John's EZ36R H6 818R Build

Finally got my coil pair wires swapped at the ECU plug. Thanks Wayne for that tip, a lot easier than cutting and re-splicing wires. The engine runs perfectly using full sequential and COP, so now I have to try to get James over at MSExtra to re-visit the "Subaru 36-2-2-2 VVT" wheel decoder to change the fuel and ignition triggers to 360 degrees out from their current position.

I will update this thread with the results from the MegaSquirt developers. I know a couple people are hoping to run these motors, possibly on MegaSquirt ECUs (I'm looking at you flynntuna ;) ).

Congrats,. But... like they say on the forum, if there's no video it didn't happen;)
Not sure yet whether or not I'm going to use Mega-Squirt or Haltech , though I'm leaning toward Haltech.
My son went to school with a friend of his whose family owns a speed shop. They tune Mega-Squirt, but I also have a friend who is a Haltech dealer. I need to make that decision in a month or so. :pI

Yea, congrats on the progress! I just got the my DBW working last night, and I'm about to sort the position sensors and cam stuff.* If I had an exhaust I would be starting/go-karting soon!
*EZ30R, Haltech 2500. So far I'm pretty happy with the Haltech system, features, S/W, etc. My first aftermarket ECU install.

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Originally Posted by DSR-3

Yea, congrats on the progress! I just got the my DBW working last night, and I'm about to sort the position sensors and cam stuff.* If I had an exhaust I would be starting/go-karting soon!
*EZ30R, Haltech 2500. So far I'm pretty happy with the Haltech system, features, S/W, etc. My first aftermarket ECU install.

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I was familiar with MegaSquirt as I put it my FFR Roadster. If I was to do it again I think I would opt for the Haltech unit as well, mostly for the DBW support.

The Aussie ford 4.0 barra motor cable throttle body supposidly direct swap to ez30 second gen. Glad to hear it's up and running full senquential. Are all the cam sensors hall effect? If not I have had good luck with jbperformance VR conditioner board.

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Originally Posted by alpine227

The Aussie ford 4.0 barra motor cable throttle body supposidly direct swap to ez30 second gen. Glad to hear it's up and running full senquential. Are all the cam sensors hall effect? If not I have had good luck with jbperformance VR conditioner board.

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All the cam sensors are hall effect and getting solid signals. I currently have a DIY DBW controller board driving the factory throttle body but it lacks ECU idle control, still working on a solution for that.

Throttle body spacer with iacv flange on it?

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Originally Posted by alpine227

Throttle body spacer with iacv flange on it?

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That could work but I am working on a circuit to take the MS IAC stepper position value from the CAN bus and drive the DBW throttle in a small range (0-10% throttle).

All your H6 818 needs now is a chain drive AWD system so you can keep up with Andy Forrest!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLfkcm-0EA0

Well I left my tuning computer in the garage and apparently Sub zero temps and I assume condensation destroyed the cooling fan so it shuts down after about 20secs of operation. But I had a brief thought of adjusting your trigger offset in tuner studio by 360 degrees instead of rewiring the coils.

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Originally Posted by alpine227

Well I left my tuning computer in the garage and apparently Sub zero temps and I assume condensation destroyed the cooling fan so it shuts down after about 20secs of operation. But I had a brief thought of adjusting your trigger offset in tuner studio by 360 degrees instead of rewiring the coils.

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I tried that, didn't work. The firmware only allows a +- 20 degree change for that decoder :mad:

Geesh haltech gives you 720 degrees of offset if I recall. I bumped your thread on the Ms forums worth keeping it towards the top the more it pops up the more likely it is to get addressed. Especially if someone can test and send logs with a working setup.

Thanks alpine227!

If anyone following this thread would like to help, please go over to the MS forum and chime in your interest in this motor combination running on MS3. The more interest the more responsive the developers might be.

http://www.msextra.com/forums/viewto...?f=131&t=67870

https://i.imgur.com/eUJ4KmC.jpg
Here is my crank wheel position with #1 tdc. Right side front piston. (Well rod tdc as the piston aren't installed) I shared over on your MS thread as well. Not sure it that's the same position as yours or not.

Thanks for the pic! I need to compare that to the code.

Can you check that the timing mark on the front pulley is lined up with the 0 degree timing mark also? Your pic seems to be off one tooth from what the MS code expects.

My timing covers are off getting painted basically a bear block at the moment, it could move a few degrees either way as it's a bit hard to tell with no piston on the rod if it's at full tdc or not.

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Originally Posted by alpine227

My timing covers are off getting painted basically a bear block at the moment, it could move a few degrees either way as it's a bit hard to tell with no piston on the rod if it's at full tdc or not.

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Got it, that may be the difference I'm seeing. When you can get a more accurate TDC, can you take another pic of the crank plate. I think it will help me convince the development team there really is a difference they need to account for ;).

Sure I can pop a piston in tomorrow late afternoon and snap a picture for you.

After all the screwing around I finally feel vindicated!

The phase is off 360 degrees as I first thought.

I went into the source code for an older version of MegaSquirt (1.4.0) as it is the latest source available and flipped the phase in the wheel decoder. After a quick re-compile I flashed it to the ECU and reloaded my tune. The motor fired right up with full sequential fueling and and COP ignition! purred like kitten :)

Now I need to get the developers to put in the phase flip code which already exists in other wheel decoders into this one.

