MSefi.com read only forum (Jan.15,2018)

New thread now that I have my wiring sorted out and the engine is running. Next level of issues I need some help on.

289 Ford
MSII V3.57
EDIS 8
Holley carb for fuel now

1) When idling (I have not driven it yet) I get a random pop through the carb. Every 10 - 20 seconds - not a full backfire just a little pop. When I had the timing light on it when it happens i lose the light. I have a shielded wire on the VR and I run it away from the engine to the fender right up to the EDIS box. No wear near ignition side or any other 12v wires. Suggestions?
2) How can I check my timing now? I put the light on it and I have 10 degrees (no MSII connected). But the coil is wasted spark so do I really have 10 degrees? Seems ok, idles about the same as when I had the dizzy.
3) Is there any way to know the MSII is powered up? I am trying to get a connection but no luck see below.
4) I have a MacBook Pro / OS X with a USB to serial adapter. I can't seem to get a connection to the MSII. I installed the drivers and did a rain dance, talked to shaman and even consulted the stars. I cannot connect to the ECU. I do not know how to test the usb to serial separately to see if the adapter is the problem.

But hey it starts!
Thanks for your help!

EDIS doesn't need MS even connected to work in the limp home fixed advance mode of 10 BTDC. And that should be fine to provide a pop free idle. What air gap have you set the VR sensor too? Have you checked it on several teeth to make sure the trigger wheel is concentric?

My gap varies between .025 and .040. My VR wire is too long so i could shorten it to reduce a chance of picking up noise. I have the extra length coiled up near the EDIS module. Maybe coiling it created an issue? The wasted spark timing check seems ok - I just put the timing light on it as if it still had points. Is that correct?

I did solve my connection problems - at least temporarily. I installed a different set if drivers. The only way to get a connection seems to be to power up MS, connect to USB then power up the laptop. The laptop won't see it otherwise. The usb to serial exists in the Apple hardware listing but it is not "active". Now that I am connected I will run the car and see what happens to MS when it pops.

Is there any chance old school plug wires are not up to the task? I had MSD ignition before and had no problems. Does the EDIS need a different wire and plug to run properly?

Also I do have the condensers installed at the coils from Ford.

I did some further testing this morning. I check the routing of all the wires and things are in the right place. The light pop is consistent and starts as soon as it starts running. It sounds / acts like I have the wires on the wrong coil but I went through the firing order and cylinders again. I checked my wiring for each coil as shown here:

http://www.megamanual.com/ms2/EDIS.htm

Coil A EDIS wire is the wire closest to the tang on the connector and this goes to pin 8 of EDIS. If that is correct then I have #1 in the right place.

I have the extra length coiled up near the EDIS module. Maybe coiling it created an issue?

In a word........ Yep!

Coiled up wires make great inductors............

Ken

I un-coiled the pickup wire and triple checked the routing and it is nowhere near a high voltage source (ignition or 12V positive). When the pop happens I see no changes in TS. I would have expected to lose rpm signal.

I think I need to go back and check my coils versus the firing order. I'll mark the balancer and strobe the leads to confirm the coils are wired/firing in the order I expect them to.

pcf_mark wrote:I un-coiled the pickup wire and triple checked the routing and it is nowhere near a high voltage source (ignition or 12V positive). When the pop happens I see no changes in TS. I would have expected to lose rpm signal.

I think I need to go back and check my coils versus the firing order. I'll mark the balancer and strobe the leads to confirm the coils are wired/firing in the order I expect them to.

If your coils were wrongly wired, you'd have a constant miss-fire, not just the odd pop. This might help for coil wiring. But note is is for a Rover V8 - not sure if the firing order is the same. On the Rover it is 18436572. But it does give the Ford wiring colours.

