The system works as advertised. But it has some weird idiosyncrasies, and bad/stupid design.A good electrical design should require minimum wiring for functionality.

Example: why use two wires from the unit to a device when one for control of the device and a chassis ground at the device will work. See attachments for stock and better
designs. Better design allows shorter/less wiring if so desired.

Operation Design:
The two adjustments for "starting boost" where the pump turns on, and "max boost" where AI flow is maximized uses to very small adjustable resistors. There require a very small Philips head screwdriver. There is no set indicator pointer and the plastic sticky label has very fine print. This does not allow precise or easy adjustment for flow.

Weird Functional Idiosyncrasies:
(1) If your 12V source to the pump is different than the 12V source to the unit, and the unit 12V is lost, the pump will come on by itself and run forever. This will flood your engine.
Example:
The 12V for the pump is taken directly from the battery 12 terminal with its own wire and fuse. The 12V for the unit is from some other interior circuit. This does not include the arming wire, and the arming is turned off or not connected.
If this other interior circuit is broken like by a cut wire or burnt fuse, the pump comes on.
Does not matter if the engine is not running, it does it.

(2) Everything is now hooked up 100% safe and fully functional. I have my arm switch in my rear console and it is off. Besides it is a switch which grounds out the fan/cooling system control box control wire behind the ECU. With everything off and nothing running, if I turn on my fan mod switch and then turn it off, the AEM LED will blink a few times and the pump will buzz.

If the heater fan is turned on and running, then turned off; the AEM LED will blink a few times and the pump will buzz.

Some circuits affect the AEM and some do not. Must be some type of circuit capacitance change affect.

(3) With everything off and nothing running , I pull out the fuse for the unit.
After waiting a while I reinsert the fuse, the pump will buzz for a few seconds.

 

Thanks for sharing. I had heard a claim about a flooded motor - sounds like he must have wired it off of two different power sources. *That* would ruin a day!

 

I recently completed my AEM installation but my new motor is not in yet....... It appears to me you didn't wire it per their instructions. Per the diagram, the hot wire from the pump and the hot wire from the control unit go to a common hot +12Vsource. You used 2 different hot sources. Also, the pump does not require a separate fuse. Per their instruction sheet the pump is internally fused so no external fuse is required. Regarding the ground wire, I ran all grounds to a common ground near the battery.

Thanks for the warnings on pump coming on and flooding the engine. Something to watch for.

Greg

 

In the normal world of electrical schematics, showing wires going to the same power source
is not indicative of being actually the same point. And the AEM instructions do not say that or give a warning about it.

Compare the wiring in our RX-7s compared to the factory schematics. Functionally correct but different.

That is why I tested my setup before finalizing it.

 

The OEM wiring schematics probably would not make sense to the majority of people out there. I found the AEM instructions very straight forward and clear. I think they are geared toward untrained people who do not know how to read proper electrical diagrams.

 

This may not be what is bothering you, but I have read that the controller does readiness checks on the pump very often, so that may be some of the extra wiring you are seeing.

 

Chuck, I'm surprised to hear your simplified wiring worked properly, is this still a functioning setup?


It's often easier & less expensive to design a controller that sends a switched ground signal to the device, due to the price and amperage capabilities of PNP (switched +12V) vs NPN (switched GND) transistors. Think of how fuel injectors and ignition coils are wired: they receive constant +12V from a relay or fuse and the ECU or ignitor sends a switched ground signal.

Since the original schematic requires shows the +12V power wire (red) connected to the battery positive terminal, it stands to reason the Pump Control (orange) wire is providing switched ground. To design a system that could send either a switched ground or a switched +12V out through the same wire would be cost-prohibitive and may require a larger enclosure.


I once thought Mazda wiring schematics were confusing... until a friend asked for help troubleshooting a late-90's Volkswagen. I'm sure there is something worse, but those VW schematics were some of the least-intuitive diagrams I have seen so far.

 

Yeah I think scotty is right. Might should take a second look at it.

 

The simplified wiring that I showed is not what I am using.
It is how AEM should have designed the system to make installation simpler and reduce use of wiring.

I was showing that their design was not as efficient as it could have been.

Their system is sensitive to some other electrical circuits being switched off and on.
Even when the AEM is not armed, switching my fans on and off will cause the led to blink.

Even so, the system does work.

 

My AEM WI will spray for about 2-3 seconds every time I turn the key on and again when I turn the key off, sometimes it would sputter and spray a few times within the first 2-3 seconds. I tried figuring out why this was happening and tried all kinds of adjustments of the start and full boost selectors. At times I was able to get it to stop spraying like this, but then it started happening again. Something is faulty with the controller. The system seems to work good except for this problem which would spray alot of water into my intake when I had it pre turbo which I believe led to some damage to my single turbo impeller blades. And then I switched to post IC WI and this water getting sprayed into my pipe would then get sucked into my engine causing it to bog.

So I just hooked up a Snow Performance Boost switch part number 81014 http://www.summitracing.com/parts/SNO-81014/ , I hooked it up to the orange ground wire going from the controller to the pump. I adjusted it so that when I hit about 1 psi boost it switches so then my pump will work and start spraying at the start boost setting on the controller, which I have set at about 2 psi. Just took it for a test drive and so far so good, It doesn't spray when i turn the key on and off. My LED light blinks an error code until the boost switch sees 1 psi, the light stops blinking, then it comes back on when it starts spraying at about 2 psi, so I know everything is working right.

And other than that I don't have the weird problems you had.

 

I bought some capacitors like used across old ignition points.
Placed one across the AC thermo switch, and another across my fan mod switch.

This stopped the false arming of the unit that was caused when these switches were switched off or on.

 

The built in check valve in the newer black aem injector body just failed on me and my engine was sucking in water and running like **** and blowing white smoke when the engine would suck in a bunch of water during normal driving. My injector is in the IC pipe coming out of the fmic, and the fmic had a puddle of water in it and the water tank was getting drained. I have one of those big aftermarket inline check valves that some of the AI companies sell, I will hook it up today and hopefully that problem goes away, it should because I used it with the older style aem injector without a built in check valve.

 

Here is a picture of the oring inside the check valve in the water injector, it was messed up so it wasn't sealing good and allowing the engine to suck water through under vacuum. I just took it apart and put it back together to fix it, but also added the extra check valve inline before the injector.

So if anyone is just using the aem black injector housing, you should also use a inline check valve.

 

Damn Tom - that's one hell of a fast RX-7!
Are you still using the factory transmission, driveshaft and differential?

 

Yes, except I'm using a jdm stock tranny, I broke my original one. And using a FC limited slip differential in my original FD diff housing(broke the FD LSD). stock axles.