Karter16's Silbergrau E46 M3 Journal

[Bry5on]

Haha - I would love to compare with your work but at this point agree - sometimes it's good to have separate efforts and then we can compare later. In terms of my process, I'm still figuring that out haha. At the moment all I really have is a tune that transitions from the Euro M3 tune to the CSL tune, with injection timing erring on the side of the CSL tune (which is generally richer) to be safe. I intend to try out a couple of different things from here to see how it goes. I ran a logging session this afternoon with LTFT off and adaptations reset to confirm my assumption that the midrange would be running rich - which it is. Plan from here is to play round with exactly where in the various maps I bring the CSL values in as I suspect I could bring them in at a lower RPM than I currently am in higher RF conditions (we'll see if that's a correct assumption or not ). Really what I'm battling at the moment is my own level of understanding.

One thing I'd love to know (it doesn't relate to any particular issue I'm having, I just was reading the other day and saw it and am super curious). In one of your first posts on the Mullet Tune you said you had to adjust the exhaust cam advance at mid throttle in the high 3k rpm range. How did you work out that was what was needed? From my (admittedly limited) understanding it seems like that would be one of the less consequent things to change and I'm curious as to how you zeroed in on that being what needed to be adjusted?

Good question, honestly hard to think back on that specific moment now that I'm through it. If I can venture to guess, there was probably a lump in the power delivery as you rolled into the throttle. This is one of the tricky things about the tuning in all honesty, throttle application rate changes fueling and can lead you to chase your tail a bit (think, "that just worked last time, what the hell?!").

In the end, doing some homework on cam timing, first intake and then exhaust, would be a smart move if you're still at the basics. You might find that you'll prefer more euro values than CSL in many cases

[karter16]

To Bry5on's point I need to make sure I understand the theory of cam timing well. I understand the individual concepts, but where I've been struggling is putting it all together and visualizing what it means in different scenarios. To this end I decided that some spreadsheets would help (spreadsheets always help).

First up I took the interpolated AVAN and EVAN tables for both the Euro M3 and CSL tunes and calculated the cam overlap for each for each point on the tables:





As you'd expect we have low overlap at idle, high overlap in the midrange, sloping down to high RPM.

So how does that work out as a difference between the two?



The CSL generally runs more overlap everywhere apart from high rpm low load, and particularly in a few different islands in the low and mid ranges.

However - we need to remember that the CSL cams have somewhat greater duration than the standard M3 cams. For the purposes of comparison then we should account for this.




That's cool and all, but what it still doesn't tell us is whether the Euro M3 tune and the CSL tune differ in where the centre of the overlap occurs (e.g. before or after TDC) which is also important information in understanding the differences between the two and why.

So I calculated the centre of the overlap for each of the tunes





And from there we can compare the difference in overlap centre between the two:



Interesting stuff to look through anyway - I feel now with this view I can better visualize and understand the impact of the various tweaks etc. that I'll make. I've only just put these together and haven't worked through them in detail to look at various areas of interest but will update here as I do.

[heinzboehmer]

I've peeked at similar spreadsheets on Bryson's laptop, but the visualizations towards the bottom of the post are awesome. Thanks for sharing.

[karter16]

Ok I think this approach is helping my brain. Here's another interesting view - this is the difference between the Euro M3 tune and CSL as it pertains to the crank degrees at which the intake valve is completely closed.



And correspondingly for when the intake valve opens:



Arguably the point at which the intake valve completely closes is the most important of the 4 (intake close, intake open, exhaust close, exhaust open), so I wanted to isolate that and examine the difference between the two maps. The intake open difference is directly related, plus an offset to account for the extra duration of the CSL cam.

As could be expected we can see that at higher RPM the CSL is configured to to close the intake valve later (by between 5-10 crank degrees) than the Euro M3 tune which will drive more top end power. we can see at low load between 4300 and 6300 RPM that the CSL closes the intake valve earlier than the Euro M3 tune. I presume this is to keep drivability decent with the bigger cams, as presumably is the other island at low RPM thru mid and high load.

[Bry5on]

That last bit is the ticket. Now compare the tune numbers from CSL vs euro and you’ll find that the euro intake cam timing should actually be making more power (and run smoother) above 3k rpm than the CSL values in most cases

[karter16]

After a few days of Mr Three being in hospital we got him home yesterday morning. Yesterday evening and today I tested v3,4 and 5 of the tune. 3 and 4 were duds (in comparison to v2) in various ways (pushing the boundaries of the theory covered above too far, but on the plus side helping me get a feel for the various adjustments) but I'm very pleased with how v5 has turned out and am happy that I have a good base now to build on. To that end I ran the first round of logging for VE tuning this evening as the tune is currently rich across the board. After a few rounds of VE tuning I'll then start making fine adjustments to the tune as needed once the larger adjustments are out of the way. I managed to force some pinging under heavy load from about 1100rpm, which is interesting as I'm entirely Euro tune in that range so would be interested to know if that happened on my original tune as well - I don't recall having come across it before. But aside from that it's feeling good.


