RHD ITB/Megasquirt install

[groovydude]

Being a glutton for punishment, I decided to say goodbye to my 40 year-old CIS, and upgrade my intake and engine management to something modern. I liked what I read about an ITB/megasquirt setup. It seemed it would increase throttle response, increase power, provide better mileage, and be tunable and not have complicated, unserviceable moving parts that are no longer made! All of my research suggested that the gains from this mod would be more cost effective than internal changes such as a cam shaft and/or piston/head change. And it’s bolt-on.

After some research and conversations, I decided to buy and RHD ITB/megasquirt system from Al Kosmal. Al sells the ITBs from RHD, the electrical and fuel components in a “kit.” Keep in mind this is about half the cost of the Rassant “kit”.

Things to note up front:
1. I already owned a CDI+ unit. This unit offers the possibility of locking the dizzy and have software control advance (via its own software). Rather than scrap this for an MSD unit, which does the same thing (and interfaces with the Megasquirt software - TunerStudio), I decided to keep it. So my system is considered “fuel only”, consisting of the ITBs and Megasquirt controller. I might switch over to an MSD eventually, as this would allow fuel tuning and timing to be tuned in the same application.
2. I already had SSIs on my car, and a cat delete. (The cat was done by a PO).
3. Otherwise my engine is stock mechanically (+ AC delete and heater backdate).
4. Al is a super nice guy.

First thing that I noticed when I got the package was the lack of meaningful documentation. And, the ITBs were very loosely attached, lots of doohickeys but nothing was really cinched down. A few manufactures pamphlets were in the box. Al did send me an email packet with an installation guide and a few other goodies, so I figured that would suffice.

I removed the old CIS, there’s plenty of threads on the board about that. It’s a few hours of very uncomfortable work (do a partial drop).

Al had “suggested” that I buy some spacers that go between the ITBs and the heads in order to minimize the risk of vacuum leaks, so I had him throw in a set. First thing I noticed is that the stock intake studs are not long enough to accommodate this. So, I found some longer studs at Clewett. It was at this point that I learned what the spacers are really for. PMO makes the set that Al sold me (for their ITBs) and calls them “insulators”. They serve as thermal insulation for the ITB mechanisms. Sounds like this could be important, right? We’ll see. Meanwhile I had to wait a few days for the new studs to arrive.

Next task - remove the old studs. Al tells me it’s easy, they should just pop right out using the double nut method. Nope. About half of mine were frozen in place, and you can’t get a torch in there to heat them up without melting the shroud, and a stud extractor won’t fit without shroud surgery. So I tried penetrating oils for days, but it’s not working. Maybe heat??? Al “thinks” you can remove the shroud without a drop. Nothing on Pelican supports this notion, and to me it looks like a drop is necessary. Do I really drop the engine just to get these insulators installed??? Rama, the guy who makes the RHD units, has little to say about the insulators, he does tell me he’s had many successful installations without them, so I decided to instal straight to the heads.

Now it’s on to the assembly/installation of the new systems, which include fuel components, electrical components, and the ITBs. Immediately I started to realize how poor the installation guide is. It says things like “connect the TPS” (throttle position sensor). OK great. But I’ve been given bare wire and a connector, and there’s 3 wires and three terminals on the supplied connector, and only one diagram that doesn’t show which of the two control wires attach to which terminal (ground in the middle). The same is true for the fuel system instructions - partial/incomplete diagrams that only get you half way there. And at least half the wires in the included harness aren’t used in this setup. But which ones? I probably spent a week total figuring out how to best connect all the components. Al was responsive through this stage via email, but his responses were sometimes not helpful, to be totally honest. It was a lot of trial and error and internet research for me. As for the ITB setup, there’s a few mediocre photos and some text, but it’s not what I’d call good instruction at all.

