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Adventures in EGR removal and fuel trimming

mwhtc

Member
Joined
Sep 7, 2021
Messages
140
I am not one who makes life easy for themselves, and often if I'm doing one job on a car I'll see if there is anything else that could be done while I'm at it. That works out for me sometimes (like it has with this thread), or it bites me on the arse (like when I went to repair the subframe of my RAV4, saw a small piece of rust in the sill, ended up spending 8 months welding it only for the brake master cylinder to fail).

While I was doing the injector work on my 120 (which has been reported on in great detail on the Injector Swap thread) I decided to also sort out the EGR on my 120. Ever since I've had the truck, it would belch black smoke on hard acceleration. I noted that doing an "italian tune up" - putting the truck in to 2nd/3rd and keeping the revs high for a period of time tended to clean the system and would solve the smoke for a period of time. But it would always come back.

Given the injector work, I reasoned I might as well sort out the EGR once and for all. I did a lot of reading and various questions were asked, and most of the time everything went back to the user TONYCY11 on the other website. So most of my own adventures here are based on his own work and guidance, although I've never asked him or spoken to him directly about any of this. What follows here is my own thoughts and experience, and I'll be adding to it while I dial everything in. I'm not going in to what an EGR does or such like, there are plenty of better explanations of what it is on the internet. This is just my experience, what I did, how I've found it. This is also specific to the 120.

Cleaning
The throttle body really did need a good clean, so it came off as one unit and straight in to a bucket of petrol. It was fairly caked up after 150,000 miles, and if you're going to do anything with the EGR you may as well just clean this out. I didn't remove the manifold though, mine didn't look too bad. It had a line of soot but wasn't nearly half as caked on as it was around the EGR.
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Blanking Plate
There are two methods for this, both involve a plate which covers the port from the engine that the EGR cooler connects to. The cheap method is to stick a plate on here with a 7mm hole (which seems to be agreed upon to be the sweet spot before you end up with EML's), or you opt for the Ozbush fuel mapper thingybob. Using the fuel mapper requires you to have a proper blanking plate with no holes on it. On the 120, it is a huge faff to fit this plate. It requires (at a minimum) loosening the EGR cooler and unbolting the power steering reservoir. Even then you ought to have some thing to catch the nut that will fall, they're 10mm in size and I lost one. Thankfully I have an MG ZR on the driveway which I'm stripping for parts, and the nuts they use to hold the windscreen wiper motor are the right replacements for this. Depending how much dexterity you have in your hands, you may opt to remove the EGR cooler and other bits to get a clear path to fit the plate. While I have shovel hands, I managed it. It was a faff, it was incredibly tight, but I got it in the end. A ratchet with a flexible head is probably a good thing to have for this, as well as a wobble bar. I didn't torque them, I just got them tight. Not overly tight though as I reckon the nuts would snap with too much force.

Fuel Mapper
The fuel mapper was purchased through Ozbush Electronics, I'm not the only one to buy from them and the mapper that comes feels like a stout piece of kit. Young (the chap there) is very friendly and very helpful I found. Stressed to me that he has no control over shipping, and he gave a time of 4 weeks to get the package, although some UK buyers had got the part in 10 days. Mine was closer to a month, which is nothing to do with him and is down to AusPost. Also email/call him before you buy as the shipping to the UK is slightly more than what's quoted.

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Installation is easy, it plugs in to the EGR valve and plugs in to the MAF sensor. It's light enough to be cable tied to the loom, although once it's all dialled in for me I'll be fixing it properly to the car via self tapping screws. The box itself is set to a "default" from Ozbush, and I left it like that as I felt the instructions to program the box was kind of hard to follow and would need to be read/re-read and digested properly before tinkering with it. The fuel trim knob was set to 0%.

Butterfly Removal
This is something that TONYCY11 reckons has improved the responsiveness of his Land Cruiser, and it's the removal of the butterfly plate on the throttle body. The butterfly is open, and starts to close when you apply the throttle allowing the recycled exhaust gases to be sucked in via the EGR valve. Removal of the butterfly plate (not the butterfly itself) means that doesn't (or at least, shouldn't) happen. It just sucks in clean cold air. The engine does shut down fairly abruptly now though after this removal, but I wouldn't think it's an issue.

