dean campbell

or any one who might have input.

i have ordered a couple 540s from bruce Dudley, i知 planning on efi and the whipple 2100 cfm throttle body, i understand the compression will close to 8.2:1. i知 currently installing oil temp., water pressure and vacuum / boost gauges. my question is, while i知 at it should i also install intake temp. gauges? would this be beneficial for testing, tuning and basic monitoring or is it just a waste of time, $ & space? if not a waste, then what would be an acceptable temp. and what exactly could i do about it if it wasn稚 acceptable?

thank you
dean campbell

laster

If you install it after the intercooler as I assume you would then it will tell you if the intercooler becomes plugged. The only other way to tell is to check the discharge stream and this can be difficult underway if you have the fitting on the rear of the boat. Side discharge may sound like the solution but you may find that your side discharge will dump into someones boat if they pull alongside or dump on the dock if it is a low one. Just my $.02 and well worth it.

Turbojack

I woud say a waste, unless you want more gauges to look at. I would add either a egt gauge or knock sensor. That way you can keep a good eye on if motor is distroying it's self, & get out of throttle before you tear it up.

cobra marty

Fuel pressure is what you really need. All the rest is eye candy.

SteveDavid

Hi Dean,

I run Whipples and currently have guages for fuel pressure, boost, oil pressure, water temp, alternator, RPM and water pressure.

I discharge the innercoolers (3) out the drivers side of the boat for visual reference. I don't think you really need to measure air inlet temp, either before or after the innercooler as there is little you can actually do about it. On the dyno (And BTW, Bruce is a fine engine builder and very with it on Whipples, he and I shared information as I was dynoing mine about 2 months ago, and will be happy to do so for you as well).

I believe you'll find your inlet temp at 130 or less on the dyno and more like 120 or less in the water, even down to 100. Our tank water for the dyno was at 95 degrees while the Atlantic average temp where I boat is more like high 70's to mid 80's.

I do not run seperate pickups for the innercoolers, although Bruce may want to with your 540's (mine are 500 EFI base engines) I plumb off the raw water pump in a standard Whipple configuration and with about 90 hours on the Whipples at this point, I haven't had any problems.

Have a ball, and please give my regards to Bruce.

Steve

dean campbell

thanks guys,

Turbojack,
if i install egt gauges would i install 4, one for each exhaust manifold? what痴 the preferred installation on that? also, i thought it was difficult to get accurate readings with wet exhaust? or maybe that was with O2 sensors.

my understanding was the EFI base whipples incorporated knock sensors in their system. if i知 wrong, then yes, i would think that would be one of the first things i should get. can someone help me for sure on this?

cobra marty,
fuel pressure, ok, i値l put a couple in. any idea what range of gauges i should get? (what is the max. my fuel pressure will be on this type of configuration?)

SteveDavid,
yeah, i know bruce is a wealth of information and most likely would have all the answers to my questions. but he痴 sooo busy this time of year, i壇 like to have as much information as possible before i talk to him. also that way, at least it kinda sounds like i know what i知 talking about.javascript:smilie('')

cobra marty

Need fuel pressure to 60-80 psi. Problem with O2 sensor is they are too narrow band and too slow. A wide band would be the best but cost almost $2000.

SteveDavid

Hi Dean,

The most current Whipple 500 EFI system runs fuel pressure at app. 48 unreferenced. That range can vary from 48 to 55. Anymore than that and you get into a wet idle where you foul the plugs real easy. This setting presupposes you have 50lb. injectors and the 2100 CFM injector body.

My O-2 sensors are just aft of the collectors, I run 1 per engine. I guess if you wanted to be real trick you'd have 8 per engine at the base (3-4 inches from the exhaust port). But if you're not running an exotic, 1 per engine will be fine.

BTW, the brake specific fuel flows at 48 to 55 lbs. are real nice, in the low 5's, not too lean and not too rich.

While on the dyno we tried several different ECU programs and fuel flows. The knock sensors (std. on the 500 efi Whipple system) worked very well. In a too lean condition we saw a 3 degree timing drop, then bumped the fuel pressure up 3 pounds, leaving the timing at 34 degrees total advance, and no knock, good BSFC, good O2 numbers as well.

Have fun!

Steve

Bayley

Steve,
Are those wide band O2 sensors, or the standard automotive types? Been thinking about adding a set of wide bands in the exhaust elbows, just above the manifolds. It'll be tricky working around the water jacket, but I think it could easily be done. Also, are you running any type of feedback from those sensors back to the ECU? I've been seriously considering aftermarket ECU's with feedback control to replace the Merc EFI's. I've had about enought of trying to tune these things. Don't get me wrong, Dustin has been a class act with trying to dial these in, but I would really like to dial things in myself. It seems like $1500 get's the game started for twin applications.

-Bayley

P.S. Steve, you coming to Detroit for Thunderfest this year?

dean campbell

thanks for the info guys. i'll take all i can get.

SteveDavid,
what ECUs are you running?