im worried about on why my a/f ratio guage is just sittin on lean? i start up the car and it almost hits stoich and then when i begin to drive it drops to lean and then pinns lean all the way after that and stays there...am i running that lean or maybe a mess up on the connection? i have it tapped to my oem 02 sensor and i just get lean...im thining i need to bump up myt fuel with the mods i have since i think im out powering my fuel with all the air flow im gettin? anyone can help me out it would be great :help

If your A/F gauge is not a true Wideband O2 gauge and sensor, then it sounds like the gauge is working fine. At best it will give you a good idea of your A/F misture at WOT.

If your A/F gauge is not a true Wideband O2 gauge and sensor, then it sounds like the gauge is working fine. At best it will give you a good idea of your A/F misture at WOT.

Nah, wouldn't even give you a good idea of A/F at WOT. That gauge is about as useful as my oil temp gauge laying in my trunk. No, seriously, it's terrible :).

I'd have to search for Marco's results, but he wrote about this some time ago... comparison of his wideband and lightshow gauge.... it's terrible......

Euroracer... what car (specifically ECU/software) are you using? You're probably stoich, but your gauge is reading it incorrectly. DO NOT LOOK AT THAT THING. THROW IT AWAY!

Boris

its a (92 325i) ....the chip i have in my car is the custom reprogrammable chip from bav auto..i had it tuned out for only intake and exhuast but now i have bored out throttle body, port& polished head, custom exhuast manifolds, and my bore is a bit bigger using stock injectors and fuel pressure regulator... i have an adjustable fuel pressure regulator layin around just not sure if i wanna install it..well basically when i ordered the guage it didnt come with any type of sensor , but i bought a new oem 02 sensore to replace my original one and i have it tapped from that since its a universal o2 sensor and the wires needed to be split..i got it from bekkers or bav auto forget which one...also the a/f ratio guage sits at lean no matter what if im idle or at WOT only on initial start up it hits a bit under stoich and then just pins down to lean and stays there...also im now gettin a check enigine light up so ima try and disconnect the battery and see what happens since the battery was never disconnected when the 02 sensor was installed :(

Euroracer, don't look at that gauge... you don't know the sensor/voltage range it's calibrated for, nor do you probably know how the stock O2 compares to that.

In my book this is about as close as you can get with a narrow-band sensor, and that's if the calibration is similar between sensor/light meter.

http://www.jegs.com/images/products/51053450_large.jpg

About your software... I just wanted to make sure you were OBD-I, looks like you are. Your ECU will always try to keep you at stoichio. About unplugging your battery, that won't clean up any codes in the ECU... you're better off reading them and figuring out what it is. Are you running any FI? Could that be some of the problem?

Finally, and most importantly... when you said you had it tapped for a new sensor, did they run all the electrical to properly power/heat the sensor?? Don't know what kind of sensor you have... *shrug*

Good luck,

Boris

umm im not sure all i know is its a universal one since i was told by thesales rep that its actually better and no im not FI ( one day maybe)...well they tapped the guages wiring into the new sensors wiring..they tried hookin up there auto meter a/f ratio guage and still got a flat out lean mixture as well...im thinking maybe my chip is leaning me out..bav auto told me they advance timing by 10% on the chips and im not sure if they played with the fuel part..

umm im not sure all i know is its a universal one since i was told by thesales rep that its actually better and no im not FI ( one day maybe)...well they tapped the guages wiring into the new sensors wiring..they tried hookin up there auto meter a/f ratio guage and still got a flat out lean mixture as well...im thinking maybe my chip is leaning me out..bav auto told me they advance timing by 10% on the chips and im not sure if they played with the fuel part..

First of all, check your codes... maybe your other O2's don't work so the ECU doesn't get any feedback... who knows.

Second of all, chances are (more likely than not), is that you ARE stoichio, but the calibration or something else is off. I assure you, if your system (ECM) is functioning properly (check your codes!) you're running stoichio. DO NOT LOOK AT THAT STUPID GAUGE!!!

Boris

LOL i tried doin that thing to check my codes but damn shit doesnt work for me....my check enigne light comes on and then goes off and then it wil come on and stay on for a while then go off and stay off for a while and the so on so on with the same shit over and over..it all happened when i put the new 02 sensor in

My wideband when dithering (zinging back and forth) reads between 14.3-14.9. Well the Split Second AFR "light show" is reading between total lean and pinned rich. Anything below 14.7 will show rich on my "light show" and anything over 14.7 shows "lean' on the narrow band.
At WOT the narrow band shows "rich" from any AFR from 14.3-10.0
At off throttle the narrow band shows "lean" anything from 14.7 up to 20.0

My wideband reads from 10.0-20.0.
The narrowband only really works for the "direction" your AFR's are going and not when they get there.The narrowband really likes to hang around stoichmetric , then besides the "blue for rich" and "red for lean" all bets are off looking at the narrowband. :)

If the A/F gauge isn't accurate what about the PYROMETER Gauge? A friend told me it/s more accurate, any using it and can comment any tough on it? :devillook

If the A/F gauge isn't accurate what about the PYROMETER Gauge? A friend told me it/s more accurate, any using it and can comment any tough on it? :devillook

You can also cook eggs on your engine: I wouldn't recommend it.

