If your refering to stole, clarifying borrowed neighbours and friends cars to test.
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CX-5 Turbo warm up time?
- Thread starter John B
- Start date
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- 2016.5 CX-5 GT AWD titanium/black 2016 Miata Club ST MT white
You borrowed/stole your friend's and/or neighbor's cars and proceeded to thrash them before they warmed up? Did they know this?
Remind me to never lend you a vehicle!!!
You borrowed/stole your friend's and/or neighbor's cars and proceeded to thrash them before they warmed up? Did they know this?
Remind me to never lend you a vehicle!!!
come join the neighbourhood, also wouldnt call blipping thrashing, we all have pos trucks for that.
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
X2 @Snorting2.5
In another world, 5.9 Cummins Turbo Diesels, my CTD has 265,000 miles on the original engine/turbo. Still pulls a +10,000 pound toy box all over the country.
Until recently, I never did anything special to warm up the engine/trans. I didn't beat on it either until warmed up.
Some of us diesel geeks are messing around getting better fuel efficiency for our old CTDs. This winter I've been plugging in the block heater and added two oil pan heaters. I run the heaters from 1 to 2 hours before driving. The engine cranks effortlessly and heats up within in 2 miles. We have increase our fuel mileage 30% by adding some bolt on items and changing our driving habits.
The Cummins also has a winter cover and exhaust brake. Both of these accelerate the warm up process.
These Mazda gas burners warm up quickly when under a light load, driving. I see no reason to do anything special. Drive it with respect and it will respect you in my moto.
I read on this forum about keeping the RPM down. I found out the hard way many years ago when I kept my Chevy truck below 1500 RPM. It spun a bearing at 90,000 miles. We put a new engine in it and drove it to 250,000 miles. Didn't lug it nor over rev it.
We keep the CTDs in the sweet spot, 1500 to 2000 RPM and don't think about it. It will see +2500 when towing and merging. My plan on the 2024 2.5T, keep the RPMs in the sweet spot, 1500 to 2500 RPM and enjoy. Every so often 4000K that is well within the design range.
Keeping clean fluids, replace filters often and be happy!
In another world, 5.9 Cummins Turbo Diesels, my CTD has 265,000 miles on the original engine/turbo. Still pulls a +10,000 pound toy box all over the country.
Until recently, I never did anything special to warm up the engine/trans. I didn't beat on it either until warmed up.
Some of us diesel geeks are messing around getting better fuel efficiency for our old CTDs. This winter I've been plugging in the block heater and added two oil pan heaters. I run the heaters from 1 to 2 hours before driving. The engine cranks effortlessly and heats up within in 2 miles. We have increase our fuel mileage 30% by adding some bolt on items and changing our driving habits.
The Cummins also has a winter cover and exhaust brake. Both of these accelerate the warm up process.
These Mazda gas burners warm up quickly when under a light load, driving. I see no reason to do anything special. Drive it with respect and it will respect you in my moto.
I read on this forum about keeping the RPM down. I found out the hard way many years ago when I kept my Chevy truck below 1500 RPM. It spun a bearing at 90,000 miles. We put a new engine in it and drove it to 250,000 miles. Didn't lug it nor over rev it.
We keep the CTDs in the sweet spot, 1500 to 2000 RPM and don't think about it. It will see +2500 when towing and merging. My plan on the 2024 2.5T, keep the RPMs in the sweet spot, 1500 to 2500 RPM and enjoy. Every so often 4000K that is well within the design range.
Keeping clean fluids, replace filters often and be happy!
Well said!
According to my data logging, the "desired RPM" is 600rpm....
So, the AT seems to help maintain engine RPM's as close to there without lugging, while actually sustaining some sort of momentum... around 1250rpm...
I find that the AT will shift at whatever rpm it takes to hit around 1250rpm (or less) in the next gear. It will hold that gear until a hair over 1000rpm before it decides to downshift.
So, usually, I abide by its wishes and stay between 1250-1750rpm.
