[Coupes33]

Originally Posted by Socket

Yes small world mate. Quang is a top guy and a great photographer. Hope you would will make it down for one of our cruises. Will def be organising something over summer. Maybe in NSW, ACT area. Would be great to see you there

I will have to get a 98 ULP tune into the car or I wouldn't make it down that far. I would certainly be interested depending on the timing of the trip.

[Socket]

After all the preparation for running some decent power, we are finally getting to the end of the road with the work that was done over the last week
Will cover each upgrade as separate mods, but basically this round of upgrades was to the set Spcgry up to run E85
Big thank you to Vince, Tim, Jin & Nathan (from Eastern BM) for making this possible.


Mod 116 - Engine Control Module (ECM)

Step one, was to upgrade the ECM from a MSD80 version to a MSD81. Turns out the MSD81 version provides tuning options above and beyond the MSD80, although this is way beyond my technical understanding of the platform lol

Transferring all the data from one module to the other, is also beyond my technical understanding, but Vince has both the know how and kit to make it happen. Also required flashing the CAS unit so the keys and everything would play nice together. Genius

Hopefully he will provide a more technical explanation as a build to this post

Meanwhile pics below

Pic 1 - ECM and CAS units ready for upgrading
Pic 2 - Old and new ECM units (hard too tell apart lol)
Pic 3 - This is what the inside of the CAS unit looks like
Pic 4 - To program the CAS, a few wires need to be soldered onto the card
Pic 5 - Vince has set up this awesome mock up N54 dash, ignition and fuse box
Pic 6 - Programming in progress

[Socket]

Mod 117 - Spool Performance Helix HPFP overdrive system

Step two was the installation of a Helix HPFP overdrive system to deliver higher flow to the HP fuel rail. The overdrive system is basically a gearing unit, that provides 3x speed on the HPFP.

It is a safer alternative to port injection as the fuel is controlled by the DME and not from a boost signal.

The kit comes with the overdrive unit, some fuel hoses and a fuel filter (optional extra).
The overdrive is quality but the use of a flex hose on the high pressure side, is not ideal. We will replace it asap by extending the stock HP hard fuel line.

If you planning to go the same route, you will also need a billet vac pump cover from spool performance. The stock one is not built for the additional strain placed on it by the helix unit and there have been cases of this failing. The billet vac pump cover has been strengthen compared to stock (see pic below) and is installed at the same time as the overdrive unit.

Installation was made more difficult because the overdrive unit, pushes the HPFP back 6 inches, which means, the low pressure hard fuel line, (that houses the low pressure fuel sensor) needs to bent and shaped quite a bit to clear the starter motor etc (pic of the finished LP hard line below)

While we purchased the optional fuel filter, we decided not to install at this stage

Pics below

Pic 1 - Overdrive kit still in the box
Pic 2 - Overdrive unit and new HPFP
Pic 3 - Billet Vac pump cover
Pic 4 - Vac pump cover. Stock Vs Spool Performance. Notice difference in thickness
Pic 5 - Manifold off...... now how do we install with all these wires in the way
Pic 6 - Parts removed, including vac pump cover
Pic 7 - Parts installed including new HPFP
Pic 8 - LP hard fuel line bent into shape to fit perfectly
Pic 9 - Flex HP fuel line that comes with the SPHO kit
Pic 10 - Done

[Coupes33]

[QUOTE=Socket;25469157]Mod 117 - Spool Performance Helix HPFP overdrive system

Step two, was the installation of a Helix HPFP overdrive system to deliver higher flow to the HP fuel rail. The overdrive system is basically a gearing unit, that provides 3x speed on the HPFP.

It is a safer alternative to port injection as the fuel is controlled by the DME and not from a boost signal.

The kit comes with the overdrive unit, some fuel hoses and a fuel filter.
The overdrive is quality but the use of a flex hose on the high pressure side, is not ideal. We will replace it asap by extending the stock HP hard fuel line.

If you planning to go the same route, you will also need a billet vac pump cover from spool performance. The stock one is not built for the additional strain place on it by the helix unit and there have been cases of this failing. The billet vac pump cover, has been strengthen compared to stock (see pic below) and is installed at the same time as the overdrive unit.

Installation was made more difficult because the overdrive unit, pushes the HPFP back 6 inches, which means, the low pressure hard fuel line, (that houses the low pressure fuel sensor) needs to bent and shaped quite a bit to clear the starter motor etc (pic of the finished LP hard line below)

While we purchased the optional fuel filter, we decided not to install at this stage

How does it perform on your car Socks. There seemed to be some unanswered questions on reliability, etc on sp***street forum. If it works really well, it will certainly be better than PI. I believe you are the first in Australia to install one so your feedback will be important for the rest of us that are interested.

