Anyone have a First Gen Insight?

[DRMORTY]

Want to sell your Stock Wheels?

I am thinking of doing some aero-mods the old civic... I could just use Disc wheel covers, but I kinda like the Insight wheels...

[Loren]

They will be far lighter than steel wheels with moon covers, as well.

Find yourself an old Insight or Prius with fried electrics or a bum battery pack. A little engine swappery and you could have a very lightweight gas-powered economy car!

I'm not up on the Insight, but I know the Prius uses the same engine as the Yaris, just with a different head and some different internals. Ditch the heavy battery pack and drop the 100 hp / 100 ft/lb Yaris engine in there and it would not only be fun to drive, but it should get fantastic gas mileage!

The Insight is a pretty cool chassis, as I recall. Lots of aluminum, very light.

[DRMORTY]

I was looking at Aerocivic.com and a few other sites and just taking some of the first easy Aero steps.

On a recent road trip to GA, I was getting 43 MPG with the A/C on about 1/2 the time.

I am going to try Super Charging and Water Injection, along with some Aero Mods...

[Empire]

slightly off topic, but...

what about the whole boosting to neutral thing.
real small turbo, just boosting high enough to equalize the pressure so the engine doesn't have to work to suck air in, its just there.
Don't know if what I'm saying makes sense or not.

but it was something that was talked about years ago as a possible way to increase mileage on like an old CRX HX or something like that.
wondered if those that know far more than I had 2 cents they wanted to throw in regarding that.

[DRMORTY]

That is kinda the super charger idea.

[Empire]

I thought that's where you were going with it... wouldn't a turbo be a little more efficient with it? uses less HP to make it do its thing. and it might be "cooler" even without an intercooler.
I have a bad perspective on superchargers so I'm biased. lol.

[DRMORTY]

LOL, I am bias towards Superchargers...

[Empire]

in my experience, superchargers take a lot of torque to get moving. It might not be so bad if you're just trying to equalize the pressure, and not actually boost, but I would imagine that the loss in torque would negate anything gained.

not tryin to argue just lookin for your 2 cents.

[DRMORTY]

Somehow I was lucky enough to end up with (2) Jackson Racking Super Charger complete set ups, so I am going that route for now...

I am not doing the turbo setup yet, I may still go that route. I definitely haven't ruled it out..

Just thinking that the SC should help a little with my highway gearing & have heard that they can help with the mileage if tuned correctly.. And, if I can keep my foot out of it... I also have a few different throttle bodies to play with...

[Empire]

well yeah, i guess if I had two sets ups like that I'd use them too.

I guess it would have to do with the set up and wastegate and all of that.

see, when I think supercharger, I think the old school ones that if it was spinning it was boosting.

but the newer ones, at a really low boost level might not be bad. It would take some doing, but if you could get it too boost < .5 pounds at idle, and be efficient, it might actually work really well.
I'm seeing air flow being a problem with boost levels that low. What kind of volume would that thing push out as such a low level?
Only way I see being able to get it to go that low is to boost higher and bleed off the extra pressure via wastegate and at that point, you're using an awful lot of torque to spin it.

Once you get into the higher rpm's it shouldn't be so bad. so you would get a real benefit from highway cruising. The extra boost in power would help push through the air. But it would have to be a real low boost level otherwise you're just adding more fuel to the mix.

What were you thinking about doing with that water injection?
We thinking that we could use it to keep the cylinder temps within reason and run a more lean AFR?
Extra oil cooler, and beef up the cooling system, and that might be a real possibility. It would take some testing to monitor detention before I'd feel safe cruisin down the road.

could be awesome.

[DRMORTY]

see, when I think supercharger, I think the old school ones that if it was spinning it was boosting.

but the newer ones, at a really low boost level might not be bad. It would take some doing, but if you could get it too boost < .5 pounds at idle, and be efficient, it might actually work really well.
I'm seeing air flow being a problem with boost levels that low. What kind of volume would that thing push out as such a low level?
Only way I see being able to get it to go that low is to boost higher and bleed off the extra pressure via wastegate and at that point, you're using an awful lot of torque to spin it.