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
We added exhaust and turbo blankets to our CTDs and have seen a nice gain in HP and FE. Equally important, it lowers EGT. This is counter intuitive. The link below explains why.
I'm investigating adding a turbo blanket to the CX 5 in the near future.
An engineering student tested a turbo/exhaust blanket one a 6.7 CTD. It's an interesting read. The cliff notes, the blankets saw a HP/Torque increase 10% in the lower RPM range and decreased ETG. Note: many of us monitor EGT when towing to prevent costly repairs. Also, when an injector on a diesel fails open, EGTs climb quickly. If caught in time, we prevent melting a hole in a piston.
If you can't sleep, this works very well!
https://repositories.lib.utexas.edu...MASTERSREPORT-2016.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
My butt dyno and hand calculated MPG indicate more HP and better FE with this mod.
The other benefit, the exhaust manifold and turbo cool slower on shut down. At one point, my truck tuner had a turbo cooling feature. The truck would idle until the EGT dropped to the set point. I no longer have or use this feature.
As mentioned, my CTD turbo has 265,000 miles on it. Under normal use, these turbos last 350,000 miles. The cast iron exhaust manifolds are known to crack much sooner. I believe my exhaust manifold is lasting because of the exhaust manifold blanket. On a stock tune, these turbos run at 32 PSI pulling loads up mountains. EGTs up to 1200F is considered normal. Imagine shutting down a 1200 F cast iron E manifold and turbo! Bad things can happen.
A turbo blanket may increase the life of our Mazda turbos, decrease turbo lag, increase HP and FE.
I'll start a CX 5 turbo blanket post with observed results in the next few months.
We have trans tuning on our trucks. We change the shift RPM, upshift and downshift. Also change the trans pressures to firm up the shift. My old 48RE trans with performance shift kit is wife neck snapping firm when solo. When towing 10K, it's smooth as silk. It's programed for the upshift and down shift to keep the engine in peak torque. It seems like Dodge programed the trans to pass EPA emissions at the expense of the engine and trans. I wouldn't be surprised if Mazda was under similar constraints.
In yet another world, drag racing, we use standalone TCUs to control electronic trans with a performance valve body. We have seen some nice gains with trans tuning and increased the life of the trans. We control torque converter lockup and unlock, shift pressures and shift RPM.
Wish, hope, we get trans tuning down the road. That could be a game changer.
Until then, I'm very happy with our CX 5. What a cool machine!
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Indeed, I am exceedingly happy with my 6 as well. The NA Skyactiv is a bit of a beast with the remap. It feels like it is making more torque at 2500rpm than any other rpm! I was getting a solid 4L/100km with the cruise control set at 60km/h today. Impressive engineering.
I think Mazda overall did a good job tuning the throttle and AT on this vehicle according to a variety of real world constraints and scenarios. I will usually only override its shifting behaviour in manual mode for very specific reasons, such as approaching a hill which it is not aware of, or trying to draw out a gear without it forcing an upshift on me.
I used the manual mode far more frequently, thinking the transmission is too conservative, until I saw what the ignition timing and knock control looked like under those scenarios. I realized that the AT is doing so for a reason and stopped interfering.
As for cold start scenarios, there is one of three for me:
1. Start up. Put it into gear. Roll out without throttle for about 30 seconds while it is heating up the cat. Set off, driving gentle and steady.
2. Start the car. let it roll out the driveway in neutral. (The ECU detects your rolling and avoids the aggressive cat warm up idling.) I take advantage of this and pop the AT into drive to reduce drivetrain wear. take off. This is my favorite option.
3. Let it idle until the idle settles.
I'll do any of the three scenarios, depending on conditions, how the engine sounds, etc.
@AL Cx5 Let me know if you'd like for me to write up a quick review regarding DRTuned and my experience with him. Take the plunge; its well worth it!
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
Absolutely! DRTunee and I have been in conversation. He seems to be very knowledgeable and easy to work with.
