Interesting idea, keep us posted as you find out more about this. Maybe, would need some sort of factory calibration from vacuum to instantaneous mpg.xcel said:
Good, detailed post. Thanks!
Warm air mods and real world data …
G
Hi All:
___First off, much of this post has probably already been disseminated in the Yahoo Honda-Hybrid and Honda-Insight groups years ago. Unfortunately for some of us newbie’s, many of us are the second generation of Insighter’s without the knowledge of our Insight’s previous owners or those that have provided this information in the past …
___I had the pleasure to meet up with and spend an afternoon with Chisight (Brian is his real name and appears to be a relatively well known poster in the Yahoo - Honda-Hybrid and Honda-Insight forums). He has also seen more then just a few > 100 tmpg’s over his own 45 - 50 mile daily commute … That last statement should be placed in his resume’ if you were to ask me
___Anyway, there is some information for those ready to mod (winterize) their own Insight’s that needs to be discussed … For one, the warm air mods work as described. Chisight has an obd2 scanner and we used it to retrieve some very important real time data through 2 very different driving conditions using my own 2000 just two days ago …
___Ambient temps were between 30 and 35 degrees F during our recordings of the hwy loop as well as a stop and go city loop(s). He had the following parameters up on his laptop in full display mode:
Timing Advance
Air Intake Temperature
Coolant temperature
An O2 sensor although I don’t recall which one?
___With these, we could see just before the Insight was to enter a NOx purge via the O2 sensor outputting any significant voltage > 0.05 or thereabouts as well as the temps achieved with the mods I had previously installed. The O2 reading climbing from 0 (indicating a NOx purge event) beats the instantaneous as well as the seat of the pants acceleration kick every single time!
___Since I travel almost 95% +, at hwy speeds (~ 55 mph), a totally blocked off radiator and pre-heater hose from the side intake to the top cat shield works very very well. Engine coolant temps and intake temperature with the around freezing ambient temperatures normalized between 190 and 195 and 54 to 60 respectively. This was seen during the hwy portion of the drive with the Insight just warmed up as we were approaching the entrance ramp to the Interstate. Lean Burn was acting as it should and with Brian’s years of Insight experience (he was driving my 2000 at this point), all appeared as well as felt normal to him.
___Now here is the slightly dangerous part … Since it was ~ freezing at this point and after ~ 10 miles of Interstate driving, we began an ~ 10 mile urban city loop back to our origin. This means gentle accelerations and stops with auto stop engaging at the lights. The slower we traveled (speeds between 20 and 35 mph), the higher both Intake and coolant temperatures rose. By the time we got back to our initial starting point, I was showing 80 degree F intake temperatures (sounds good) but coolant temperature was still climbing and had climbed to a dangerously high 207 degrees in the last 2 or 3 blocks of travel before stopping at our initial start point! In other words, if you are doing any thing over 5 miles of city driving with a 100% blocked off radiator, don’t! We were not running the A/C to compensate other then to keep the windows clear and keep the cabin at maybe 66 degrees. Manual control of the heat was the only method we used for cabin comfort control. We were shutting down all HVAC functions before hitting a light to guarantee an Autostop and I do this as well given the chance Autostop will not engage with the HVAC up and running no matter the setting in my own personal experience as well as his. Anyway, if you were to run city conditions or Stop and Go on the hwy, I would suggest that you manually increase the A/C’s fan to 4 blocks with the temperature set reasonably high to compensate for the higher coolant temps. I will do some of my own experimentation with this when my own OBD-2 scanner arrives but I wanted to pass on this warning that city driving with a 100% blocked off radiator can lead to real trouble over a relatively short period of time. On the hwy at hwy speeds, it works fantastic.
