87roach's 1987 S Hatch Build

[87roach]

Yea perhaps, but this is what I have to work with for now. If I have to I'll upgrade to something better when the time comes.

I also live in Canada so it's not $94 shipped for me and our dollar is currently at $0.82, the omni 4 bar is $129.99 + plus shipping($20 est.) so that means if the sensor comes to $150USD shipped, I will be paying $183. Soo yea.. no thanks, I am not spending almost two bills on a map sensor.

Oh yea, I also got my new battery in today, it looks good and is ready to go. Hopefully I will be able to keep this one alive for a long time(unlike the previous one)!

[Tdurr]

ohh well damn. That sucks, exchange rates ftl?

what kinda of battery did you get?

[87roach]

Yea exchange rates for the lose. I think if I keep my eyes open though I could probably get something closer to $100, at least I hope.

The battery is an Odyssey PC680.

[obd0driver]

I ran that battery and hated it. It dies fast. Be sure to get a battert tender for it to keep it at 110% when you not use the car. These are deep cycle batterys and need to be "over charged" to full charge the battery. I did upgrade to bigger one

[87roach]

Care to elaborate? Why would your battery die fast? Power problems? Poor alternator?

[Tdurr]

Besure to do the uhh 2amp(i think) charge before installing it. My battery didn't do to hot in the cold weather but works fine. Just try not to kill it too often.

[87roach]

I was just curious about why he had problems with the battery.

I recall you having a power draw from your seat belts Tim? I'm sure that wouldn't help with keeping a smaller battery alive either, and what is cold for your area? I'm just curious because I think your battery is similar to mine?

Ohh I also think I got something in the mail today.. I have to go check today.

[Tdurr]

Yea I Did have a power draw with the seatbelts(im surprised you remembered) but during the winter here there were a few days when the batt was just dead. One time i did try and hit it like 7 times and only got a few slow turns. Then on the 8th time it started up like it wasnt struggling before. cold here is like 0-10*F. so if ur in Canada you might have some serious struggles. But i hope its not the case for you man!

[obd0driver]

^I had a power draw somewhere also. The battery it's self has little to no auxiliary power so when playing music no sub with the car off it will only last 5 minutes or just sitting when tunning the battery would die. The best thing to do it just get a battery tender and hook it up when you not using the car. Just like you would for a atv or dirt bike.

[gp02a0083]

had this argument in one of lostforawhile's threads. The Pc680 only has a 170 CCa rating (540 hot) with a 24 min reserve, so any drains as you guys have encountered would kill this battery in no time as you guys found out. its nice it still is a Pb type battery and the discharge curve wouldn't have the cliff that lithium types have.

all depends on the usage, for a DD i'd suggest a normal battery. For my "toy" car i use the optima batteries being i can get them for less than $150 new

[obd0driver]

optima batteries are just as bad ask Messy Honda. He just had a similar situation with his yellow top. A battery tender will fix this either way

[87roach]

Good points fellas, I would have to agree that it isn't the ideal daily battery but I don't have a sub or crazy stereo and I will be also keeping an eye out for any power draws just in case.. I don't want to waste the bills I spent. I do agree with the battery tender but unfortunately in my current situation there is no external power anywhere on my apartment build so it's not even an option. The only thing I can do is to bring the battery into my place and keep it on the trickle, I think this would only be worthwhile doing on extended trips out of town. I will have to see what happens over the next few months though as I will hopefully be driving quite a bit and messing around in the car! Actually when I was looking at the old PC680 and the new one I just got I noticed that the new one was quite a bit of a step down from the previous, the new one with 170CCA and the old one with 220CCA for instance, also the voltages were different when running the car too, I believe the old one was around 14.6v(give or take) and now the new one is 14.0v'ish, the car still started fine on the new one but I wanted to note the differences(I'd have to look again for every difference though).

ANYWAY! ONTO THE GOODS:

This is the Demon 2!!





So I was able to return my Honda Tuning Kit(that I purchased probably 3 years ago) to Moates and use the credit towards the Demon/Neptune RTP Combo, it was well worth it and simplified everything. I just have to install it now which I will be trying to tackle this evening! I'll take some pictures as I go along too, I'm stoked!

