I feel very confident that he would never "hack" into anybody's systems. Plus, LEC-ers are people of integrity and I do not believe for an instant that any of us would have anything to do with "hacked" systems.

Just a minor point, no biggie. On the bigger issue, I agree with you that the money would be better spent by an Elan owner putting in one of Alan's chips than the crap the snake oil salesman are selling on eBay these days.

Sincerely,

Algirdas

[Ultimatt]

Algirdas,

That was the sentiment of what I was trying to put across.
By 'hack' I meant looked in detail at the existing coding to understand it and improve upon it where possible. I used 'hack' in the loosest possible English terms.



Matt

[algirdas]

Dear Matt:

Sorry, my misunderstanding. Its just that a year ago I finished a gig as general counsel for a computer software company and whenever I hear anyone use the term "hack" (that is, in the loosest American meaning of the term), I go immediately to battle stations.

I'll shut up now.

Sincerely,

Algirdas

[ESM]

I would have thought that the engine management would correct the mixture - ?

Dubious - what are the suggested advantages?

Simon

Not in an open loop only SE. Even the S2/Federal Elans don't correct mixture under fuel enrichment (high boost).

[s5tuart]

Now I'm out of my depth!
My S2 is (as far as I know) absolutely standard; so can anyone (Alan??) perhaps recommend either the Everest or the Kilimanjaro (is that how you spell it?) for me and would I need to do anything else to the car apart from improve the braking which is currently work in progress.
By the way, thanks for all the contributions so far. Being a "Newbie" I am knocked out by the quality of response. Thanks.

[Ashaman]

FWIW...

The reason people use these normally is simply to deliver more fuel. As ESM stated though, there is no reason to do that if your car is stock. If you start to run more than 1 bar of boost, eventually you will run lean.

The best way around this is with a programable ECU or a "piggyback" controller and larger injectors.

Another way is with an adjustable regulator & stock injectors. This way is not as accurate, but is much cheaper. You use the same injectors, but since you increase the fuel pressure, they flow more. It is a way to cheat a little extra performance out of stock components.

[GeoffSmith]

Stuart,

I speak as a relative newcomer as well. I thought my S2 was stock until I had a sticking wastegate - massive off-gauge boost but, worryingly, no fuel cutoff to protect the engine. Alan was a great help and e-diagnosed that it had been chipped - a crude affair by Superchip @~£200 which only inhibited the fuel cutoff to allow a manual boost control (MBC) @~£50 to operate. Having got back to stock, I was a little disappointed with performance but have added a 2¼" s/s Peco exhaust which made a big difference. I have also had the opportunity to play with Alan's Mountain range in a custom designed setup which allows me to switch between stock, Kili, Everest settings. The dyno results are all well and good, but I can confirm that the level of fun increases as I turn the dial.

I was advised to get to know the car before upgrading, which I think is very sound advice. Like you, I'm going for a brake upgrade plus I'm adding a roll bar (having seen the two pictures of inverted Elans) before the Mountain performance upgrade.

Alan has obviously put a lot of hard graft into understanding the ECU so the results are very good and much more refined and controllable than the crude MBC installation I started with. I echo the sentiments of others and consider that we are lucky that ESM has an Elan (or two) to amuse himself with.

Geoff

PS I'm on the lookout for a company that can do small volume double sided pcb's. If anyone has any contacts I'd be interested to here from them.