Group Buy: EFI (Fuel Injection) Conversion Kit

[setasai]

@n4mwd Thanks for all the suggestions. Yes I was just tired today so I'll take it off again and take a picture of it. I just wanted to put it out there to see what kind of ideas we can get off of it.

You're suggestion of epoxy is exactly what I was thinking a couple hours ago. I'm thinking about trying quicksteel epoxy steel putty to mold something for support. I believe the fuel injection mounts are welded on and then polished but I dont see why epoxy wouldnt work since it doesnt get that hot. I'm thinking J-B weld along w/ some quicksteel putty.

I'm not that concerned about the aluminum extrusion. It's relatively thick and the throttle cables arent putting a whole lot of pressure on it. Still though, once I add a 2nd support bolt, I think it'll be fine. My design is more for quick and functional, hence the reason I went with the original carb bracket. If I modify the pulley wheel, it wont be anything as elaborate as yours.

How is your mount coming? I am hoping to be close to done by the weekend.

[n4mwd]

Originally Posted by setasai

How is your mount coming? I am hoping to be close to done by the weekend.

I've never used quick steel putty before. If its something that can be molded into a shape and then drilled and tapped, then I'm all for it. You could drape it over the injector tube and then epoxy it in. If you look closely at the inside of the bore, you'll see that the throttle tube is also attached with set screws that protrude into the bore. I don't see why you couldn't attach something to the injector tube with tiny set screws as well.

Commercial aluminum welding is usually done by TIG which leaves little fish scale tracks behind. There isn't any of that on mine.

By "mount" I guess you are referring to my fuel rail. Last night, I cut the raw aluminum stock to shape and today I plan to start machining it into the respective injector housings. They are connected by an aluminum pipe and the #2 injector has a hole to plug the regulator in. Because I'm mounting the TB right side up, the fuel pump is attached to the second TB cable mount hole which is not used. That lets it hang on the bottom of the TB and makes for a nice self contained FI unit. The way it will be set up, any fuel bubbles will cavitate toward the top where the regulator is and be expelled to the tank.

Its been slow going for me, but most of it has been design and engineering work. That is, sometimes its harder to figure out how to do it than to actually do it. If the kit came with a set of plans to properly modify the TB, then it would be a lot less work.

[forbitel]

Originally Posted by ecotrons

Thanks a lot, Forbitel, you have helped a lot.
But this time your calibrations would not fix this issue.
It's a different issue. We have found the root cause. It is caused by slight difference of pickup signals, from bike to bike. Hopefully a new calibration file, or a small software change can fix it. We are in the process to verify.
Please hold your "horse", guys.

Hey matt, not a problem, just trying to help .
I'm glad you found the issue.

[forbitel]

Originally Posted by setasai

@n4mwd Soooo I attempted to flip the injectors and put it on the bottom but just like forbitel's setup... toooooo much crimping of the throttle cables. Especially since for some reason my cables have a long threaded piece that apparently forbitel's did not.

setasai, now that you mention that, I remember I had to cut part of that threaded piece on one of my cables . I did it with a Dremel tool and a small cutting disc being careful to not cut the wire.

[EMSRacer07]

for all those curious Matt fixed the 10k limit and it dying. got my bike up to 13k no problems. Bike is running really good too. still got a lumpy idle and dying when i stop too early but im going to see what Matt recommends and if not try what others have tried with the fuel decel cut off.

[lgk]

what settings did you end up changing?

[ecotrons]

Originally Posted by lgk

what settings did you end up changing?

OK, for those who want to learn, here is the root cause and the fix:

The pickup installations can be slight diffrent from one bike to another.
the pickup pulse widths have variations from bike to bike. At high RPM, like >= 10k; the pulse width become very small, like 100 micro seconds (us); which is 1/10000 second. A small variation can cause big difference at that super short "period". Our old calibrations ignore the smaller than 100us pulses. Which caused the misfire.
We now change the threshold to 50us, half of the old one, meaning it can theoretically handle 20k-RPM pulses. This is the fix.