[89T]

Xenocron has exelent tutorials on the installation. I haven't forgotten about you. I just haven't had the time.

[87roach]

Thanks Jerry, and no problem. I will be messing around this weekend on neptune so if you could get me anything before/on saturday that would be very helpful!

My camera battery died but I just finished the install, I used the guide on hamotorsports as it was very thorough with images. I can't do much else since I can't go outside and plug it in the car until the weekend but I'll get those pics up soon!

[Tdurr]

legit!! hopefully you can get to tuning the car here soon! what ecu did you put this chip in again?

[87roach]

Thanks Tim!

I want to try to get some tuning in on the weekend, and since the hatch is currently not where I live and 1 hour away(2hr round trip), I will only be able to mess around on the weekends for a bit until I sell my daily(neon) and free up a parking spot.

The ECU I chipped is an Integra PR4 OBD1.

The ECU of course:


All the resistors and hardware components installed(sorry no before picture):


The kitchen workstation!


The Demon snapped into place!




I have to cut two holes into the case so I can access the USB easy, and also so I can connect my wideband(to the green). I don't have those tools right now so it will have to wait till the weekend. The install went well, I followed the directions and I didn't actually have any de-soldering braid or the pro sucker device but I did have the bulb and it worked very well when I heated the front of the board and used the sucker from the back. After a bunch of that and soldering the rest into place it was just a matter of plugging in the demon to the board and that's it.

Well I think I'm ready to go.. I bought a netbook so I could have something portable for tuning, plus the map sensor, plus the battery, plus the demon.. needless to say I am a bit in the red. However, it's going to be worth it as I will finally be able to drive the 3geez again! I'll have to get some pics and videos going on soon, I still have to get those engine bay ones.

Any tips on tuning are welcome, of course. I have a lot to learn so any help is welcomed.

[Hash_man_Se_i]

Hash man! Great to see you're still around dude, if you're still in the area we should get together this year.

For sure man, I do plan to make my way out to BC at least once or twice this summer so we will have to make that happen. I've been in school the past couple of years so not much has been done on the Accord but she's still on the road.

Send me a PM with your number or email or something so I can get in touch when coming out that way. Cheers.

[gp02a0083]

optima batteries are just as bad ask Messy Honda. He just had a similar situation with his yellow top. A battery tender will fix this either way

I never had a problem with spiral AGM's. The last one i had for just over 10 years in my cutty even when it was stored outside. All i do is disconnect the battery since the car is not driven every week. Last one i bought back in 2013 , and still works fine today even tho I do not keep it on a battery tender. A lot of people kill those batteries when they recharge them with a normal re-charger without connecting a lead acid battery in parallel

Roach, doesn't really surprise me the voltages you observed were different, size/energy density and stuff like that. I would think with those odyssey batteries with the multi shim plate design there might be a good chance that shorting of the plates could happen, but they might have thought of that in the design. im not sure.

Looks like the electrical component install was clean

[87roach]

For sure man, I do plan to make my way out to BC at least once or twice this summer so we will have to make that happen. I've been in school the past couple of years so not much has been done on the Accord but she's still on the road.

Send me a PM with your number or email or something so I can get in touch when coming out that way. Cheers.

Right on man, I'm down for a meet! I'll pm you my contact info.

I never had a problem with spiral AGM's. The last one i had for just over 10 years in my cutty even when it was stored outside. All i do is disconnect the battery since the car is not driven every week. Last one i bought back in 2013 , and still works fine today even tho I do not keep it on a battery tender. A lot of people kill those batteries when they recharge them with a normal re-charger without connecting a lead acid battery in parallel

Roach, doesn't really surprise me the voltages you observed were different, size/energy density and stuff like that. I would think with those odyssey batteries with the multi shim plate design there might be a good chance that shorting of the plates could happen, but they might have thought of that in the design. im not sure.

Looks like the electrical component install was clean

Thanks man, I'll have to take a video showing it because I don't think the pictures turned out very well. As for the battery, you make a good point about unplugging it when not in use. I will probably be doing this as a "just in case" thing. Actually another idea, do you think a big kill switch would be a better option instead of disconnecting the terminal every time?