Another simple mod we do on Gen3 Hemis to 2.4l NA Honda's, add grounding to the heads and throttle body. I added grounds to a friends Mazda years ago. She didn't give me much fees back and drove it 280,000 miles. This mod was instantly noticeable on our 09 Accord.
We have measured some small gains with well placed ground cables using chassis dynos. 8 to 10 HP.
This is on my CX5 list as well....
Assuming appropriate TCM control software does become available I will be offering transmission tuning through Drtuned. There are some fun things we can do with the right control.
A few things i've observed..
Now, I think as long as you are running 91 octane, even on the stock tune, you are getting the most benefit out of your Skyactiv turbo.
My 2.5 NA is designed for 87 octane. That's not to say it did not add timing once I made the switch to 91, I just didn't get much extra torque. I remember doing it in hopes of the ecu adding timing to improve smoothness and drivability below 2000rpm, where the AT is so stubbornly staying at, and indeed it worked out great. The shift points and gearing actually started to make a lot more sense.
On the stock tune, with or without 91 octane, torque peaked at about 3000rpm or so (3250rpm on paper)
I just did a quick search online. It appears that your turbo engine makes all of its torque between 2000-2500rpm, depending on which octane you are using. That is impressive!
Anyways, I first flashed the basemap over, which was subtle. It wasn't until I deleted my second cat and sorted out the exhaust leak at the vibrant resonator that the engines new torque peak was revealed. It quickly and abruptly peaked from 2250rpm - 2500rpm, and maybe held that torque steady to 2750rpm, but noticeably lost steam onwards. It's great having all this usable torque at an even lower RPM. I remember driving around on the basemap, thinking the ECU will need more time to develop torque past 2500rpm... Looks like it adjusted much faster than I realized...
Takeaways:
1. With the exhaust mod (Second cat delete and vibrant resonator in place of the OEM one..) Really woke this drivetrain up with the tune upon approaching its rather narrow but nonetheless particularly usable powerband. However, my near 300,000KM second cat at the time was cracked on the inside and halfway clogged up with unburnt fuel... Obviously removing it helped tremendously, but with your turbo engine in particular, freeing up some exhaust flow at the mid-pipe is even better..
2. As you work back and forth with Daniel, indeed he is a highly knowledgeable guy who knows the platform and can safely squeeze a fair bit of torque and HP out of your engine. The primary thing I suggest to look out for is your AFR ratios at WOT and for excessive KR (Knock Retard). The only time I ever see ignition timing high and steady is at sustained cruising rpm's in low gears. The Skyactiv NA runs at something like 14:1 under most scenarios, but abruptly drops to 10:1 at WOT and dials back ignition timing to cool exhaust gasses and modulate cat temps... Keep an eye out for this, as your turbo engine will already be running richer to start with.
In summary, what I am most pleased with after this tune, would be this obvious introduction of a second nature... An alternative personality to the engine and the way it operates. With the midpipe and several tune revisions, keep the revs below 2250rpm and you barely notice any difference. it operates just like the economic, reliable and trusty workhorse of a 4 cylinder it was born to be. Start to cross past 2250rpm and this is no longer the case... The intake begins to bellow out a distinctly altered frequency as it crosses over, and even with the stock exhaust manifold and muffler, it will get loud.. Punch the gas at 2500rpm and you don't have to wait for your torque. It's extremely responsive as it snorts and rips with a visceral AMG-like burble on each upshift. Then, the AT hastily shifts back into one of your cruising gears and purrs along with the utmost innocence.
Even when it was stock 87 octane, off the line, all these heavy luxury cars with their powerful turbo engines struggled to keep up until their turbos started spooling. the 2.5 NA was always known for its fast and linear response in the lower gears. However, with the torque peak now coming on sooner, I think the gearing would need to be revised. If you are in a hurry, shifting at 2500rpm drops you just outside of the powerband in the next gear. Its a little more fussy when shifting outside this torque window if you are trying to stay in the powerband after the upshift.
