Bad Dyno Tune - Timing Question

Ol' Blue is an '08 R3T to which I've added jards, K&N's, and Hagons. The dyno tuner I used (and wouldn't use again - not even to wash the bike) kinda screwed things up. He went for horsepower and torque and I believe completely ignored any aspect of timing. After about 4K miles, I finally figured out the noise I was hearing was pre-ignition. In the last two years I've tenderly put on about a thousand miles for fear of completely trashing it.

I've never worked it hard. Up to 80 mph on the freeway and I drive it like an old lady around town and the backroads (Warp9.9 has not hypnotized me yet). Horsepower numbers are 140+ with 150 ft lbs. Since the tune, I get 30 mpg pretty consistently. I got 37 mpg before the tune.

It finally dawned on me I could add some octane booster (I'm a little slow). I tried it the other day with about 4 oz. in four gal. and saw almost immediate improvement. The only pinging I hear now is at about 2K - 2.5K rpm with another band at about 3K - 3.5K (I'm guessing - no tach). I'm being tender and only accelerating smoothly through the gears. I haven't tried it on hills and only have about 10 miles since the addition of the booster.

My questions: Will octane booster help me until I can get down to Birmingham and have Wayne's shop do things properly? Will a 3K mile trip trash things and leave me with a boat anchor by the side of the road somewhere in eastern Wyoming? Since the timing is hosed, will octane booster actually compensate for the bad timing or am I just hiding the continuance of damage? Because I still have some pinging should I add more booster? Will the computer's variable timing be affected positively or negatively? If adding octane booster is OK, can a homemade version work or do I have to buy the spendy off-the-shelf stuff and guess about translating the car applications to our little fuel tanks? The homemade version is a mixture of toluene, diesel or Jet A, and ATF or Marvel Mystery Oil.

Thanks for your responses.

Wayne has closed shop but if you have set it up you'll be good I'd get a cord and load one of his tunes from here for it or I can send you one that will be close to what you need as he has done both my R3T 12 and 14 with same set up as you got Oh welcome

I would download TuneECU (for free), and find the original tune, or the one from Wayne Tripp that adds about 30 hp.
Total cost wold be less than $10 for the cable.

Edit to add: Dang Watcher you're too quick for me. You must have a better tune on your computer than I do.

Yep, I run with TuneECU.

The first tune I loaded (before dyno tuning) was the one from the Danish guys with nearly the same setup. The first thing the tuner said when he hooked it up was that it was tuned "scary lean". Then he went to fumbling around trying to learn TuneECU and the bike at the same time. He went through about 70 full runups over two-and-a-half days. He ran it hard enough to blow out the silicone slip joint on the exhaust. He didn't notice it and it ended up running a little fat because of it. I put him on the phone a couple of times with Wayne, but it apparently didn't sink in (I think pride got in the way). At least he got things fattened up and out of "scary world".

Too bad about Wayne making the change. I wish him well in whatever he's doing these days. I always appreciated his expertise and devotion to the community.

I appreciate your offer of sending me one of his tunes. Is there a place on the forum where they are stored or is it something you can email to me?

And since Wayne's out of the game, does anyone know of a dyno shop on the West coast that deals with R3's and TuneEcu? At some point I'll need to go and visit one. A few years ago, I asked Wayne for a recommendation for this area. The Bay area was the closest option (700 miles). Nothing in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, or Montana.

On the Tune ECU site. Here is the link.
http://tuneecu.com/Tune_List.html


Edit to add: I have a Roadster, so I don't have a copy of the tune Wayne made for the Touring. I'm sure some one who has it will chime in.

Thanks for jogging my memory regarding alternate tunes. I do have a couple of Wayne's tunes for R3T. He sent me a Tuneboy file (.DAT) labeled POWER-TRIPP Jardine-KN R3Ta. The filename suggests the bike's setup is the same as mine. Since it's a .DAT file, I couldn't use it. The second one he sent is labeled Power-Tripp R3TouringB.HEX with no mention of the setup. I can't remember if I ever loaded the .HEX file onto Ol' Blue. Both files indicate I received them in 2011.

I only see one tune file that may be applicable on the TuneECU site: 30368Map.HEX. It mentions the aftermarket exhaust, but no mention of whether or not the air intakes are stock or something else. The file I downloaded from the TuneECU site immediately after installing my mods is labeled 20258 Jardines_exhaust_DB_Killers Map.HEX. This was the one the tuner labeled "scary lean". I don't see it on the site anymore. I remember without dyno tuning, it seemed to run fine. Without hooking it up to an analyzer I would never have know how lean it was running. This is why I'm leery of just swapping around and trying tunes not specific to the bike. Wayne's website actually makes mention of having to tune each bike individually. I was hoping I could use the octane booster as kind of a bandaid until a proper tune was available.

MountainMan said:

Yep, I run with TuneECU.

The first tune I loaded (before dyno tuning) was the one from the Danish guys with nearly the same setup. The first thing the tuner said when he hooked it up was that it was tuned "scary lean". Then he went to fumbling around trying to learn TuneECU and the bike at the same time. He went through about 70 full runups over two-and-a-half days. He ran it hard enough to blow out the silicone slip joint on the exhaust. He didn't notice it and it ended up running a little fat because of it. I put him on the phone a couple of times with Wayne, but it apparently didn't sink in (I think pride got in the way). At least he got things fattened up and out of "scary world".

