Issue with leaning
Feb 16, 2019, 03:02 PM
#1
Issue with leaning
Hey guys. I'm having some major issues with my Evo and just can't seem to figure out what is going on. So just to get you guys an idea of what has happened in the last couple months, I recently installed an MHI 18K turbo and tuned with flex fuel. Everything was running flawlessly and great. However, an very unfortunate event happened where as I was heading home right after the tune, some lady decided to run into me. One of the worse days of my life. It was a month long battle as she was trying to claim it was my fault when it clearly was not. Long story short, I won my case and got the Evo back all repaired and better than ever. Or so I thought. I currently live in Philly, and my god the road conditions here are the worse that I have ever experienced, even compared to NYC. Before heading into the body shop, I unfortunately hit a massive pothole because it was just not visible based on the angle I was in, plus it was very dark out. I started to notice I was receiving a couple different types of CEL's with leaning out, P0171 and P2096. I could get the codes to clear and won't come back right away. After about 50-100 miles worth of driving, it would come back, clear it out, and not come back again. I couldn't get it diagnosed in time as it had to go into the body shop.
Now after getting the car back, my luck with this Evo has just been extremely bad. A few days later I decided to try to make my own vacuum leak tester to see if maybe I was having some sort of leak, which may have been my issue for the leaning out. Well here comes ANOTHER massive pothole that I was not able to see in time or avoid and BAM! This one was the worse. So bad it ended up bending my wheel, which I was so upset about, and now the leaning out seemed to have gotten worse. I was able to check the vacuum and ended up finding out my GFB BOV was leaking pretty badly, so ended up removing it for the time being and put the OEM back in just to eliminate any possibilities temporarily. That seemed to have fixed quite a bit of the leaks, but then I found another leak right at the turbo inlet pipe, which I also ended up taking care of. So far, I can't find any other leaks and seem to be all good. However, the car still continues to lean out. I also changed out the MAF sensor to a few "good" used ones, but then ended up changing it with a brand new one instead and still the leaning out comes back. And also I want to note that the Evo also sounds like it is misfiring as well, but never tossed up a code until about a week or two ago where I had P0303 while just letting the car sit there. Cleared that code and has not come back since.
Ok so from that misfire code, I figured maybe spark plugs were bad or the coilpacks. Checked the plugs and they still look almost like new as I had just changed them out right before the tune, so probably less than 3000 miles on them. The coilpacks have been tested for resistance and everything seem to be good on that end as well, so don't think it's coming from those. Injectors couldn't be bad as I also had those put in on the day of the tune, so again, less than 3000 miles with ID1300's in there, that are brand new.
After doing some research, I hear a lot of people talking about the FPR vacuum hose popping off and causing leaning out issues or car running really bad. Visually it looked ok and was still on there really tight. However, after taking off the hose, I did notice there were a couple marks where it looks like someone had dug something sharp into the hose when removing it, but do not believe it was punctured all the way through to have any types of leaks. Regardless, I decided to change the hose just for that piece of mind. I couldn't find the right size and ended up going with a size slightly smaller than OEM. Also read by doing this could cause the AFR's to run a bit rich, so I did this just for testing and to see if this may get rid of my misfiring issues. Sure enough, the car was running on average about low to mid 13's for a good solid 15-20 min and what do you know? No misfires! I let the car just idle this way for some time and noticed the AFR's started to slowly balance back out to 14.7. And before anyone comments on this, saying it's because the car was just warming up, the car was already fully warmed up as soon as I put the new hose on as I had it changed immediately. My assumption is that the hose started to get warmer and possibly caused it to "expand", which may have balanced out the AFR. Picked up hose from Advanced Auto and was told it was vacuum hose, but I have a feeling it was probably windshield washer hose/vacuum and probably not really good to use for the FPR vacuum. At first, the hose felt stiff and solid, but as it warmed up, felt a lot more softer than before. Anyways, as it continued to idle, the AFR continued to keep rising again and about 45 min of just idling, the car started to act the same way again as before. So my question is, does the hose like this really make that much of a difference? I want to pick up the correct hose and will probably pick up the silicone type, but before I do, I just want to see if anyone could really confirm this as this has just been bothering me like crazy. Or if anyone here locally or close to Philly could help me out and take a look and see what they think, I would greatly appreciate it. Sorry for the long story, but tried to summarize this as best as I could. Please help! I am at a complete loss at this point. Just want my Evo running as great as it did the day of the tune.
