To Emerald or not to Emerald?
Discussion
My cars been standard from day one. Then creeped in the linked decat pipes, and nitron suspension. Better sound and good handling.
My old wonky HT leads fell apart in my hands (honest guv), so got a new set of super HT leads.
Still an original 2000 LW, I thought.
Now comes the decision about Emeralds. This is a tricky one I need some help with. Gotta make a decision yes or no by the end of June (end of tax year).
Pros.
1) Well trodden upgrade path now. And would be nice to try and join the 400 club.
2) New K3's allow on the fly switching between three maps. My prefered option is 99ron switch, pass an mot emissions with cat switch on 95, and economy no pops and bangs on fast idle 4000 revs to pass noise emissions test at any track I might go to (have to admit I rarely go to tracks).
3) Allows me to have a play and understand a bit more about engines.
Cons.
1) Previous emeralds seem to ignore the lamda sensor using open loop rather than closed loop.
2) Constant state of change of the engine renders any very specific setup futile in weeks.
3) Not seen an emerald working yet with a wideband sensor to effectively utilise the emeralds adaptive abilities to counter the above points.
Currently getting a price from both emerald and trackcar for the above and currently getting a set of shortened pipes to fit (probably).
Would be interested on anyone elses opinion on the above. Remember my cars standard, although I was assuming it would suffer from being standard at the recent Brands hatch track day it didn't have any difficulty keeping up with the other Cerbs at the Brands Hatch day. Also my car seems to be one of the few 4.5 Cerbs that isn't snatchy at normal driving speeds, in fact its rather smooth.
Promised myself if I don't get the emerald by the end of this month I'll never get it.
My old wonky HT leads fell apart in my hands (honest guv), so got a new set of super HT leads.
Still an original 2000 LW, I thought.
Now comes the decision about Emeralds. This is a tricky one I need some help with. Gotta make a decision yes or no by the end of June (end of tax year).
Pros.
1) Well trodden upgrade path now. And would be nice to try and join the 400 club.
2) New K3's allow on the fly switching between three maps. My prefered option is 99ron switch, pass an mot emissions with cat switch on 95, and economy no pops and bangs on fast idle 4000 revs to pass noise emissions test at any track I might go to (have to admit I rarely go to tracks).
3) Allows me to have a play and understand a bit more about engines.
Cons.
1) Previous emeralds seem to ignore the lamda sensor using open loop rather than closed loop.
2) Constant state of change of the engine renders any very specific setup futile in weeks.
3) Not seen an emerald working yet with a wideband sensor to effectively utilise the emeralds adaptive abilities to counter the above points.
Currently getting a price from both emerald and trackcar for the above and currently getting a set of shortened pipes to fit (probably).
Would be interested on anyone elses opinion on the above. Remember my cars standard, although I was assuming it would suffer from being standard at the recent Brands hatch track day it didn't have any difficulty keeping up with the other Cerbs at the Brands Hatch day. Also my car seems to be one of the few 4.5 Cerbs that isn't snatchy at normal driving speeds, in fact its rather smooth.
Promised myself if I don't get the emerald by the end of this month I'll never get it.
julian64 said:
My cars been standard from day one. Then creeped in the linked decat pipes, and nitron suspension. Better sound and good handling.
My old wonky HT leads fell apart in my hands (honest guv), so got a new set of super HT leads.
Still an original 2000 LW, I thought.
Now comes the decision about Emeralds. This is a tricky one I need some help with. Gotta make a decision yes or no by the end of June (end of tax year).
Pros.
1) Well trodden upgrade path now. And would be nice to try and join the 400 club.
2) New K3's allow on the fly switching between three maps. My prefered option is 99ron switch, pass an mot emissions with cat switch on 95, and economy no pops and bangs on fast idle 4000 revs to pass noise emissions test at any track I might go to (have to admit I rarely go to tracks).
3) Allows me to have a play and understand a bit more about engines.
Cons.
1) Previous emeralds seem to ignore the lamda sensor using open loop rather than closed loop.
2) Constant state of change of the engine renders any very specific setup futile in weeks.
3) Not seen an emerald working yet with a wideband sensor to effectively utilise the emeralds adaptive abilities to counter the above points.
Currently getting a price from both emerald and trackcar for the above and currently getting a set of shortened pipes to fit (probably).
