covertrussian

Ok I think I'm sold on the idea of a PHEV Subaru, especially since it has the Toyota's geared CVT without a belt!

The performance of this system is top notch compared to RAV4 hybrid or even gas version.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qidx3AsUmpk]2019 Subaru Crosstrek Hybrid Off-Road Challenge! (PHEV) - YouTube[/ame]

Did you bump into the MAF plug/wire or touch them when regrounding the radiator? For me everytime I looked at the MAF connector/wires it would start going bad or back to normal. Even the slightest tug on the wires would cause the connection to change.

Logically it makes no sense for radiator grounding to affect your MAF like that. UNLESS your engine grounds are completely toast and it's grounding through the water in the coolant....

This is long, bear with me. After a run at the drag strip last year, the car went lean, I have another post on that. It went 12% lean everywhere, idle, cruise, WOT, on boost, off boost, very consistent. I went through checking fuel pressure, voltage, MAF voltage, pressurizing the intake with smoke for leaks, I had the injectors cleaned and flow tested, I took the intake manifold off and replaced every gasket and vacuum hose, cleaned the bottom engine grounds.

This sounds really similar to what I, and a few others, recently experienced with the MAF connectors loosing contact overtime. Here is how I re-did the MAF connectors that resolved that issue.

Nah we're only a family of 4, so around town it's fine. It's would be most useful when we go anywhere, especially with extended family.

Also minivan fails the ground clearance and AWD requirement. Also minivan's are uncool, which is one of the reasons the Honda Pilot is not high on the list, nor the 2020 Highlander (both look too much like a minivan).

Realistically though both Highlander and Pilot are not on my high list due to: cylinder deactivation, auto start-stop, and boat like handling, and lack of space (highlander). Though I might settle for a used Pilot since they are half the cost of the Ascent.

BTW, thinking about it, part of that 7500 OCI (1/3) was with limited to no AC. That said, running with AC at full lilt, it doesn't seem to affect the mileage more than .2MPG.

That's probably due to the extra cylinders, even on my LGT I remember AC being about an 1-2mpg hit around town. I'm gonna test this next, while it's blistering hot.

Just install the Front camera, Rear view mirror camera, and power folding mirrors on your current outback and you're set

Halfway there, installed a mirror dashcam right before my last long trip. It was useful to catching idiots doing idiot things. I didn't hook up the backup camera portion yet though.

But even with all of that, we are at the limits of the Outback size, it's just too cramped for us. Having to take two cars to go anywhere was also a pain, if we had an 8 seater, around town excursions would fit my whole family.

Anyway, so I'm back to shopping for bigger car, I love the Outback but we simply outgrew it already .

Just saw the Legacy/Outback pricing & features thread, and noticed something that makes me angry at Subaru and Ascent.

The 2020 Legacy Premium begins at $24,995. Upgrades over the Base trim include All-Weather Package (heated front seats, heated exterior mirrors and windshield wiper de-icer), leather-wrapped steering wheel, dual-zone automatic climate control system and a 10-way power driver seat that includes power lumbar support. The Premium now comes standard with power-folding exterior mirrors in matching body color with integrated turn signal.

Why is it that we have to go ALL THE WAY TO Touring model of the 2020 Ascent to get power folding mirrors, when a 20k cheaper legacy premium gets it standard (not even as a $$ add-on!).

I really want a Front camera, Rear view mirror camera, and power folding mirrors, pricing aside I really hate the forced 7 seat BROWN leather, along with moon roof. Thus I wish Subaru would give us these items as option packages for the Limited trim.

They were $31k back in ‘05 (15yr ago).

I can’t afford one right now, but if I had that price range, I’d be pretty serious about one.

Weren't Legacy GT Limited's $31k? Which is 35k now? And the Premiums have MUCH more stuff then even Limiteds of 2009 , sans leather.

But still to your point, adjusted for inflation, $31k would be $40.5k today.

The current 3.6R OB Touring is $39,970 with the destination charge.