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***

Initial Findings
So after fitting the injectors, removing the butterfly plate, and fitting the fuel mapper I took it for a good test drive. Well, anywhere I fancied going I made damn sure I drove the Land Cruiser! I filled up with diesel, and after getting over the shock of the cost (it was 145.9p a litre when I parked it up, now 177.9p a litre at the time of filling up/writing). Before doing the injectors, I was getting about 24mpg.

Over the next 277 miles, I initially had black smoke, but that since subsided and now doesn't belch anything. So the initial black smoke I had I would say is down to crap being burnt off. I wouldn't say there was that noticeable of a difference in power, but I would say it feels more potent when pulling off from a standing start. The engine feels like it has less holding it back, rather than having more power. I filled up again, and I did the calculations and I am now getting 29mpg - a 5mpg difference.

In both cases (24mpg v 29mpg) I did similar sort of driving. I'm not Lewis Hamilton, and I'm not driving Miss.Daisy either. I drive in a smooth, considered way. The variations in speed were similar, as I mostly drive along country roads to and from work, and then a run to Birmingham every week which is either by the motorway (at a steady 60mph) or through the A roads. So use cases were the same, same weight in the car (I've not lost any unfortunately!). Tyres weren't checked for pressure either. While I had a duff injector, I do feel the fuel mapper has improved the economy of the Land Cruiser.

I'm not great with numbers, so I won't even attempt the whole ROI of the mapper. But given that this Land Cruiser is a long term proposition for me - 5 years ownership minimum, hopefully I'll be buried in it - I think the mapper will pay for itself in no time at all in terms of economy.

***

Next Steps
I've filled up the Land Cruiser again, and will inflate the tyre pressures to 32psi (which I normally run anyway). However, I am going to look through the instruction manual of the fuel mapper again, and I want to start with a 13% increase on acceleration, and 8% reduction on cruise and see how that goes. Then take an MPG calculation. The mapper can go as high as 20%, I wouldn't really want to go further than 13%, and I think from default it's set to 10% anyway.

After I'm happy with that, I'll want to look at the EGR emulation it does as this can also be changed.
 
Another good write up.
If you contact TonyC direct hecan give you lots of tips with the mapper, having had one for many years, regarding performance and fuel economy. He knows the engines inside out too
 
Great writeup, thanks. I'm intrigued by the removal of the butterfly plate, not something I've read about and wonder if it's worth the effort.... Hmm
 
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Great writeup, thanks. I'm intrigued but the removal of the butterfly plate, not something I've read about and wonder if it's worth the effort.... Hmm
I think it makes a difference to the responsiveness of the pedal. Like a light tap on the pedal causes an immediate noticeable response on the engine. It makes it feel like there’s more power but there can’t be that much improvement. I think, given the cost of it, it’s worth giving it a go. It doesn’t make it drive worse as far as I’m concerned! So, so far I would agree with TonyC that it’s a good upgrade given it’s cheap and improves the feeling at least (to my foot anyway!)

I went to the truck to do the programming, and I had the fuel trim set to 0%/+1% but the Mapper was in bypass. So it’s been running with a slight boost on acceleration but fairly normal on cruise as far as I can tell.

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I’ve set it to 13% on the acceleration (up from 10% default) and -6% on cruise (down from 0%/-1%).

What I didn’t go in to is that this box handles the EGR simulation, but this has different levels. As standard it’s set to Level 4, which is factory standard. This translates to a 10% loss of power. I decided why not, let’s put it at Level 2. This translates to a 1-3% loss of power (apparently). This is the lowest recommended setting which shouldn’t bring on the error codes.

The EGR simulator programming is done at the same time as the ATT on this box, so it made sense to do it now rather than wait.

I will give it a good run to Birmingham on Friday and Saturday to see what difference it makes, both on the A roads and motorway. Won’t expect much on Friday as I’ll be going during rush hour, but Saturday will be in the morning so less traffic annoy me.
 
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I think, given the cost of it, it’s worth giving it a go. It doesn’t make it drive worse as far as I’m concerned!

How do you remove it, is it held in with screws, or do you have to cut it?

Good luck with your Bham run - let us know how you get on. I recently had a 400 mile run in mine (mostly motorway, so 50/60/70) and got 32mpg - was very happy with that!
 
PS there's some info on the other site about it
Sadly I'm not welcome on the other site... Related to when we set this one up and there was shall we say bad feelings
 
It's all ridiculous everyone should be welcome everywhere. Can't you view it as a guest?
 