For those who want to convert the carb bike with any ECU, the first thing to deal is the pickup signal. And that is the most challenge part of the EFI software.

Matt

[n4mwd]

Attached are photos of my new fuel rail. It is made of machined aluminum. It is still a work in progress, but its mostly done. The #2 injector has an internal channel that allows the pressure regulator to be plugged in. The problem is that the throttle body is bolted together crooked as was mentioned earlier. This causes the precise tolerances of the machined parts not to match the imprecise throttle body. So I still have work to do.

[greg737]

Originally Posted by n4mwd

Attached are photos of my new fuel rail. It is made of machined aluminum. It is still a work in progress, but its mostly done. The #2 injector has an internal channel that allows the pressure regulator to be plugged in. The problem is that the throttle body is bolted together crooked as was mentioned earlier. This causes the precise tolerances of the machined parts not to match the imprecise throttle body. So I still have work to do.

I see you've chosen to build your fuel system "automotive style" with a loop through the fuel rail rather than the standard motorcycle practice of configuring it with a "dead end" fuel rail. This will make your version of the Ecotrons install unique.

[Scattcatt]

I have to admit, that sure looks sexy!

Anyway, just wanted to let everyone know that after seeing files from ProCAL get transferred on here, it gave me an idea! I just created a blog containing all the changes that I've made to ProCAL to get my bike running smoothly, I've included a multitude of maps for the Desired Lambda and my fix for the fuel cut off for those who didn't get the updated version from Ecotrons or who haven't switched yet. All are in excel and can be imported directly to ProCAL. I'll continuously be updating it as I make more calibrations so I can share them all with you guys. Beats blowing this thread up every time I make a calibration

[choneofakind]

@n4mwd and @greg737, what advantages does using fuel rail loop have over going with dead end style fuel delivery?

or vise versa, what advantage does dead-end have over fuel rail loop?

@Scattcatt, consider making a ProCal settings thread and link it to this one so that you can do a similar thing, and people can get all the different ProCal maps that work with different intake/exhaust combinations, and all those maps will be in one place instead of scattered throughout a handful of threads and blogs.

kinda like the Jetting Database that we carby guys use.

[Scattcatt]

Originally Posted by choneofakind

@Scattcatt, consider making a ProCal settings thread and link it to this one so that you can do a similar thing, and people can get all the different ProCal maps that work with different intake/exhaust combinations, and all those maps will be in one place instead of scattered throughout a handful of threads and blogs.

kinda like the Jetting Database that we carby guys use.

I was considering it, but I'm not quite sure how helpful it would be, I know I personally never once used the jetting database for anything lol. I'm really just testing the water here, if it takes off then I won't have a problem creating a separate thread

[n4mwd]

Originally Posted by greg737

I see you've chosen to build your fuel system "automotive style" with a loop through the fuel rail rather than the standard motorcycle practice of configuring it with a "dead end" fuel rail. This will make your version of the Ecotrons install unique.

I'm not sure why motorcycles use the dead end rail - I guess maybe its simpler and can be accomplished entirely in the tank. However, unless he changed the way he did it, Forbitel's fuel rail is the same design (in principle) as mine unless he changed it. There is a photo of it in his first post in his EFI thread.

My theory goes like this... The fuel pump hangs from the bottom of the TB which makes it the lowest fuel component. Any gas bubbles will rise from there. The regulator is the highest and is the last point in the fuel circuit before returning to the tank. That way it is less likely for bubbles to be caught somewhere important.

Now here is an interesting twist. The "fuel bubbler" line from the fuel pump is just another intake port as far as I can tell. So its entirely possible that fuel leaving the regulator is not going back to the tank as planned, but is getting recirculated.

I'm wondering if I can just cap that line off because of the way my fuel rail works.

Oh, and somebody posted a link (sorry I didn't save it) of a third method of supplying pressure to the fuel rail. The guy uses a pressure feedback loop and a variable speed control on the fuel pump. So there is no return to the tank.

[greg737]

Oh, and somebody posted a link (sorry I didn't save it) of a third method of supplying pressure to the fuel rail. The guy uses a pressure feedback loop and a variable speed control on the fuel pump. So there is no return to the tank.

