Problem Roush 427IR on the way to Roush
 

Got some good news. I got a call from Roush (I'll not mention names as he's not been mentioned here before). I described the problem to him on the phone, all the way back to the bad mechanical adjustments that had been done (including the bell crank turnbuckles all the way in) and the root cause of the bad throttle position cable. Then the attempts at tuning on the dyno and still "missing" at 4500RPM, and backfiring when I let off the accel.

I questioned the oil capacity and Todd and he are pretty sure that it is the original oil pan, so the 11qt fill is probably wrong. That probably explains the oil overflow but not the rest of it.

He said they would look at the DFI controller but we both believe - he based on his talk with Todd - that the original installation was sloppy and needs to be cleaned up. If it gets toofar and it looks like a swap of the controller is needed we'll switch to their new (simpler to manage and install - fewer wires) DFI controller.

Anyway, I've placed the order with Intercity to ship it back, and should have a scheduled pick up date soon.

In reality I don't expect to have it back before much of the summer season is over.

Good luck! Did they also make you pay for shipping it back to them? I was told that is their new policy
Ron

Yep. Having to pay to ship the car, probably both ways. I doubt this is going to be warranty - I think the install was sloppy. The only hope is if they actually supply the TPS cable as part of the kit, in which case it's their bad since everything done was to attempt to wrench around problems caused by that to begin with. I'm expecting to drop another 5K on this before it's done. More if I have to get a new DFI controller.

If you dont get satisfaction from them you have the right to sue them in small claims court in there state if damages exceed court limit you can sue them again for balance due over court limit.Any new deliverd product has an implied warrenty time period if you dont know what that is you can contact states attorny generals office in there state and your state for guidence to clear this up at no cost to you.Your purchase shouldnt cost you grief or money beyond the purchase price already paid by you. Good luck

You gotta read the posts before offering that advice... it sounds from all angles that the installer is likely to blame for a poor job during the critical install phase :LOL:

Correct. The only hope I have is to get them to accept that the Throttle Position Sensor cable (if they supply it) was incorrect and that all of the other stuff was caused by that (it was). Todd said they do not supply the cable. I'd like to hear from other IR customers if their kit included it.

Have you ever been able to get ahold of Todd or is he really gone from Roush? When I tried last week I couldn't get through on his phone
Ron

I did get with Todd. His email and phone were in the process of being converted to Roush. He is still the "go to guy". After the last call (and perhaps assisted by Steve's nudging) I got a call from one of their other guys and the car is scheduled to go. I need to get a write up of the stuff I've done off to him before the car gets there. That should be easy since it'll probably be next week before they pick it up.

I'm hoping it is something simple. No matter what I'm going to have them level the engine on the mounts and reroute the wiring harnesses and dress them properly.

Yeah create another lawsuit, probably something the enthusiast can do without. Roush has a pretty good reputation, at least with my experience, so I'd be less than inclined to head in that direction. I haven't seen any issues that they didn't jump to fix without much hesitation, but there may be some. I mean, it's not "Rash ingeneering" in bumfug, it is Roush.
I don't have a Roush engine but have installed 2, they even sent out updates at one time to correct an overadvancing problem. Paid for it to be performed and supplied the parts and instructions...pretty heads up as far as I'm concerned.
The above rant is not directed at any of the legal consultants on the board, I'm sure they have their own views of those that endeavor in that arena.

Larry Spillman, *DUDE* -- That is just mean spirited. --

Providing enthusiast based services is hard enough without proposing litigious posturing.

I have seen Roush bend-over backwards to "Be-the-Man" (apologies -B) .

They have communication issues at their offices, just like we all do. --

There just is not enough margin in ANY of this stuff to self insure that kind of *THAT* stuff. (shipping cars, etc.)

Twobjshelbys, Todd and I talked about your situation and I referenced a couple of things it could be, --they took it from there.

Steve

Great to hear that Roush is going to take your car back to investigate. Very tough situation considering the uncertainty about the quality of the install, being the second owner of the car/engine, and the fact that the engine has (I suspect) long been out of warranty.

I got a call from the Intercity Lines driver - they will be picking it up Sunday afternoon or Monday morning.

Good Luck and hope you get it back soon:cool:

I don't know why you guys keep messing around with fuel injection anyway, a waste of the whole summer in this case.

Kirkhams have it figured out, as Tom once said, they considered fuel injection but in the end decided they would rather DRIVE their cars than spend endless hours sorting out the fuel injection myriad of problems that just never seem to go away.

Real simple solution in this case: Dump the EFI, put a carb on it and drive THIS summer.

But hey, whatever works for you...

