K series emissions ''failure'' advice re MOT impending

[Fil M]

Hello All,

I have done a couple of posts re my car running / not running rich. Today I took it to my local garage who are a fine crew of mechanics and they were kind enough to let me put the car in the MOT bay and run her up to see what emissions she was putting out. She is K series 1800 r upgrade with roller barrells with an R500 MBE ECU.

 

She was putting out 6.4 ish CO2 .. way over the level deemed a pass. She has the original Caterham exhaust with the cat. So she is a bit rich but the chap at the garage said she would give great performance!! The R conversion was done by Caterham. The roller barrells were balanced a year ago for the last MOT at a garage too far away to use. The MOT is due in June. I see my options as ...

 

1. Take her back to Caterhams for the MOT including any adjustments.

2. £££ re map first ..but will the re map get her to MOT standard and leave me with a car that leaves me with a grin...this was an 'upgrade' I had slated for a few months time.

 

Yet again a call on your experience please sevener's. What would be the best next step re the MOT? Have you experiecned this? Its my first 7 MOT

[GPBox]

Hi, are you sure the CAT was up to operating temperature, they are pretty 'binary' in the way they work............

[Grubbster]

Phil, mine struggles to make MOT compliant emissions - I usually have to refit the cat exhaust and adjust the mix on the Emerald (not an option you have). There are some garages that will do the MOT without checking the emissions though. I'll mail you.

[Mark w]

I had my R400 re mapped by the two steves , fantastic improovement but i dont think it will resolve your MOT problem ( mine now runs without the Lamda)

 

I suggest that you find an MOT garage with a " faulty " emissions tester .

 

Mine seems to pass that test OK .

[oilyhands]

You could start by balancing the throttle bodies, ensuring they are drawing 5.5KG/hr on each one at idle and then aligning the throttle position sensor. This should get you close.

 

Oily

[Ivaan]

Do you have verniers?

 

On my K series car, I found I had to back of the cam timing overlap a bit to get through the test. After marking their current positions, slaken the verniers off and move the exhaust a couple of mm anti-clockwise and the exhaust a couple of mm clockwise, and the emmissions will drop well down. ( Or should that be the other way round ?? ).

 

Turn the engine over by hand before starting to make sure there's no valve / piston clearance issues.

 

Because the inlet and exhaust opening/closing overlap by a few degrees, unburnt fuel will get through int the exhaust.

 

After the MOT, set them back to the original locations.

 

My local MOT station let me do this whist the car was in the emissions bay, with the probe up the exhaust 😬

 

Clive

[EFA]

TPS alignment. Uisng Easymap, set the TPS voltage (at correct idle speed) to the lowest value (load site 0) in the throttle map.

[oilyhands]

edited..

 

Edited by - oilyhands on 18 May 2011 07:56:58

[Nov-07]

Ivaan

You might like to edit your advice to indicate which is Inlet and which is Exhaust.

Ever since I built, and subsequently modified, my 1.8 SV I have tried to persuade MOT stations that the "Emissions: N/A" on the SVA certificate means what it says. No luck, until this year. The car failed, marginally, despite trimming of the Emerald ECU. Then the tester revealed that if the test is not passed within a specified time, set by the DVLA computer, a second menu of instructions is displayed. Now the tester was able to recheck the VIN number and to declare that, as a self-built car, the Emissions test was indeed N/A 😬

I have not yet found an MOT station that preforms the emissions test on a really hot engine (and cat.). Typically the test is performed after the car has been on the ramp for half an hour ☹️ I am in the process of educating our local garage, who claim to maintain Ferraris and other exotic machinery.

[Fil M]

Thankyou to all of you for your suggestions. The car was nice and hot on the ramp GP Box. The exhaust has a cat. The garage chap got me to try it at different revs..he event dismantled the probe and blew it through with air ... in fact he did just about everything he could to test it fairly even sayinng that if it was a bit out it wouldnt be a problem.. it was a bit too much over the .25! Cost me a voluntary £5 to the tea fund.

 

Thanks Oily for your tech info. I will research this and see if I cant do this myself. I just need to find out the what equipment and the how to do it bit. I am happy to get my mits mucky.

 

Thanks for your suggestion Grubbster I will take it there and see how things turn out. If I cannot do Oily hands suggestion I will ask that establishment to do those checks and adjustments as part of the visit then MOT it.

 

Thanks Ivaan .. she doesnt have Verniers yet and my intention is to do a visit to Oilys establishment in the coming months for these. That will give me some options for later on.

 

The ECU adjustments EFA are bit beyond me ... can I access my MBE unit somehow? Its something I would be happy to learn about.

 

The two Steves are on my to do list Mark after the Verniers.

 

Thanks to all of you. If the above plan does'nt pan out I will have a blat to Caterham as they fitted the upgrade. Thanks for giving me some options. Let you know how i get on in a few weeks.

 

Fil