Now after getting the car back, my luck with this Evo has just been extremely bad. A few days later I decided to try to make my own vacuum leak tester to see if maybe I was having some sort of leak, which may have been my issue for the leaning out. Well here comes ANOTHER massive pothole that I was not able to see in time or avoid and BAM! This one was the worse. So bad it ended up bending my wheel, which I was so upset about, and now the leaning out seemed to have gotten worse. I was able to check the vacuum and ended up finding out my GFB BOV was leaking pretty badly, so ended up removing it for the time being and put the OEM back in just to eliminate any possibilities temporarily. That seemed to have fixed quite a bit of the leaks, but then I found another leak right at the turbo inlet pipe, which I also ended up taking care of. So far, I can't find any other leaks and seem to be all good. However, the car still continues to lean out. I also changed out the MAF sensor to a few "good" used ones, but then ended up changing it with a brand new one instead and still the leaning out comes back. And also I want to note that the Evo also sounds like it is misfiring as well, but never tossed up a code until about a week or two ago where I had P0303 while just letting the car sit there. Cleared that code and has not come back since.
Ok so from that misfire code, I figured maybe spark plugs were bad or the coilpacks. Checked the plugs and they still look almost like new as I had just changed them out right before the tune, so probably less than 3000 miles on them. The coilpacks have been tested for resistance and everything seem to be good on that end as well, so don't think it's coming from those. Injectors couldn't be bad as I also had those put in on the day of the tune, so again, less than 3000 miles with ID1300's in there, that are brand new.
After doing some research, I hear a lot of people talking about the FPR vacuum hose popping off and causing leaning out issues or car running really bad. Visually it looked ok and was still on there really tight. However, after taking off the hose, I did notice there were a couple marks where it looks like someone had dug something sharp into the hose when removing it, but do not believe it was punctured all the way through to have any types of leaks. Regardless, I decided to change the hose just for that piece of mind. I couldn't find the right size and ended up going with a size slightly smaller than OEM. Also read by doing this could cause the AFR's to run a bit rich, so I did this just for testing and to see if this may get rid of my misfiring issues. Sure enough, the car was running on average about low to mid 13's for a good solid 15-20 min and what do you know? No misfires! I let the car just idle this way for some time and noticed the AFR's started to slowly balance back out to 14.7. And before anyone comments on this, saying it's because the car was just warming up, the car was already fully warmed up as soon as I put the new hose on as I had it changed immediately. My assumption is that the hose started to get warmer and possibly caused it to "expand", which may have balanced out the AFR. Picked up hose from Advanced Auto and was told it was vacuum hose, but I have a feeling it was probably windshield washer hose/vacuum and probably not really good to use for the FPR vacuum. At first, the hose felt stiff and solid, but as it warmed up, felt a lot more softer than before. Anyways, as it continued to idle, the AFR continued to keep rising again and about 45 min of just idling, the car started to act the same way again as before. So my question is, does the hose like this really make that much of a difference? I want to pick up the correct hose and will probably pick up the silicone type, but before I do, I just want to see if anyone could really confirm this as this has just been bothering me like crazy. Or if anyone here locally or close to Philly could help me out and take a look and see what they think, I would greatly appreciate it. Sorry for the long story, but tried to summarize this as best as I could. Please help! I am at a complete loss at this point. Just want my Evo running as great as it did the day of the tune.
Feb 16, 2019, 07:13 PM
#2
Evolved Member
Honestly, it sounds like you need to have someone look at your tune. Maybe get a second opinion on it from the place that originally tuned it. It's doubtful that you hitting a pothole impacted anything, unless it wasn't bolted together properly in the first place. Before getting the tune checked revisit all parts of the system - UICP, LICP plumbing from the intake / intercooler. You could 'possibly' have something loose, but it feels more like your tune is the issue over anything else.
Did you tune it at a drastically different elevation? That may account for some of this.
Did you tune it at a drastically different elevation? That may account for some of this.
Feb 16, 2019, 08:12 PM
#3
Thanks for taking the time for your response. I can't see it being the tune because the day that I got it done and before the accident, the car was running great. Probably the best it has ever been in a while. From my understand, a tune cannot just randomly change and go out of tune, can it? I checked all the plumbing and everything is all good. And no drastic difference in elevation from the tune location either. To me, what's more strange than anything else is how when I changed the hose on the FPR to a slightly smaller one, the misfiring disappeared for a decent amount of time until the hose started to warm up a bit. I found some extra silicone vacuum hose and change it out to see if this might help. Crossing my fingers.
Feb 16, 2019, 09:05 PM
#4
Evolved Member
- How long was it running properly with the good tune? Months? Weeks? Days? Before you got hit by that lady.
- What are the modifications on the car?
- How long after the accident did the car drive properly?
Need to isolate what the issue is to figure out the problem. Giving more information would help others help you.
- What are the modifications on the car?
- How long after the accident did the car drive properly?
Need to isolate what the issue is to figure out the problem. Giving more information would help others help you.
Feb 17, 2019, 10:28 AM
#5
Well this is where it sucks. The day I got my tune was the day the lady hit me. However, I was driving it for a good hour and it felt smooth and strong. So for that short time frame I was able to enjoy what I had felt great. It was an unfortunate event, but was just my luck that day.