I have to get a boost gauge setup once it is on an see what is going on..

I still have to grab a FMU & WB O2..

Might even switch to OBD1

but, I am trying to keep the cost down..

Once you get into the higher rpm's it shouldn't be so bad. so you would get a real benefit from highway cruising. The extra boost in power would help push through the air. But it would have to be a real low boost level otherwise you're just adding more fuel to the mix.

7lbs to start.. Lowest boost pulley Jackson makes..

What were you thinking about doing with that water injection?
We thinking that we could use it to keep the cylinder temps within reason and run a more lean AFR?
Extra oil cooler, and beef up the cooling system, and that might be a real possibility. It would take some testing to monitor detention before I'd feel safe cruisin down the road.

To cool things is the idea.. Also looking at a Big oil cooler... Should, also let me run continue to run low octane fuel ( saving money is the idea )... And, advance the crap out my timing..

I will definitely be monitoring things before I rack some highway mileage...

could be awesome.

Hoping it is!

The Other SC is for my 4WD civic wagon, and anything I learn from this car is going on to that car as well...

[Loren]

You're overthinking this.

For a low "economy" boost setup, you're looking at probably 4-6 psi max. Not enough to need water injection or really even need an intercooler.

You can stick with stock fuel injection and you don't have to worry about the air volume and all that. It will push more air, that's what it does. The result will be that the fuel injection will either "see" more air coming in and fuel accordingly (open loop) or "see" more O2 in the exhaust and add fuel accordingly (closed loop). Either way, at these low boost levels, the stock ECU can handle it without issue, just as it deals with extreme differences in altitude.

The net result will be that the engine will make more power at a given RPM, using more fuel (more air in = more fuel in) to do it. I think the only way to really benefit from that in fuel economy would be to change the overall gear ratio to get the cruising RPM down lower. (lower than the car would be comfortable running without the added boost)

Or... if you go with a full engine management system (MegaSquirt or whatever), you could lean the fuel mixture under cruise while still maintaining a safe mixture (coupled with some timing retard) under acceleration. You'd still get more out of it with a gearing change.

Thinking about it further, I bet turbo is better for economy. When you're cruising at light load and fairly low RPM with a turbo, you're not making much, if any, boost. Less air in = less fuel in. If you then lean the mixture with your custom engine management, you're using even less fuel. Whereas with the SC, you always have boost, even in light-load cruising, which is forcing the engine to make more power (using more fuel) than it needs.

Fully programmable engine management is the way to go. If you're worried about "putting your foot in it", you can tune around that. Set your rev limit low (as low as 4,000 rpm... the average non-gearhead never goes that far, you don't "need" to, either if you're driving for economy), set a fairly low boost limiter (MS lets you do this, works like a soft rev limiter... you hit the boost target, it cuts timing). And tune for economy rather than power. With limitations like that, the usual things that "big power" FI guys worry about are a non-issue and it's just like tuning NA. As much timing advance and as little fuel as you can get away with in the low-load cruising range, and a little bit of power on-tap for acceleration.

I really need to get something running with a MS again so I can play!

[Empire]

i tried to search around some, not finding good info. but i'm probably just not asking the right question.

even at 4 lbs, couldn't you do some simple intercooling and water injection and gain mpg.
my thoughts are, (and I could totally be off base here) that a small intercooler would be to cool the air to a reasonable temp, not a cold dense air charge like usual. The thought being, the cooler air would help keep the cylinder temps down.
Then the water injection would take it a step further. Keeping the cylinder temps down, and adding a little bit to the cylinder pressures.
The idea would be to be able to run a rather lean AFR. As I understand it, the more lean the mix, the more power that can be made (of course, there is a breaking point to it, but i'm talking within reason) But the limiting factor to how lean you can go is how hot the cylinder gets. too hot, and you get detention which is what causes problems. But if you're air charge is cool, and your spraying some water in there, couldn't you keep that cylinder temp reasonably low? Wouldn't that allow for a much more lean mix?
If it does, then you have the increased efficiency from the low boost turbo, plus less air=less fuel and still have ample power to push through the air, or on demand as needed, and could theoretically, get a significant increase in MPG.

or am I totally off here?