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
Great info. Thanks. I was wondering how a 14:1 cr pump gas engine could live. It would be interesting to know the afr at WOT too. My race na race engine is 14.5 : 1. It burns methanol fuel, make 1100 HP at 8300 rpm. It would last 10 seconds at WOT on pump gas!
It would be I interesting to see a before and after chassis dyno of your car. With and without the 2nd cat and down pipe.
I'm surprised the power band moved lower with less exhaust back pressure. Not sure why that happened but sounds like you like it.
A chassis dyno will show peak torque and HP and confirm the tune and exhaust changes. I've rented dynos for this reason many times.
I would be very concerned to see the knock sensors pulling timing. Back in the early days, some tuners used the knock sensors to protect the engine and turn up the timing. They melted to many pistons.... Also the knock sensors are tuned by the factory for a specific engine/exhaust. After changing the exhaust on our cars the knock sensor calibration was off. After installing a wide band O2 sensor, we turned down the knock sensor sensitivity and eventually turned them off. At wot, our factory O2s didn't provide any data.
Soon, we switched to lead based oxygenated race gas, VP Q16. The O2s didn't last very long but our power increased. After many tune revisions, we turned off the O2 sensors. I learned how to read spark plugs to do firm all was well. Now we log O2 sensors and read spark plugs. The engine burns methanol. We compare this data to egt temps. We have an egt sensor on each cylinder.
I've spent countless hours fixing false knock from aftermarket exhaust on street cars. Ugh
I'm so new to the Mazda platform and haven't looked for high flow cats. I'm assume they exist for Mazdas. Did your tuner tune off a O2 sensor so that you could delete a cat?
My goals for the CX5 are pretty tame. Lighter wheels, slightly wider tires, coilovers and lower 1 to 2", add camber adjustment, run a street tune. Down tube may or may not happen. I'll be experimenting with grounding the engine and a turbo blanket.
I've been down the road of over modding a street car to the point it became a track car. I have a tube chassis track car and intend to keep the CX 5 street friendly. After all its my wife's grocery getter!
It would be I interesting to see a before and after chassis dyno of your car. With and without the 2nd cat and down pipe.
I'm surprised the power band moved lower with less exhaust back pressure. Not sure why that happened but sounds like you like it.
A chassis dyno will show peak torque and HP and confirm the tune and exhaust changes. I've rented dynos for this reason many times.
I would be very concerned to see the knock sensors pulling timing. Back in the early days, some tuners used the knock sensors to protect the engine and turn up the timing. They melted to many pistons.... Also the knock sensors are tuned by the factory for a specific engine/exhaust. After changing the exhaust on our cars the knock sensor calibration was off. After installing a wide band O2 sensor, we turned down the knock sensor sensitivity and eventually turned them off. At wot, our factory O2s didn't provide any data.
Soon, we switched to lead based oxygenated race gas, VP Q16. The O2s didn't last very long but our power increased. After many tune revisions, we turned off the O2 sensors. I learned how to read spark plugs to do firm all was well. Now we log O2 sensors and read spark plugs. The engine burns methanol. We compare this data to egt temps. We have an egt sensor on each cylinder.
I've spent countless hours fixing false knock from aftermarket exhaust on street cars. Ugh
I'm so new to the Mazda platform and haven't looked for high flow cats. I'm assume they exist for Mazdas. Did your tuner tune off a O2 sensor so that you could delete a cat?
My goals for the CX5 are pretty tame. Lighter wheels, slightly wider tires, coilovers and lower 1 to 2", add camber adjustment, run a street tune. Down tube may or may not happen. I'll be experimenting with grounding the engine and a turbo blanket.
I've been down the road of over modding a street car to the point it became a track car. I have a tube chassis track car and intend to keep the CX 5 street friendly. After all its my wife's grocery getter!