Would be interested on anyone elses opinion on the above. Remember my cars standard, although I was assuming it would suffer from being standard at the recent Brands hatch track day it didn't have any difficulty keeping up with the other Cerbs at the Brands Hatch day. Also my car seems to be one of the few 4.5 Cerbs that isn't snatchy at normal driving speeds, in fact its rather smooth.
Promised myself if I don't get the emerald by the end of this month I'll never get it.
I think I remember from your previous posts that you service the car yourself and the Emerald certainly makes sense if you'd like to adjust your own mapping. I never thought I'd ever play with mine, other than putting in pre-programmed maps, but even I started to tinker when I needed to adjust my (very) cold starting. The software is nice and not too intimidating. And Jools gave me newbie guidance.My old wonky HT leads fell apart in my hands (honest guv), so got a new set of super HT leads.
Still an original 2000 LW, I thought.
Now comes the decision about Emeralds. This is a tricky one I need some help with. Gotta make a decision yes or no by the end of June (end of tax year).
Pros.
1) Well trodden upgrade path now. And would be nice to try and join the 400 club.
2) New K3's allow on the fly switching between three maps. My prefered option is 99ron switch, pass an mot emissions with cat switch on 95, and economy no pops and bangs on fast idle 4000 revs to pass noise emissions test at any track I might go to (have to admit I rarely go to tracks).
3) Allows me to have a play and understand a bit more about engines.
Cons.
1) Previous emeralds seem to ignore the lamda sensor using open loop rather than closed loop.
2) Constant state of change of the engine renders any very specific setup futile in weeks.
3) Not seen an emerald working yet with a wideband sensor to effectively utilise the emeralds adaptive abilities to counter the above points.
Currently getting a price from both emerald and trackcar for the above and currently getting a set of shortened pipes to fit (probably).
Would be interested on anyone elses opinion on the above. Remember my cars standard, although I was assuming it would suffer from being standard at the recent Brands hatch track day it didn't have any difficulty keeping up with the other Cerbs at the Brands Hatch day. Also my car seems to be one of the few 4.5 Cerbs that isn't snatchy at normal driving speeds, in fact its rather smooth.
Promised myself if I don't get the emerald by the end of this month I'll never get it.
Looking at your list:
Pros:
1) Yes, it's certainly a well-developed upgrade path. You might need the short induction to get to 400bhp but there's no reason you shouldn't with a healthy car. I'm not too bothered about the numbers but it still made me smile when Jools texted "401.5bhp" late one evening. Emerald themselves seem pretty aware that people like easy upgrade paths so firmware changes (like adding the switchable maps) are cheap and easy.
2) I like the map switching (Pops and bangs on demand). If you will only be using a given map occasionally, for an MOT for example, you can just download that map for the day with a laptop but the evil map switch causes me amusement. I just kept my MBE (and my cats) for the MOT.
3) Yep
Cons:
1) I think they still do.
2) Maybe, check with Emerald/trackcar
3) I'm almost certain Jools was running a wideband lambda on an RV8 with an Emerald when I was there recently but I don't know if he's done an AJP yet.
I'll be interested to know what you decide, and why. Could you try a "before" dyno run and see what gains you might make in smoothness and power ?
Steve_T said:
There is option 2, an MBE remap, although it sounds like you've already ruled that out. Works for all of us that have it though.
Sorry ruled that out, mainly because it doesn't get me what I want.I kind'a wanted the switchable maps before emerald actually started doing them. Nothing switchable with the MBE
I wanted to play with it. No playing with the MBE.
I think it likely my tinkering will continue. I'll probably do the short induction thing. I want to take another look at my throttle butterflies. I want to play with the 4.2 inlets I have to see what they'd be like on the 4.5. All of which would play havoc with a fixed MBE system. I'd have to turn up at Gatwick every other weekend to hae them adjust it for my messing around. Not really practical
I don't have a rolling road at home (
) But I do have a bunch of local rolling roads near me, a few of which have offered me free out of hours time to play if I want. None of them know much about Cerbs so it would be down to me.If I don't use rolling roads them a wideband sensor and the car on a run to see how close the car comes to an 'ideal' wideband sensor reading would be my 'poor mans' alternative to a rolling road. Feasable with the emerald to adjust while someone else is driving I suppose. Or easy enough for me if it were on a rolling road.
