M88/3 Modern(ish) Engine Management Upgrade options

[passta]

85' M635, looking for what are some recommendations on upgrading the engine management system from the stock 055 ECU that may be more recent, or something somebody has done lately vs 15 years ago.

I'd like to be able to upgrade to something that eliminates the MAF and allows more options down the road, while also not making it permanent if desired. I've got a Miller WAR chip and MAF conversion still NITB that came with the car that I have not wanted to put in, mainly because I've not seen anything remotely positive about their customer support, seems to be non-existent. I didn't want to crack open the ECU without a backup plan in place in case I mess things up. Since 055 ECU's are hard and pricey to come by anyway, upgrading the system, while more expensive, might make more sense.

I' know very little about this space but I've seen or read about the following:

Haltech
Megasquirt
Alpha N

What are some of you actively using or recommending?

[Ralph in Socal]

I've asked Anri to reply. He does coil on plug management system

Ralph

[passta]

I found some of his posts and videos in my search and reached out to him today to see what some options are after I saw your reply. Thanks!!

[RossDinan6]

I went standalone back in about '05 so am out of your recent comment I'd imagine. A few thoughts if you are interested.

At the time I felt like Megasquirt was not quite ready for prime time. It would have been a good choice looking back on it. It may have required an upgrade on my part by now had I gone that direction. I must say it looks solid and well supported with an active community.

I went with an Autronic SM2, at the time over the Halltech, mainly due to Aurtonic's Autotune function. I am still very pleased with the SM2. The tuner kept saying after we got off the dyno for some road tuning tweaks "It runs like a road car". I had to remind him the seats were leather and the air was on. It does so much more than I need. If I was in Aus, I'd do it again with their SM4. Unfortunately support here in the States is limited. The forum I used shut down some time ago. Thankfully I have enough experience installing it and tweaking it. After a pro tune of the important, don't grenade it. stuff I'm happy.

Ultimately I suspect it comes down to Are you hands on or using the checkbook. Support is important in both cases.

[GazM3]

I’m looking at using one of RHD engineering’s ecu master on the m88/3 to divorce myself from the fragile Bosch 055 ecu and airflow meter setup. Rather than intergrating to the 36pin he is going to do a complete new wiring harness, but will have to use a crankshaft based trigger like on the m30. In addition we are going to run a coil on plug option most likely the Audi coils. I can run also a cam position sensor replacing the distributor which can allow individual spark and sequential injection. Not sure as it’s a weekend car that I’ll go this way as fuel efficiency is the main gain here.

Full harness, done incl ecu & tune will cost c/ 4K aud in full drive in drive out with me supplying the coils. I’d imagine the car will run significantly better, more efficiently and pick up a stack of power and peak and under the curve also. Most people doing this upgrade are reporting dyno results around 280+rwhp which will be a nice lift from my 240rwhp I have currently. The other benifit with this system is I could delete the intake plenum altogether and run open trumpets with filters and an effective heat shield would sound very nice.

[TimU]

I’m looking at using one of RHD engineering’s ecu master on the m88/3 to divorce myself from the fragile Bosch 055 ecu and airflow meter setup. Rather than intergrating to the 36pin he is going to do a complete new wiring harness, but will have to use a crankshaft based trigger like on the m30. In addition we are going to run a coil on plug option most likely the Audi coils. I can run also a cam position sensor replacing the distributor which can allow individual spark and sequential injection. Not sure as it’s a weekend car that I’ll go this way as fuel efficiency is the main gain here.

Full harness, done incl ecu & tune will cost c/ 4K aud in full drive in drive out with me supplying the coils. I’d imagine the car will run significantly better, more efficiently and pick up a stack of power and peak and under the curve also. Most people doing this upgrade are reporting dyno results around 280+rwhp which will be a nice lift from my 240rwhp I have currently. The other benifit with this system is I could delete the intake plenum altogether and run open trumpets with filters and an effective heat shield would sound very nice.

Keen to follow your progress Gaz. Especially after my Moss Vale miss-hap last weekend.

[Slownrusty]

Subscribed.

[GazM3]

Rama from RHD development is receiving my car hopefully November this year. As the 36pin Ecu plugs are NLA, we are going a different path. Full new loom, and running off a 60-2 toothed front balancer wheel off the crank, from the E34 based m30b35. Apparently the flywheel sensors are not as reliable for this application.

The plan is to have the loom commercially available with the EMU ecu and will come in either standard coil configuration, or the coil on plug which is what I will be using, as there are so many advantages to this form. I now have the crank damper and Audi coils which have their own ignitor and kind of look OEM (ish) if you hide the wiring in the factory cowling that the HT leads were in. There should be very little difference for an M30B34 in the loom to the M88/3. It will be awesome finally having a semi p&p option for our cars.

Recently the wild man from Adelaide (Daniel Groot) installed and had tuned this setup, but with the factroy loom grafted to the EMU ecu and coil on plug. His results on the M88/3 were very encouraging, went from a power output of 168rwkw (225rwhp), to an impressive 212rwkw (284rwhp) on the factory RHD restrictive headers which is just short of 50rwhp gain to peak power without any mechanical changes, and more power at the wheels than it originally had at the flywheel!, with I'd imagine pretty dramatic improvement to drivability under the peak power curve.

Another thing I'm strongly looking at is making it flex fuel capable to potentially run on E85. This could potentially need larger injectors or a 4.5bar FPR. Not sure that the comp ratio in the M88/3 is high enough to take full advantage of this fuel, but with its cooling nature, it could run some pretty agressive timing which may liberate another 5-10% of power. The other benefits are in the future regular fuel may be expensive and hard to get so plant based ethanol fuels may be seen as a eco friendly fuel for the IC engines. This will need full replacement of all the rubber based fuel lines though.

[TimU]

Thanks for the update Gaz, sounds like some good gains to be had.
Keep us updated

[GazM3]

Just a quick update for those interested.
The E34 toothed crank damper and sensor have been delivered, and so has the extensions sections for the Audi coils to attach to the factory spark plug location. I have also the Audi coils in my posession, along with the wiring loom plugs to make installation easier.

Just fitted an upgraded in tank fuel pump (walbro 460) which is E85 capable, and will allow me to delete the in line pump. Just have to resolve some factroy looking wiring ducting to hide all the wiring to make it look somewhat factory.

The plan was to send it up to sydney this weekend, but Rama from RHD engineering is now too stretched before xmas as he is away the 2nd half of Decamber. It hopefully will be on its way Early-Mid Jan 2023, and works will take approx 2 weeks. This will be very exciting, to unleash all the hidden horses that the M88/3 has to offer