To be fair I can, but I stay away on principle....
 
The butterfly plate is held to the spindle with small machine screws, one of TonyC's was tight/gummed up and the head chewed, so he had to drill it out. Just a slight hiccup and as the throttle body was off anyway, no probs in the workshop.
 
How do you remove it, is it held in with screws, or do you have to cut it?

The butterfly plate is held to the spindle with small machine screws, one of TonyC's was tight/gummed up and the head chewed, so he had to drill it out. Just a slight hiccup and as the throttle body was off anyway, no probs in the workshop.
I took it that the screws had to be drilled out, so I drilled mine out as well. I didn't think it could be unscrewed, as a loose screw would end up being sucked in to the engine. It wasn't at all difficult to be honest, drill out the screws then tap the plate out. I had my throttle body apart, so it was easy enough to do with the drill on the bench as it was getting soaked in petrol anyway.

Has anyone on done this on an 80?
Not sure what engine is in the 80, but Young lists all the available options for the mapper here: Ozbush Electronics - Products and Purchase Info - [Leaving Land Cruiser Club]

As for the EGR butterfly thing, no idea.

It's all ridiculous everyone should be welcome everywhere. Can't you view it as a guest?
Ah you would think so.

A few years ago when I bought my Lada I was trying to find out specific dimensions with the drivetrain as I wanted to do something different. I had joined the Facebook group, but I also found the UK website which had a forum connected to it. I signed up to it and waited for an acknowledgement which never came. I tried signing up again thinking the automation hadn't worked, when I realised then that the wording made it sound like a human was involved. So I emailed the owner of the website and asked what the craic was with getting on the website as I thought he might think I'm a bot. He emails back saying that people who are members of the Lada group on Facebook aren't welcome on his forum and banned.

I asked on the Facebook group why would I be banned from the forum especially as I'd not done anything, and it just goes back to the Facebook group being set up and the forum owner not being happy and banning everyone from the forum associated with the group. What's more is that, apparently, he is part of the Facebook group but under an alias no one can quite work out - so he can see or at least check any registrations. I go back to the forum owner anyway, thinking I can be a peacemaker and trying to get him to see sense, but I get nothing back. Until the morning after where my email is flooded with sign ups to gay porn and gay dating sites. It could be pure coincidence, but with GMail if you type +something between your name and the @ it serves as a wildcard email and most websites accept it as a valid email. So when you get emails in your inbox you can see what the address is they've been sent to, and you can work out what website has either sold your email or been hacked, or see what forum owner had been that petty to sign a stranger up to pornographic websites.

I went back on to the Facebook group and told them what had happened, stopping short of accusing the forum owner of doing that, I said that the website owner should check the security of their website because I'd hate to think someone had hacked it to send that sort of email to me. It's gone beyond petty with it now though as the forum owner sells parts for Ladas in the UK but no one on the Facebook group uses him, and new owners come on looking for parts are told not to use him either. Not because of the pettiness but because there are Ukrainian and Russian (well, were) businesses selling the same parts for less even with the postage. One such owner actually ordered parts from that guy in the UK, but he didn't have stock of a specific part. The owner said "oh it's OK I got it from Lada Power instead (Ukraine)" and the UK guy just went ape shit at him, cancelled the order and refunded him and barred him from the forum.
 
Crazy right.

It's not quite that bad here, some of us were banned from over there as we were accused (rightly so) of encouraging members from there to join here. No issue from here with people being members of both, and I think it's the same the other way round. Life's to short to take this seriously, but as I said, I refrain on principle as I was asked to leave.
 
On a different note I blanked my EGR off and cleaned mine a few years ago, so I may take it off again and take a look and see if it has clogged up much. Mine has the 7mm hole in the plate.
 
On a different note I blanked my EGR off and cleaned mine a few years ago, so I may take it off again and take a look and see if it has clogged up much. Mine has the 7mm hole in the plate.
It'd be interesting to know what it's like, especially as it's gone so long without throwing a code?

More importantly, does your wife like the lada? :)
She'd rather I didn't have it, but it's been in the garage for a while and she doesn't see it. So I think she's forgotten how woeful it is.

She did show some interest in it a few months ago, which was a nice surprise. But she was only wondering what I was doing for parts with the restrictions on Russia, as she didn't want me to tell her I can't get parts for the car and to be stuck with it. Which was nice of her...
 
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