More finishing touches

Fly lead to ECU

The fly lead was supplied by Canems and consisted of two cables - a cable with 9 pin connectors at each end and a cable with a 9 pin at one end and a USB at the other. The female connector, on the double 9 pin cable, was fitted to the ECU (to the female socket nearest to the edge of the ECU). The other cable was connected, 9 pin to 9 pin, leaving the USB connection at the end. Hopefully you have got this!

Fly lead coiled up before taping to avoid electrical shorts

Once the cable was secured in place, the metal end of the USB connection and the joint between the double 9 pin connection was taped up to avoid any potential electrical short. The cable was then coiled up and tucked behind the passenger under dash tray. The USB end of the cable is accessible via the slot between the under dash trays above the transmission tunnel. The under dash tray was then re-fixed.

Immobiliser

The female connector from the immobiliser went to the ECU. It can only go into one connection on the ECU (the one farthest away from the ECU edge and nearest the LED).

After connecting the fly lead to the ECU (you need to screw in the connector, so room is needed if the ECU is not unfastened) and connecting the white and black wires, the engine was started to make sure that I had not messed anything up!

Next the application software was downloaded (using a link provided by Canems) to my laptop. This is a zipped file so it was unzipped and then viewed.

Screens shot of ECU set up screen

It is amazing how flexible the ECU is and what parameters can be set from fuelling to rev limiter, from shift light to data logging. No wonder that the engine builder and GD use it. I even hear that it is planned to add traction control and reverse lock-out to the functionality shortly.

Mapping

The engine was mapped on the dyno, but at that stage did not have the GD headers or cats fitted. Also prior to the IVA the map was changed slightly to reduce the emissions. So Dave from Canems is going to redo the mapping. This doesn't need to be done on a rolling road as I am not looking for maximum power (it already has plenty).

Advisables

GD had advised that the light connections under the wings needed further sealing, as they could be exposed to the weather. I think it was the ends of the heat shrink that had not fully sealed around the wires. As a result I re-sealed them with silicone to avoid any damp penetrating the electrical joints.

Also GD pointed out that the grease nipple on the steering column support UJ should face the front of the car for ease of maintenance, so it was turned around and guess what ..... no proper nipple!

Support UJ turned round

Andy thought that the fixing point for the boot gas strut on the body was not strong enough (GD do not recommend using gas struts due to the pressure exerted) and risked distorting, cracking or stressing this area, so this needed to be strengthened. At this point I also decided to add a second strut to equalise the pressure (the pressure from each strut was also reduced) on the boot lid as the single strut was pushing the off-side away from the boot seal. The fixing bracket was replaced by a wider one on both sides. 120mm x 50mm  angle aluminium was used for this. These were bent (hard to do!) and bonded under the rear wing.

Locating plate bonded under rear wing

The triangular brackets were fitted as before at each side to give strength (there is a third bolt on the triangular bracket behind the  ball fixing for the strut that you cannot see in the photo). The fixing to the boot lid was unchanged and the struts were attached after making sure the pressures were the same - I used bathroom scales to check the pressures (mine are set at 15 kg).

Setting the gas strut pressure (both to be same)

Two struts and pressure balanced