A cheap "standalone" solution?

i'm gonna look into this a little closer when i get home sinc ei have a spare protege na ECU laying around
 
Rom reader/burner can be found on ebay really cheap. I had one when i was modding honda ecu but i sold it since i switch to mazda. I will take a protege ecu next visit to the scrapyard and watch for the rom. Maybe we can desolder it and put it in a rom reader.
 
going back to reality, s***..i didn't have time to check on the ECU yesterday.
will have full specs soon.
 
im all for decoding the ecu, why not really lol but it still seems like a waste for me to reflash the ecu entirely. what would be much more interesting would be a obd2 port device that allow you to piggyback like so many other cars have, then when its time for emmissions just unplug it. otherwise i dont really see any advantage to this.

cause really a reprogrammed ecu isnt any better than a stand alone or piggyback. you are still stuck with a MAF, you have no wideband o2 target afr table (from my understanding), no auto tune features, you still fail emmissions, you dont get anything cool like launch control, flat shift, meth/water injection control etc. and cost would be the same really unless someone turns into jesus and donates their time to flash peoples ecus for next to nothing after spending alot of time just to figure this ecu decoding out.

So really its more like how much is it worth for a decent afr in boost and the ability to control timing and larger injectors. and we already have piggy backs that do these things for cheap so....so what exacly are we trying to gain here? a used ssafc is like $200. Seems like the best option even if the reflashed ecu costs 200 as from my understanding you can put the ssafc on a switch (though i never tried with mine and its been years since I wired one) and that way you can still pass emissions with the flick of a switch, control larger injectors (with the unit turned on) and maintain a decent afr.

or is there some benefit to unlocking the stock ecu that I am not aware of that would justify all this time spent? aside from removing CELs for no EGR, no cats, etc. maybe some VICS control? (which a stand alone could do also).

i dunno just seems to me like if you cant afford a used SSAFC I would hate to see what the rest of the car looks like lol
 
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All good points, Jeff. I think that the stock ecu would offer much tighter mapping points, control for VICS and the rest of the solenoids (the outputs can be converted to be used with meth or other devices), overall a more accurate fuel and timing tuning.
 
much tighter mapping points, control for VICS and the rest of the solenoids, overall a more accurate fuel and timing tuning

I wonder if you could alter the "switch point" as well. Nothing scarier than seeing super lean afrs at low rpm in boost, always shocked me to see them that lean until the switch point.

aside from VICS (which most seem to just rip out anyways) why would you want to control the other solenoids?

Im still thinking the biggest benefit is to remove the CEL from no cats/no egr etc. so when you get pulled over with say a 626 intake manifold with no EGR/VICS/VCTS and a 3" catless exhaust you dont get in big trouble if the cop has a roadside test done on your car.
 
I wonder if you could alter the "switch point" as well. Nothing scarier than seeing super lean afrs at low rpm in boost, always shocked me to see them that lean until the switch point.

aside from VICS (which most seem to just rip out anyways) why would you want to control the other solenoids?

Im still thinking the biggest benefit is to remove the CEL from no cats/no egr etc. so when you get pulled over with say a 626 intake manifold with no EGR/VICS/VCTS and a 3" catless exhaust you dont get in big trouble if the cop has a roadside test done on your car.

The closed to open loop switch over control would be a big plus as well. What i mean by that is one can use the VTCS (with removed VTCS flappers) and Fuel pressure regulator solenoids as two separate outputs to control other devices, as these two OE solenoids are not required for a properly functioning protege.
 
Another thing I've noticed while using a non-flashed ecu for about a year is that as soon as there's positive pressure the AFR becomes extremely rich and stay rich until about 5k rpm at which point it jumps to mid - high 11s. The flashed ecu doesn't dump fuel until the preset rpm of about 4k no matter what the pressure is. The non-flashed ecu is somehow able to sense positive pressure as if there's a map sensor in the equation. We do have a map sensor, but it's used for the EGR valve. May it's using it?
 