That person was me.

I posted the link as a demonstration of an alternate way of controlling the fuel within the system. This technology is actually used by a number of car manufacturers these days, and is slowly replacing the older continuous-flow systems (at least in the automotive world).

If you go to the link and read you'll see that this type of system is also a "dead end" which indicates that the dead end system is probably going to become the dominant technology in the future.

I've got a friend who used it when he fuel injected his Honda CB-750SS. He loves it.

I'd have to say the best feature of this type of FI fuel system configuration is that it uses less power than a continuous-flow type system. The reason is that the controller circuit only runs the pump as fast as necessary to maintain the PSI that you've programmed into it. Which means that when you're sitting at idle, like at a stoplight, when the bike's fuel demand is low and so is it's electrical system output, the fuel pump is going to run less and demand less power.

http://www.madhu.com/content/Main/FuelPumpController

[greg737]

Originally Posted by choneofakind

@n4mwd and @greg737, what advantages does using fuel rail loop have over going with dead end style fuel delivery?

or vise versa, what advantage does dead-end have over fuel rail loop?

As long as you've properly addressed all the basic fuel system issues either one is as good as the other.

You need to make sure you have: enough PSI, enough volume, no overheating/vapor-cavitation issues, good system filter(s), electrical draw not too high for the vehicle's system, and a good fuel pressure regulator. All these things can be done with either loop or dead end.

[n4mwd]

The part about dead end systems I don't like is that if fuel bubbles make it into the final link to the injectors, its stuck there and will cause the engine to run bad.

I didn't know that cars are using the variable fuel pump system. With the fuel pump in the gas tank, they probably don't have the fuel pump overheating problem that madhu claims.

The ecotrons system uses a very low power pump, but its still on the fringe of being too much draw. I'm thinking that after I get this thing running, it will be necessary to change the stop/tail/turn lights to a low power LED system. That should save enough power to make up the difference.

[greg737]

The part about dead end systems I don't like is that if fuel bubbles make it into the final link to the injectors, its stuck there and will cause the engine to run bad.

I've never seen this happen. In all the times I've opened my fuel system for one reason or another and then re-primed it, I've never had any problems. None at all.

I've done this quite a few times and it always re-primes easily and the bike always runs the same. No variation, it always runs the same after being worked on.

So my hands-on, directly-experienced conclusion/theory is that after I re-connect the fuel line to the throttlebody fuel rail it could very well be true that there are air bubbles in the fuel line and also in the fuel rail, but apparently they purge out as I crank the bike up.

I didn't know that cars are using the variable fuel pump system.

Well, as you can gather by reading the information on Madhu's website Ford has been doing it since at least 2006. And based on the fact that the sensing unit he mentions is a Bosch product I'd be willing to bet there are plenty of other manufacturers doing it too.

[Spork]

Hey guys, I have been trying to read through the comments to figure out what is going on with the group buy now. I might be interested at the 450 cost of the kit if its still going on but had a few questions regarding when it might be going on (if it still has not taken place) as well as some questions on the installation. Since some people have gone through with it already I figured it might just be easier to ask about some of the tricks to the install versus sorting through all the comments. In any event, can someone update me on whether or not the group buy is still available? Sorry if it was explained and I just missed it. Thanks

[Scattcatt]

@Spork, As far as I know, the group buy ended somewhere at the beginning of January

[n4mwd]

Originally Posted by greg737

Well, as you can gather by reading the information on Madhu's website Ford has been doing it since at least 2006. And based on the fact that the sensing unit he mentions is a Bosch product I'd be willing to bet there are plenty of other manufacturers doing it too.

Actually, what I gather is that Ford has been using the sensor since 2006, but not necessarily his system. That sensor, BTW, costs about $100-$150. Its not a cheapie. Cars have a lot of diagnostic systems these days and a fuel pressure sensor would be necessary to monitor the fuel rail pressure to make sure its OK.