One thing is crystal clear to me at this point - A good set of instructions, clarity about the needed parts/fittings (and clarity about the insulators) and this could be done in two days. At this point I’m into this with WAY more than that (spread out over several weeks), and I’m still not sure if the insulator issue is going to bite me in the butt later. I should also point out that RHD units are the relatively inexpensive for ITBs. The reason, I think, is that each throttle is separate and identical. There’s only one “mold” so to speak. Things are bolted on to the ITB depending on which cylinder it goes to. The PMOs in contrast look to come as two complete banks of three throttles, nothing to attach between the throttles on each bank. RHDs come as six separate units that have to be linked together manually. I counted and there are 20 different screws, bolts, and nuts that have to be set/attached properly. That leads to a LOT that can go wrong, which I would soon come to learn all about.

So, I finish connecting everything, going by my intuition and feel mostly as there’s several different ways to make all the linkage connections.

Unlike the installation phase, Al’s instructions about the first start and using Tuner Studio are very good, and with his help I got the engine running on the second try. He was helpful at this stage. However, to make a long story less long, this phase had problems too, but after a couple of days of consulting, and one trip to the auto parts store to buy a new throttle position sensor (the one I received with the set was apparently bad), most of them were ironed out. Startup and idle were working and tunable with the software, after another week or so. There seemed to be a problem though - once hot, when the engine was revved up it wouldn’t properly return to idle, and it seemed to go out of balance. After a lot more monkeying around with the linkage and I thought I had this solved.

But, my first drive out and after a short trip down the block idle again hung up, and once the idle goes out of whack it looks like the tune is going out of whack too.

Let me say here that getting and keeping all the cylinders balanced in terms of flow through the throttles is CRITICAL! The tune just won’t be good unless they’re all even. All this is not at all simple with the RHD setup. So, more fiddling, setting, tightening. One thinks one is good to go and then give it a little gas and check again and it’s off again. I can’t tell you how many times this happened to me. We’re talking many, many hours of fiddling. This, and the resulting hangup issue led to WEEKS of dialog and trouble shooting. I mean WEEKS. Low rpm and the car ran fine. Get it hot and rev it up past around 4000 and things go wonky. Try a different setup. Same result. Another setup. Same. We get Rama in on the conversation, and NOW he sends me a link to a video of him setting up a system. (Side bar: I’m a video professional so crappy video drives me especially nuts, and this is crappy video. It does help a little though.) More tweaks, still no change. I’m thinking it’s GOT to be something in the idle adjustment screws - they're on a lever that never seemed to be in the correct position to me, but then Al and Rama are convinced I need a new crossbar as the one I was provided with is too long which made me connect things in an “incorrect” way (this bar connects the linkage from one bank to the other). And btw, Rama has made some improvements to this bar since mine was purchased. - he’s added notches that facilitate more accurate installation of the linkage. That I’ve been a Guinea pig is not exactly what I wanted to hear, but OK, at least it will work now. The new bar comes and it’s still too long. Opps, sorry, we must have sent you one of the early prototypes. So, I grind it down and get the car running and…

Same problem. More fiddling - I finally took upon myself to reset the position of lever holding the main idle adjustment screws and it seemed to help, but it would still go wonky at high rpm/ high heat.

After a few more days of chat It’s decided that I send the ITBs back to Al and Rama will send me a new set from Australia. Weeks later I get the new set. (Note: I can tell that setup for the second set was given more attention, many of the linkage components that had been loose the first time around are bolted on and locked in the proper position, including the all important center levers). So, I install again as I’m supposed to and…. (Continued)


Flow testing one of the ITBs. I ended up with flow set for 6 at idle, which translates to about 1050rpm when warm.


THe 1-2-3 bank installed


The 4-5-6 bank installed

[groovydude]

Continued from previous...

Same problem!

Is it a leak? Perhaps, but I’ve checked for that with starter fluid and nothing. Is it the heat and lack of insulators??? The throttles, where all the action is, just don’t get that hot, even when the engine is at high temp I can touch the throttles. So I’m thinking it really must be in the linkage. Each bank is controlled at the middle ITB via a “drop link” from the crossbar (this is a wiggly piece of kit). And there are two adjustment screws on the center ITB units - they’re called “main adjustment screws” - and are used for adjusting the idle in the center ITBs for each bank (the inner and outer ITBs have individual fine adjustment screws). Everything has to be JUST SO. I decide the main idle screws have to be the problem, so I try backing these screws way out and setting the idle with the drop links instead. It’s a bit tricky but doable.