For some the MBE is ideal. Fire,forget, and get on with the driving. But for me its a waste.
julian64 said:
Pros.
1) Well trodden upgrade path now. And would be nice to try and join the 400 club.
Yes it is well trodden, but the Cerbs are only a minute part of the Emerald story. There's an increasing number of Emerald-aware people out there, including some businesses so finding someone to help you with your tweaks is easy.1) Well trodden upgrade path now. And would be nice to try and join the 400 club.
julian64 said:
2) New K3's allow on the fly switching between three maps. My prefered option is 99ron switch, pass an mot emissions with cat switch on 95, and economy no pops and bangs on fast idle 4000 revs to pass noise emissions test at any track I might go to (have to admit I rarely go to tracks).
Quite honestly there's such a lot of bullshit being talked about popping and banging that I've never heard outside of this forum. A properly mapped car doesn't not exhibit this trait at all. I see there being the opportunity for the following maps:a)Normal map designed for max power, probably running on Super UL (meaning the ignition is fairly advanced.
b)A map for use when only 95RON fuel is available - ignition slightly retarded.
c)The MoT map which, if my previous experience is anything to go on (and I haven't tested my theory at an MoT station with the Cerb yet) is where the ignition is massively advanced at the zero load sites for the rev ranges to be tested (normally idle and 2500rpm or thereabouts).
So the changes are *only* to the ignition. A properly mapped car shouldn't need the injection map buggering about with at all although it is possible that some testing for the MoT map may prove minor tweaks necessary.
julian64 said:
3) Allows me to have a play and understand a bit more about engines.
Definitely. I've learned a lot playing the Emerald on my Caterham over the past 7 years.julian64 said:
Cons.
1) Previous emeralds seem to ignore the lamda sensor using open loop rather than closed loop.
An Emerald *can* utilise a standard narrowband lambda without any further hardware. People tend not to because once mapped, why would you rely on a bit of kit that cannot operate in the range that the Cerb engine requires anyway?1) Previous emeralds seem to ignore the lamda sensor using open loop rather than closed loop.
julian64 said:
2) Constant state of change of the engine renders any very specific setup futile in weeks.
Engine doesn't change constantly.julian64 said:
3) Not seen an emerald working yet with a wideband sensor to effectively utilise the emeralds adaptive abilities to counter the above points.
I used an Emerald and wideband with a system for self-mapping before the official Emerald system came out and although it required a bit of faffing about, it worked very very well. You could hone your map to "production car" standards with a bit of patience.The Emerald K3 has moved this game on a bit further and generally improved the interface and ease with which you can accomplish this. You would be advised to have your engine mapped on the rollers first, and to save that map as a baseline, but buggering about with it using the self-mapping facility should lead to your increasing your fuel economy. Just make sure you know what AFR you should be outputting and where in the map, and ensure you don't deviate from and you'll end up with the best map you can get.
julian64 said:
Would be interested on anyone elses opinion on the above. Remember my cars standard, although I was assuming it would suffer from being standard at the recent Brands hatch track day it didn't have any difficulty keeping up with the other Cerbs at the Brands Hatch day. Also my car seems to be one of the few 4.5 Cerbs that isn't snatchy at normal driving speeds, in fact its rather smooth.
Mine too, but I would have put that down to the Emerald. If yours is good too then perhaps they don't all *have* to be as bad as one or two I've witnessed before.julian64 said:
Promised myself if I don't get the emerald by the end of this month I'll never get it.
I have to agree with those that have had remaps on the standard MBE though. It *is* just an ECU at the end of the day. There's nothing rocket-science about it and the MBE is as good in all aspects *except* the community and ease of operation. If you only wanted to get the car mapped as good as it can get, then just do it to the MBE. If you intend to learn a bit about mapping and wish to make incremental changes to the engine spec, the Emerald is hard to beat.Thanks all, I have never been interested in the pops and bangs.
They concern me for two reasons.
In an MOT situation at fast idle 2500rpm, the engine is not under load, and one side of the engine is usually carrying the other. I have yet to hear a Cerb V8 so well balanced that there is no poping and banging in this respect.
This puts so much poorly combusted fuel through the exhaust its a wonder any cerb ever passes an MOT, let alone has a working cat from then on. So I want to play with a system to rid myself of this if possible when the situation needs.