[Socket]

Mod 118 - Motiv Flex Fuel System

Step three, was the installation of a Motiv Flex Fuel system for hassle free E85 corn fuel cruising

The Motiv kit comes with an ethanol sensor, sensor harness and two flexible fuel lines (see pic below) that need to be connected between the HPFP and the low pressure hard fuel lines to the fuel tank. The sensor also needs to be wired in, instructions are provided

As we are running a stage 3 LPFP (with two walbro pumps) we also needed a way of triggering the second pump on the LPFP. We opted to install a harness and a solid state relay, using the signal to the exhaust flapper to trigger the fuel pump.

We also purchased the flex fuel option in MHD so we can display Ethanol content as a dial in the MHD monitoring dash board.

With everything hooked up and some E85 in the tank, the E sensor checked out reading 40.0% (see pic below)

Big call out to Vince, for installing and rigging up the harness and trigger. Good one mate

Pics below

Pic 1 - Flex fuel kit
Pic 2 - Spcgry prepped for install
Pic 3 - Installing fuel line and sensors
Pic 4 - Solid state relay used to trigger stage 3 LPFP
Pic 5 - Installing wiring harness
Pic 6 - Wiring in ethanol sensor
Pic 7 - MHD dashboard (E% in upper left)

[Socket]

Mod 119 - TBT Flex Fuel Tune

Step four was to put SPCGRY on the dyno for a flex tune, by local legend Tim Murray

Jin at Eastern BM let us use his dyno to do the tune (big thanks to Jin and the guys at Eastern !!!!!)

Tune took about 6+ hours, starting with 98 and gradually increasing the E content, with lots of tweaking of the maps along the way

At the end of the day, we ran out of time and fuel rail pressure but posted a respectable 373 KW on E50 which was a 50 KW gain on 320 KW on 98

HP fuel pressures dropped below 900 psi when running E60 and above, so we have more tuning work to on the AFR and boost levels, but very happy with the result so far

HPFP is brand new so is not related to a worn pump etc

This is pretty new ground in term of flex fuel tuning with this set up, so Tim is talking with Motiv who is providing technical support etc. Hopefully we can get it back on the dyno in the next week or so and see if we can crack the 400kw mark and run 100% E85 without cutting back boost

Once again a big call out to Tim for taking time away from his family to spend his Saturday tuning Gary

Pics below

Pics 1 to 3 - Gary on the dyno
Pics 4 & 5 - Tim hard at work
Pic 6 - E40 graph
Pic 7 - E50 graph

[Socket]

Originally Posted by Coupes33

How does it perform on your car Socks. There seemed to be some unanswered questions on reliability, etc on sp***street forum. If it works really well, it will certainly be better than PI. I believe you are the first in Australia to install one so your feedback will be important for the rest of us that are interested.

Hey Coupes.... So far so good. 373 at E50. Still more tuning to do.

[DR-JEKL]

Great work guys, glad to see you finally have Gary set up where you can feed him some E85 and more timing/boost

[jzx_andy]

Great numbers Socks, it's gonna rip with E85! Really hope the Helix coupled with the latest HPFP will turn out to be a fairly reliable DI only solution for N54's.

[Coupes33]

Originally Posted by Socket

Hey Coupes.... So far so good. 373 at E50. Still more tuning to do.

That is very similar to what I was getting on E50. I got 383. When you get 100% E85 into it and a tune that suits you will be into the 400+rwkw without any trouble at all. You will need a stock of rear tyres then Socks.

[vtl]

Originally Posted by Socket

After all the preparation for running some decent power, we are finally getting to the end of the road with the work that was done over the last week
Will cover each upgrade as separate mods, but basically this round of upgrades was to the set Spcgry up to run E85
Big thank you to Vince, Tim, Jin & Nathan (from Eastern BM) for making this possible.