I still find this price absurd, especially with the Ascent being a "bigger/better" cars

Another item that's worthy for this thread. I also came across this issue/fix during my headlight test, which once again set me back a few weeks .

The MAF connector's female receptacles tend to over-compress overtime (or repeated unplugs). Thus one day during my baseline MPG test, car starts running pig rich and short and long term adjustments get maxed out pulling fuel (-25% and -15% respectably). As soon as I touched the MAF connector, the car's idle rose up and short term correction dropped into adding fuel (to correct for the -15% learned trim).

I pulled the pins out and pushed in the receptacle's connection, which fixed the issue. Compare the before and after gap in this picture:

More details on how I did this can be found in my build thread.

Onto the numbers

All the runs were done in the 60-91F weather, similar traffic patterns (as seen by run times), and similar driving styles (up to 0psi, staying in closed loop).

Before the fix:

20.51mpg (Gauge: 21.3) - 267min Runtime

20.78mpg (Gauge: 21.3) - 268min Runtime (Failure and fix happened about halfway through this run)

After the fix:

21.44mpg (Gauge: 22.5) - 265min Runtime

21.38mpg (Gauge: 22.2) - 284min Runtime

Real world gains (Averaged): 0.765mpg or 3.71%

If I stayed in Closed Loop then why did I see some gains?

Part of it is the closed loop turn on delay, but in summer months this delay is about a minute tops. I think the biggest reason is timing related. With the MAF reading higher loads, which caused the over-fueling issue, the timing would be reduced too. Basically the ECU would think I'm in boost when I'm really in vacuum or 0psi.

That’s exactly want mine was doing, but at -12.x%. Leading theory is high ground resistance, creating a fairly consistent voltage to offset.. The maf’s Output signal generator (opamp or digital electronics) will be referenced to it’s own ground and thinks everything is fine. But it’s ground is maybe 1/4 Volt higher than the ECU ground (which it uses as reference), creating a bad reading. Compounding this the power draw of heater circuit in the MAF is proportional to the output voltage and thus the ground voltage offset will be close to a fixed percentage.

 

Guess this is why some domestic manufacturers use PWM signals from their maf’s vs the analog signals most Japanese and Euro manufacturers use. As long as the signal is still making it and the MAF input voltage is high through for it to operate these sort of issues don’t matter.

Thank you very much for this, I definitely wasn't considering the ground. I was thinking it was related to hot wire MAF design; where the hot wire wasn't being heated as much, thus ECU thought that it's being overcooled, as it would be with higher airflow, thus seeing higher load.

Also I've never seen such MAF funkyness with 1990's Nissan ECU's. Both are similar design (hot wire), but for some reason Nissan MAF's were much more resilient to airflow and intake changes. MAF V wouldn't jump down, like it does on Subaru, when I would install a cone filter instead of stock airbox.

Seems like maybe something I should do to (all of) the connectors in my engine bay to try to address my misfire.

Definitely! I'm thinking about going through and re-crimping all of the injector and spark plug pins too, fortunately those don't get unplugged nearly as often so they don't seem to fatigue as quickly.

I really should watch this thread, so many goodies get posted in between the everyday chatter. Maybe the forum should have like based notification scale, if a post gets 3+ likes then send me notification

Managed to figure out how to clone the code from my original ECM to a replacement ECM. Mucking around with a hex editor, realized that the "secret code" was my VIN number... Also means that I can now read the VIN from an ECM to know what car it came from, which could be useful.

 

It took a while, and I had to pull info from several different sources to finally get it working. But really didn't want to pay the dealer to do it. I can try to write it up if people think it might be helpful. It was about $30 in parts and a bunch of time to figure out the software and drivers.

 

[ATTACH]277187[/ATTACH]

This is really cool! I'm assuming your doing this to replace the ECU without needing dealer to program in the keys right? I have two spare 06 ECU's that are bricks, but I would love to use them if mine turns into a brick again (thanks to rad fan recall).

Now I've seen some cars, Mini Coopers, which were able to use ECU Flash to reprogram the immobilizer keys. This told me that it's at least possible to use flashing software for some ECU's, not sure how ours fare to it.