I run the car around the block again and it seems to have worked! A few laps around my block and everything is fine but all of a sudden I can feel the idle creeping up again. I go back and look and now I can see that one of the main adjustment screws had worked its way down on the last run. I back off on this screw while the engine is racing at idle and it drops back down. Here’s the kicker - there’s a lock nut on each adjustment screw, but fitting a wrench in there to tighten the lock nuts when the stacks are fully assembled, as you would want to do when you’re tuning, it is almost impossible, at least with the 8mm open end wrench in my toolbox. So all this time I’ve been hand tightening these lock nuts. They never seemed to be loose, and I never saw any change in the position of the screws visually until now, BUT 1/4 of a turn will throw the idle way off and that’s not something one can see without a precise measurement. So this is clearly the problem. Apparently, the lock nuts need to be REALLY, REALLY tight. I find another wrench that fits, tighten them down, go for a spin and…

Viola!

Well, live and learn. Yes, I feel a little stupid for the hangup issue having such a simple fix, but I feel ultimately the blame goes mostly to Rama/RHD on that. This is his product and the ITBs should come as ready to go as possible and he should provide clear installation instructions - and tightening everything with a wrench should be in CAPS and BOLDFACE in the documentation (and it should come with a printed setup guide). IMO Al could have provided clearer instructions from the start too, but he certainly was responsive. Hopefully AL and Rama correct these issue before any more sets are sold. The good news is now the idle is no longer hanging up. Lots of work to do on the tune still.

My first real drive today was great, even just running auto-tune on the controller software. I’m optimistic that this system will deliver as I expected. My butt dyno tells me HP and especially torque has increased, the engine is definitely way more responsive. It sounds better too. Now that she’s up and running I’ll update in a few weeks.


I added a light spring to the throttle linkage to give a bit more resistance, the RHD spring feels a bit soft to me.


The all important main adjustment screw and its even more important lock nut. Notice the lack of clearance. An Allen screw would be a slight improvement as one could hold the adjustment screw securely in place while cranking down on the lock nut.

[KMoore68]

Thanks for posting your review and experience. I will be watching for any updates!

I am considering a similar purchase however I was planning on doing the Bitz EFI conversion first and then going to RHD ITBs afterwards. Mainly because the I'm in Canada and the full kit from Al adds up pretty quick when you include the exchange rate and duty however I figured I could source the RHD kit directly from Australia which has a similar exchange/currency valuie.

[al lkosmal]

I have to admit, this was the debug session from hell....Steve got his engine running pretty quickly, but was was experiencing inconsistent throttle returns, once the engine was running and warm. I originally thought that the setup was incorrect and offered various suggestions for fixing the problem.....and sometimes the recommendations seemed to succeed, only to reappear during the next test session.
We were frankly baffled with this one.......after trying everything we could think of and not being successful, I recommended that Rama supply a new set of throttle bodies that he personally assembled. These were built and shipped directly to Steve from Australia. Literally lots of time and expense went into trying to solve this problem.

Once installed, Steve emailed me that the problem still existed and mentioned that he thought that the problem was the main adjuster........long, long story short......after adjustment, during tuning....none of the adjusters were locked. Once the engine was running, vibration etc..the adjusters were coming out of adjustment... Rama and I spent countless hours trying to figure this out and even supplied a new set of throttle bodies..... ...just to find out it was something simple, the locknuts were not tightened.

I provide quite a bit of documentation, providing the basics for installation and tuning, as well as a start-up file, manufacturers manuals etc.....however, as good as I think it is, it can always be improved. No matter what system you buy...and i've installed many of them...the manuals and instructions can't cover every detail......but damn, man..... I'll definitely add notes regarding tightening the locknuts etc....

We stuck with Steve through the ups and downs of his install....he had direct access to me and Rama at RHD.......Admittedly, it was frustrating, but as it often turns out, it was something so simple. The effort ultimately paid off and I'm glad that, as frustrating as it was for us all......at long last, Steve's system is working well.

