AC Owners Club Forum
AC Owners Club Forum => Ace 'Brooklands' Forum => Topic started by: David S on November 22, 2014, 14:39:04
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Has anyone got a copy of the wiring diagram that I might be able to a copy.
Having replaced the exhaust the car still runs like the cats are blocked, Neil Fisher reckons it is a wiring problem. So looks like a winter period trying to understand the wiring, unless anyone has had a similar problem and resolved.
Let me know, thanks
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To provide more detail on the faults I am chasing or wiring errors:
1. I have a loss of power, the car was put on a rolling road prior to replacing the exhaust. As a supercharged Ace it should be showing 320-340 bhp, the rolling road showed a maximum of 201 bhp and would not rev past 4000 rpm. The check of the cats showed the first two badly burnt with the inners boith twisted and collapsed. Having replaced the exhaust, the car still runs as if the cats are blocked. Discussing this with Neil Fisher his view is that this is wiring related.
2. Whilst on a steady throttle the engine will fluctuate, no idea on this one
3. Rev counter after 2000rpm starts showing increased revs upto and holds at 4000, until the accelerator is released for a few seconds and then it drops back to 2000 - I think this is an earthing issue although changing the distributor cap has marginally improved the problem.
4. The Coil pack has been replaced and appears to have 2 wires (excluding the high voltage lead to the distributor)the white wire I lose into wiring loom and a newly installed black wire that goes into the fuse box. My understanding of older coils is that 1 wire goes to the ignition and 1 wire to the distributor. Looking at some of the diagrams on Google that there may be 1 or 2 wires which are earth. Question is how many wires come from the Coil pack and where do they go.
Any advise welcome
thanks David
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Hi David,
It was good to meet up at the NEC, look forward to seeing the car when you get the niggles sorted.
This applies to the standard 302EFI (US version) but I guess in principle would apply to your car also.
One of the common causes of cats overheating is an incorrect TPS (throttle position sensor) setting, I had this issue on my 1994 car when I bought it and the cats actually glowed red.
Loads of the mustang forums discuss this in detail but from memory you should have an output voltage at idle of around 0.9 from the TPS, any higher than this at closed throttle and you will simply dump unburnt fuel in to the exhaust system as the fuel air mix is way to rich, hence knackered cats.
If TPS is really out of kilter this will also prevent performance at WOT (wide open throttle)as the ECU doesn't ask for enough fuel.
TPS voltage is very easy to check with a multimeter and a couple of small safety pins through the wires but do set your base idle first.
I'll try to find the article I found as this went in to much greater detail than above.
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http://www.allfordmustangs.com/forums/5-0l-tech/177382-proper-tps-idle-settings-5-0-fix-idle-surge.html
http://www.muscularmustangs.com/tps.php
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http://forums.corral.net/forums/ is another good site for Mustang 94/95 engine probs.
I had a CD with wiring diagram for all variants of Ace, but lent it to someone who never returned it. However, I found it pretty useless. For a start it required AutoCAD to open and none of the circuits were colour coded making it difficult to track path of a circuit when scrolling around the page.
I agree with DGoose - sounds more like a fueling or ignition problem than wiring problem. Is ignition advancing with increased revs? Is fuel filter OK?
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Neil Fisher of Redline has a set of wiring diagrams for the Brooklands Ace. I asked him for a copy some years ago but he couldn't find them. Might be worth trying him to see if he's found them in the meantime. I once spoke to the man who designed all of the Ace wiring - I think his surname began with a K - not much help I know, but I've got his contact details somewhere. If I find them, I'll post them here.
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I have some diagrams, will have a look early next week for you, incase they can be of any help.
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Hi David
Any further forward unearthing the cause of your engine malfunction?
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So far have replaced the distributor cap and rotor, the rotor had been broken and glued together this was not operating correctly and had scorched the inside of the distributor cap, this has made a small improvement.
Looking at DGoose information I need to remove the IAC to be able to loosen and adjust the TPS. The bottom bolt for the IAC does not seem to allow for a small socket and do not see enough space for a spanner. Need to have another try before going to the local garage
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Hi David,
Easiest way to get the IAC off for cleaning is remove the entire throttle body.
You can test the TPS voltage without having to remove it simply by sticking a couple of pins through the wires and attaching your voltmeter to the pins.
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Finally received some new fuses for the multi meter this morning.
Battery test measures at 13.3v seems a light high for a 12v battery.
