ca18det into s14, SPEDO and fuel gauge, WTF?!?!?!?!?

[jynxtrix]

so it's been a while since I've had a reson to post, and I've searched everything out there to no avail.Here's the prob,I have my ca installed in my s14, runs fine, mostly (a little lean but I'll work on that) anyway, all my sensors were cut at the transmission. (auto to 5 speed swap as well as engine swap) i got it all figured out (no thanks to YURI at wiring specialties and the effed up pos wiring harness he butchered for me), anyway, I have no fuel gauge, my electric fans don't work (i hardwired those for now) my fuel gauge doesn't work, but most importantly my speedo doesn't work. I tried tracing the wiring diagrams, but just can't sort it out. none of my wires are the factory colors, so nothing (which is what everyone wants to refer to), and I don't know how to hook my sensor straight to the harness the way I've heard mentioned before. Can any one help. And don't flame me for not looking hard enough, there is little or nothing online about a CA18 into an s14 swap. at least, nothing successful anyway.if you got something good reply, if i've missed something obvious, please text 701-340-6971.thanks, I'm losing mind.Jon

[float_6969]

IIRC, the fuel gauge has nothing to do with the wiring of the engine. It runs up the drivers side of the car in a totally separate harness. You either have a bad cluster, a bad sending unit, or a wiring problem elsewhere.

As far as the speedometer goes, you will probably wire it directly from the sensor, to the big plug under the dash. I'd have to look at an S14 FSM to know exactly which wires you need to connect to.

[jynxtrix]

yeah, got the speedo working after wiring it directly to the cluster (neatly however). But it's way off. I'm guessing about half. It's weird, I'm running a ca engine, ca bell housing, on a ka transmission. I thought that if i used the ka speed sensor it would be fine, but apparently not. I've searched, and found alot of people complaining about it, but no real fixes. I've tried both the ca, and the ka sensor, and swapped pinions as well to no avail. Any ideas?

[jynxtrix]

So, after hours of searching, I found this mod on fresh alloy. This is the fix for for the s14 speedo problem if any one else is having it. It doesn't matter if it's usdm or jdm, and though it requires more soldering than the s13 mod, it way more adjustable than the s13 mod, especially if you just do what i did and make a box for the switches and leave them wired up, that way you can fine tun your speedo whenever you have to. I was lucky enough to have one of those cop signs that flash and tell you how fast you are going right next to my house. so Now I am squared away! Anyway, I'll drop the link here, the guy who wrote this is definitly my hero! oh well, now on to the fuel gauge issue...

http://forums2.nicoclub.com/sh...24389

sorry, theres the right link, lol.


Modified by jynxtrix at 8:30 PM 7/21/2009

[float_6969]

You can't link to another forum. Just copy and paste the info here so that it's actually on NICO for other ppl to find.

[jynxtrix]

apparently I jynxed myself. Go figure. It worked for half a day. Now my speedometer if flatlining. nada. I'm pissed.

[float_6969]

Nevermind, I did it for you

Copied from another forumOk guys, I've been working on this one for a little while now. Turns out it was more complicated to crack, but should be easier for you guys to modify than S13 now that I've done the work researching how it works.

This modification is for people running an S14 JDM speedometer to be able to read in mph instead of km/h. Also this can be used to tune a JDM OR US gauge for gearing/tire changes to get speedometer to read correctly.

*** Important: Before you pull your speedometer, make note of a speed/rpm you can verify with later. Example: 70mph/3000rpm. ***

To get the speedometer out, reference the FSM. It's possible to get it out without dropping the steering wheel, but tricky.

Back of the instrument cluster, four screws and the speedometer is out.

JDM gauge face.

Back of the gauge.

This is where the speedometer will be adjusted. On the right side you see numbers 0-9, by the marking "ADJ". Stock setting for JDM gauge is for 4,5,6 to be soldered.

What you need to now is:De-solder: 5Solder: 7, 8Here's what mine looked like afterwards.

The next problem is while the S13 speedometer feeds the odometer, the S14 odometer is independant of the needle. To fix the odometer remove this resistor here.

This will get the odometer close, but it will actually read ~5.7% high. This is what it should look like after removal.

Now you're done! All that's left is to put it in the car and verify that it's reading the same as your USDM gauge was.

***** This section below is only for fine tuning *****

Alright, here's some gritty details for the people interested in that sort of thing. Here's how I figured out what these solder joints did..

I hooked up a bunch of switches so I wouldn't have to keep soldering/de-soldering..

Here's how it works. It uses the adjustment points as a binary divider. The more switches on, the lower the speedometer will go. 9 is the most significan bit, and each switch below that will have half the effect on your needle. Here's a list of how they affect the needle. All these numbers are based on my eye reading the needle and some calculations, so they are not 100% perfect.

ADJ 9: -49.4%ADJ 8: -24.7%ADJ 7: -12.4%ADJ 6: -6.2%ADJ 5: -3.1%ADJ 4: -1.5%ADJ 3: -0.8%ADJ 2: -0.4%ADJ 1: -0.2%ADJ 0: -0.1%

Now here's an example of how this works. My settings for mph are 4,6,7,8. You add these together, and come up with -44.8%. If your tires are 9.2% smaller, you will need the speedometer to reflect that by having a *larger* divider. Adding -9.2% (because speedo needs to slow down) to the -44.8% you get -54%. To achieve this, look back at the chart and start with the biggest adjustments first. 9, 5, and 4 would add up to -54%. So solder these and you should be good to go. Don't even bother with switches 0,1,2 as they make so little change.

I have fought with this odometer difference for a long time, and cannot come up with a reason why they are different. I tried swapping crystals (~5.1MHz) and no change. Part number on the chip is the same, resistors all the same.. If anyone can help out here that would be great. One idea I've had is you could swap a JDM face onto the actual USDM speedo/odometer, and then go from there to scale it. You would also retain the mileage on your odometer. Unfortunately my USDM gauge didn't survive my dissection to discover differences in the gauges so I haven't tried this, but I know I could get it to work.

Now I hope you guys make use of this, it was kind of a pain in the butt. I would prefer it if you guys just do it yourself, but if someone really needs me to do one pm me.

[jynxtrix]

thanks, sorry about that, well at least i hope the info helps someone else.

[float_6969]

np

[jynxtrix]

got it fixed, lol. I just firgot to resolder my speed sensor, lol, the tape came undone. This mod is awesome though, lol.

[float_6969]

Yea, I was glad you found it. I am going to do this to correct for my different rear diff ratio. They don't make the right gear for the speed sensor anymore.