Went to a LKQ for the first time today. Both outbacks they had were complete trashed so I didn’t get much, but I did manage to grab a few clips and things I needed.

 

Over the last three days my car has started to seriously pull fuel. As in I’m -12% across the A, B, and C ranges. Watching trims while driving it gets up to the 20’s or as low as zero net pulled though. Fuel pressure looks fine idling (34 psi), and the meth system isn’t showing flow when it shouldn’t, so I’m stumped on what could cause it to go negative like this. An air leak should cause the trims to go positive. A bad O2 sensor would show up as a delta between the OEM and AEM sensor.

 

Only changes in the last few days were installing the new boost controller on the EWG, and adding some MMT based octane booster for additional knock margin while tuning it.

This really does sound like what I experienced with MAF wires getting loose over time. Especially the variations I would see every time I would unplug the MAF to do another change. Remember how spark plug changes would really screw with my g/rev's?

Presuming I don't find something physically wrong, that would be my guess. I had to readjust the turbo inlet when doing the EWG plumbing which necessitated moving the Grimmspeed intake a little. If the wiring is starting to go, that slight movment may have caused an issue.

 

Covertrussian had similar issues when doing inlet testing where he though the had to rescale the MAF, which 100% should not be needing for changes upstream of it. Subaru kind of cheaps out on there wires that have lots of movment (see wagon hatch issues).

 

So if the MAF ground went high resistance, it should cause the MAFv reading to go up (output is referenced to ground, ground is ~0.1v higher than ecu ground, ECU sees a 0.1v higher signal).

 

Not looking forward to rewiring the MAF harness if that is infact what happened though... Finding the correct shielded signal wire will be a pain.

Does the GS intake position the MAF a little too far (too stretched?) Or is it related to the box being a little too small?

It really does seem like Subaru connectors and female receptacles are prone to stretching. I've owned a bunch of ~2000 Nissan's and I've never had to recrimp the pins so many times.

Today: ordered new MAF connector, a spare MAF, and some connectors for relocating the IAT sensor into the throttle body hose when I rewire everything. I have one there now, but it’s just used for logging. Need to change the ECU input so it will adjust timing based on it.

I'm really curious on your post IC IAT setup once your done!

Thank you for this post... I’ve been fighting the same issue for the last few weeks, and actually just ordered a new MAF connector and enough shielded wired to replace thing all the way back to the ECU. This seems faster than redoing everything, may try this first.

Heck yeah, I did this over my lunch break, so shouldn't take long at all.

Ok I found my learning view log screenshot. A, B, C was maxed out at -15%. This is ECU removing fuel, which means the engine load is higher when the MAF connection is loose. This also means the MAF is reading higher voltages too, I'm still brainstorming on why it would read higher voltages in this case...

You guys might remember my MAF connector contact issue from about two years ago, just like with my OBD2 port, repeated unplugging simply wore it out. Well it happened again, one day, the car just started being pig rich. It happened about a week or two after I hand to unplug it to replace the headlight/fog light bulbs.

Now, when I first did the MAF connector fix, I didn't understand how they worked so I probably made it worse. I was planning on doing a new connector eventually, but this failure happened spontaneously and I didn't have the parts on hand yet. Also, this time around I was armed with knowledge of how Subaru pins work, thanks to the OBD2 connector fix that I did a few months back.

Here's the problem child, this is the new MAF that I got in 2017

Even though I pull one wire at a time, still a good idea to have a picture of wire color and their respective locations.

In order to take the female receptacles out, the little white tray needs to be pulled out, just don't pull it all the way out.

Inside the connector you'll see a little plastic tab that you need to push up or down and it will free up the female receptacle (sorry didn't get a pic of it). Once removed, it will look like this:

The way this receptacle works is, the metal wraps from the front of the receptacle halfway back. It works like a flat spring, where the inside should constantly push up against the MAF's male pins. Overtime this flat spring compresses too much, resulting in a loose fitting male pin.