[ToySnakePMC]

A few comments from the Right Coast:
- Detailed and suspenseful story from Groovy.
- Happy, I hope, ending that wasn’t revealed till the end.
- As someone who spends too much time planning (dreaming?) of my own future EFI TBI update, I wasn’t sure how X Factory would be perceived by me near the end of this adventure...
- Now I am pretty certain that Al will be my first choice as preferred vendor for the complete kit I’ll be shopping for.

[Peter M]

Originally Posted by al lkosmal

I have to admit, this was the debug session from hell....Steve got his engine running pretty quickly, but was was experiencing inconsistent throttle returns, once the engine was running and warm. I originally thought that the setup was incorrect and offered various suggestions for fixing the problem.....and sometimes the recommendations seemed to succeed, only to reappear during the next test session.
We were frankly baffled with this one.......after trying everything we could think of and not being successful, I recommended that Rama supply a new set of throttle bodies that he personally assembled. These were built and shipped directly to Steve from Australia. Literally lots of time and expense went into trying to solve this problem.

Once installed, Steve emailed me that the problem still existed and mentioned that he thought that the problem was the main adjuster........long, long story short......after adjustment, during tuning....none of the adjusters were locked. Once the engine was running, vibration etc..the adjusters were coming out of adjustment... Rama and I spent countless hours trying to figure this out and even supplied a new set of throttle bodies..... ...just to find out it was something simple, the locknuts were not tightened.

I provide quite a bit of documentation, providing the basics for installation and tuning, as well as a start-up file, manufacturers manuals etc.....however, as good as I think it is, it can always be improved. No matter what system you buy...and i've installed many of them...the manuals and instructions can't cover every detail......but damn, man..... I'll definitely add notes regarding tightening the locknuts etc....

We stuck with Steve through the ups and downs of his install....he had direct access to me and Rama at RHD.......Admittedly, it was frustrating, but as it often turns out, it was something so simple. The effort ultimately paid off and I'm glad that, as frustrating as it was for us all......at long last, Steve's system is working well.

A perfect response from someone who obviously has the patience of a saint.

I can't imagine how I would respond to anyone who admitted to just hand tightening lock nuts because a suitable spanner wasn't handy! I do know I wouldn't be as gracious as Al.

However Mr groovydude I do appreciate your public confession.

Can I suggest you should also use a spanner on the locknuts when doing your valve clearances too.

[walt]

Maybe a slightly smaller head on the adjusting screw or a larger hex on the lock nut would allow the use of a standard deep socket to tighten.

[LeftCoastErik]

I will chime in here too, as we have done a dozen ITB setups using TWM, PMO and RHD units from Al.
Al is great, support always top notch.
The RHDs are actually pretty trick but they can be a *****. Getting a long 8mm combo wrench and putting a bend or two in it makes it usable to tighten the lock nuts. If vibration is killing you, a little (and I mean little) bit of silicone RTV on the threads will dampen vibration and prevent the threads from backing off. I would do this on the bench.
Glad to hear you got her going! Get out there and tune!

[pampadori]

I had issues with my Triumph ITBs sticking just slightly open once the motor was nicely hot (say after 30 min of driving). It ended up being a very simple fix:

[groovydude]

I replaced the original plastic bushings, no one seems to have the bronze in stock and no word on when they might reappear.

[Tremelune]

I just like reading these stories to get the real skinny on things. I have a mental shopping cart of X-Faktory bits when my engine starts running poorly in expensive ways, and it's nice to hear real-world experiences with RHD vs PMO/Jenvey etc.

[groovydude]

My fix to the RHD main adjustment screws. I discovered how soft the supplied brass screws are by overtightening the lock nuts (the screw broke off). This Allen screw is much easier to keep in place when tightening.

[groovydude]

If anyone here has an MS2 tune for a 3.0 with stock cams and pistons I'd love to see your VE table.

[Marwil]

I think you may have reached out to on the BitzRacing forum also. Here are the VE, AFR and spark tables for my current tune. Runs really well with some minor stumbles between 2200 and 2800 low load cruise situations. Mind you many modern cars experience similar stumbles that you can feel in part throttle, low load, over hill crest and down situations. Specs for my car are in my signature below.