The other time I want to get rid of the pops and bangs, is a similar situation of no load while bill and ben are testing my engine for noise at 3/4 throttle with no load. In this respect if one side of the engine is popping and banging you get a situation like I did recently at Brands when the sound testers were complaining of one side being 96db, and the other side 100db. Very carefully slipping the throttle to load the engine would cure this but at 4000 rpm slipping the clutch slightly is a sure way to end up with no clutch after a minute or so.
However when I have my foot to the floor and some pesky lesser car in front needs overtaking I am quite happy to leave a balls out slight imbalance to get the most from each side of the engine.
I could of course be talking complete cobblers
They concern me for two reasons.
In an MOT situation at fast idle 2500rpm, the engine is not under load, and one side of the engine is usually carrying the other. I have yet to hear a Cerb V8 so well balanced that there is no poping and banging in this respect.
This puts so much poorly combusted fuel through the exhaust its a wonder any cerb ever passes an MOT, let alone has a working cat from then on. So I want to play with a system to rid myself of this if possible when the situation needs.
The other time I want to get rid of the pops and bangs, is a similar situation of no load while bill and ben are testing my engine for noise at 3/4 throttle with no load. In this respect if one side of the engine is popping and banging you get a situation like I did recently at Brands when the sound testers were complaining of one side being 96db, and the other side 100db. Very carefully slipping the throttle to load the engine would cure this but at 4000 rpm slipping the clutch slightly is a sure way to end up with no clutch after a minute or so.
However when I have my foot to the floor and some pesky lesser car in front needs overtaking I am quite happy to leave a balls out slight imbalance to get the most from each side of the engine.
I could of course be talking complete cobblers
trackcar said:
You rarely talk cobblers julian.
Did you get my email from earlier this evening? It's very unbiased and defo not hard sell i promise.
One of the things I like about you is that I pretty much always feel your information is unbiased and pretty much straight to the point. I rarely take anyones word for anything, cos I'm an awkward sod, but pretty much I've not known you to be wrong.Did you get my email from earlier this evening? It's very unbiased and defo not hard sell i promise.
The email set me back on my heels a bit and am still digesting. I used part of it to email emerald this evening and shame them into a decent reply. I hope you don't mind. It upsets me to swap anything out to pass an MOT.
I would secretly like to go MBE, because its more of the 'standard car'. But its the end of the ability to play to have a fixed chip.
Truth be told have been waiting quite a long time while others go for the emerald to see if anyone is actually going to be able to do what I wanted with the MBE. I was hoping that if the demise of TVR had any sliver linings it would be that MBE would release details of the MBE graunched for the Cerb.
But it would require a lot of info I don't have right now. I would want to know where all the data in the 32K eprom is and what it does. I would like a way of changing it on the fly using a glorified automated eprom emulator. Its all do-able. But its a lot of work, there ain't no road signs to help, and pretty much there would be no market for it as everyone seems to be happy with their Emeralds.
So sitting here thinking.
Not sure what the issue is about MOT's (assuming standard cats fitted).
If the correct car code is keyed into the MOT software, it will automatically increase the maximum allowable lambda value from a standard 1.03 to 1.2 for the Cerbera (going from memory here) resulting in a pass for a normally set up car.
S'what happened to mine anyway. Or is there another issue I'm not understanding?
If the correct car code is keyed into the MOT software, it will automatically increase the maximum allowable lambda value from a standard 1.03 to 1.2 for the Cerbera (going from memory here) resulting in a pass for a normally set up car.
S'what happened to mine anyway. Or is there another issue I'm not understanding?
Julian, I can see you're in Kent while I'm in Redditch (Worcs) so not exactly around the corner, but if you want to join one of our local runs or meetings, or even fancy a drive up here specifically to meet with me I'd be pleased to go through what I have. My Emerald isn't a K3 nor do I yet have a wideband lambda on the Cerb but I had it all on the Caterham and understand how it's applied. I have connected the laptop to the Emerald and can review the settings.
I would also be proud to show you the car's behaviour itself, athough my pride is limited to ownership. What Jules and Joolz achieved previously is a sensational setup.
Alternatively, if you're at the Fighting Torque event in August, I'll be there too.
I would also be proud to show you the car's behaviour itself, athough my pride is limited to ownership. What Jules and Joolz achieved previously is a sensational setup.