Boris

Ill have mine sunny side up.. As for tuning by EGT, thats very hard to do.. it takes a Ton of practice to interpret.. Lean can cause high egts.. but it can also cause falling egts!!!! tuning by wideband is the only way to fly really

You can also cook eggs on your engine: I wouldn't recommend it.

Boris


WTF????

WTF????

As Marco would say "In this country we say...."

Anyway, it was just a [bad] analogy. Some people can tune by EGT's, roughly, somewhat... well, some people can cook on an engine.

Ok, bad example... American's wouldn't get it anyway, because they've probably never cooked on engines. For us it was a stove, a clothes dryer, etc. when we went on long family trips to the Black Sea, etc.

Anyway, long, personal story... just ignore my stupid analogy... it was probably a bad choice anyway...

Boris

thing is my a/f ratio guage that i got never came with a 02 sensor with it...do you think this might be the prob?or mayhbe since i have it tapped off the oem 02 sensor?

For your sensor to be acting like that it may not be hookd up correctly.

When the stock oxygen sensor going the a/f gauge moves very slow and lazy. Maybe you got the worng one the volt are different from OBD 1 to 2 ??

What brand or type are you using?

? got me man..i have no idea i just no that its a universal one and was told it works better but now my chek engine light stays on all the time..lol...im pissed bout this shit..ill try and see whats up this weekend..if anyone else has any ideas feel free to drop a line

Pump that sucker (the gas pedal) and get the code. :)

How old is your oxygen sensor ?? Could be bad and that why you have a lazy a/f gauge. Makew sure the gaguge is rated for the right voltage 1 or 5v. :)

>>Makew sure the gaguge is rated for the right voltage 1 or 5v.<<

Mark, dont our stock O2 sensors, besides having a 5V range, also reverse which end is Rich and which is Lean? Wouldnt that make standard type gauges read opposite??

Paul no the difference from 0 to 5v is what makes the a/f gauge show lean to rich.

There is only one Voltage connection that you tap from the oxygen sensor.

If there is a quick short it will trigger the engine check light. You should be able to check if you remove the sensor wire going to the oxygen sensor and then unplug the power harness to the dem and then reconnect it and start the car.

Pull the code before if you start and you drive around for 20min and no check light then your oxy sensor maybe ok.

Mark, did you understand what i was asking? I know most car's o2 sensors read between 0v and 1v. I forget which end is interpreted as rich, and which as lean.. But whatever it is, I thought it was reversed with the 5v sensors used in the obdii M3. So, I was asking whether not just the 5V vs 1V issue would be important for proper gauge display, but also whether the reversal of which end was rich and which end was lean, if it really is opposite of what most o2 sensors on most cars use, would screw up the readings... Maybe you did understand what I mean.. i just couldnt tell by your response. :)

WHOOPS..... Boris very kindly pointed out to me that my comments are correctly based on OBDII systems; the car we're talking about is an OBDI specimen, hence, my comments dont apply.. Forgive...

Sorry I was not clear in my response what I meant was that there is only one wire from the stock oxygen sensor that gets hooked up to any a/f gauge.

0 -.5v usually means rich on a 5v setup.

.9-1.0v usually means rich on a 1v setup.

The only way his a/f gauge can so so far off if he bought the one with the incorrect voltage.

Hope this is the information you were asking. :)

the guys that rebuilt my motor will be checkin it out for me...so im thinking the wiring job was done the wrong way..but ill find out hopefully next week sometime..if anything and i really am runinig lean ill have to slap in my afpr and start makin adjustments

the guys that rebuilt my motor will be checkin it out for me...so im thinking the wiring job was done the wrong way..but ill find out hopefully next week sometime...How'd it work out for you, any luck tracing the glitch?

I recently installed the Autometer Air/Fuel Gauge also, I pulled it off my previous car(worked fine there). My case seems a little worse than yours. I don't even get a reading when the engine is running.

Measuring the voltages at the oxygen sensor wire, shows correct readings of .2 - .8 volts. No shorts in the wires. Power wire is fine, ground is fine, with the sensor wire disconnected, it shows full rich, when I connect the sensor wire, no lights/reading. :shifty