Really deep dive down the rabbit hole! It's a mystery why Subaru had so many changes in wheel trigger patterns and offsets. I ran into a similar problem with my jdm ej205 with avcs the cam angle sensors were 4 tooth wheels where the us and euro are 4-1 wheels. No support for my wheels

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Originally Posted by alpine227

Really deep dive down the rabbit hole! It's a mystery why Subaru had so many changes in wheel trigger patterns and offsets. I ran into a similar problem with my jdm ej205 with avcs the cam angle sensors were 4 tooth wheels where the us and euro are 4-1 wheels. No support for my wheels

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Turns out your suggestion on the MS forum of allowing the trigger angle to be 360 degrees or greater would have fixed it! It will most likely be the way they deal with the issue as that code is already in the decoder, they just need to turn it on for the 36-2-2-2 wheels :rolleyes:

Great to hear, a major milestone checked off the list. Congrats

Between the motor swap, ECU, brakes, front fender gaps and oil cooling system you are blazing some new paths for sure.

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Originally Posted by alpine227

Between the motor swap, ECU, brakes, front fender gaps and oil cooling system you are blazing some new paths for sure.

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Thanks! I'm only doing what a lot of people do with FFR kits, make them their own :cool:

I hope I can help make other's journey a bit smoother.

Great news, congratulations.

I decided I wanted to join the two rear deck lids to have a single rear deck panel. After thinking about the best way to join the two panels I finally decided the easiest and most structurally sound method would be to completely cut off the shelf section from the humps. Then sand the back side smooth so there is no lip left over.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...1&d=1514500320

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...2&d=1514500326

Moving on to the rear deck lid I cut and sanded the mating edge so there was no lip left either. Now the two panels will butt up to each other and be the same thickness. This will make it easier to layup 6 or maybe 8 layers of fiberglass cloth and mat to give strength to the newly formed panel.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...3&d=1514500332

After I glass up the back side I can flip it over and fill any crevice left with resin and gel-coat before final sanding in preparation for paint.

On the R models there are these small flappy winglets on the rear humps that are left over when FFR cuts out for the roll bar. They a quite fragile and make it really difficult to get the hump section on and off the car. So I cut them off!

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...9&d=1514500309

I made the cut at the location where the TMIC vents are. I plan to glass them in permanently to the side panels.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...0&d=1514500314

Interesting idea on the winglets. On my R, there is a push-lock retainer on the front to hold them down. One of them cracked from working them over the roll bar, so I added some more fiberglass underneath to strengthen the stress point. Works for now. Easier to remove with two people.

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Originally Posted by Rob T

Easier to remove with two people.

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Yes, I wanted to be able to easily remove the rear deck lid by myself. The winglets made it difficult to do that.

Did some thing similar. Thought about riveting to the quarter fender but decided I want to be able to remove it if I needed the space to work on something.
Attachment 78288Attachment 78289

I don't have a problem removing it by myself.

You're inspiring me to do the same on my R. My roll cage modification project has spilled over into a body-test-fit project. Very interested to see more detail on the fiberglass work. Thanks for the pictures!!

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Originally Posted by Mitch Wright

Did some thing similar. Thought about riveting to the quarter fender but decided I want to be able to remove it if I needed the space to work on something.
Attachment 78288

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Mitch, I see what looks like 10-32 button head screws holding the winglet in place. I assume you fabricated some brackets, but where did you mount those too? Any pics?

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Originally Posted by Zach34

You're inspiring me to do the same on my R. My roll cage modification project has spilled over into a body-test-fit project. Very interested to see more detail on the fiberglass work. Thanks for the pictures!!

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Thanks Zach, I'm very impressed with your door frame mods. You got skills :cool:
I'll try to keep posting pics of the body mods as they happen. There are many more left to do!

To prepare for laying fiberglass I first taped off the top side with Gorilla Tape to give me a backing in the gap between the panels. Then I secured 6 strips between the two sections to ensure the top surfaces would be aligned correctly. I cut the strips out of the pieces of fiberglass body removed when cutting out the vents in the hood. Good use of scrap material!

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...6&d=1514852145


After flipping the two panels over, I sanded about 5 inches around the gap to be fiber-glassed. The round black object you see on the right hump is a solid piece of steel I'm using to weigh that side down as the panel is a bit warped. I hope to lay the first round of cloth and mat tomorrow.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...5&d=1514852139

John, The front aluminum bracket is riveted to the door the one by the main hoop is bolted to the hoop. Sorry no pictures. I might be able to get a picture of the rear mount but it will be a week, head out west to do some skiing.

Attachment 78563
This is what we did, but it does take two people to remove and install, with the wing on.
Attachment 78564

I previously cut the side vents to make them deeper in hopes of getting more air flow. Now I need to fiberglass up the gap to make the panels look like they were designed that way. I added 1.5 inches depth to each vent, measured approximately half way up the vent. But to get the top to look right I had to cut out the entire top self. This meant I need to create a flat surface I could layup fiberglass against until it cured. I ended up cutting out some wood shapes and clamped / taped them in place while I laid the glass. It made a nice smooth flat surface to work on.


http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...9&d=1515450169

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...8&d=1515450164


The bottom was easier since the gap was smaller and the surfaces to be joined were flat. I just used duct tape between the gap laid the glass against that :p Here is the side panel after removing the wood mold and duct tape.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...1&d=1515450179

After it cures in a few days I can cut out the middle vent section and bondo any rough spots to make the transitions smooth.

Earlier I cut openings in the front of the side pods to allow some high pressure air from the front wheel wells to escape thru the hollow side pods and exit into the engine bay. Hopefully adding some cooling back there.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...1&d=1509399621


To keep large debris and pieces of rubber from entering, I added some stainless steel mesh I had from a previous project. I secured the mesh with clear silicone. Here its held in place with wire and some welding rod while the silicone cures.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...0&d=1515450174

Nice! Interesting. I refer you to my post about my bodywork and lightening.

Nice job on the wood forms.