Checked the TPS, it has three wires as per the website page DGOOSE sent me, of course being AC each of the coloured wires does something different than shown, however it states the middle wire and this correct ignore the colour (in my case the wire is all Grey). The measurement shown was 0.96 rather than 0.98-0.99. Is this a big enough difference to cause a lack of power[?]
If warm enough over the winter break will strip down the throttle body in order to remove the IAC then re-fit to adjust the TPS
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Hi David,
If the reading is low rather than high the ECU would call for less fuel than required, the difference between the reading you have and optimum is pretty slight but could still under fuel the engine I guess.
Did you check the reading with the throttle wide open ?
Engine doesn't need to be running for this, provided the ignition is switched on the TPS will be live, just hold the throttle fully open and see what voltage you get -
Maybe clean the air flow sensor next, nice easy job but be careful as the filament is quite delicate.
Use electrical contact cleaner and a cotton bud as described on the mustang forums.
Good luck,
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Just tested with throttle wide open and measures 4.63v.
MAF looks like it needs a special tool to unscrew, was going to check a spark plug but these are not standard size socket to remove looks like 16mm.
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In the process of elimination I think you can safely say the TPS is not the cause of your lack of top end revs, seems as though it is doing what it should.
The four screws holding the MAF in place have anti tamper Torx heads (standard torx with a pin in the middle) sets of bits are readily available on ebay etc.
If, like me, you're too impatient to wait for proper tools and if the the screws are not overly tight you may be able to shift them with nose pliers, side cutters or similar. If the filament has gunge and muck on the forward facing surface clean very carefully with electrical contact spray.
I had an issue on my car after cleaning & re-conditioning the piper cross filter, seems that I was a tad liberal with the conditioning spray (oil ?) and the excess was sucked through the filter, up the intake and coated the MAF sensor - result was hesitation at full throttle and noticeable lack of power at higher rpm although the engine would still rev to 5k if asked to.
Cleaned the filament and back to normal.
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If you are in a hurry both Screwfix and Halfords sell box sets of bits that include the Torx security ones. If you have a branch of either close by you can check online to see if they have any in stock. I bought a set years ago and also find them very useful for fixing ( or al least trying to fix) domestic electrical items as well.
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So update is that having bought a set of Torx heads (£5 from e-bay) I have removed the MAF and cleaned the fine wire/filament - sad to say it did not need cleaning so the problem still exists.
The car is presently with a Car Electrician who has sorted out the wiring from the Coil pack and is now looking at trying to get the front heated screen working.
However, he has found that the drivers side window no longer works and I need to replace the motor - can anyone advise what window motor I need to purchase?
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quote:
Originally posted by David S
Battery test measures at 13.3v seems a light high for a 12v battery.
A fully charged 12v battery, in good condition and disconnected, will give about 13.2v (6 cells in series at 2.2v each)
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David S --> message sent
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quote:
Originally posted by David S
So update is that having bought a set of Torx heads (£5 from e-bay) I have removed the MAF and cleaned the fine wire/filament - sad to say it did not need cleaning so the problem still exists.
The car is presently with a Car Electrician who has sorted out the wiring from the Coil pack and is now looking at trying to get the front heated screen working.
However, he has found that the drivers side window no longer works and I need to replace the motor - can anyone advise what window motor I need to purchase?
I understand the motors are Ford and most likely Sierra units. The motor will have a Ford engineering number on it that can be crossed to a Ford service part number.
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.. I changed both motors on my Ace last year. I used the Ford part numbers, paper label on the motor casing, and found second-hand replacements from a Ford Scorpio/Granada (1994). My motors were Bosch, the Bosch part number was stamped in the metal cover; something like 0130821198. Its quite easily to cross-match the Bosch number to a Ford part number.
BR /Paul
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So update on the questions started back in Nov 2014.
So on point 1 car is still not running very well now, having replaced the exhaust system,the manifold, removed the US smog re-circulation system - the cars performance did improve now from 201bhp to 280bhp. But continued to pink through the rev range, we concluded that the car is still running lean, so have now replaced the fuel pump with one three times the size (you will not believe how small the pump was that was removed from the fuel tank - will get a picture posted up of it some time soon), fuel filter increased, larger fuel lines and increased the injectors to 30lb. This resulted in lots of fuel - in fact to much, so gone from too lean to rich and managed to fail the MOT with a reading 3000% higher than the maximum CO2 reading allowed. We found that the throttle sensor is malfunctioning and may be causing part if not all of the problem, of course there were 3 types of Throttle sensor and the one fitted would of course be the rarest type, car now back with RW Racing to fit sensor and see of CO2 will drop. Of course the main concern is that the original supplied ECU from Ford was never able to accept the supercharger - therefore waiting the news that we need to replace the ECU and associated wiring. To be continued
Point 2 - Rough idling was part of point 1 - car was running very lean and I mean very lean.
