BlastinSideways12A

My innovate wideband controller and guage was just shipped to me today and I should have it this weekend. I have a Racing Beat Street Port exhaust and was thinking of putting the sensor on the rear part of the header (on the rear rotor's pipe).

First of all, will this be to hot for the sensor to function properly? Secondly, I was thinking of having an exhaust shop weld an O2 sensor bung into the header. Is anyone here running a setup like this?

jayroc

I talked to Innovate about this and they HIGHLY recommend the HBX-1 heatsink with rotaries. You will need it if you're going to put it that close to the engine. It's $90 though.. a bit pricey considering the sensor itself is about $30. It is a solid unit, though.
Make sure you leave enough clearance for wiring and stuff, it adds just over 1" length to your o2 sensor placement.
I don't have a LC-1 yet, but I will as soon as I get the cash.. I assume that's what you got?
I have read on here that temps can climb as high as 1600°, and a good state of tune should yield 1450° or so. The Bosch 4su can't be controlled properly at EG temps above 1300°. Soooo....
An EGT sensor wouldn't hurt either.

FB II

yes, GET AN EGT GAUGE! plus, i think the only reason my wideband sensor has survived as long as it has, is because i run so rich my egt's stay kinda low. losing power, but thats un controllable with the carb setup.

BlastinSideways12A

soooo much money for all this stuff. I just sunk 400 into the wideband (yes it is the lc1)

BlastinSideways12A

BTW what about mounting it right by where the pipes collect (by the rear axle)

Rex4Life

Put the WB sensor at the header collector and the EGT sensor close to the outlet of the engine. The WB should be a mininum of 18" after exit from the engine. The WB can be damaged by the high temperature--and lets face it, rotaries run real hot.

Also, for the EGT you may want to consider a 2000 F limit as opposed to the standard 1600 F sensor.

BlastinSideways12A

The only issue I can see with putting it where the pipes collect is that it may be a bit far back and the signal will be delayed when being sent to my near future Megasquirt, especially under cruise conditions when it will be most effective. I may be overreacting though.

jayroc

Below is what I was told about sensor placement from Innovate.
What I was trying to ask also when I emailed, was whether or not the LC-1 would read error if the sensor became too hot to control, and indeed it does.
BTW, they got a real cool video section that goes over some tuning tips and product features. Good info there if you haven't checked it out.

jayroc

BTW, you got the gauge with? Honestly, even if you arent going EFI, megasquirt has awesome logging capabilities. MAP, coolant, intake temp, o2, EGT.. You could build one for the cost of one of those gauges, probably. The LC-1 by itself with sensor is only $200..

Also, if you got a normal autometer A/F sweeper type gauge, the controller has an analog output that can be setup to output a MUCH more accurate narrowband signal turning a normal autometer A/F gauge into a much more accurate A/F gauge.

BlastinSideways12A

I had thought about using the anolog signal and a different guage but the digital readout will be easier for me to read and the xd1 looks sweet too.

BlastinSideways12A

That is a sweet idea to use the megasquirt as a datalogger, even with a carb.

jayroc

Yeah, I wouldn't use the NB sweeper gauges to tune reliably with, but you can hook up a laptop to do the tuning/logging. Seems like the gauges would become much more accurate, but still, I can't say for certain.
Personally, I wouldn't buy an expensive gauge, since the laptop does what I need, but those are very nice.

cmartinp28

for a 90 dollar heatsink. you are better off just buying a 3 dollar bung, and having it welded for 30 bucks

jayroc

As long as it's far enough away from the manifold.. If you don't use one, your sensor can overheat and cause erronious readings. This is true of rotaries with sensors on or very near the manifold, anyway. If you got a custom exhaust with thin piping, you can probably get away without a heatsink, however..

BlastinSideways12A

I've just mounted it by the collector and its been working fine. Now the issue is getting rid of the 10.X:1 cruise AFR and 11.X WOT AFR.

Zyrano

how hard is it to have the bung welded on to the rb header? can normal exhaust shops do it?

Alvin

autopaul

yes most exhoust shops will be able to, as long as they have a welder