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RickDaTuner
12-21-2006, 05:55 PM
.. Err I mean MAF...

so for a while now I've been noticing a huge drop of Fuel Economy on my beast, I went from averaging 430km to 60 liters of fuel down to a measly 360km... not fun when the car already guzzles gas like its an alcoholic at Oktoberfest.

That issue combined with a CEL that would sporadically appear when it rained, lead me to inquire further.
A somewhat long drive down to a local (to you Calgarians) Auto value was made, in order to make use of their free OBII scan tools... "A-ha!" I said "we have a win"...

P0171 System Too Lean (Bank 1)

oh shi-take mushrooms... we have a looser.

this code meant one of a many things, here are some just to name a few

-I had tuned my car to run way to lean and the ECU wasn't happy
-The front O2 sensor had call it quits ( big money)
-there was some sort of small creature living inside my intake track...
-or I had one seriously dirty MAF

The local help at the Auto Value kindly cleared the code, rest my ECU and I was on my way.

For about 1 week I had notice my fuel range decreasing ever so slightly and my AFR gauge was doing silly things, randomly going from a nice and stead fuel saving 14.7 all the way down to a gas guzzling knock inducing 9.0 AFR.
A quick log run from my UTEC revealed my stock injectors were running 110% injector duty cycle during those bouts of hella rich fuel mixtures, haha

well I started do some research on Nasioc, and was directed to this thread

http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=475620&highlight=p0171

"eureka," I said, followed by "damn this looks expensive."

So I started going down the list, and didn't really get a hit until I went down to my local NAPA and bought my self some Intake cleaner, put my MAF in a ziploc bag (as was suggest by other fellow STI owners) and gave the senor a good bath, in smelly super flammable liquids... mmm can you smell the cancer forming...

Then allowed the MAF to dry and put here back in the car

BINGO!!

as soon as i started the car, the AFR shot all they way up to 16.3 followed by a much more smooth and appealing engine tone.
Took the Roo for a spin and was getting a sporadic AFR again, but this time on the opposite side of things..
16.0-17.2-15.5-.14.7 and then stayed steady at 14.7
Sweet the ECU was happy again, the car gained power and was sounding super smooth...

pheeeeewww, and from the start of all this I though I was gonna have to shell out some big money for a new sensor.
And all it took to fix was a 10 dollar can of maf cleaner...

wooot!

here are some pictures of my date with the MUFF... i mean MAF...

Here it is out of the car, I swiped a finger across the caseing to show how much dirt was actually on there

http://www3.telus.net/duarpa/maf1d.jpg

and another angle

http://www3.telus.net/duarpa/maf2d.jpg


the back side

http://www3.telus.net/duarpa/maf3d.jpg

here is a shot of how dirrty the cleaning fluid was after the first bath..

http://www3.telus.net/duarpa/maff.jpg


and now here it is all clean and ready for more fun

http://www3.telus.net/duarpa/maf1c.jpg

and another shot

http://www3.telus.net/duarpa/maf2c.jpg

and what was the cause of such a dirrty MAF sensor.....


this

http://memimage.cardomain.net/member_images/7/web/2311000-2311999/2311651_12.jpg the short Ram intake made by K&N desinged to increase horse power...

haha


Happy Tuning

CRXguy
12-21-2006, 06:16 PM
Hey Rick.... which spray can did you buy? I'm at 85,000km and I think I'm due for a MAF cleaning as well. :rofl:

RickDaTuner
12-21-2006, 06:19 PM
Originally posted by CRXguy
Hey Rick.... which spray can did you buy? I'm at 85,000km and I think I'm due for a MAF cleaning as well. :rofl:

I bought some Kleen-Flo air intake kleen from Napa, I dont think it's directly made to be used with MAF's but it gets the job done, with out damaging the sensor of course:thumbsup:

^SkylinE^
12-21-2006, 06:32 PM
This is great ! i have the K and N short ram! I have only had the car for a couple months but i have notices that STI guzzels gas like V8:eek: I think im going to try this out! Great post!

CRXguy
12-21-2006, 06:38 PM
Originally posted by ^SkylinE^
This is great ! i have the K and N short ram! I have only had the car for a couple months but i have notices that STI guzzels gas like V8:eek: I think im going to try this out! Great post!

Did you sell your EG h/b?

Congrats on the STi. :thumbsup: :bigpimp:

xrayvsn
12-21-2006, 07:02 PM
Originally posted by ^SkylinE^
This is great ! i have the K and N short ram! I have only had the car for a couple months but i have notices that STI guzzels gas like V8:eek: I think im going to try this out! Great post!

Its not the STI, its your right foot on the go pedal :burnout:

Altezza
12-21-2006, 07:11 PM
You can use pretty much any non-residue electronics cleaner for this job.

harv91
12-22-2006, 01:20 AM
:eek:
wow thats sweet i think i gotta get myself one of those now.
How many km's u gettin on a full tank of gas now?

rip
12-22-2006, 10:18 AM
I did, this same thing a few months ago. I just have the stock flat panel K&N replacement panel. I noticed a slight improvement in fuel economy.

Make sure the cleaner you use isn't going to damage the plastic casing and the o-ring.

RickDaTuner
01-08-2007, 05:19 PM
Originally posted by harv91
:eek:
wow thats sweet i think i gotta get myself one of those now.
How many km's u gettin on a full tank of gas now?

on my drive to edmonton, running on 25 liters of petro 91 and 30 liters of Husy 94, i managed to get 480kms out of 60 liters of gas, and this was with me doing 140 all the way out there... yeah the Fuel econ picked up quite a bit...

the only down side to all this is i have to go back and re-tune my car since i had down it first with the dirty MAF

I should book some Dyno time