I took my car to the dealer today and had a guy bump my ignition timing +3 degrees. It was set at a base of 14 and now it's @ 17. As I suspected I can feel a bit more low end torque.

I also had my base idle bumped +25 RPM to 650 because my AC makes noise sometimes if it spins to low. (I have a UDP)

 

um no.. you of all people should know that you want to retard your timing not advance it when running a 100 shot of NOS.. i would be very very careful..

 

Yeah... I have put it through serious consideration. As usual I will rely on the knock sensor to do it's job if it sees a problem. And I will be more attentive to keeping 100 octane in my tank when I spray. If I suspect any problems after that I will have it turned back down.

Even you said that I can only run 12's part time. The other 99% of the time I have a 14 second car and it's an improvement on that 99% that I am looking for.

 

It's only adjusting the BASE ignition timing, which is overridden/compensated for as soon as you hit the throttle. The ECU adds more advance depending on the change in TPS and current advance value. At least up to 60-degrees advance from my OBD-II scans with 91-octane crap, so if any additional advance is left from the base timing it will just compensate and not advance as much thus nullifying(sp?) the base ignition timing advance. The final ignition timing by the mid-to-upper RPMs is the same as it was before the Consult advanced it.

The low end grunt people claim to have gained seems to agree with my THEORY. I'm betting by the time he is at WOT and the N20 engages, the ECU has adjusted the timing according to the current sensor values and thus shouldn't cause any EXTRA detonation.

 

Extra low end grunt always comes from increasing base timing. And thats the best palce for anyone to actually feel a difference. If any increases are made at the top end they wouldn't be felt since they would be so small. I have advanced timing on literally dozens of vehicles and I have always gotten the same results. But just as you said, there may be no difference at all on the top and the only way for me to prove it is to head off to the dyno and get an OBD-II scanner that does full data aquisition.

Which one do you have? I am considering the AutoTap. $3500 for a Consult2 is out of my price range.

 

check out:

www.obd-2.com ... you can hook it up to a laptop and monitor many things ... plus it's pretty inexpensive

 

to u as it did to me...benefit primarily in the lower/mid RPM ranges -where one spends 80% of one's time anyway.

ICE...I dont know that I fully agree with you...you may be right once u get to past 3k rpms with the engine under load but when we were doing my mod we observed the ECU did indeed kep the timing +3 degrees up to 3k rpms.

Again, that was under a no-load condition -which is really revving without much engine vacuum nor any significant TPS movement- so...u could be right, only way to check is to run the timing map while on a dyno.

Me no need to do that, it works well for me as I have lots of city & moderately twisty road driving in my commute, etc so...I'm cool with the mid-rpm response

 

I'm curious, I have a 99 SE-L Cali Spec and share the same ECU as some 5th gens. I wonder if it's possible to do the same tweeking to my cars ECU?

Any input guys?

I hate the service department at my local dealer, and I'd like to have my facts in line before I go and talk to them about something like that.

 

If you do, they can do the same thing.

It's just above the brake pedal and looks like a trapezoid.

 

Yeah, I agree it's going to be different under load, but that's VERY INTERESTING. I'm looking at "target" advance with the scanner, while your looking at ACTUAL advance, so they are going to be different. Under load the timing will vary.

What do you mean "timing map" and is that something a Dyno Jet can measure?

 

any engine pinging????

I had to retard my timing (I never advanced it)because of engine pinging

 

Under what conditions did you get pinging? Uphill while WOT with A/C on in top gear?

What octane fuel are you using?

Was this with the INJEN?

I'd wonder if a coil was bad, but the retarding helped?

 

SR20DEN,

Did the dealer charge you for these services? If so what was the charge?

Thanks...

 

Yeah, that's a good question...

Also, is this going to help on my car? I'm not running any juice...just an intake.

 

Chevron Premium all the time

basically after shifting into 2nd or 3rd and accelerating (a/c makes it worse) and if it is over 100+ degrees outside which it has been the last week!

I had the ECU reset after I installed my Injen. After the dealer retarded my timing my power loss was bad and the pinging did not go away

I'm going down to the dealer today for an oil change and an earful

 

I know it's not what you want to hear, but I'm wondering if it's not the INJEN.

You may try and go back to stock and see if it helps ESPECIALLY before you take it back to the dealer.

 

The odds are 99 out of 100 that it's those sh!tty Nissan coils, Dave. I had the coils replaced in my 2K SE at around 10K miles and the coils in my wife's 2K GXE replaced at around 40K miles. Both sets were replaced as a result of detonation.

 

I talked to my friend Chris at Mossy and he told me he has seen coil probs with the V6 Altima engines. He's going to look into it for me on Monday and hopefully replace them. How many coils do I have? Should I replace them all?