Yes sir, my logging shows around 10-11 at WOT. Daniel leaned this figure out a little. I haven't seen what the figure is in the revision file yet.
I would love to dyno it at some point!
With the condition the second cat was in, no doubt it would.
Daniel has pointed out that cat-backs help optimize Skyactiv tuning.
Daniel has mentioned it part of the end-result goal for tuning, so long as it is not persistent or excessive of course. Ignition timing on the Skyactiv NA is generous under ideal circumstances. I have seen it at 40 degrees plus steady while cruising
Do some research and see if the factory downpipe on your 2.5T is restrictive. (It's probably not)
The second cat is small and unmonitored.
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
I'm assuming you have a calibrated butt dyno and can tell when torque comes on!
I use to have some street dyno software. The values were off vs. a chassis dyno but the HP and Torque curves followed a chassis dyno very closely. Also the incremental change was about the same.
Historically, less restrictive exhaust moves peak HP to higher RPM and less low RPM torque. Maybe your 2nd cat was severely restricted.
Makes me wonder why the 2nd cat failed?
I use to have some street dyno software. The values were off vs. a chassis dyno but the HP and Torque curves followed a chassis dyno very closely. Also the incremental change was about the same.
Historically, less restrictive exhaust moves peak HP to higher RPM and less low RPM torque. Maybe your 2nd cat was severely restricted.
Makes me wonder why the 2nd cat failed?
N7turbo
2023 CX-5 2.5T ... 2024 MX-5 RF GT
Electrically grounding? Never heard of that. Everything electronic should already have a ground. What benefit would this have?
I've also read some of the discussion on the turbo blanket. If heat is our enemy, this has to be a bad idea in hot climates.
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
This grounding use to be called Hyper Grounding on imports. It's been around for years. I've hyper grounded Honda's, Nissan's, Toyota's and 1 Mazda. It worked just as well on Domestic gas burners. They all picked up around 8 whp and 2 mpg. Newer models are better grounded. It may not help. I'll do some before and after logs and post the results. If the Mazda community rejects this as a valid mod, so be it. I'll keep enjoying.
May I suggest reading the tech paper. The physics works the same on a 2.5 l gas burner turbo as a 6.7 l diesel. Lots of turbo blankets on race cars. It's applied heat vs universal heat. As mentioned, this is counter intuitive.
On my CTD the turbo blanket REDUCED Egts because of improved efficiency on the hot side. I live in Alabama and tow a 10,000 pound toy box. Total package weight with truck, trailer and crew, +16,000 pounds or +4xs the weight of a CX5. I have an egt and boost gauges on a DD dash. With the blankets egt is lower at the same amount of boost. The tech paper goes into detail why. Even a Mazda could benift from this mod. We will see...
I'll do some testing and show my results. I have a test route I use to test my 5.9 CTD for checking better FE. I'll use this on the CX5 T. Maybe do a few wot logs too. And wot is not where it's at on this CX5 for me. More of a cruiser, grocery getter.
I'm not much for doing a lot of wot tests. I accelerated the demise of my trans in my truck doing wot tests. It lasted only 230,000 miles. On the other hand, the refreshed 48re trans puts a smile on my face everytime I drive my tow pig!
May I suggest reading the tech paper. The physics works the same on a 2.5 l gas burner turbo as a 6.7 l diesel. Lots of turbo blankets on race cars. It's applied heat vs universal heat. As mentioned, this is counter intuitive.
On my CTD the turbo blanket REDUCED Egts because of improved efficiency on the hot side. I live in Alabama and tow a 10,000 pound toy box. Total package weight with truck, trailer and crew, +16,000 pounds or +4xs the weight of a CX5. I have an egt and boost gauges on a DD dash. With the blankets egt is lower at the same amount of boost. The tech paper goes into detail why. Even a Mazda could benift from this mod. We will see...