___As for fixes to the above, Brian had a number of his own warm air mods but I did not see his Insight’s OBD2 parameters except for an extremely short period of time before his 2000 Insight was even warmed up. He has only ~ 2/3 of his radiator/condenser blocked off with a safer ~ 6” gap between the two cardboard blocks right down the center open to the air stream. He also has his entire lower intake blocked off from the exterior of the Insight which I believe to be a novel approach given it will help with aerodynamics and block off the lower portion of the radiator from seeing the cold air steam as well. He does not have the pre-heater hose installed although I think he will after he saw my Insight’s own intake temperatures with one installed With his own 65 – 80% radiator block mods, he is seeing coolant temps in the high 180s’ to a maximum of 201 in his year + experiences of colder winter temperatures here in the Chicago area. He removes his own warm air mods when its ~ 45 degrees or above … I believe his methods to be not only a more safe proposition for those with some city driving in their normal every day routines but even for us hwy drivers, we will eventually be stuck in a stop, crawl, or stop and go situation for a period. His frontal air dam block and its aerodynamic enhancements had me really intrigued given the achieved higher winter time coolant temperature and the mileage increase from the cleaner air flow as well … As for non hwy stop and go, crack your windows and blast the heat is my suggestion for now but I will try and add a bit more detail later after some time with a real time OBD2 scanner watching my own habits …
___With the above, he also mentioned he sees the best fuel economy when intake temps are ~ 75 to 80 degrees. Much higher then this and he says his fuel economy actually begins to fall slightly. It is to bad Honda didn’t place a pre-heater with a thermostatically controlled cold/warm air mixture plenum somewhere in the air intake to always have the optimum intake temperatures He also received a respectable 71.x tmpg over these two very different driving condition loops.
___And some interesting superfluous information that many may be interested in … The Coolant Temperature digital readout is totally bogus and this was confirmed in both mine as well as his Insight. 2 Bars always show up when the car is booted. 4 bars appear at ~ 145 - 160 degrees F coolant temperature. 6 bars show up from ~ 160 + and that includes the final 2 or 3 blocks we traveled with the coolant temperature at 207 degrees F! The Digital readout means nothing other then that the Insight’s coolant is above a certain trigger point and nothing else! This was not only unbelievable but downright dangerous imho. How are you supposed to know if or when you are having radiator/thermostat/coolant trouble when the gauge doesn’t move in proportion to temperature?
___Lastly, the Insight’s instantaneous is very twitchy not because it is actually matching your instantaneous economy but that it appears to be tracking vacuum instead? I wish I had more time with Brian to see if the OBD2 scanner had the two throttle trims in the list (I forgot to ask) so I could see in real time if the instantaneous was actually following the pulses or simply vacuum. Brian believed it was simply following vacuum and I would have to agree …
___Brian, I know you will read this eventually and I want to thank you publicly for both your knowledge and real world Insight experience(s). I learned a few things and cannot wait to put them into practice to improve my own mileage. Your throttle strap was a great idea! I also hope you enjoyed the lunch at the Pub
___Good Luck to you all with your own winterizing mods. I saw a balmy 3 degrees F in the driveway when I arrived home early this morning
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Hunt Club Farms Landscaping Ltd.
___[email:lfhzqv0l][email protected][/email:lfhzqv0l]
___First off, much of this post has probably already been disseminated in the Yahoo Honda-Hybrid and Honda-Insight groups years ago. Unfortunately for some of us newbie’s, many of us are the second generation of Insighter’s without the knowledge of our Insight’s previous owners or those that have provided this information in the past …
___I had the pleasure to meet up with and spend an afternoon with Chisight (Brian is his real name and appears to be a relatively well known poster in the Yahoo - Honda-Hybrid and Honda-Insight forums). He has also seen more then just a few > 100 tmpg’s over his own 45 - 50 mile daily commute … That last statement should be placed in his resume’ if you were to ask me
___Anyway, there is some information for those ready to mod (winterize) their own Insight’s that needs to be discussed … For one, the warm air mods work as described. Chisight has an obd2 scanner and we used it to retrieve some very important real time data through 2 very different driving conditions using my own 2000 just two days ago …
___Ambient temps were between 30 and 35 degrees F during our recordings of the hwy loop as well as a stop and go city loop(s). He had the following parameters up on his laptop in full display mode:
Timing Advance
Air Intake Temperature
Coolant temperature
An O2 sensor although I don’t recall which one?
___With these, we could see just before the Insight was to enter a NOx purge via the O2 sensor outputting any significant voltage > 0.05 or thereabouts as well as the temps achieved with the mods I had previously installed. The O2 reading climbing from 0 (indicating a NOx purge event) beats the instantaneous as well as the seat of the pants acceleration kick every single time!
___Since I travel almost 95% +, at hwy speeds (~ 55 mph), a totally blocked off radiator and pre-heater hose from the side intake to the top cat shield works very very well. Engine coolant temps and intake temperature with the around freezing ambient temperatures normalized between 190 and 195 and 54 to 60 respectively. This was seen during the hwy portion of the drive with the Insight just warmed up as we were approaching the entrance ramp to the Interstate. Lean Burn was acting as it should and with Brian’s years of Insight experience (he was driving my 2000 at this point), all appeared as well as felt normal to him.
