D2 V8 LPG & killed cats

Guess who still don't know wether he can get the little light to go away if he throws the cat out.......

pandj said:

Guess who still don't know wether he can get the little light to go away if he throws the cat out.......

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putting the light out will no doubt be just putting 12v feed to a warning lamp wire but sierrafery would know exactly which one id bet

and, let me guess..... Sierrafery just went to California for christmas fortnight.....

What I am rather hoping, James, is that some one will tell me that ten mins on testbook will turn off the bit of ecu brain that recognises the lambda signals, hence killing the light, but also not causing any performance/driving issues.
Long experience with D2 mending tells me that if you annoy anything electrical, it gets some sneaky revenge further down the line.

I guess the way forward is to disconnect the rear lambda probe wires and see the result. Trouble is, probably need to reset on testbook to put out the light anyhow.

Have you read through the engine management system section in RAVE?

You also need to check if the engine ECU is different for NAS spec or not. The basic ECU has tunes for the 4.0 and 4.6, but without looking at Microcat I cannot say if it is yet another ECU for NAS vehicles.

I'm scanning the SU Master Manual at present and don't want to come off that to go onto another PC right now, but will look it up later.

Peter

listerdiesel said:

Have you read through the engine management system section in RAVE?

You also need to check if the engine ECU is different for NAS spec or not. The basic ECU has tunes for the 4.0 and 4.6, but without looking at Microcat I cannot say if it is yet another ECU for NAS vehicles.

I'm scanning the SU Master Manual at present and don't want to come off that to go onto another PC right now, but will look it up later.

Peter

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I have read through some of it in the past, but not in respect of this particular issue...... I will try and get back into my rave download, but suspect I will need to re-download a fresh one. I don't know about the ecu either, and again, my microcat copy is subject to being able to get it to open before I can check it. I am out for a couple of hours this evening, playing firemen, but will try and figure this all out on my return. If you do have chance to figure out the answer, I would be well chuffed! Will pm you my reg if that helps?

Cheers,
Pete

Putting in your reg and going to Microcat gives NNN100480 as the non-UK spec ECU, the standard UK/Europe/Japan ECU is NNN100640.

Check & see which one you have, it's down behind the kick panel on the drivers side footwell.

Build date of your car is February 2002.

Peter

Mine appears to be UK spec on a 640 part no. But there are 4 HO2 sensors as per NAS spec. Hmmm.... interesting. Read the rave through, understand it, but don't know how the UK ecu copes with the extra sensors. Presumably they are operational in order to show a fault and turn on the mil, which is part of the NAS spec. UK spec does not illuminate the mil according to rave. Puzzled, thats me!

OK, I assume that the ECU copes with both types of system, which just leaves you with the SAI system, which quite honestly you could do without.

I can't remember without checking if the SAI is an option in the BCU, which I don't think it is, or programmable in the ECU, would need to hook up my Hawkeye and see what menu options I have.

If it can be taken off, and then revert the Lambdas back to 2 not 4, I think that would take out a lot of faffing about that you could well not lose any sleep over.

I'll pop out to the car and check the Hawkeye handbook and see if there are any options listed.

Peter

Had a look at the Hawkeye handbook online which appears to say ecu programming is not an option. Also read up a lot more rave info on the motronic ecu and am still no wiser! As I read it, the mil should self extinguish on all but NAS ecu faults involving the cats, only remaining lit on NAS ecu's. As we have already established, mine is a Uk/Eu spec ecu, but the mil is remaining lit. The third option of Middle East spec is designed with a cat-free system entirely, with no HO2 sensors etc,so presumably a third model ecu is available to cater for this. I need to get the fault codes cleared and then re-check when the light comes back on I think, and confirm exactly what codes are showing.
Thanks for your input, Peter much appreciated!

I wonder if yours has had an ECU transplant?

There was no ambiguity about the ECU number, there are two, and if you have the UK spec then it must be able to cope with the SAI system, unless it's a bodge job.

As you say, Engine Fault light isn't normally enabled on UK cars, but might be if fitted with quad Lambdas and SAI.

