Hi First time in a group, but I have been reading the discussions for a while now. I have a 86 GN and have just put in a knock guage. I wired it like the directions said but it does not seem to be working. Here's what I did...maybe I screwed up! I grounded the negative (duh)didn't screw that up, I found the B7 wire for the "c" terminal(yellow with a black strip) and tied into that...but the "A" terminal just said battery. I originally put it on the lighter wire but found that was wrong 'cause it stayed lit all the time. So I found a wire next to the fuse panel that went "out" when the ignition was turned off (it was pink with a black strip).....now this is what happens...I turn the car on a some lights light up on the guage(ie 1 green, 1 yellow, 1 red) I shut off the ignition and they go out (duh), but when I turn the key back on a different combination of lights come on (say 2 green and 1 yellow). They eventually go out.The one green light on the bottom of the guage does not light. I took the car out and got to WOT and the guage did zip! Any ideas?? Did I screw up? thanks Chris
Just took the car out for a ride and the bottom green light was lit. I went to WOT (17-18 boost) and no lights lit up! I'm assuming all is well with the guage and I have no knock. Thanks
Chris 86GN
Chris, the gauge should be hooked up as follows:
A- Battery Ground
B- Power (12v) (Doesn't matter where you hook it up as long as it gets power when you turn on the ignition)
C- Yellow/Black (B7-ECM) You have this correct bud.
It sounds as though you've got A & B crossed. It's pretty easy to get mixed up on that because we normally think of A being power & B being ground. It's the opposite in this case. I believe virtually every pink wire with black stripe is a switched positive feed.
HTH
Joey, Thanks. I'll check it out and let you know what I find. I cannot get to the back of the guage now (installed in pillar pod), but I'll just switch to 2 and see what happens. Chris
Well I switched the 2 wires and then the guage did nothing(not even the bottom green light lit up). I switched them back and got the same thing happening again as previously mentioned. My question is this:will the series of lights light up if I don't have any knock...seems like a dumb question but what if I have NO knock...is that possible. I've read other discussions and everyone seems to have some degree of knock...so I should too right? Any ideas?
That light at the bottom indicates that the gauge
is working. Make sure all your connections are tight and make sure all pos and neg leds on the car are tight.If this don't do it maybe a bad
unit.
Not nessesarily, you could be one of the lucky ones with no knock. I know they don't cost much but those gauges suck! When you can (they are expensive)get a real scan tool. You'll thank yourself 100 times over (maybe 101)
I must disagree that knock gauges suck. It is definetly NOT a substitute for a scan tool, but it is a very good supplemental tool. I don't care to look over at a laptop on the passenger seat while going through the traps and 118. Or when doing a little T&T on a "personal dragstrip funded by the county" :^) By comparing the chirps, or beeps to what the scan tool can tell you when you play it back you can then know when and if you are getting into detonation without having to take you eyes off the road. Again, it is not a replacement, but a complimentary tool.
Fast Freddy makes the one I use, and it even has a real time o2 display. Mounted right on top of the dash in my line of sight, it has saved my butt a number of times.
OR, another alternative is the NEW Turbolink 3.0 has a method of giving an audible warning through the laptop when a given amount of knock is recorded. If you really want to get trick, you can save a wav. file and put it in there so when KR is seen by TL it will say "LIFT your foot dummy"
Ain't technology great :^)
just my opinion,
Dwight Hayden
No time to LOOK at the laptop but recording 18 frames per second is priceless! I look at the scanmaster on the dash for the (get out of it stupid) signal. Your right though, I shouldn't say they suck, I haven't seen the one with the o2 readout, that could work. It's the plain jane with just the lights that I,ve seen perform poorly. Like always every car is DIFFERANT. Thanks for setting me straight!
Regarding Dwight's comment re: TurboLink v3.0. Here's another trick...
- First, use one of those cassette adapters that let's you run a portable CD player thru a cassette deck. Plug it into your laptop and the cassette deck and now your audible alerts go through your STEREO (neat trick, eh?)
- Then set multiple audible alerts in your TurboLink settings (details in the online help).
- Set one WAV file for 0-3 degrees (maybe a chime sound),
- Another WAV file for 3-5 (maybe a beep)
- Another for 5-7 degrees (maybe a buzzer)
- And then another (maybe a siren) for > 7 degrees.
That way you get escalating sounds as the knock gets worse.
Don't have a turbo-link yet, but I'm saving up for one....they sound pretty invaluable! Chris
regarding ken's cd/cassette adapter trick:
I AM SPEECHLESS...;-)
Ken, I can't wait to get my new upgrade...that will be sssso ccooool!
Dwight, I know I've seen it before...but where can I get info on Fast Freddies Knock/O2 readout for my dash?
After over 10 years on it...THIS LIST ROCKS!
ROCK ON!
Joe
http://turbopig.freeservers.com/ffp.htm
or his email address is turbopig@solarstop.net
He's a good guy, and has a couple of neat gizmos for our cars.
Tell him I sent ya.
Dwight
I just bought and installed a knock gauge myself.. Does the same thing, the bottom green light does not come on, but some top ones do. If i wiggle the actuall terminal comming out of the gauge, then the bottom green light will come on and nothing else. If i turn off the car and restart it, it goes back to square one. Maybe they should have put a user manual and better instructions in the box... or stop sending broke gauges.