___Now here is the slightly dangerous part … Since it was ~ freezing at this point and after ~ 10 miles of Interstate driving, we began an ~ 10 mile urban city loop back to our origin. This means gentle accelerations and stops with auto stop engaging at the lights. The slower we traveled (speeds between 20 and 35 mph), the higher both Intake and coolant temperatures rose. By the time we got back to our initial starting point, I was showing 80 degree F intake temperatures (sounds good) but coolant temperature was still climbing and had climbed to a dangerously high 207 degrees in the last 2 or 3 blocks of travel before stopping at our initial start point! In other words, if you are doing any thing over 5 miles of city driving with a 100% blocked off radiator, don’t! We were not running the A/C to compensate other then to keep the windows clear and keep the cabin at maybe 66 degrees. Manual control of the heat was the only method we used for cabin comfort control. We were shutting down all HVAC functions before hitting a light to guarantee an Autostop and I do this as well given the chance Autostop will not engage with the HVAC up and running no matter the setting in my own personal experience as well as his. Anyway, if you were to run city conditions or Stop and Go on the hwy, I would suggest that you manually increase the A/C’s fan to 4 blocks with the temperature set reasonably high to compensate for the higher coolant temps. I will do some of my own experimentation with this when my own OBD-2 scanner arrives but I wanted to pass on this warning that city driving with a 100% blocked off radiator can lead to real trouble over a relatively short period of time. On the hwy at hwy speeds, it works fantastic.
___As for fixes to the above, Brian had a number of his own warm air mods but I did not see his Insight’s OBD2 parameters except for an extremely short period of time before his 2000 Insight was even warmed up. He has only ~ 2/3 of his radiator/condenser blocked off with a safer ~ 6” gap between the two cardboard blocks right down the center open to the air stream. He also has his entire lower intake blocked off from the exterior of the Insight which I believe to be a novel approach given it will help with aerodynamics and block off the lower portion of the radiator from seeing the cold air steam as well. He does not have the pre-heater hose installed although I think he will after he saw my Insight’s own intake temperatures with one installed
With his own 65 – 80% radiator block mods, he is seeing coolant temps in the high 180s’ to a maximum of 201 in his year + experiences of colder winter temperatures here in the Chicago area. He removes his own warm air mods when its ~ 45 degrees or above … I believe his methods to be not only a more safe proposition for those with some city driving in their normal every day routines but even for us hwy drivers, we will eventually be stuck in a stop, crawl, or stop and go situation for a period. His frontal air dam block and its aerodynamic enhancements had me really intrigued given the achieved higher winter time coolant temperature and the mileage increase from the cleaner air flow as well … As for non hwy stop and go, crack your windows and blast the heat is my suggestion for now but I will try and add a bit more detail later after some time with a real time OBD2 scanner watching my own habits … ___With the above, he also mentioned he sees the best fuel economy when intake temps are ~ 75 to 80 degrees. Much higher then this and he says his fuel economy actually begins to fall slightly. It is to bad Honda didn’t place a pre-heater with a thermostatically controlled cold/warm air mixture plenum somewhere in the air intake to always have the optimum intake temperatures
He also received a respectable 71.x tmpg over these two very different driving condition loops.___And some interesting superfluous information that many may be interested in … The Coolant Temperature digital readout is totally bogus and this was confirmed in both mine as well as his Insight. 2 Bars always show up when the car is booted. 4 bars appear at ~ 145 - 160 degrees F coolant temperature. 6 bars show up from ~ 160 + and that includes the final 2 or 3 blocks we traveled with the coolant temperature at 207 degrees F! The Digital readout means nothing other then that the Insight’s coolant is above a certain trigger point and nothing else! This was not only unbelievable but downright dangerous imho. How are you supposed to know if or when you are having radiator/thermostat/coolant trouble when the gauge doesn’t move in proportion to temperature?
___Lastly, the Insight’s instantaneous is very twitchy not because it is actually matching your instantaneous economy but that it appears to be tracking vacuum instead? I wish I had more time with Brian to see if the OBD2 scanner had the two throttle trims in the list (I forgot to ask
) so I could see in real time if the instantaneous was actually following the pulses or simply vacuum. Brian believed it was simply following vacuum and I would have to agree …___Brian, I know you will read this eventually and I want to thank you publicly for both your knowledge and real world Insight experience(s). I learned a few things and cannot wait to put them into practice to improve my own mileage. Your throttle strap was a great idea! I also hope you enjoyed the lunch at the Pub
___Good Luck to you all with your own winterizing mods. I saw a balmy 3 degrees F in the driveway when I arrived home early this morning
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Hunt Club Farms Landscaping Ltd.