Peter

I struggle to understand why a NAS spec underbonnet was built as a R/H drive motor.........but may as well ask the meaning of life!
Not impossible that an ecu swap was done, I guess, although all the NAS functions work as they should - or did, anyhow. The build detail from microcat for my vehicle shows a couple of anomalies, eg, it shows powerfold mirrors fitted, but whilst I have the BCU for them, I don't have the actual mirrors.
Ah well, give up till after xmas I guess. Have a good one - I'll be passing Rushden tomorrow en route to Wellingborough for my dinner, so I'll raise a metaphorical glass to you.
Cheers,
Peter

Wellingborough, I did know the place quite well in the 80s as the company I worked for then was part of GEC and had their Head office there. So around four times a year I saw Head Office for meetings and always stayed at that dump of a hotel called Columbia Hotel but then it was off down the road to disco the in the evening with guys from other branches of the company and returning to the hotel at 1am in the morning.

I remember it well as then my company car was a Talbot Horizon

OP, you have 4 lambda sensory because your car is post 2001 and ALL petrol engined cars post 2001 must have a pre and post cat lambda sensor as part of the EOBD fault checking and logging protocols needed for the emissions regulations that came into force then. To pass a UK MOT you need to present the vehicle with all emissions regulation equipment fitted as it was intended. Unfortunately this means that upon removing the cats even though you would pass an emissions test, you would fail the MOT as the vehicle was not presented with all emissions systems complete.

There are ways around this! My suggestion would be smash the matrix out of the cats (they're broken anyway) but leave the cat bodies in the exhaust system as it would still appear you had cats. If you can't get anything in to break them up, then cut a section out that can't be seen - by the chassis etc, break the cats out there then weld them back up.
Once you've done this you will need 2 O2 clamps. these are little devices that essentially emulate the correct output from a rear o2 sensor thereby extinguishing your light. Simplez.

This is assuming you have checked your fault codes and don't have other problems of course.

sidewaysste said:

Once you've done this you will need 2 O2 clamps. these are little devices that essentially emulate the correct output from a rear o2 sensor thereby extinguishing your light. Simplez.

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Sounds like a plan.... where does one locate these marvels of modern technology?? Removal of the internal cat workings was how I intended to play this, if the ecu can be persuaded to play along.

discool said:

I remember it well as then my company car was a Talbot Horizon

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.... Could have been a Marina, I suppose- just slightly worse!

Merry Christmas all!

I think we are possibly going off track.

Euro-3 was introduced for January 2000 for petrol passenger cars, Euro-4 was January 2005, so as far as I can see, there was no need for anything different to what was fitted to the 2000MY cars, which is reflected in the standard build, ie 2 Lambdas and 2 cats. Only NAS build had the extra Lambdas.

What 'was' introduced was Type Approval for cats fitted on cars from March 2001, but that's all.

Taking out the cats is a separate measure to the Lambdas and shouldn't be necessary and I would advise against it. The cats are completely passive and are not controlled or have any means of control from the emissions management.

Peter

Here are the relevant details from Microcat:





Peter

Just to add to the confusion:



Peter

Odder and odder..... Microcat details correct for everything except powerfold mirrors and........Those bl**dy HO2 sensors. The rear pair are properly (factory) fitted, correct wiring, brackets fitment holes, not that I can see any possible reason for anyone to want to fit them aftermarket.
Another interesting point arises from the rave write up on the introduction of the D2 - According to that, it MUST be fitted withthe correct grade of Champion plugs, or Cat performance will be affected. Mine has always been fitted with NGK's, (dealer supplied) untill last year when I splashed out on a set of horrendously expensive LPG plugs which cured a low revs intermittent missfire I had been struggling with on LPG. Mind you, 5000 miles later this has returned. :deadhorse:

We use double platinum plugs that we bring in from the USA, they are Champion 7318, an OEM version of the RCP....... whatever it is that the factory recommends.

I think we found them recently at something silly like $3.49 plus California sales tax.

We were wondering if your engine number tallied with the V5?

No question about the sensor number listed, it is 2, plus standard cat's for Euro 3 which is the same for all D2's, the Euro 4 was into D3/D4 terrotory as far as I can see, the D2 V8 never had to comply.

Might be wrong, but I'd take a bit of convincing.

Peter

The Microcat panel is more detailed than I've shown, it is probably 3 boxes long, but you can't enlarge the box on-screen.

I did run through all the options, it does say somewhere that it has an R380 box and oil cooler....

Peter