[Loren]

Cooler air (whether you get it from a cold-air intake, intercooler, or just by compressing the air to only 4 psi rather than 12) is always more dense than warmer air. Just cooling the air in itself has the same effect as (very) low-boost.

For example (numbers pulled out of ass, not real numbers), the density of 90-degree ambient air might be equivalent to the density of typical 140-degree underhood air compressed to 1psi. And a cooled 4psi charge might be equivalent in density to a non-cooled 5 psi charge.

For the level of boost and performance that we're talking about, I just don't think intercooling is enough of a benefit to add that level of complexity. Instead of running intercooled at 4psi, just bump the boost up to 5 psi and call it a day. The intake air density will be the same, and the temperatures you get from that level of boost aren't all that much.

Cylinder temps are another issue, but again... your head is firmly stuck in the "performance" realm. If you're running 12 psi at 7,000 rpm, cylinder temperatures are a serious concern. 4 psi at 4,000 rpm? Not so much... in my opinion. (but I bet someone with the engineering data and know-how could back that up)

Disclaimer: I'm really not a turbo guy, though I did Megasquirt tune a friends 1.6 Miata at 8 psi a few months ago. (it was an interesting tune, as he didn't upgrade his injectors, so we had to stay within their limits... but I was still able to get 8psi for kick-ass mid-range torque by setting the rev limit to 5800 rpm... and he's one of those drivers who rarely goes up to 5k, anyway)

[Empire]

Cooler air (whether you get it from a cold-air intake, intercooler, or just by compressing the air to only 4 psi rather than 12) is always more dense than warmer air. Just cooling the air in itself has the same effect as (very) low-boost.
For example (numbers pulled out of ass, not real numbers), the density of 90-degree ambient air might be equivalent to the density of typical 140-degree underhood air compressed to 1psi. And a cooled 4psi charge might be equivalent in density to a non-cooled 5 psi charge.

For the level of boost and performance that we're talking about, I just don't think intercooling is enough of a benefit to add that level of complexity. Instead of running intercooled at 4psi, just bump the boost up to 5 psi and call it a day. The intake air density will be the same, and the temperatures you get from that level of boost aren't all that much.

yeah, makes sense.

Cylinder temps are another issue, but again... your head is firmly stuck in the "performance" realm. If you're running 12 psi at 7,000 rpm, cylinder temperatures are a serious concern. 4 psi at 4,000 rpm? Not so much... in my opinion. (but I bet someone with the engineering data and know-how could back that up)

yeah, when you've been taught performance for so long, its hard to switch it up to go to MPG mode. lol.

The part that I'm trying to get is, just how lean can you really go?
Like you said, <5 psi at 4k rpms isn't that big of a deal, but how lean can you go at that point?

I know that at a certain point, even a carb'ed NA will eventually be lean enough to cause problems.
Add FI, and low boost levels and that magic "too lean" mark gets moved all over the place.
You would of course need the tuning to compensate for things like WOT, but at cruising speeds with the throttle at 25% or below, you ought to be able to tune it for a crazy lean mix.
right?
if you have a teenie tiny turbo, it should still be spooling at that point. With the low boost level's we're looking at, we just want a little extra power to get through the wind resistance a bit easier.
So I guess the magic question and the key to the whole thing is, how lean, is too lean?
and what can you do to A) get that lean?, and B) maybe go a touch more lean, safely. ?