Alternatively, if you're at the Fighting Torque event in August, I'll be there too.
Mars said:
Quite honestly there's such a lot of bullshit being talked about popping and banging that I've never heard outside of this forum. A properly mapped car doesn't not exhibit this trait at all.
Absolutely. But I missed them when they were gone so I have a switch to bring them back and remind me how it used to be. Just for my amusement. Julian...if you would like to confirm with Joos that a straight Emerald swop onto your car wont mess things up, I could always pop over to yours sometime in mine, plug my emerald onto your car and take the car for a drive to see if there are significant differences. I know when Cyclone first had his fitted, it was at a SRR meet, and all Joos did, was used my laptop with my saved configuration, and downloaded it onto the emerald fitted out of the box in Cyclones..(although as we all know further tweeks were carried out later!)
In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
satman said:
Julian...if you would like to confirm with Joos that a straight Emerald swop onto your car wont mess things up, I could always pop over to yours sometime in mine, plug my emerald onto your car and take the car for a drive to see if there are significant differences. I know when Cyclone first had his fitted, it was at a SRR meet, and all Joos did, was used my laptop with my saved configuration, and downloaded it onto the emerald fitted out of the box in Cyclones..(although as we all know further tweeks were carried out later!)
In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
As an essex boy I can see where the pops and bangs still come in handy! In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
But come MOT time you take you car on a six hour round trip to Jools for fettling, where jools swaps out your Emerald with a standard MBE, sticks a cat in, and reconnects your lambda sensors.
Its just for a control freak like me that hurts. Not the jools bit, but the rest of it. I want an emerald to be a proper replacement with a wideband sensor working and ......well you know the rest. I want to throw the MBE in the bin and forget about it because the emerald does everything.
There nothing wrong with having the emerald as you do, and everyone has universally been happy with it.
I know this is my problem
julian64 said:
satman said:
Julian...if you would like to confirm with Joos that a straight Emerald swop onto your car wont mess things up, I could always pop over to yours sometime in mine, plug my emerald onto your car and take the car for a drive to see if there are significant differences. I know when Cyclone first had his fitted, it was at a SRR meet, and all Joos did, was used my laptop with my saved configuration, and downloaded it onto the emerald fitted out of the box in Cyclones..(although as we all know further tweeks were carried out later!)
In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
As an essex boy I can see where the pops and bangs still come in handy! In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
But come MOT time you take you car on a six hour round trip to Jools for fettling, where jools swaps out your Emerald with a standard MBE, sticks a cat in, and reconnects your lambda sensors.
Its just for a control freak like me that hurts. Not the jools bit, but the rest of it. I want an emerald to be a proper replacement with a wideband sensor working and ......well you know the rest. I want to throw the MBE in the bin and forget about it because the emerald does everything.
There nothing wrong with having the emerald as you do, and everyone has universally been happy with it.
I know this is my problem
Steve_T said:
julian64 said:
satman said:
Julian...if you would like to confirm with Joos that a straight Emerald swop onto your car wont mess things up, I could always pop over to yours sometime in mine, plug my emerald onto your car and take the car for a drive to see if there are significant differences. I know when Cyclone first had his fitted, it was at a SRR meet, and all Joos did, was used my laptop with my saved configuration, and downloaded it onto the emerald fitted out of the box in Cyclones..(although as we all know further tweeks were carried out later!)
In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
As an essex boy I can see where the pops and bangs still come in handy! In my experience, mine is much more reponsive, more drivable around town etc and has given me more 'pull' throughout the range....oh and i do still have lots of pops and bangs!
But come MOT time you take you car on a six hour round trip to Jools for fettling, where jools swaps out your Emerald with a standard MBE, sticks a cat in, and reconnects your lambda sensors.
Its just for a control freak like me that hurts. Not the jools bit, but the rest of it. I want an emerald to be a proper replacement with a wideband sensor working and ......well you know the rest. I want to throw the MBE in the bin and forget about it because the emerald does everything.
There nothing wrong with having the emerald as you do, and everyone has universally been happy with it.
I know this is my problem
and besides, Joos doesnt do my MOTs for me and neither do I take the Emerald out and replace with the std MBE for my MOTs...I just use a TVR friendly garage, who hears me coming down the road, with my "essex-boy" pops n bangs......
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