I'll do some testing and show my results. I have a test route I use to test my 5.9 CTD for checking better FE. I'll use this on the CX5 T. Maybe do a few wot logs too. And wot is not where it's at on this CX5 for me. More of a cruiser, grocery getter.
I'm not much for doing a lot of wot tests. I accelerated the demise of my trans in my truck doing wot tests. It lasted only 230,000 miles. On the other hand, the refreshed 48re trans puts a smile on my face everytime I drive my tow pig!
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- 2016.5 CX-5 GT AWD titanium/black 2016 Miata Club ST MT white
This grounding use to be called Hyper Grounding on imports. It's been around for years. I've hyper grounded Honda's, Nissan's, Toyota's and 1 Mazda. It worked just as well on Domestic gas burners. They all picked up around 8 whp and 2 mpg. Newer models are better grounded. It may not help. I'll do some before and after logs and post the results. If the Mazda community rejects this as a valid mod, so be it. I'll keep enjoying.
May I suggest reading the tech paper. The physics works the same on a 2.5 l gas burner turbo as a 6.7 l diesel. Lots of turbo blankets on race cars. It's applied heat vs universal heat. As mentioned, this is counter intuitive.
On my CTD the turbo blanket REDUCED Egts because of improved efficiency on the hot side. I live in Alabama and tow a 10,000 pound toy box. Total package weight with truck, trailer and crew, +16,000 pounds or +4xs the weight of a CX5. I have an egt and boost gauges on a DD dash. With the blankets egt is lower at the same amount of boost. The tech paper goes into detail why. Even a Mazda could benift from this mod. We will see...
I'll do some testing and show my results. I have a test route I use to test my 5.9 CTD for checking better FE. I'll use this on the CX5 T. Maybe do a few wot logs too. And wot is not where it's at on this CX5 for me. More of a cruiser, grocery getter.
I'm not much for doing a lot of wot tests. I accelerated the demise of my trans in my truck doing wot tests. It lasted only 230,000 miles. On the other hand, the refreshed 48re trans puts a smile on my face everytime I drive my tow pig!
Hyper Grounding added 8whp and 2mpg? This sounds like BS to me! If this method of grounding is that much better, I suspect that vehicle manufacturers would have adopted it in the design of their cars.
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
I hear ya! This is the same argument folks have on other platforms too.
Hyper grounding originated from Japanese tuners.
Your logic is sound, logical and reasonable.
I encourage all to do some research and or try this mod before throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Or not.
I'll be adding ground cables to our CX5 t and post results, favorable or not.
I don't have any monetary thing to gain. Just passing along something I tried and works.
Hyper grounding originated from Japanese tuners.
Your logic is sound, logical and reasonable.
I encourage all to do some research and or try this mod before throwing the baby out with the bath water.
Or not.
I'll be adding ground cables to our CX5 t and post results, favorable or not.
I don't have any monetary thing to gain. Just passing along something I tried and works.
Pretty much the entire tuning of this drivetrain is focused around low to mid range torque. Removing that cat should only exacerbate this.
That's not to say torque isn't strong across the rev range. I typically don't rev past 5000rpm unless the engine "sounds" like it's capable of doing so in the moment.
I think it's a combination of repeated WOT runs earlier on the vehicles life, using 87 octane fuel, further exacerbated by the stock rich WOT conditions to try and modulate EGT.
AL Cx5
2024 CX-5 Prem Turbo Tuned Lowered Forged Wheels
I'm still wrapping my head around how many of the unique Mazda features work.
Hats off to Mazda for thinking out of the box and producing unique, dependable, fun cars!
2 inline cats and the 2nd one doesnt have O2 sensors makes me wonder if this was an after thought to meet emissions standards? Or????
This cat might disappear on my CX5 too.
Like you, I replaced a cat with a resonator on my CTD. The cat had +200,000 miles and was not plugged up. Since it wasn't plugged I didn't see much gain.
If it's easy to get to, the 2nd cat might become a high flow cat.
We use to punch out the catalist in cats so they appeared stock back in the day.