Point 3 - the rev counter continues to fluctuate but now at approx. 3000 RPM, this is related to the malfunctioning throttle sensor so hopefully this problem will now be resolved.
Point 4 - we traced the wires back and sorted out the coil pack - this first thing cleared from the list.
Well maybe next year will be back on the road - will update when I know more
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Hi David, my heart goes out to you. I too have a late series Ace V8 bought by a previous owner from AC Cars just after the Frimley fire, and finished privately (DE1102). The blueprinted niche line 4.6L quadcam ran like a bag of nails, poor starting, stalling in traffic, pinking, flat spots, stalling on the over run; horrible! Like you, in the absence of any OBD outputs I set about renewing various things (TPS, Idle valve, EGR and DPFE sensor, COPS and plugs, temp and lambda sensors, in-tank fuel pump etc etc). The last place I looked was the ECU. When I did, I found my car fitted with an aftermarket unit by British company 'DTA Fast'. It's an S80PRO unit. They sold me a USB cable for a laptop hook up and I downloaded their software and manuals for free. I found that my ECU had only a rudimentary set of values in the ignition and fuel maps and no refinements such as over run fuel cut off. Just about enough to get the engine to run. After much experimentation, I now have the engine running like a dream and ready for a final tune up by the professionals on a rolling road. In hindsight (!) I wished I'd looked at the ECU first before amassing a whole load of spare parts. I don't know if my story is relevant to your situation but a look in that direction is highly recommended. Best of luck and I hope you solve your problems one day soon!
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As an update, new Throttle sensor fitted whilst making a difference the engine is still not running correctly. We had a call with Peter Knight who had re-built a Supercharger engine and confirmed this is as far as he could get without changing the ECU. So as the ECU is the original Ford item with values which we cannot alter, the solution is a Motec ECU, new simple distributor and new wiring loom. So far this fits with the Cobra Superchargers except the moving of the Sensor. Lets see what happens when all rebuilt in 2017
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so never made 2017 completion but 1st month of 2018 we have finished getting the car working again. As a re-cap the car had a number of problems which required, up to end of 2016, a full exhaust system, removal of the US gas re-circulation system, the replacement of the fuel delivery system from the fuel pump to the injectors.
Part of these problems is down to the way AC built the supercharged engines which was just to bolt a supercharger onto an engine which meant to much air not enough fuel with a hard coded ECU unable to make the changes. The story is on the superblower AC owners club site.
So we have stripped out any electrical cabling that not required as AC took looms and just left cables in the car that were not required. We have had to get a car electrician to make the electrical cabling safe - he was surprised how bad the changes made to the cabling was and that the car had not caught fire :o. Could be that S50ACE had the same problem as this car did catch fire.
We have installed a new ECU from MOTEC, replaced the sensors, coil packs and used an engine map from a Superblower that was rebuilt last year but to a much higher spec. Retuned it on rolling road in Northampton and finally have a car that works - final output at the wheels is 298bhp/340 lbs torque and we have limited to 5500 revs following advise from Peter Knight.
So now I can start thinking about sanding down and re-painting the sub frames - when it is a bit warmer.
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David
I'm pleased to see that everything has worked out. I've been following with interest.
Um, should I be concerned about the fire risk?
Nigel
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Hi Nigel,
Personnally I think it would be wise to have the electrics checked.
Do you know if your car has had the supercharger modifications?
David
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David
I'm not aware of any modifications. But it had a number of owners so its possible, though unlikely i think. Are there any obvious signs?
Nigel
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Hi Nigel,
my car use to pink badly when under load (heavy acceleration), this was all done on a rolling road, in my case Northampton Motorsport.
I would suggest it is worth taking the car to a rolling road to check
David
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David
Thanks for that, I will.
I had been thinking about putting it on a rolling road just for fun to check out the BHP.
Luckily I've had no problems with mine so far. Very smooth acceleration and good 'top & bottom end' power.
Nigel