[Marwil]

Spark table wouldn't load in the last post. Trying again but no dice.

[Cheshire Cat]

Originally Posted by Marwil

I think you may have reached out to on the BitzRacing forum also. Here are the VE, AFR and spark tables for my current tune. Runs really well with some minor stumbles between 2200 and 2800 low load cruise situations. Mind you many modern cars experience similar stumbles that you can feel in part throttle, low load, over hill crest and down situations. Specs for my car are in my signature below.

I`d say it fairly lean hence the stubles

[mikedsilva]

Sounds like Al and Rama have the patience of a saint!

So to clarify, the issue was that you didn't realise you had to use the locknuts to stop the throttle adjusters from vibrating loose while running....
And then when you finally did figure out they were locknuts, you tightened it so tight, that you broke the screw? Amazing... I have fitted a few of these and have not managed to strip, let along break any of those bolts!

The difficulty with these threads, is any newcomer who reads it, will get the impression that the kits, the items, and the vendors are below par.

I think to install any form of itbs and to get this running, you have done remarkably well considering your skill level, so well done. However I believe it's a stretch to put any blame onto either Al, Rama or the products in this case, considering the issue that prevented you achieving a final result. And to think, they sent a whole replacement set of itbs to you to try to help!

I hope you bought them both a nice bottle of wine or something.

Perhaps you could update this thread you started... http://forums.pelicanparts.com/porsche-911-technical-forum/1099402-any-megasquirt-consultants-out-there.html

[Nditiz1]

Originally Posted by mikedsilva

Sounds like Al and Rama have the patience of a saint!

So to clarify, the issue was that you didn't realise you had to use the locknuts to stop the throttle adjusters from vibrating loose while running....
And then when you finally did figure out they were locknuts, you tightened it so tight, that you broke the screw? Amazing... I have fitted a few of these and have not managed to strip, let along break any of those bolts!

The difficulty with these threads, is any newcomer who reads it, will get the impression that the kits, the items, and the vendors are below par.

I think to install any form of itbs and to get this running, you have done remarkably well considering your skill level, so well done. However I believe it's a stretch to put any blame onto either Al, Rama or the products in this case, considering the issue that prevented you achieving a final result. And to think, they sent a whole replacement set of itbs to you to try to help!

I hope you bought them both a nice bottle of wine or something.

Perhaps you could update this thread you started... http://forums.pelicanparts.com/porsche-911-technical-forum/1099402-any-megasquirt-consultants-out-there.html

Edit: I misunderstood, foot in mouth, lol. I didn't realize it was with the linkage setup I thought that was on the ITBs themselves. Sorry Mike.

[Marwil]

@Cheshire Cat - I thought so too and I tied a richer mixture to no avail. Oddly enough, even though the AFR table class for lean values many of the stumbles show at 14.3 to 14.6 on my AFR gauge. Some have suggested even more timing at the low load vaues where the issue appears. More travel with the laptop and logging to come. I wonder if there is an odd resonance in the intake - I pull vacuum for the MS2 from just below the throttle body butterfly. I could try pulling vacuum from a source towards the middle of the plenum.

[jpnovak]

I am with Mike on this one. These ITBs are individual segments and are assembled together on the car by mating the cross bars. While the throttle blade in the bore is factory calibrated, the rest of the linkage is not. Step number one is to balance the system using the linkage - including the adjusters that came loose. Even if there are no instructions one should be mechanically adept to notice there is a lock nut on the adjuster screw. I would even go so far as to blue loctite these critical adjustments. Its a vibrating automotive application.

There are other ITB systems that are exactly the same. Jenvey is one such setup.

While you say that new carbs should not meed to be sync'd this is far from the reality if install. The linkage drop rods need to be adjusted - And, all the modern reproduction cross bars are incrorrectly bent such that the ball studs are at a different length causing balance problems at different load positions.

While Al and others offer amazing product kits and technical support, the user-installer that is doing this for the first time needs to have some background to optimize the install and final results. The same goes with tuning.