But regardless of who is and isn't using it, its a very promising technology. Hopefully the kinks will get worked out and the cost will come down soon. He mentioned heat build up at the fuel pump, but I have to assume that this was heat from the engine and not the pump itself - because if its barely running then its not generating enough heat to cause a problem. Maybe wrapping it in glass insulation in a little plastic bag would help?

[greg737]

Actually, what I gather is that Ford has been using the sensor since 2006, but not necessarily his system.

I never said Madhu had anything to do with the automotive industry. He's just one of us, a guy who experiments with motorcycles and fuel injection and computers. He builds things like his fuel pump controller in his spare time.

[lc86]

So after reading this thread for awhile I ended up buying ShoeProtectors ecotrons kit and attempt to install it. I got it yesterday and I have it fully installed (emphasis on installed). It actually wasn't too bad, I only ran into a few problems along the way, such as...

Especially since for some reason my cables have a long threaded piece that apparently forbitel's did not.

Mine was the same way, and it turns out if you try to get it to fit onto the throttle body it breaks off (ask me how I know). So I ended up making a temporary solution by making a mount using the piece off of the old carbs.

I called it a night after I couldn't get the harness to plug into where the CDI unit went, after messing with it for about half an hour I decided I would splice it in the morning. Luckily when I was messing with it today I realized the little yellow plastic piece from the CDI unit was still in the connector, and now it fits like a charm.

...Other than that, nothing was too bad (but holy crap, who designed it to be so hard to move the air box, I think that took longer than anything else).

So anyways, its installed with the throttle body upside down, and everything stock on the bike (i.e. exhaust, airbox, throttle cable). It starts with a little effort, but it will start, but it doesn't like to idle very well. If I keep on the throttle just ever so slightly it will work fine, but I can't seem to fix it, and obviously being the newbie I am I completely followed Forbitel's example of playing with the idle screws :-) I don't know if the ECU is mapped correctly for my bike since ShoeProtector bought it, but I did hook it up to the computer and there are no error codes (and the O2 sensors are in).

I honestly have no idea what the hell I am doing on the computer or what I am even looking at, so I figure I will retire for the night with lots of rum and cokes, and tomorrow I will try and figure it out.

[Spork]

So I want to know if we can set up another group buy. Cause I am interested in the kit and would love to get a discount on it. What do I need to do in order to set that up (if at all even possible)?

[choneofakind]

Originally Posted by Spork

So I want to know if we can set up another group buy. Cause I am interested in the kit and would love to get a discount on it. What do I need to do in order to set that up (if at all even possible)?

You'll have to talk to Matt at ecotrons since he's the owner of the business you'd be working with

Honestly though, you might be better off waiting a little bit because you might have trouble getting enough buyers in your GB with it this close to the GB that just happened. It might also benefit you to wait until this group of guys have a solid, tried and true method of installing and tuning this kit, because people will be more interested in a kit that doesn't require loads of ingenuity and fab work.

[setasai]

Very cool updates everybody. If you intend to start another group buy, please make another thread for it. I also agree with everybody else, wait until the rest of us have all of the kits installed, and a few more bugs worked out. The major issue that we are still having with installation is the throttle cables brackets. The major issue with tuning is starting to work itself out and hopefully will get closer to being refined soon enough.

I found some interesting stuff called QuickSteel. I am using it to make a mount point for the carb throttle cable brackets. Let's see if this works easy enough. It should allow us to use the original throttle cables and have almost perfect attachment points without any kind of tight angles.

[DJK]

I'm interested in the second group buy, but I want to wait till all these kinks get worked out.

[n4mwd]

Originally Posted by setasai

Very cool updates everybody. If you intend to start another group buy, please make another thread for it. I also agree with everybody else, wait until the rest of us have all of the kits installed, and a few more bugs worked out. The major issue that we are still having with installation is the throttle cables brackets. The major issue with tuning is starting to work itself out and hopefully will get closer to being refined soon enough.

I found some interesting stuff called QuickSteel. I am using it to make a mount point for the carb throttle cable brackets. Let's see if this works easy enough. It should allow us to use the original throttle cables and have almost perfect attachment points without any kind of tight angles.