Mods on the car is MHI18K turbo, ETS recirc dp, ETS intake with 3.5 MAF adapter, ETS UICP & LICP, COBB HFC, ETS V2 quiet exhaust, ID1300, DW300 fuel pump, DrivenFab Flex Fuel kit, and DrivenFab Catch Can.
The car started to feel a little off, but nothing major right after the accident. A lot of it really seemed to have gone downhill after hitting that major pothole. And this is no ordinary pothole, Here in Philly, I have seen plenty of places where they would literally dig out a huge hole where you could probably lay in there and not be seen. Almost every place I ever been to they would always put signs of some sort for warning of these dig outs, but sometimes this is not the case and they just leave it as a massive deep hole in the middle of the road. And because it was in the middle of the night, it was very difficult to see and ended up being too late. From that day, the car has just been running like utter crap. I think I currently got most of everything taken care of, but my current issue is the misfiring that I can't figure out. So when going from a cold start, the car seems to warm up very smoothly and AFR's seem to be normal. Once it is fully warmed up, it starts randomly misfiring and AFR's start fluctuating anywhere from high 13's to high 16's and sometimes in the low 17's. But overall, it does try to maintain itself around the 14.7 range.
Mods on the car is MHI18K turbo, ETS recirc dp, ETS intake with 3.5 MAF adapter, ETS UICP & LICP, COBB HFC, ETS V2 quiet exhaust, ID1300, DW300 fuel pump, DrivenFab Flex Fuel kit, and DrivenFab Catch Can.
The car started to feel a little off, but nothing major right after the accident. A lot of it really seemed to have gone downhill after hitting that major pothole. And this is no ordinary pothole, Here in Philly, I have seen plenty of places where they would literally dig out a huge hole where you could probably lay in there and not be seen. Almost every place I ever been to they would always put signs of some sort for warning of these dig outs, but sometimes this is not the case and they just leave it as a massive deep hole in the middle of the road. And because it was in the middle of the night, it was very difficult to see and ended up being too late. From that day, the car has just been running like utter crap. I think I currently got most of everything taken care of, but my current issue is the misfiring that I can't figure out. So when going from a cold start, the car seems to warm up very smoothly and AFR's seem to be normal. Once it is fully warmed up, it starts randomly misfiring and AFR's start fluctuating anywhere from high 13's to high 16's and sometimes in the low 17's. But overall, it does try to maintain itself around the 14.7 range.
Feb 17, 2019, 10:32 AM
#6
Evolved Member
Check where the downpipe meets if you hit a pothole that sever that's maybe something that could be impacted I guess? Check the exhaust back to front on a lift / jack stands. Barring anything something else had to come loose. Shame you didn't have more time with the tune, hard to say it was solid or not
Feb 17, 2019, 10:44 AM
#7
Yeah, I checked the complete underside as that was one of my first suspicions as well that something had to have "broken" or fallen loose, but as hard as I hit that hole, there was no visible damage or loose nuts or anything. Everything looked perfect to me, which was a bit strange. Maybe I was just lucky. I believe from that hit, the turbo bracket broke the seal loose on the inlet pipe to the turbo because it was actually pressing up against it pretty hard. I did find a leak there, but that was all taken care of. And yeah, I really wish I had more time with the tune I had because it just felt amazing for that short time frame I was able to drive it, but no way to tell how everything was suppose to be afterwards as there wasn't enough time to monitor things. Just don't think the tune could be at fault though.
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Feb 18, 2019, 07:44 PM
#10
Evolved Member
Did you check miles on the car when you dropped it at the body shop, and again when you left? Have you checked the positioning on the MAF sensor to make sure it is in the same position as when you tuned the car? (those things can be *****y)
Feb 20, 2019, 03:38 PM
#11
Yeah, everything was fine as far as mileage goes and the MAF sensor. I've been working on this issue for quite some time and right now, my friend and I have come to another conclusion. There may be a chance the camshaft position sensor is going bad. So how we came to this conclusion is that the misfiring tends to happen only when the car is fully warmed up, never during cold starts. I've also ready about this is other forums for different model vehicles and have also read the same thing. My friend was also working on another vehicle that was having about the same type of symptoms as mine and changed out those sensors and everything went right back to normal. I'm going to pick up the sensor and have them replaced and see what happens. Hopefully this is the cause to all these issues. What do you think? Possible?
Feb 21, 2019, 11:35 AM
#12
Evolved Member
Yeah, everything was fine as far as mileage goes and the MAF sensor. I've been working on this issue for quite some time and right now, my friend and I have come to another conclusion. There may be a chance the camshaft position sensor is going bad. So how we came to this conclusion is that the misfiring tends to happen only when the car is fully warmed up, never during cold starts. I've also ready about this is other forums for different model vehicles and have also read the same thing. My friend was also working on another vehicle that was having about the same type of symptoms as mine and changed out those sensors and everything went right back to normal. I'm going to pick up the sensor and have them replaced and see what happens. Hopefully this is the cause to all these issues. What do you think? Possible?