Mikes 1987 Chevy Camaro - Build Thread
Posted: Tue May 01, 2012 5:13 pm
First off, Hi, I'm new! Comments thread here
A little background, I'm 27 years old and work as a robotics technician at a local robotics company. It's really not nearly as cool as it sounds. I'm into programming, carpc's, microcontrollers and electronics. I like to think I have enough background to embark on a project like this... but if I don't, I certainly will by the time I'm done! I plan on turning my Camaro modern, while keeping it looking and feeling late 80's.
Now, about this car. Over the past few years I've been building a 1987 Chevy Camaro. I purchased the car several years ago with a bone stock 305 in it. Did some drag racing at the track, and blew up the engine (spun a rod bearing). So over the course of the following 3 years, I built and installed a 383 in the car. The car itself is a 1987 Chevy Camaro IROC-Z T-top, red, with some body damage. I'll try to get some pictures soon.
The engine:
383 Stroker, 2 bolt main
Holley Stealth Ram instake
AFR 195 heads
Hypereutectic pistons, cast rods/crank
Cheap dynomax 2.25" dual exhaust
COMP cams xfi cam
Currently I've been playing around with the stock ECU trying to tune it, and have been running into issue after issue with the datalogging communications. Finally I gave up and decided that I was going to buy an aftermarket ECU. 25 year old ECU's just aren't built for what I am trying to do. I looked into a couple, including megasquirt and there were a couple good options. Then I ran into Fred on irc, and he pointed out this system. One of my goals when I first got this car was to build my own ECU. I was vaugly familiar with megasquirt, and having looked at the schematics I knew that I could at least design the hardware without too much effort. FreeEMS seems to be pretty much exactly what I was looking for. It lets me design my own sensors and control interface, while providing a (at least semi at this point?) stable code base that I could work with. As an added bonus, it looks like total cost will be significantly less than the megasquirt system that I was looking to buy.
So this is where I am today. I'm still in the process of doing all the research into the hardware that I am going to use, but with any luck I will be able to start purchasing some hardware within the month, and get started developing the sensor and control interface for my car.
Sensors on that that need to be integrated:
MAP/IAT
MAF - Haven't done enough research to know which one I should use with this sytem, but both are an option.
Coolant temp
Throttle position
Tachometer output from 7 pin HEI module
Narrow and wideband o2 sensors. Both are 0-5V output from a single WB sensor/controller
Knock sensor - Not a priority, but a "wish list" item.
Speedometer input - Purely for datalogging purposes. I'm not sure it has any real tuning value. on my car, it's a hard cable going to the gauge cluster, then an electronic signal FROM gauge TO ecu.
Fuel Pressure/Oil Pressure - These two would be nice, but aren't manditory. I'd like to work in a check engine light for malfunctions like a drop in oil pressure or fuel pressure
Controls that are required:
Injectors (Two banks of 4, batch fire. Sequential eventually?)
Spark control - hooking up to a computer controlled HEI, I hear DeuceEFI is the guy to talk to about this)
IAC - GM Stepper type I think? have to check
Fuel Pump - I don't know why, but I'd like this ECU controlled instead of ignition key controlled.
MAF burnoff - If needed, I need to figure out what this is, and why my car had it.
Fortunately, as a reference I can use the megasquirt documentation, since most of my sensors are compatible with the MS. This should make interface development go slightly faster and require slightly less component research.
A little background, I'm 27 years old and work as a robotics technician at a local robotics company. It's really not nearly as cool as it sounds. I'm into programming, carpc's, microcontrollers and electronics. I like to think I have enough background to embark on a project like this... but if I don't, I certainly will by the time I'm done! I plan on turning my Camaro modern, while keeping it looking and feeling late 80's.
Now, about this car. Over the past few years I've been building a 1987 Chevy Camaro. I purchased the car several years ago with a bone stock 305 in it. Did some drag racing at the track, and blew up the engine (spun a rod bearing). So over the course of the following 3 years, I built and installed a 383 in the car. The car itself is a 1987 Chevy Camaro IROC-Z T-top, red, with some body damage. I'll try to get some pictures soon.
The engine:
383 Stroker, 2 bolt main
Holley Stealth Ram instake
AFR 195 heads
Hypereutectic pistons, cast rods/crank
Cheap dynomax 2.25" dual exhaust
COMP cams xfi cam
Currently I've been playing around with the stock ECU trying to tune it, and have been running into issue after issue with the datalogging communications. Finally I gave up and decided that I was going to buy an aftermarket ECU. 25 year old ECU's just aren't built for what I am trying to do. I looked into a couple, including megasquirt and there were a couple good options. Then I ran into Fred on irc, and he pointed out this system. One of my goals when I first got this car was to build my own ECU. I was vaugly familiar with megasquirt, and having looked at the schematics I knew that I could at least design the hardware without too much effort. FreeEMS seems to be pretty much exactly what I was looking for. It lets me design my own sensors and control interface, while providing a (at least semi at this point?) stable code base that I could work with. As an added bonus, it looks like total cost will be significantly less than the megasquirt system that I was looking to buy.
So this is where I am today. I'm still in the process of doing all the research into the hardware that I am going to use, but with any luck I will be able to start purchasing some hardware within the month, and get started developing the sensor and control interface for my car.
Sensors on that that need to be integrated:
MAP/IAT
MAF - Haven't done enough research to know which one I should use with this sytem, but both are an option.
Coolant temp
Throttle position
Tachometer output from 7 pin HEI module
Narrow and wideband o2 sensors. Both are 0-5V output from a single WB sensor/controller
Knock sensor - Not a priority, but a "wish list" item.
Speedometer input - Purely for datalogging purposes. I'm not sure it has any real tuning value. on my car, it's a hard cable going to the gauge cluster, then an electronic signal FROM gauge TO ecu.
Fuel Pressure/Oil Pressure - These two would be nice, but aren't manditory. I'd like to work in a check engine light for malfunctions like a drop in oil pressure or fuel pressure
Controls that are required:
Injectors (Two banks of 4, batch fire. Sequential eventually?)
Spark control - hooking up to a computer controlled HEI, I hear DeuceEFI is the guy to talk to about this)
IAC - GM Stepper type I think? have to check
Fuel Pump - I don't know why, but I'd like this ECU controlled instead of ignition key controlled.
MAF burnoff - If needed, I need to figure out what this is, and why my car had it.
Fortunately, as a reference I can use the megasquirt documentation, since most of my sensors are compatible with the MS. This should make interface development go slightly faster and require slightly less component research.