___[email:lfhzqv0l][email protected][/email:lfhzqv0l]
1 - 20 of 21 Posts
G
Hi Armin:
___Someone in the Yahoo - Honda-Hybrid forum just asked the same question!
___It wasn’t just the 207 degrees F directly that was making me nervous as I am assuming the mix will boil at maybe 220 - 240 under the small amount of pressure inside the coolant system as well as the actual antifreezes boiling point, it was that it was still climbing when we finally finished our urban loop in maybe 20 minutes time that had me concerned. I believe 190 +/- 10 degrees is probably close to the norm with good a thermostat cycling as it should? I did not hear the radiator fan come on so all must have been Ok? Hearing that your radiator fan was cycling during your event must mean it was following a prescribed high low temp set point with some overlap to protect the engine. The fact that it shut off must mean the Honda temperature control was doing something right. It is the wide spread of the gauge that seems odd to me now that you mention you have seen 8 bars on your own Insight? 6 bars is only a little over 1/3 the way to the top. 10 bars would be ~ center and sounds way over 230 degrees? What the heck does 12 bars supposed to mean? Would 20 bars mean molten aluminum? Just kidding of course When your coolant registered 8 bars with the radiator block and warmer temps, did you see any steam escaping from under the hood anywhere?
___I would really like to see the coolant temps while it is 10 degrees F or below like it is currently near us with a blocked radiator under a variety of city/hwy conditions but I don’t have a scan tool yet.
___I am still considering an engine block heater to help remove some of the < 50 mpg for the first 2 miles or so while still warming up. I wonder how much it will help? I need a scan tool in a hurry
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Hunt Club Farms Landscaping Ltd.
___[email:4ka6minm][email protected][/email:4ka6minm]
___Someone in the Yahoo - Honda-Hybrid forum just asked the same question!
___It wasn’t just the 207 degrees F directly that was making me nervous as I am assuming the mix will boil at maybe 220 - 240 under the small amount of pressure inside the coolant system as well as the actual antifreezes boiling point, it was that it was still climbing when we finally finished our urban loop in maybe 20 minutes time that had me concerned. I believe 190 +/- 10 degrees is probably close to the norm with good a thermostat cycling as it should? I did not hear the radiator fan come on so all must have been Ok? Hearing that your radiator fan was cycling during your event must mean it was following a prescribed high low temp set point with some overlap to protect the engine. The fact that it shut off must mean the Honda temperature control was doing something right. It is the wide spread of the gauge that seems odd to me now that you mention you have seen 8 bars on your own Insight? 6 bars is only a little over 1/3 the way to the top. 10 bars would be ~ center and sounds way over 230 degrees? What the heck does 12 bars supposed to mean? Would 20 bars mean molten aluminum? Just kidding of course
When your coolant registered 8 bars with the radiator block and warmer temps, did you see any steam escaping from under the hood anywhere?___I would really like to see the coolant temps while it is 10 degrees F or below like it is currently near us with a blocked radiator under a variety of city/hwy conditions but I don’t have a scan tool yet.
___I am still considering an engine block heater to help remove some of the < 50 mpg for the first 2 miles or so while still warming up. I wonder how much it will help? I need a scan tool in a hurry
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Hunt Club Farms Landscaping Ltd.
___[email:4ka6minm][email protected][/email:4ka6minm]
G
Hi James:
___Since I have only owned the Insight for 1 month as of today, I am a bit inexperienced of course. After reading through the many threads on ASI in the cold and experiencing non-Auto-Stop activity for myself, I now simply shut down the climate control before downshifting when I need ASI to occur. It works every time when the Insight itself is warm. ASI works very rarely with the climate control in manual or Econ A/C-Off even with the temperature dial set below 65 in the temperatures I have been driving in. I am sure when it warms up here in the Chicagoland area, it will work as advertised but with climate control engaged, it usually doesn’t with temperatures below freezing in my short experience … Watching Brian shutting down the climate control confirmed my own actions to force an Auto-Stop irregardless of what the climate control is telling the Insight to do or not.