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[Bry5on]

After a few days of Mr Three being in hospital we got him home yesterday morning. Yesterday evening and today I tested v3,4 and 5 of the tune. 3 and 4 were duds (in comparison to v2) in various ways (pushing the boundaries of the theory covered above too far, but on the plus side helping me get a feel for the various adjustments) but I'm very pleased with how v5 has turned out and am happy that I have a good base now to build on. To that end I ran the first round of logging for VE tuning this evening as the tune is currently rich across the board. After a few rounds of VE tuning I'll then start making fine adjustments to the tune as needed once the larger adjustments are out of the way. I managed to force some pinging under heavy load from about 1100rpm, which is interesting as I'm entirely Euro tune in that range so would be interested to know if that happened on my original tune as well - I don't recall having come across it before. But aside from that it's feeling good.


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Nice. Some areas of the map are sensitive to fueling and can ping if they’re not right on. Others are sensitive to throttle and cam timing. I found the same, translating 100% didn’t really work but it gets you real close. My advice is always sanity check your VE tuning with logic and ideally the wideband. I’ve found it’s thrown a few cells lean, but mostly works. Keep in mind how the full load table is incorporated while you’re doing this.

[karter16]

Nice. Some areas of the map are sensitive to fueling and can ping if they’re not right on. Others are sensitive to throttle and cam timing. I found the same, translating 100% didn’t really work but it gets you real close. My advice is always sanity check your VE tuning with logic and ideally the wideband. I’ve found it’s thrown a few cells lean, but mostly works. Keep in mind how the full load table is incorporated while you’re doing this.

Yes I've found the same with the first round of VE tuning - threw one cell to the lean side. The other thing I've done is built out a histogram of RO/RPM/Lambda at 100rpm intervals to better see where there are peaks and troughs between the RPM interpolation points in the CSL VE table which is interesting, as I fine tune I may well end up adjusting the interpolation points to smooth things out more.

Yes am keeping the VL table in mind, but wary of doing too much there until I get a Wideband and get it in play. I've found logging STAT_VL_EIN useful for understanding in the logs exactly when the car is in the VL operating mode.

If I can get the VE map tuned well enough I theoretically should be able to then use the lambda measurements to help evaluate tweaks to camshaft timing to identify where VE is improved/worsened (will have to experiment to see if this works in practice).

[Bry5on]

Yes I've found the same with the first round of VE tuning - threw one cell to the lean side. The other thing I've done is built out a histogram of RO/RPM/Lambda at 100rpm intervals to better see where there are peaks and troughs between the RPM interpolation points in the CSL VE table which is interesting, as I fine tune I may well end up adjusting the interpolation points to smooth things out more.

Yes am keeping the VL table in mind, but wary of doing too much there until I get a Wideband and get it in play. I've found logging STAT_VL_EIN useful for understanding in the logs exactly when the car is in the VL operating mode.

If I can get the VE map tuned well enough I theoretically should be able to then use the lambda measurements to help evaluate tweaks to camshaft timing to identify where VE is improved/worsened (will have to experiment to see if this works in practice).

Yep, you’ve got it. If you’re logging via D-bus and not CAN, it’s really hard to trust the data at 100rpm fidelity. There’s a lot of latency on the D-bus for request/response (testo logging is alternating requests) and the polling frequency is super low. For the higher fidelity logging TPS, RPM are both on CAN and a wideband should be plenty responsive.

While you’re in there disassembling, if you’d like to continue your current approach, you should really see if there’s a way to broadcast more useful values over CAN.

[wahsm]

You ever end up sharing the file for the adapter? Have the CSL rail and same sensor, your adapter is very clean, would love to print it. Your build journal is dangerous to follow lol.

[karter16]

You ever end up sharing the file for the adapter? Have the CSL rail and same sensor, your adapter is very clean, would love to print it. Your build journal is dangerous to follow lol.

Hey yes I will! I'm away for a few days but will be putting this up next week when I'm back in front of my PC :-) thank you!


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[karter16]

Yep, you've got it. If you're logging via D-bus and not CAN, it's really hard to trust the data at 100rpm fidelity. There's a lot of latency on the D-bus for request/response (testo logging is alternating requests) and the polling frequency is super low. For the higher fidelity logging TPS, RPM are both on CAN and a wideband should be plenty responsive.

While you're in there disassembling, if you'd like to continue your current approach, you should really see if there's a way to broadcast more useful values over CAN.

Yeah fair point re resolution/sample rate. I'll have a look into the CAN functions when I get home next week - that would be pretty cool!


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[wahsm]

Hey yes I will! I'm away for a few days but will be putting this up next week when I'm back in front of my PC :-) thank you!


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That's awesome, thank you. Such a clean solution.

[heinzboehmer]

Yeah fair point re resolution/sample rate. I'll have a look into the CAN functions when I get home next week - that would be pretty cool!