You can somewhat see this on the before (left image) and after (right image) here:

Inside the female receptacle, you should be able to push the flat spring up(down in the picture since the receptacle is upside down), which will reduce the receptacle's overall gap.

Here is the before and after again, sorry for the after being kind of fuzzy. You can see slightly smaller gaps in the receptacles. When I went to install it, it refused to go in at first! It really needed some force to get it back onto the MAF!

Technical Details

Unfortunately I didn't get a before and after log, since I accidentally fixed it by touching the MAF connector (which temporarily re-established a connection and car ran better already). But as I mentioned earlier, the loose connections made the ECU run pig rich when going into slight boost/open loop. I did see the short and long term fuel trims being maxed out in the negative (removing fuel).

This is interesting because the loose connection was causing the MAF to read a higher higher load. Basically, the MAF made the ECU think that I'm running 6psi when in reality I was only running 1psi. This causes enriched fuel and reduced timing, which both would lead to rich fuel and sluggish performance.

utc_pyro has a more technical description in this post.

Surprising Aftermath

I was in a middle of an MPG test (for headlights) when this happened. While I'm mad that it created another variable, nullifying weeks of headlight testing, the MPG benefits that this made made up for it!

Before the fix I saw the following city MPG:

20.51mpg (Gauge: 21.3)

20.78mpg (Gauge: 21.3) * Failure and fix happened about halfway through this run

After the contact fix my MPG instantly jumped to:

21.44mpg (Gauge: 22.5)

21.38mpg (Gauge: 22.2)

Real world gains (Averaged): 0.765mpg or 3.71%

Also, it's nice to see that gauge MPG saw the difference too, which also makes sense since it's based on mass airflow readings.

Ohhhh I see how your getting such good gas mileage, E-0 fuel is probably the biggest help! I wish Shell had E-0, I would test the heck out of it myself.

As for BWTC, any reason for going external instead of retuning the ecu?

Was impressed by a guy who has been posting videos of his new Passport.

He's out west and going out on runs with a bunch a Subarus. The Passport definitely does much better in crawling situations than Subaru

Do you know if the the Passport AWD exactly the same as the Pilot's or has been tweaked a bit? General articles make it seem like it's the same, but the details like this usually are found on user forums (which I haven't bothered reading through yet).

Pilot's AWD seems good but still is re-active at the end of the day.

I haven't posted in a LONG time, but I've seen doing a lot of MPG testing in the background. While I was testing headlights usage gas stations switched to summer fuel here, and while it ruined my headlight test it did provide me with a nice data point for Winter vs Summer fuel MPG difference in the city.

Winter gas: 19.71mpg

Fill date: 04/20/2019

Temps: 55-83F

Runtime: 267 minutes

Summer gas: 20.97mpg

Fill date: 05/03/19

Temps: 60-83F

Runtime: 274 minutes

MPG Increase: 1.26mpg

Percent Increase: 6.39%

I filled up about 15 gallons after that winter test, which should have flushed out all of the old gas. Since I wasn't testing for this change for say I didn't get the exact date it switched but all of my runs after 04/27/19 were in 20's while prior to that they all stayed 19.71 or less.

I keep forgetting from which perspective Subaru names stuff :-).

That's odd that the new one would be slower to react, especially with no turbo leaching oil pressure from the line too. No obvious oil leaks right?

Looks like it's hitting the right numbers. Now your right side is lagging behind the left side a little, especially when you first floor it, you can even see it working harder by increasing the duty cycles.

I believe right side is the driver side, if it is, then it's probably a clogged filter behind the timing belt cover (which is really hard/impossible to get to without removing the timing belt etc.).

I would definitely pay the 2x price for OEM in this case, especially since it's only $50 more, OEM ones seem to come with ball joints too. OEM metal is generally better, ball joints are far superior, and same goes for OEM style bushings.

Also I got my OEM ball joints for $30ish each online. But now seeing that arms are only $70 more maybe I should have just replaced it all (I still have whiteline bushings in my BM arms).