___Overall, it was a lot of fun watching Brian go through the gyrations to maximize fuel economy while driving my own Insight. I learned to shift at even lower shift points (I used to shift at just below VTEC RPM’s around 2,200 RPM, now its at ~ 2000 RPM or less), learned how to engage ASI at speeds exceeding 20 mph instead of 8 or 9 mph as before (slow down in regen or coast in neutral like normal but below ~ 24 mph, make sure the Insight is regenerating and push hard enough to just touch the mechanical brakes. After that, immediately let off the brakes/engage the clutch in neutral and ASI is a guarantee at 21 to 22 mph or below), shutting down the climate control before approaching an Auto-Stop expected event as I always have, shifting the Insight into gear and moving as soon as the engine fires off instead of waiting that extra 2 seconds or so (that was new!), and even turning the Insight off (1 click of the key) when it isn’t quite warm enough to engage Auto-Stop but I will be sitting at a light for some time. The only item I didn’t see him doing was swapping between Metric/English displays to see when or if Fuel cut occurred. I must look like a mad fool with my hands and feet moving around to catch all of this in one fell swoop as well. This is what makes the Insight so fun or in some respects, demanding to drive!
___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Hunt Club Farms Landscaping Ltd.
___[email:34wsf1us][email protected][/email:34wsf1us]
___Since I have only owned the Insight for 1 month as of today, I am a bit inexperienced of course. After reading through the many threads on ASI in the cold and experiencing non-Auto-Stop activity for myself, I now simply shut down the climate control before downshifting when I need ASI to occur. It works every time when the Insight itself is warm. ASI works very rarely with the climate control in manual or Econ A/C-Off even with the temperature dial set below 65 in the temperatures I have been driving in. I am sure when it warms up here in the Chicagoland area, it will work as advertised but with climate control engaged, it usually doesn’t with temperatures below freezing in my short experience … Watching Brian shutting down the climate control confirmed my own actions to force an Auto-Stop irregardless of what the climate control is telling the Insight to do or not.
___Overall, it was a lot of fun watching Brian go through the gyrations to maximize fuel economy while driving my own Insight. I learned to shift at even lower shift points (I used to shift at just below VTEC RPM’s around 2,200 RPM, now its at ~ 2000 RPM or less), learned how to engage ASI at speeds exceeding 20 mph instead of 8 or 9 mph as before (slow down in regen or coast in neutral like normal but below ~ 24 mph, make sure the Insight is regenerating and push hard enough to just touch the mechanical brakes. After that, immediately let off the brakes/engage the clutch in neutral and ASI is a guarantee at 21 to 22 mph or below
), shutting down the climate control before approaching an Auto-Stop expected event as I always have, shifting the Insight into gear and moving as soon as the engine fires off instead of waiting that extra 2 seconds or so (that was new!), and even turning the Insight off (1 click of the key) when it isn’t quite warm enough to engage Auto-Stop but I will be sitting at a light for some time. The only item I didn’t see him doing was swapping between Metric/English displays to see when or if Fuel cut occurred. I must look like a mad fool with my hands and feet moving around to catch all of this in one fell swoop as well. This is what makes the Insight so fun or in some respects, demanding to drive!___Good Luck
___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Hunt Club Farms Landscaping Ltd.
___[email:34wsf1us][email protected][/email:34wsf1us]
Thanks for being forthcoming in your last line. <g>xcel said:
Simply stated MPG is just that, Miles per gallon. Since a calculable amount of fuel is injected into the engine and the odometer measures distance, an MPG readout is almost a gimmie for any newer fuel injected car. No other data is required.
But who really knows? And for IMPG does it really matter? It very well may be a cheap and dirty way to provide a reasonably accurate IMPG readout.
Reading and interpreting engine vacuum is an old and reliable diagnostic tool that will reveal many different engine systems failure. In relation to MPG the more the throttle plate is closed the greater the vacuum in the intake manifold and (usually) a lesser amount of fuel is consumed.
Fuel trim values are simply long term and short term averages of the O2 sensors bias of add more fuel, a positive fuel trim value. OR negative as in lean the mix shorten the injector pulse etc. The result of the O2 sensors bias is continuously reflected by the on time of the injectors. OBDII specifies that when either of these values reach +-20% to set a code. Nominal for most cars is +- 6%. With "spikes" possible from extreme driving conditions.
An interesting bit of Honda trivia on their SULEV engines is the O2 sensors signal is time matched to the corresponding cylinder that the exhaust puff originated from and then the corresponding individual injector is appropriately "trimmed."
HTH!
1 - 20 of 21 Posts