[Tdurr]

Kill switch woul be nice. Mounting them is a pain imo.

[gp02a0083]

Right on man, I'm down for a meet! I'll pm you my contact info.

Thanks man, I'll have to take a video showing it because I don't think the pictures turned out very well. As for the battery, you make a good point about unplugging it when not in use. I will probably be doing this as a "just in case" thing. Actually another idea, do you think a big kill switch would be a better option instead of disconnecting the terminal every time?

taking some snapshots with a camera in macro mode should work out alright. My only other suggestion / tip when dealing with these old electronics is to get some flux remover / 90%-100% isopropyl alcohol and clean up flux residue. In addition if you wanted to spend the time, examine some of the resistors and the solder ringlets. I can be fairly sure that a good majority of those solder joints could be cracked, its the same issue with our dash clocks.

hog out a spot for that usb B connector and maybe make a small breakout chord / mount for that micro usb. Not sure what is required or if you have to use th but it sure would make life easy if you needed access to them.

I got one of those quick disconnect parts for now after i had messed up the negative side terminal on my cutlass. any auto store sell them or swap meets. Otherwise stick to the kills witch idea and get a decent one and a good hiding spot. Either way with the bastard electrical gremlins we can have on these cars, just best to disconnect the battery when not using it.

[Rendon LX-i]

whoa where have i been? Looks like you came back an with some progress.

With the pc680 I have installed its working great for me . Flaws its not meant for a system lol i can see a super stress on amperage when its loaded to small of a battery. other then that its great i suggest keeping a battery tender on it when parked for a long period of time. other then that its great working battery. I have it mounted on the side of the body inside the engine bay.

Glad to see some progress man. Great work.

[87roach]

Hey Josh, long time!

Glad to hear you've had a good experience with the battery. So far for mine I have just been disconnecting it when I am done, and it there have been no issues(so I think I'll keep doing that as it appears to work!).

Okay well, I went down and tinkered on the hatch for the weekend. Although after swapping out the map sensor, wiring in the wideband to the ecu and some other thing's that kept popping up I finally managed to get neptune plugged in and working! I made various basemaps and watched the results and just observed what was going on and watching the sensors, etc. Once I did that I figured I'd better do some more research.. since just diving in isn't really the best idea for me since I am new to this. So after much reading and finding out what numbers I should be shooting for I went back at it. Although this time I wanted to make sure the timing was good and matched what I had in neptune, this took me a while to get sorted out. I did manage to finally get the timing set with the help of the cam gear adjustment because the amount on the distributor was just out of reach. Okay so once I did that I started the car and proceeded to try and get the idle from crazy rich(around 10) to 14.7. This took me a while because I was just slowly going and watching the changes and learning as I went. Basically the whole fuel table is rich and I had to lean it up to get the idle where I wanted it. I also went for a drive after that and took a data log so I could see what was happening(damn neptune is cool!), it's very cool so see what's going on with the engine as I'm driving around and learning what happens when and such. Anyway, I am still learning but so far so good, still running rich and I really need someone else to drive around while I make adjustments because doing it by myself is quite challenging! I also think my bov spring is set too lightly because it's seems to be letting out boost while building, so I'll have to adjust that.

[Tdurr]

What bov do you have?

& great news man! Glad to hear that you are working on this thing still. I onow the struggle with trying to datalog/adjust when driving. A 2nd person is truly helpful. Did any of those maps work for you or did you start with a p75 then go from there??

[87roach]

The bov is a Greddy RS, it's just not the easiest to adjust because of where I put it, but once I tighten it up it should be fine(with some trial and error driving of course).

Thanks man, yea it's very hard doing it solo haha and trying to learn it all at the same time too but it's still very cool. I did use your maps and I also tried the p75 as a base too, I have iterations of both but I just recall everything mainly being way too rich so I think I just started with a p75 and went from there. Although I am interested in taking your boosted one, reducing it a bit and seeing what happens... now that I know enough to do that! haha

Man! Now that I've seen Josh's hood strut how to I want to get that! So cool.