Mod 116 - Engine Control Module (ECM)

Step one, was to upgrade the ECM from a MSD80 version to a MSD81. Turns out the MSD81 version provides tuning options above and beyond the MSD80, although this is way beyond my technical understanding of the platform lol

Transferring all the data from one module to the other, is also beyond my technical understanding, but Vince has both the know how and kit to make it happen. Also required flashing the CAS unit so the keys and everything would play nice together. Genius

Hopefully he will provide a more technical explanation as a build to this post

Meanwhile pics below

Pic 1 - ECM and CAS units ready for upgrading
Pic 2 - Old and new ECM units (hard too tell apart lol)
Pic 3 - This is what the inside of the CAS unit looks like
Pic 4 - To program the CAS, a few wires need to be soldered onto the card
Pic 5 - Vince has set up this awesome mock up N54 dash, ignition and fuse box
Pic 6 - Programming in progress

Some additional notes:

To get a new DME paired, theres a shared key called the "ISN" that is shared between the DME and CAS

The ISN is quite difficult to write into the DME, so the common method is to read the ISN out of the new MSD81 and write it to the existing CAS unit.

Basically the steps are:
- Read ISN out of new MSD81 with special tool
- Assuming you are on the old CAS software version you can simply write the ISN in and you are done.


In Phils case this was not so easy as it has been updated to the newer version which has more security. This is technically a good thing, as with the older software versions you can easily program a blank key, start the car and drive off. This is even without having access to a working key.

Extra steps were required in getting the ISN into the old CAS unit, which involved soldering up programming leads to it, backing up the EEPROM data and editing it to add the new encrypted ISN.

Addtionally, there was a bit more work in getting it ready for Gary:

- New DME was flashed with the N54 PPK (this will act as the base for the single turbo tune)
- Injector calibration values were programmed into the new DME
- Service indicator reset
- Migrated all of the I8A0S MSD80 tuning tables to the new IJE0S MSD81 tune (manually done in tunerpro)

[Hoper]

Wow, that's awesome Socks and Vince, lots of work but also huge gains now....makes me feel like my forged internals will need a single turbo and some more ethanol...

Good work guys, awesome to see this continuing to come together

[TiAgAu]

Nice upgrades socks. And those rolling shots are gorgeous! Well done.

[vtl]

Originally Posted by Socket

Mod 117 - Spool Performance Helix HPFP overdrive system

Step two was the installation of a Helix HPFP overdrive system to deliver higher flow to the HP fuel rail. The overdrive system is basically a gearing unit, that provides 3x speed on the HPFP.

It is a safer alternative to port injection as the fuel is controlled by the DME and not from a boost signal.

The kit comes with the overdrive unit, some fuel hoses and a fuel filter (optional extra).
The overdrive is quality but the use of a flex hose on the high pressure side, is not ideal. We will replace it asap by extending the stock HP hard fuel line.

If you planning to go the same route, you will also need a billet vac pump cover from spool performance. The stock one is not built for the additional strain placed on it by the helix unit and there have been cases of this failing. The billet vac pump cover has been strengthen compared to stock (see pic below) and is installed at the same time as the overdrive unit.

Installation was made more difficult because the overdrive unit, pushes the HPFP back 6 inches, which means, the low pressure hard fuel line, (that houses the low pressure fuel sensor) needs to bent and shaped quite a bit to clear the starter motor etc (pic of the finished LP hard line below)

While we purchased the optional fuel filter, we decided not to install at this stage

Pics below

Pic 1 - Overdrive kit still in the box
Pic 2 - Overdrive unit and new HPFP
Pic 3 - Billet Vac pump cover
Pic 4 - Vac pump cover. Stock Vs Spool Performance. Notice difference in thickness
Pic 5 - Manifold off...... now how do we install with all these wires in the way
Pic 6 - Parts removed, including vac pump cover
Pic 7 - Parts installed including new HPFP
Pic 8 - LP hard fuel line bent into shape to fit perfectly
Pic 9 - Flex HP fuel line that comes with the SPHO kit
Pic 10 - Done

Some additional notes:

- The helix overdrive kit works as a planetary gearbox that gives 3x increase in speed, the unit itself looks great quality.
- No instructions at all
- The flexible fuel hose is a joke and a terrible solution. The fittings are not the same as stock and has orings in them. This is not the principle in which the original pressure fittings use to seal. The hose itself can easily touch the oil filter housing cap and manifold dpending on the angle. any rubbing over time could be catastropic. We will be replacing this with a proper hard pipe, similar to stock
- The plug for the low pressure fuel sensor does not reach, as the overdrive spaces everything out around 85mm. Had to extend the plug for it to reach properly.
- Low pressure hardline needed to be bent a lot, would not fit at all ootherwise
- Low pressure feed lines not cut to any useful length, and no instructions on which way to route in order to get their lengths to work. Basically just have to redo it yourself properly.