I'm still having a great deal of trouble with everything. I've been working almost continuously for a month now and have nothing to show for it. I'm really tired of it now. I'm very close to putting mine on ebay.

The only problem with the throttle body that I have solved is the cable bracket for top feeding injectors. I have actually modified my original design by JB-welding a piece of aluminum (shaped like an upside down 'U') on the #1 injector tube. The aluminum is threaded at the point where the bolt comes out and has a flat top. This creates a very solid upper mount point so that the bar between the two injectors is no longer required. If anybody is interested, I can post the engineering drawings of the new cable bracket and mount block. That's the little problem.

My new machined aluminum fuel rail has failed. That's the second one. At least I know what the problem is now. The TB is actually two TB's bolted together - crooked. The problem is that the random complex angles between the two injector plates create stress points on the O-rings that cause them to leak when the two injector housings are bolted down and connected with a rigid pipe. Making the fuel rail work with a rigid pipe requires machining equipment and skills way beyond what I have.

I'm thinking about machining new injector housings but with rubber tubing connecting the two instead. But this will be my last attempt to get the TB to work properly. If that attempt fails, the kit it will be for sale.

BTW, if you use JB-weld or other epoxy, make sure you wire brush off the powder coat where you want it to stick or else it wont. I cleaned it off in my case, but accidentally spilled some JB-weld on a non-cleaned spot and it easily flicked off with my fingernail after it was dry.

EDIT: I have attached a photo of my injector tube Cable Bracket Support block. It is pictured with the ecotrons plastic (ready to snap off) injector housings also installed. Maybe this will help someone else. Also attached is a photo of my first attempted fuel rail made from copper tubing. I didn't know why back then, but it had the same problem as the new one with the TB being misaligned.

[setasai]

@n4mwd Why not just go back to the original hoses and dead end fuel injection connections? I'm still not sure how a fuel rail fixes anything. The only thing that was an issue functionally to begin with was the throttle cable mounts and you already fixed that. Similar to how I fixed it except I used quicksteel. Photos in a bit, just gotta polish and tap the threads today.

[n4mwd]

Mostly because the plastic barbs are in a high fatigue situation (especially injector #2) that is a failure waiting to happen. By failure, I mean snap off and squirt gasoline all over your legs while you are doing 65 mph on the interstate.

Take a look at injector #2. Its barb nearly touches the electrical connection for injector #1. The hose is 5/8" OD. There is no way to make the connection without somebody being overstressed.

If the plastic housings had two barbs (like a Tee), then they would have a lot less fatigue caused by the constant tugging of the high pressure rubber fuel line. Also, the pressure regulator has no barbs so if you just clamp hoses to it, it will be necessary to use safety wire (or equivalent) on it to make sure the hoses don't pop off.

I could live without a pass-through fuel delivery system, but as far as the throttle body and fuel rail go, if I can't do it right, I won't be doing it at all. Using the original plastic injector housings is definitely not the right way to go in terms of both safety and reliability.

I mean, can anyone who has installed the kit honestly say that if they lay it down that its just as safe as it was with carbs?

Like I said, I'm going to give it one last try, but if that fails, I'm going to sell it and let someone else worry about it. Honestly, if you used a UK TB with it, you would probably have a pretty decent system.

[Daves2JZ]

I already ditched my kit Do to the TB. If I had gone with th uk fi tb I would probably be running the kit now but lost interest do to the supplied TB

Anyone reading this thinking about getting the kit spend the extra money on the uk fi tb offered!

[ecotrons]

The interference between the high pressure fuel hose and the inejctor electrical connector can be alleviated by replacing the thick hose (5/8" OD) with the " Helix 1/4' fuel line" (3/8" OD).

The barbed pressure regulators are coming. All guys who bought this kit can get one to replace the old one.

Matt from Ecotrons

[setasai]

Agreed! It's unfortunate the UK throttlebody isnt supplied directly by kawasaki to us. It would make many things easier! I wonder if there is another TB that we could have purchased. Like a 650 FI TB or CBR250's FI. I know they're very different but maybe the modifications would be less invasive.

