2007 Ford Focus wagon, 5-speed

[spacemanspif]

You have the ZETEC which has the intake near the firewall. Mine is DURATEC with the intake right behind the rad. With all the PZEV stuff it looks like a WAI is out of the question for me but I think the ZETEC's have some space to pull hot air around from the exhaust manifold. I'm going to seal up the gaps between the headlamps and body to hopefully stop pulling in cold air; otherwise I'm pretty sure I'm stuck with what I've got. It's good to see another Focus, can't wait to see what mods you do and how well they work for you.

[Focus-Ak]

Originally Posted by spacemanspif

... When are you going to start a thread? I'd love to see pics of the car and see what mods are working for you. Did you ever get the tuner?

I will start a thread when I have something conclusive or unique to report. I will PM you a photo sometime soon; not much to look at. I have a 90% grill block -- upper totally blocked, and the lower is jammed with pipe insulation except for a small rectangle. 30s to 40s here most of the winter, and I typically reach 186-196, with highest peak of 205 on a steep hill. The upper block is two layers of fairly stiff closed cell foam wired to the grill (flush in the recess) and heavy-duty construction garbage bag material over that -- but some wrinkles because it was hard to work around legs on the back side of the grill. All quick, dirty, pragmatic, temporary setup for now. The car had low suspension when bought (used).

I have the tuner and am running on my 5th custom tune. My idle now drops to 850-875 by a short block from home, and a block later into the 600-750 range (quite variable within that, depending on engine's mood at the time). The target setting is 600. My idle had been 1300-1400 until about 20 minutes of running. Also, after a pulse it now goes to a stable idle in about 3.5 seconds instead of 5 to 6. A-B-A testing will be impossible because the stock tune uses adaptive management -- takes a lot of miles to get the stock tune to its most efficient (but still high idle) state. I still hope for some tweaks in the custom tune.

On the UltraGauge I am seeing good improvements on short trips compared to previously, especially from cold starts. A 1 or 2 mile errand now nets 19-20 MPG instead of 13-14. Glide gal/hr was in the range of 0.6 to 0.8 for a long time, slowly dropping to .35, sometimes (if engine was in a good mood) .23 -- now I'm at 0.3 on short order and at .23 within a few minutes. That's rolling; stopped it drops to 0.2 or 0.21. These short trips (and we normally walk or bike for that) were killing our tank averages -- should be much better now. No roads out of town here, very small road system, 45 mph is highest speed limit.

On a couple of 6 mile test courses I use (some 35 mph driving, mostly P&G 40-50 MPH), results with the tuning are inconclusive so far. Likely this is since the stock tune would be into the 0.5 to 0.3 gal/hr range half way out. Before and after, if fully warmed up I was/am getting 42-45 MPG on the calibrated UG on these runs, typically; but sometimes in the high 30s or as much as 47. A few years ago we got 40-41 MPH (odometer/gallons) on a long road trip on the mainland -- 55-60 MPH, downhill gliding, but not using P&G as aggressively as now.

Hope I didn't take too much space on your thread.

[spacemanspif]

Originally Posted by Focus-Ak

Hope I didn't take too much space on your thread.

Definitely not! Good things to see. Who cares if it's all quick and dirty? We all love to see what everyone is working on. Thought I might have scored a cheap tune because I friend has a SCT X3 for his old F250, but it's married to the truck that was sold off long ago. To "un-marry" it from the truck it has to go back to SCT who charge $150 for the service, then another $150 for Tom's tuning and I'm in the range of "I think that $300 is better spent on my other car" territory. Been waiting to see what results you get out of it to see what cost recovery time would be. If I can get a bump to 42mpg just from a tune, I'd be a happy camper and would probably bite the bullet and buy the tuner.

[Focus-Ak]

BTW, the way I got into doing a tune was that my first attempt to fix the insanely high idle on short trips (up to about 5 miles) than the Focus is known for was deleting the IAC valve (inlet air control) by blanking it off with a flat gasket and manually adjusting the throttle body for an idle of about 600. I left the IAC valve electrically connected to avoid any trouble codes. That worked perfectly for a day or two, until the ECU figured a way around it through adaptive learning (timing probably), and I was back to the high idle again. So I removed the blank gasket.

My tuner says he has the adaptive learning off, but oddly on my first run I still had the high idle. After that, it has been low as I like it after a few hundred feet of driving. (And that is with "go" immediately after startup.)

Edit:

Originally Posted by spacemanspif

... Who cares if it's all quick and dirty? We all love to see what everyone is working on. ...

Here you go -- winkles and all. It is pretty well blocked off except for the small rectangle in the lower middle and maybe some leakage arount the headlights and hood. The pipe insulation installation is pretty crude, but it is in the stagnation area, so likely doesn't matter. The wrinkles surely make turbulence though, but probably less drag than the radiator and engine bay did before.

I didn't notice before taking this photo, but at the very bottom of the bumper cover there is a cross-wise surface that is angled to direct airflow under the car. Still thinking about that one.

[spacemanspif]

Are you using Tom from focusfanatics.com or some other tuner? I'd really like to just get HPTuners and tune both cars but the Focus isn't supported by HPT yet and I'm not sure how confident I am in not blowing up my own engine.

[Focus-Ak]

Tom is my tuner.

[Edit]: I have always run 87 octane in this car. Tom detected some knock (less than I could hear) from my datalogs, and has reduced the spark advance to compensate. He says that if I go to a higher octane he can change my tune to give better MPG than I am getting now, and that this will more than make up for the difference in pump price.

[Focus-Ak]

Originally Posted by spacemanspif

... Been waiting to see what results you get out of it to see what cost recovery time would be. ...

In my case the payback to my wallet will be quite awhile, unless we get bump up in the price of gas (big surprises have happened in the past). But I also consider that: (1) the health cost of gas in the US amounts to about $3.80 a gallon; (2) the costs of climate change are incalculable in the future, and even now are likely quite high even if difficult to pin to particular events (Katrina, Sandy, Vanuatu, Shishmaref, heat waves, a frozen east coast, record warm winter in Alaska, etc.); we should have had a carbon tax on fuel long ago (in my opinion); and Europeans are better off with their decades-long fuel costs of 3x to 4x ours. So for me, some unrecouped cost to save fuel seems worthwhile, and my wife and I use the car as little as we can in the first place.

Just my opinion -- hope I'm not pushing anyone's button on some of this.

[spacemanspif]

I'm digging the pipe insulation, AK! I didn't think that it would work with the vertical supports but now I might have to give it a try, although I think cutting some coroplast and using zip ties to hold it to the back would be just as easy. Either way, I think that my next project is definitely a lower grill block. Just waiting for warm weather and some free time. I think I can do a quick-and-dirty over my lunch break though.

[Focus-Ak]

Originally Posted by spacemanspif

... didn't think that it would work with the vertical supports ...

I made slices for those, and the pinch there helps hold them in place; as well as the pieces being cut a little over-long for some pinch. Over 2 months I lost one of the lower pieces, new one fits tighter.

>> The Pragmatist

[spacemanspif]

Long time no post. I finally hit 40mpg!!!

I know its all weather related and not almost nothing to do with me but it still feels good to see it on my fuel log. My ScanGauge was reading 37 but I'm having trouble with the gauge activating with the ignition and some small trips were not logged. I thought this would lead to an optimistic result but apparently it's opposite. Lots of variables like different gas pump, odd trips, etc. but the graph still says 40mpg!

Off to email linearlogic about the inconsistent turn on behavior.