[Coupes33]

Originally Posted by vtl

Some additional notes:

- The helix overdrive kit works as a planetary gearbox that gives 3x increase in speed, the unit itself looks great quality.
- No instructions at all
- The flexible fuel hose is a joke and a terrible solution. The fittings are not the same as stock and has orings in them. This is not the principle in which the original pressure fittings use to seal. The hose itself can easily touch the oil filter housing cap and manifold dpending on the angle. any rubbing over time could be catastropic. We will be replacing this with a proper hard pipe, similar to stock
- The plug for the low pressure fuel sensor does not reach, as the overdrive spaces everything out around 85mm. Had to extend the plug for it to reach properly.
- Low pressure hardline needed to be bent a lot, would not fit at all ootherwise
- Low pressure feed lines not cut to any useful length, and no instructions on which way to route in order to get their lengths to work. Basically just have to redo it yourself properly.

When you come up with a solution to the flexible hose Vince, you should make a couple of these pipes because if these overdrive units are successful, there will be a few members in Australia after them.

[jzx_andy]

I would be keen on a custom hard pipe. Might be worth posting this info in the Helix thread on the spool street forums - perhaps Spool may look into including a hard pipe with their kits.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by jzx_andy

I would be keen on a custom hard pipe. Might be worth posting this info in the Helix thread on the spool street forums - perhaps Spool may look into including a hard pipe with their kits.

They are now selling a hard line for the HP side for $40 USD each

[E85 335]

Awesome job Phil on the extra goodies installed recently. I sort of still don't understand why your car isn't producing 400kw+? I know you have gone down the path of single extra and spent a hell of a lot of money but just reading through, thought that for sure a single setup would crush it with ease. I know when I was putting mine on the dyno I only got 1 run before I have to fix the head issue but still pumped 585rwhp on 100% e85 with PI and that was the base map from wedge and haven't even done a revision yet due to the issue. I really am wondering if it is really worth getting the helix especially if your reporting the that its dropping really low. Might wait for the 4x one instead. But yeah mate love the info you and Vince are putting up.

[vtl]

Originally Posted by DAT335

Awesome job Phil on the extra goodies installed recently. I sort of still don't understand why your car isn't producing 400kw+? I know you have gone down the path of single extra and spent a hell of a lot of money but just reading through, thought that for sure a single setup would crush it with ease. I know when I was putting mine on the dyno I only got 1 run before I have to fix the head issue but still pumped 585rwhp on 100% e85 with PI and that was the base map from wedge and haven't even done a revision yet due to the issue. I really am wondering if it is really worth getting the helix especially if your reporting the that its dropping really low. Might wait for the 4x one instead. But yeah mate love the info you and Vince are putting up.

Yeh unfortunately in Australia you can't really compare dynos, even ones of the same brand (although Mainline seems to be a bit more consistent)

On the dyno day, most N54 stage 2+ MHD cars on 98 fuel were producing 230-240 kw on the same dyno. Other dynos will be showing 260-300kw with the same mods.

There helix should have some extra headroom in it, there's extra tables in the DME that control the max current to the fuel quantity control valve, so they have to be modified to take full advantage of the helix. Once the new fuel line is installed, next step would be to go back and retune and go for the bigger numbers.

[Coupes33]

Originally Posted by Socket

They are now selling a hard line for the HP side for $40 USD each

I checked out the Spool website and see the hard pipe for sale. Thanks Socks for the info.

[Socket]

Originally Posted by DAT335

Awesome job Phil on the extra goodies installed recently. I sort of still don't understand why your car isn't producing 400kw+? I know you have gone down the path of single extra and spent a hell of a lot of money but just reading through, thought that for sure a single setup would crush it with ease. I know when I was putting mine on the dyno I only got 1 run before I have to fix the head issue but still pumped 585rwhp on 100% e85 with PI and that was the base map from wedge and haven't even done a revision yet due to the issue. I really am wondering if it is really worth getting the helix especially if your reporting the that its dropping really low. Might wait for the 4x one instead. But yeah mate love the info you and Vince are putting up.

Yep after all the work it is tough only pulling 300 kw on 98. Hopefully the helix with live up to the hype and deliver an alternative to PI. As Vince said above we have some work to do to upgrade the LP and HP fuel lines before we really push the helix. Watch this space

[Socket]

Originally Posted by Coupes33

I checked out the Spool website and see the hard pipe for sale. Thanks Socks for the info.

Ur welcome mate 👍