@ecotrons cool thanks. Would it cost us anything? If not go ahead and send me one whenever you pick them out.

Can you really replace it with the fuel line? Arent they supposed to be pressure rated? The blue fuel lines arent exactly rated for any sort of pressure. If anything, I think a 90deg barbed connector would be solve that.

[greg737]

Like a 650 FI TB or CBR250's FI.

Do you mean the Ninja 650 throttlebody? It's got 38mm bores. Way too big for the EX-250 engine.

[setasai]

Originally Posted by greg737

Do you mean the Ninja 650 throttlebody? It's got 38mm bores. Way too big for the EX-250 engine.

Yea I figured it'd be too big. Which throttlebody did you use again? I was just thinking that since a custom throttlebody is too difficult to make and a kawasaki OEM can only be found in the UK used, then the next best thing is another brand's throttlebody that can be purchased easily in the US.

[n4mwd]

Greg said he used a UK Ninja 250 throttle body. That's what everyone should use IMHO. The problem is availability and the fact that those junkyard guys in the UK KNOW just how bad we want them and price them accordingly.

I bought a 650 TB just for design reference. I only paid $25 for it. Greg already told me that it was too big so I wasn't expecting it to fit. However, its good for design reference because its pretty much a scaled up version of the UK 250 FI TB. It can't be used unfortunately. Its too wide to fit in the frame.

The CBR250 is a single bore TB (only one cylinder) so that is worse than what we have now. Probably.

[n4mwd]

Originally Posted by ecotrons

The interference between the high pressure fuel hose and the inejctor electrical connector can be alleviated by replacing the thick hose (5/8" OD) with the " Helix 1/4' fuel line" (3/8" OD).

The barbed pressure regulators are coming. All guys who bought this kit can get one to replace the old one.

Matt from Ecotrons

A new regulator would be nice for some people, but its really one of the smaller problems. If the kit came with T-barbed injector housings, then it would go a long way toward making it easier to install. Attached is a photoshop version of what I am talking about.

[EMSRacer07]

Originally Posted by n4mwd

A new regulator would be nice for some people, but its really one of the smaller problems. If the kit came with T-barbed injector housings, then it would go a long way toward making it easier to install. Attached is a photoshop version of what I am talking about.

Yea the T injector would make it super easy to install them side by side. I had to loop around some of the lines to get to the other injector. But wasnt that bad. I been running my kit for a while now. Why not just install it the way it was intentionally intended? No need to custom fab a fuel rail or new throttle wheel.

My only issues have been some of the maps but Matt has been great with all that and adjusting and helping with issues. other than that its been working great. My bikes been my DD and after a bit of tweaking of the system its been pretty reliable. Especially cold starts in the morning were always a pain. FI so much better. I dont know how im doing fuel economy wise. Maybe a bit rich right now but the ecu really needs to learn more and i need to ride more.

Just to watch out for the Map sensor, it sits downward when u flip the TBs upside down, and from my experience gathers a bit of gas at idle and makes for a lumpy idle and in some cases turn off the bike but moving it so it doesnt collect the fuel fixed it. Just a heads up. Otherwise i love my fuel injected bike . And for the price we got it its relatively cheap.

O and i would def get those cut offs. i need to pick two up so i can do my regular mateinance like valves and stuff. but otherwise pretty nice.

[setasai]

Hey question. Where did you end up putting the fuel pump? I couldnt find a better place to put it so I put it on one of the lower bolts. Hopefully it's not too low and wont affect anything.

[EMSRacer07]

idk if u were asking me but i have a older gen bike. i used a steal bracket hanger and the holder that it came with and i stuck it about 3-4in lower than the tank petcock. but i have mine sitting above my tbs. i had more space above the tbs than below. below probably would have been better but its been working great

[Scattcatt]

Originally Posted by setasai

Hey question. Where did you end up putting the fuel pump? I couldnt find a better place to put it so I put it on one of the lower bolts. Hopefully it's not too low and wont affect anything.

On the right side under the black cover, I just zip tied it to the harness and it worked great!