well, me and nismopick have been arguing about the usefull/lessness of narrow band A/F guages and there tuning capabilities. now from my stand point and talking to many people that actually tune there cars, its been said so many times narrow bands are a pointless light show, instead of continuing our actually really fun argument lol, i want to start a new thread and have other people list experiences beliefs and or just what they have heard. im sticking to it that the A/F guag will tell you if your rich or lean but only as acurate as pulling your spark plugs would tell you and that they are useless for tunning. now its your and nismopicks turn to further on this topic.

 

Here's the thing... I have lots of experience w/ narrow band & some experience w/ wide band. My narrow band works great for basic tuning & making sure the a/f ratio is correct under boost. I'd much rather have a gauge telling me it's running correct, than hopping out, pulling the plugs, and looking at the tips on a blazing hot engine... there's no sense in pulling the plugs "just to check a/f ratio" on a motor that for the most part is running good.

Now I do think wide band has many advantages over narrow band, but again for basic tuning & checking the stat of your a/f ratio, a narrowband works great (if you know how to use it).

Snw... putting all this hearsay aside (because all you've said is "car tuners SAY they use wide band" - which isn't 100% true) what actual experience do you have w/ WB & NB a/f gauges?

 

I was thinking too what point is there to having wide band on a generally stock engine. In most cases you're limited by the ECU, O2 sensor, Injectors, etc. in most cases if you would try to tune based off of wide band your car is probably not going to run exactly right on a stock setup as you're going for performance, where as the stock is set to go for an ideal balance between performance, economy, and emissions. As I said in the other thread it would be decent enough to tell you when you're running lean or rich under varying load conditions. There could be times when you're running lean under a higher load, but not under slightly less. Or maybe running lean when you're supposed to be rich and vice versa. The plugs aren't going to tell you when you were running lean or rich, just that you were at some point running lean or rich. Now granted you start putting money into performance upgrades then a narrow band becomes less ideal because that's tuning based on the stock O2 sensor which is going to probably limit you. So in all the wide band may be better, in a lot of general applications and for basic tuning ie: just getting your car to run correctly, a narrow band is probably a lot more useful as it is far cheaper. Besides if there's things that can be adjusted while the car is running it's easier to see if the gauge begins to go one way or another, rather than stopping to pull the plugs continuously. Besides you may not always have a socket and wrench on you to pull the plugs.

 

my narrowband bounces a lot, and sometimes when I floor it the lights go out, then suddenly it says rich... then nothing. Then it plays the Mario Brothers theme at idle.

I'm going 3-wire O2 with my Z31 ecu and getting a better gauge. $$$$$
oh ya, I have an 88 turbo ECU... haha!

 

In a nutshell, a narrowband o2 can be used to get you in the "safe" zone under WOT. Not to be used for fine tuning. As long as you know what you are getting, you'll be ok. Accurate at stoic, not so accurate anywhere else.

If you don't have full adjustability of your fuel curve, there's not much use for the wideband cause you can't do much with the data.

 

good to know. Since I don't plan to tune the Z31 ECU from factory settings, maybe I can just hook up the one-wire gauge and leave it at that. (just for looks)

 

see bleach's readings are much like ALL narrow A/F guages ive seen, they sometimes are steady under WOT thats it, as for wideband ive only helped with my buddy but his engine shortly failed, not due to tuning, due to almost 30 psi on a stock block but he was planning a rebuild anyways and thats what he is almost done with now, also going AWM standalone. nismo, dont feel like im trying to pull you out here infront of people your last post seemed kinda, idk, slightly asertive lol, i just want to hear other people. my car is the first time ive actually seen a narrow band one read something logically, its not all stupid and all over the place. the problem with narrow bands is if you are to rich or to lean they someimtes dont read crap and you would never know it if thats what your trusting, thats why plugs and exhaust smell/look i think could achieve teh same goals as an narrow band for 100 percent less the price. now no if your jumping out pulling your plugs trying to tune your car so it seems just right/perfect you should be able to do it after only 2 or 3 tries, but if you imply having to jump out every time or all these times it seems as though your trying to fine tune it which the narrow band wont do much for you anyways.

 

Wait... you have, or haven't used your a/f gauge?

Understanding why it does the "light show" is important. The ecu does a sweep when it's not under load (or the load is very light). That is why you see the gauge sweep back & forth. If you are worried about the a/f ratio when it's at idle or coasting, then you deffinately should invest in a wideband.

 

lets examine who these two differing opinions are coming from..... NismoPick, and snw.... who would YOU trust???

 

Ummmm....................Pwned?

I was on Autometer's site and read the PDF manual for one of their Narrow Band A/F gauges and it says that it is normal for the lights to bounce around alot when not under WOT as the ECU is in closed loop mode and many times a second is adjusting fuel to keep emissions low causing the voltage to change quickly at the O2 sensor, whereas at WOT the ECU goes into open loop mode and the A/F mixture goes rich for full power......here is the link to the PDF...I may not be explaining it right...Just scroll to page 4 and read....PDF

 

no one to trust here this is a discussion, not a competition. jeez, take it lightly lol. and some times it will light show at WOT i know you going to get a junk reading at idle, and i have used it BUT it was during the period it was stumbling now that i have it running good i have yet to use it again, i havent wired it properly yet becuase i still have no good way to mount it.

 

I'm using an AEM wideband now, but before that I was using an Autometer narrowband gauge. Anyway, like Veyenyl said, I just used the gauge to keep things more or less on the safe side of things when I cranked up the boost on the NB. If the green leds were lit up in the middle, I was safe, if the first green led was lit up under boost, I was running lean. (I checked this during a dyno run and found the a/f to be ~12.6 when lean, and 11.6ish when in the middle.) But all things said, if you do want to fine tune, a WB is the best way along with an EGT gauge.

 

Should the exhaust temp be cooler or hotter when it's running rich?

 

Generally it will be cooler running rich. You want to try to be below 1600 degrees at WOT. I think somewhere around 1400 is what people aim for, but I can't remember off hand.

 

hotter = lean COoler = Richer