Too bad about Wayne making the change. I wish him well in whatever he's doing these days. I always appreciated his expertise and devotion to the community.

I appreciate your offer of sending me one of his tunes. Is there a place on the forum where they are stored or is it something you can email to me?

And since Wayne's out of the game, does anyone know of a dyno shop on the West coast that deals with R3's and TuneEcu? At some point I'll need to go and visit one. A few years ago, I asked Wayne for a recommendation for this area. The Bay area was the closest option (700 miles). Nothing in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, or Montana.

Click to expand...

I can email them to you

"The homemade version is a mixture of toluene, diesel or Jet A, and ATF or Marvel Mystery Oil."

This stuff will make your problem worse! Whike toluene has a very high octane number, the jet A or or diesel fuels have such low octane ratings that they can't be measured in octane and are measured in cetane ratings. ATF and Marvel Mystery Oil are acceptable in diesel engines at low levels, but no performance gasoline engine should ever have these put in the fuel. Yes, there are hydrocarbon based "oils" used in methanol, alcohol and nitro engines to add lubricity to the fuel to reduce valve stem wear but even these reduce octane ratings and are used sparingly.

Use the purchased stuff if you need to but get the timing back under control soon. Even purchased octane boosters can be hard on engines as they often use metallic compounds that are abrasive to cylinder walls, ring faces and valve seats. Toluene works but it is tough on plastic parts and will act as a solvent to "melt" many common plastics if the concentration is high enough so use caution there as well.

Here was one of many references to DIY octane booster: http://swimminginthought.com/boosting-octane-yourself-research-it-proved-it/ This recipe calls for 0.25 oz diesel and 0.25 oz ATF in 100 oz toluene. That recipe dilutes 16 oz of mix into 16 gal of gasoline. Concentrations are pretty low. Here's another that breaks down common off-the-shelf octane boosters: http://www.hotrodders.com/forum/octane-booster-info-124750.html . What you'll notice is that in a number of the products the main component is kerosene (effectively diesel/Jet A). In the homebrew recipe, the major component is toluene or xylenes. I also read that toluene is already a sizable component in premium gasoline. Also take note that these users are running race engines and other high-performance applications. One TouTube video has a guy putting half-a-gallon of straight xylenes into 3/4 tank of regular gas in his 550S Benz. He states that he's been doing that to his $110K car for 17K miles (since new). There are other examples.

To me, it seems that regular gas (octane 87) has an advanced ignition more than premium (octane 91) and premium more advanced than diesel/kerosene/Jet A. It makes sense that compounds that retard ignition would get rid of predetonation. Here's a decent treatise on the subject: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engine_knocking This article also speaks to the evil knocking does to the engine. That has me scared to death.

Watcher, thanks for the offer to send me a tune or two. I now have an email entered in my profile. Let me know if it works.

MountainMan said:

Here was one of many references to DIY octane booster: http://swimminginthought.com/boosting-octane-yourself-research-it-proved-it/ Here's another that breaks down common off-the-shelf octane boosters: http://www.hotrodders.com/forum/octane-booster-info-124750.html. What you'll notice is that in a number of the products the main component is kerosene (effectively diesel/Jet A). In the homebrew recipe, the major component is toluene or xylenes. I also read that toluene is already a sizable component in premium gasoline. Also take note that these users are running race engines and other high-performance applications. One TouTube video has a guy putting half-a-gallon of straight xylenes into 3/4 tank of regular gas in his 550S Benz. He states that he's been doing that to his $110K car for 17K miles (since new). There are other examples.

To me, it seems that regular gas (octane 87) has an advanced ignition more than premium (octane 91) and premium more advanced than diesel/kerosene/Jet A. To get rid of pre-deonation, it makes sense that compounds that retard ignition would get rid of pre-detonation. Here's a decent treatise on the subject: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engine_knocking This article also speaks to the evil knocking does to the engine. That has me scared to death.

Watcher, thanks for the offer to send me a tune or two. I now have an email entered in my profile. Let me know if it works.

Click to expand...

"Diesel fuels are actually very prone to knock in gasoline engines" from the Wikipedia treatise you listed. Kerosine, Jet A and kerosine all have very low octane ratings and will increase detonation. They are estimated to have octane ratings of 8 to 15. (Yes you read that correctly. Adding 15 and 87 to do not make 90.) Snake oil is snake oil. Only several of those supposed octane boosters are actually octane boosters. See: http://www.eere.energy.gov/afdc/pdfs/afv_info.pdf, http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/tbldefs/pet_cons_prim_tbldef2.asp for reference.

Toluene is great for many high performance engines and can be run straight (100%) provided your fuel system has teflon hoses, a steel or aluminum gas tank, brass carb floats and no plastic gaskets or fitting seals. However, your R3 is not so equipped, hence my warning about using too much. Same warning for too much xylene, hexane or napthalene. Acetone does not increase octane at all but does act as a solvent in gasoline reducing its surface tension so that the combination when atomized creates smaller more uniform droplet sizes.

What both Jet A and kerosine do have are higher autoignition temperatures than gasoilne by about 100 deg F. Thus preignition may be slightly reduced with their use, but detonation is increased. Pre-ignition and detonation are two very different phenomena and should not be confused even if they both can cause "knocking."

However, you are free to save money and top off with whatever you choose.