To each his own. I wont deny that it has issues to get sorted out but no one looks at fuel injection and says Carbs also have issues to get sorted out if you live at altitude, etc but to me it is just personal preference. I wanted the look of Webers without them being so touchy-

No one ever looks at an injected motor and says - "too bad it doesnt have a carb!":LOL:

Well the Weber look makes a strong case for injection all right!! You could easily spend as much time working the kinks out of Webers as you could FI. :)

As for the carb, actually I've looked at several motors over the years, talked to the owners and came away thinking, "They coulda, shouda had a carb". Some injection systems just look "funky" as well, to bad they didn't have a carb. Stock 302 EFI comes to mind, in many cases the motor looks SO much better with a carb.

Weber like stack injection? OK, you got me there. :)

.....just as no one ever looks at a Cobra with an FE and says - "too bad it doesn't have a small block!":eek:

Sorry, as long as the gasoline is leaking onto the ground, I figured I might as well throw a match! After all, it's been....what...3 or 4 days since we've had a good small block vs. big block debate around here?:LOL:
And yes, CSX4910, I realize you have a big block (as it should be!).:cool:

Relax, small block guys, just pulling your leg.....:D

Birdstrike!

I got it back this week. They did alot of stuff to it. Some of it was to clean up the original install, some to address the operational issues. The total bill was around $3K. Plus shipping each way. I'm in a little over $5K for this "tune up".

On a "worth it" scale of 1-10 we're about 8. There were lots of problems, and it's not perfect, but it is a significant improvement. I'm pretty sure I understand the final issue (which was probably there all along but now is obvious.) Read on...

The engine had never run right since I got it and I futzed around all last summer (with Roush on the other end of the phone) and it never got right. I'd started by flushing every fluid out of it, and it took about 11.5qts of oil to fill. Way over what they said on their spec sheet. I went on line and was convinced that this was a 11qt Canton racing pan that had been changed. Well, it turns out that it was the original pan and that the dip stick was not calibrated. Poof - one big problem gone. Oil was blowing by the breathers on the valve covers (even though they were baffled), and it would burn off the headers and run onto the floor. Plugs wires were soaked and the 90* plugs would vibrate off so I sent along a set of FRPP 45* boots that they installed. They also replaced the valve cover gaskets (you have to pull the driver side cover to get to the last plug). Problem 1 solved.

Issue 2 was that the engine was at a slight angle. The engine mounts aren't level so they shimmed. The driver side mount is still high but the pipe doesn't rub as much on the exit port. I still want to look more at that but it's OK for now.

They rewired the DFI controller harness and dressed up the install. There were huge wire looms where they took the cables and connected them to the other end at the front of the engine instead of running shortest route. Wires were merely twisted and black taped in the loom. I'd seen that and didn't want to tear into it myself lest I mis-wire something. I have a box of wires they trimmed off and sent back. I will post some pictures of before and after. At least now in future dealings I will not have to argue with them about the install job.

The third problem - rough running - is still there to some degree - and represents the remaining 2 of 10 points.

The original problem/symptom was that it would cut out (miss) at about 4000RPM under quick acceleration (like getting into an accel lane or off the block at the strip) When I got it home on Tuesday I took it for a spin and it ran a little rough on a quick accel, but the engine was cold. I let it warm up and ran a few runs into the accel lane I use for the test and it ran pretty well up to close to the red line. Then it started to spit rain.

Wednesday night I took it out again and it failed. I had just filled it up with gas. The only two changes from their tests in Detroit to here were gas and altitude. They had filled it with 92 (which is probably 95 here). I filled with 91 (which would be their 93+). But in case the pump isn't right I drove to town to get some octane booster. It rained on me on the way home so I didn't get a chance to run it hard. (There is a third change - the driver :) )

I took it out yesterday for the same test and it still failed - rough running at 4000.

This is a DFI system that has altitude compensation (it reads the base from the MAP when the engine is not running). So last night I installed the Accel CalMap software and looked - the compensation table is null - there is no adjustment happening... So I'm waiting for Roush to tell me what they do next.

This afternoon I decided to take it for a test run and have my wife shoot a video on my crappy-cell-phone-video-camera to send to Roush. Guess what. It didn't fail. But it did rain on me. So there is a humidity/atmospheric pressure change (more humid, lower pressure) from the Thursday run (sunny, warmer, high pressure).

So now it's down to intermittent, but it still runs better than it did. I'd appreciate a pointer to anyone that has set up an Accel DFI Gen7 altitude compensation table.

Cheers!

are you setting any trouble codes?

are you using a datalogger?

where is the alt. comp. table located, i've used the gen 7 and am a little familiar with the tuning.