Thank you for the diagram. Updated on my status: I marked the balancer every 90 degrees and strobed each cylinder to confirm wiring and order. Good news is they are firing in the right order. Bad news - two of the cylinders did not have enough spark to light the timing light. They had a weak spark you could see but not enough to light the timing light. I suspect I have some bad wires because the other wire on the same coil would spark fine. I had been cheating a bit by using my original points type plugs wires and squeezing the end down to fit inside the EDIS coil towers. The OEM wires are very expensive but I guess I am off to get new ones.

Being a Scot, I made my own - and on a engine which didn't originally have EDIS, wanted custom lengths anyway. Got enough leads from a scrap yard for 10 gbp making sure the ends were all good. Bought 8mm resistive plastic cored HT cable.

Worked some rubber grease between rubber boots and terminals with a small long screwdriver - they then pulled apart easily. Cut the terminals off and opened them up carefully by forcing some needle nose pliers into the remaining bit of wire. Among my collection of crimp tools was one for BNC video connectors. This worked perfectly to crimp them on to the new cable. Total cost about 30 gbp - and perfect lenghts to each plug.

Also changed to resistive plugs after reading on here these are needed with EDIS.

I purchased a new set of STI wires for a 97 Ford Explorer for $42 and they fit great! A little long but really nice quality wire and ends. In my quick testing last night the random pop through the carb looks like it is gone! Woot! Woot!

More testing to go but then I am going on a road trip to see how it runs. I created a spark map and the communication issues seam to be behind me.

Thank you!
Mark

Looks like my problems have not gone away. When I put the car in gear it shudders, stutters and shakes until it finally dies. Watching in Tuner Studio it does not appear to lose ignition source. However when I have the timing light on a random cylinder the timing light strobes steady then suddenly it will go dark for a few cycles then re-start. This makes me think the VR signal must be getting interrupted. Anyway to test the signal on this wire? My gap is between .015-.040. My ring has a lot of run out because it is mounted on the pulley not the balancer.

Re-cap of the symptoms: Idling at a steady 950 rpm in park, TS is showing 18-20 degrees of timing, IAT at 80 degrees, CLT is a not reading on the right scale but is showing 100 degrees. Just sitting watching it run there is a random slight pop through the carb or exhaust. Very slight pop - not a backfire, no flames, just an audible pop. If you increase rpm it gets worse. When you put it in drive it just gets worse.

Thanks for your assistance. I am so happy I tried to run the ignition control only side or I would really be chasing my tail.

I, for one, would be interested in seeing a log of the issue.

Ken

I think this is the log - my first time!

Thank you for any feedback.

Attachments seem to be out smarting me. I can see them on the attachments tab but I do not see them in the post. Crap!

I cant seem to attach a log. I have reached out to the admim.

In the interim I tried several things. With the truck running in park it is pretty smooth but not perfect. I twisted, tweaked and stretched every wire in the system multiple times. Also triple verified the coils and wires with the timing light and firing order. For fun I swapped wires from coil C to coil D just to see if I had them confused. Lots of grumbling and popping when attempting to start! Changed them back.

I am running out of ideas. EDIS module bad? VR could be wired backward - would that do this?

PM sent............

Ken

pcf_mark wrote:I cant seem to attach a log. I have reached out to the admim.

I think the attachment issue has been resolved now.

Thank you gentleman for your assistance!

Both logs start in park under normal conditions. Then I shift to drive and it falls apart. Because it is dropping cylinders it really goes super rich (no O2 hooked up yet) based just on smell.

Glad to see you were finally able to post those logs, Mark!

I will leave the interpretation of the logs (especially the second one ) to the experts, but one thing did jump out at me. What is going on with TPS? Is it connected? If so, it needs to be calibrated!

Ken

EDIT: One more observation if I may..... IMO, you will find it very difficult to achieve any meaningful tuning without your wideband working.........

I am trying to do this in stages so I am doing spark only at the moment so no TPS or wideband. I am letting my controlled fuel leak (aka carburetor) handle the fuel until I get the spark sorted. I have all the EFI bits on my work bench ready to go!