Jwbetley

Hi. I have a ls-t civic. I just installed my wideband today. Now, when at idle, the a/f is a 14.67-14.7. It will stay there far about 25 seconds, then start going crazy. It goes to 13.xx to 17/18.xx; rich to lean, to stoic, to lean, just everywhere. Now , is this normal. It seems to do this as I am driving out of boost. Is this normal? It the car safe to drive or is there something wrong with the basemap (crome?) Is it possible to blow my motor when idleing or out of boost? I need to know so that i can drive to work tommorow.

Secondly, it is safe to drive with the turbo disconnected from the charge pipes so that it wont ceate boost. My charpe pipe came disconnected and I was just wondering, how bad is it to drive like that. I wouldn't drive like that anyways, but I am just curious.

Thirdly( if thats a word ), where do you guys get your hose clamps. These homedepot ones keep breaking on me. I tighten them too much, and they just break. I tighten them to little, they slip off the chardpipes ( and yes, I double them up). I swear, I have aout $40 worth of hose clamps under my hood, lol. I dont have a rib on half of the charge pipes, so i need to make em' hold somehow. Any quick advice.

any advice is helpfull. Just little thing I have to learn somewhere. Thanks

dornon13

firstly i think your a/f is fine...is it changing as your throttle position changes or is this all at idle? What is your EMS? Who tuned it? The reason it starts out at 14.7:1 is because it isnt warmed up yet... try this..turn the car to the on position to get the wideband warmed up mine says lean when its fully warmed up with the car off then you can start the car and the readings should be accurate. but at idle it should stay pretty close to one number but while driving around its gonna change alot because the ecu is trying to compensate for the readings its getting from the o2 sensor.

secondly you shouldnt drive without charge piping connected. your turbo doesnt build boost therefore the wastegate will never open and the turbo will just spin as high as your exhaust will push it..when i have a pipe blow off i just keep the throttle SUPER low untill i get home i mean seriously i drive like a granny or somethin

thirdly if you are having problems with charge pipe blowing off get t-bolt clamps..most likely you will have to order them online im not sure what kinda shops you have in your area though.

Jwbetley

I am running chrome. It is not tuned yet, just running off the basemap. I am open loop, so the computer isn't really reading anything. The fluctuation occurs while at idle, no throttle movement. The wideband will actually read "LEAN" at sometimes. I get nervous. Somebody told me that they blew their engine within 2 mins at idle with a bad tune. I dont know wether to belive him. There is little cylinder pressure at idle. Maybe it was all over the place because it was 87 degrees out today. I dont know. I just dont think that it should be fluctuating so much. Other (tuned) cars i see stay within 14.5-15.0. My car's just everywhere.

I retarded my timing all the way, but no difference. The wide band read the same readings while I am driving around with no fluctuation of the throttle. This is my first turbo experience, so I dont really know what should be happening.

Jwbetley

bump for some piece of mind

OMG B16

Don't drive your car untill its tuned. Please.

dornon13

well theres the problem you cant expect it to be right without being tuned

Jwbetley

I put about 200 miles on the car with the turbo. It seems to be running really nice. Idle fluctuates sometimes, but with a little tap of the throttle, it revs back down. my a/f reads around 13-16 when driving. Is 16ish too lean? I have never heard any detonation, and i dont really know what it really sounds like. I am still open downpipe. Under boost, my a/f goes to 10-11, which seems nice. The car fills with the rich smell. I am pretty sure that is a safe a/f for boost, correct me if Im wrong.

Also, when at higher rpm, when i let off the throttle, the a/f goes really lean (obviously) , but is this bad? Can the car detonate at all when out of boost and in vaccum? Sorry for the somewhat retarded questions, but id like to get some kind of kniowledge of how I should safetly drive this car till I get it tuned. My ugly *** 89 civic wagon beater is temporarily out of commission, so i am fprced to drive my coupe untuned. Just looking for some opinions. Thanks

EBP.EM1

why dont you just go and get it tuned? whats so hard about that?

you shouldn't be going in boost on a base map. a base map is used so you can drive to the tunner. it just makes your car driveable.

Jwbetley

i am not exactly in the most dense of places in which tuners are available. This isn't socal, this is more or less mass. I have been trying to find someone that does chrome, but the closest I can find is NJ. I really dont go into boost. I hit it very lightly a few time over the past week. I am PARANOID. I dont want to do any damage to my set-up. All i hear is horror stories about people blowing their motors prior to getting it tunes. Patience is my best friend. I was jsut wondering if the car is safe to drive out of boost. wether I could possible hurt anything out of boost.

EBP.EM1

i live in canada

but anyway, you should be fine to drive around w/o hitting boost. just get it tuned as soon as you can.

Jwbetley

will do. Just need to find someone around here... How much does a street tune usually run a brother? (im white, but brother just sounds cool)