Even if we were to tune via ODB port we would still have to decode the stock software regaurdless. BTW I have no cats and no CEL... try using a non-fouler trick.
 
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Even if we were to tune via ODB port we would still have to decode the stock software regaurdless. BTW I have no cats and no CEL... try using a non-fouler trick.

i know thats why I was saying im all for someone decoding it lol I did try the non fouler when I was on the stock ECU and it still kept coming back. I just got into the habit of resetting the ECU.

either way I hope someone gets somewhere with the ecu.
 
Another thing to note is that we can read the ECU using any OBDII scanner, right? Maybe we can somehow adapt the scanner's hardware to communicate with the ecu?
 
i believe things such as the powerFC and cobb tuner plug right in so obd2 port must be able to manipulate signals fine and not just be stuck in reading mode kinda thing. ive seen some nice ones on F series trucks and other trucks with big turbo diesels that just plug into the port and can alter all sorts of things from transmission modes like towing mode or even things like EBC etc.

we should all just donate a part to a group FS thread and use the money to pay some engineer in asia like no money to do all the work. im pretty sure thats how most of this things get designed anyways. you can have these guys build websites or design software, do online work etc. how much would it really cost to employ a automotive/computer engineer in a poorer nation for a few weeks? cant be much more than a few used parts sold in the FS section. i think my last work was paying a guy like $100/week to do really good photoshop work. would have been like $25+ an hour here in Canada. just send the guy an ECU and tell him to get cooking.
 
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Unfortunately, this has hit a dead end numerous times. Here is an outfit in Houston that didn't have any luck with the ECU:

“UPDATE.

I just got back from Houston. First off my 03 protege5 is running a 5MGA eec-V. Ya'll might want to compare that to ya'lls. It appears that the service port was disabled at the factory. One it was coated with that varnish looking stuff. We scraped that off but the Tweecer wasn't able to talk to the PCM. the PCM noticed something trying to connect but otherwise was unable to talk to the tweecer. Apparantly the Ford PCM has some jumpers to enable or disable the service port, but it looked like mazda had removed the jumper posts. Since we didn't have a schematic of the pcm board and his partner in Dallas has all his diagnotic tools we weren't able to figure out where the jumpers should be to put some in. So currently it's a no go. However he said he is going to locate and purchase a mazda protege ecu and play with it. Said he'd let me know what he finds out, but the marketability isn't really there since most people don't want to have to modify they pcm. But he seemed to enjoy the challenge so who knows. Sorry guys. BTW the Ford PCM is rather complex LOTS of different tables. Several different base tables for both fuel and ignition. Then there are multiplier tables that modify the base tables for various conditions. It can be rather confusing for anyone not thoroughly experienced in tuning ecu's/pcm's. As of this point I guess I'm going to be using Unichip to modify the output data, unless at somepoint down the line tweecer can be made to work with my pcm. Oh, before you ask. Mazda flashes/updates PCM via the OBD2 port, which is located on the drivers side and accesses the pcm via the huge wiring harness.”

Tweecer response 6 years later: "Ahhh, now it comes flooding back. I do remember a hot afternoon of trying to get his EEC to communicate with the TwEECer. I did try (not real hard) to find an EEC, but only came across two locally which one guy wanted way too much for and the other did not work. So, basically just never got anything to work with and was not really interested in putting out much effort for such a small market.
If someone can get a unit for under $100, we can take a look at getting the jumpers figured out. It is possible that not ALL PCM's have the J3 port disabled. I may be able to read the calibration from the OBDII port, allowing me to hack n crack on the strategy while we wait to get a unit to test with."


For what its worth, a Houston tuner saw my ECU and claimed it was strikingly similar to either the ford focus or ford probe ecu (I do not remember which one). However, whichever one it did resemble, he had full control and the ability to flash it. He suggested to swap a couple of the pins that didnt line up, and replace the stock protege ecu with the one that he had. Apparently the connector was the same as well, just a few pins were different. I did not follow up.
 
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