Oh man that would be awesome. I still haven't had time to look through your disassembly and see if I can help out with anything. Real work has kept me busy

Definitely post about it if you find anything interesting! Should be motivation enough for me to find some spare cycles and contribute.

[Kipjames3]

My order from EMIAuto arrived earlier in the week after a bit of a delay at Customs (turns out if you read the invoice properly and pay the correct amount it tends to speed things along).



It does not disappoint!




It's a nicely made piece, it's a soft felt on the outside with firmer layers inside to hold the shape, with the sound material in the core. I haven't got the scales out yet but its weight feels to align with what RealOEM quote. As you can see in the photo it comes with cutout flaps for accessing the fuel pumps. Nicely the cutouts aren't quite complete so there's some little tabs that hold it all in one piece, that you can easily cut with a knife if you need to access the fuel pumps.







I haven't done a full fitting yet, but I did have time the other day to do a quick check, and it looks to fit well. The only thing I wasn't able to completely validate without removing the rear seats completely was whether the isofix fittings fit through the existing cutouts. I'll check this when I have some time to get everything out of the rear bench.










The other exciting parts of the package were the bits and pieces that I needed to install the CSL centre console that picked up a couple of months ago. I had some time yesterday in between renovations and plastering and got to work removing the existing centre console. Step 1 being to remove the driver's seat.





Removing the centre console is straightforward, you just have to remove enough of the trim pieces and inserts to get to the screws holding the rear of the console down.










My console had, at some point, been leather wrapped, and whoever did it actually did a nice job of it, it looks and feels good and is much better that what I imagine the soft-touch plastic would look like by now. The flip side to this is that some of the inserts were a bit difficult to remove due to the extra thickness of the leather. On the inside of the console there is also a fair amount of over-spray of the adhesive that they used to affix the leather (not that this affects the end result). Once the gear selector trim is lifted and unscrewed as well, lifting up the handbrake boot means you can then remove the trim at the back of the console and then lift the whole thing up and over the arm rest. This then means you can access the bolts for the arm rest.








Once the three bolts are removed (being careful not to lose the metal collars which are loose) the arm rest can be removed. I took this opportunity to then give the whole thing a good vacuum.







The module resting on the carpet is the "genuine bluetooth module" which, given I don't use it, I took the opportunity to remove it and wrap up it, and the connector for the rear ashtray light in the soft wrap that the phone wiring is wrapped in. At the same time I installed the new bracket for the CSL/arm rest delete console.







With this done I was able to get on to the exciting bit of fitting the console! Prior to this, and not photographed, I took the mirror control and hazard light switch units and spent some time going over them with some wet cotton buds to clean them up and get all the dust and grime out of them that tends to accumulate over time. The other thing that I needed to do as part of fitting the console was make some space for the depth of the hazard light switch by depressing the carpet underneath it. If you don't do this the carpet will offer too much resistance and pop the hazard light switch back out again.

With the console in place the next thing was to replace the gear selector trim with the new titan shadow trim I ordered. The car was originally spec'd with this, and at some point it has been replaced with silver trim, which is in excellent condition and very nice, but I wanted to go back to the original colour. While I was doing this I gave the window controls the same cotton bud treatment. It was at this juncture that I discovered that what I thought was a spec of cola on one of the buttons does in fact appear to be collateral damage from when the contents of the rear view mirror leaked out (prior to my ownership). This is a shame as it is corrosive and can't be cleaned off the switch, so I'll need to order a replacement. Fortunately it has only affected one of the two switch units.










Once that was done I was able to reinstall the trim. Almost done!




Last thing for the console was the installation of the new boot. This is straightforward, just use the factory procedure of cable tying it on and then fit it in place!

The last work for the day was to replace the 3 other dash trim pieces. This is easy if you have a set of trim removal tools and in no time I was done and had the driver's seat back in.










I'm very happy with the end result. The CSL console very much suits the seats. I have a couple of things left to do to finish that particular project entirely.


1: The mirror control switch currently isn't wired in. With everything that I do with this car I want to make it easily reversible (why I don't know as I intend to keep the car for a long time) so rather than just hacking the existing wiring I'm working on building an extension harness to extend the wiring from it's current location in the driver's door back to the centre console. I wanted to actually move the console and check the mirror control switch before I ordered the parts for this side quest.

2: I need to order some foam-backed 9002 Alcantara to manufacture a copy of the OE tray-insert in the centre console (since these are NLA).

Speaking of NLA, the titan shadow trim I ordered was manufactured in late 2004! Which is interesting and really highlights that with these cars now being 20 years old, when the spare parts run out a lot of these sorts of projects are going to become astronomically more difficult.

Anyway, a good little project for a Saturday. When I get the time, Christmas probably, I'll get into the next steps on sorting out the rear seat!

Do you have the part numbers for the titan shadow shifter trim and dash trim kit? I'm trying to replace my brushed aluminum interior to a CSL lookalike trim and having a hard time figuring out the difference between the titan shadow trim and the titan trim. Yours looks to be what came in the CSL unless I'm incorrect in thinking that's what the CSLs came with.