Building the Jeffries ECU for Your Triking

Building the Jeffries ECU for your Triking

Introduction

I built my Triking in 2015 using an 1100cc Moto Guzzi engine out of a California EFI. I decided to keep the electronic fuel injection and the ECU setup for the obvious reasons that such technology brings; good starting and idling from cold, a broad power band and hopefully better fuel economy and lower emissions. I had some slight reservations in that the fuel injection and engine management system can usually only be fixed by specialists, with the attendant costs and hassle. But that aside, I’ve been pleased with the setup as the engine seems well suited to the Triking enabling one to potter along at low revs or wind it up through the gears.

When I discovered that Cliff Jeffries in Australia had developed a replacement/upgrade kit for the ECU used by Moto Guzzi I contacted him and bought one. This was because I wanted to be able to fine tune the engine to get rid of the flat spot programmed in to meet the Californian emissions tests and also to be able to fix it myself should it go wrong.Having built the ECU and used it for a while, I thought other Triking owners might be interested too, so the main purpose of this document is to relate my experiences, in case you are interested in doing the same.

The Jeffries ECU kit

There is an excellent web site created by Cliff that details the history of his design, the prototypes and the kits now available, as well as the setup and testing etc of the ECU. I’d therefore recommend that you read through the content on his web site as well as this document, as my intent is to compliment his information rather than repeat it. Here is a link to his web site:

As a first step, I talked to Cliff via email about my current setup so that he knew which version of his ECU to supply. He developed his original ECU when the one on his Moto Guzzi blew up several years ago and there are now several different versions available.

Moto Guzzi used several varieties of ECU all sourced from MagnetiMarelli; the WM16M was used between the years 1996-2000 whilst the WMP8 was used on MotoGuzzimotorcycles prior to the WM16M, although some models like the California used it up to 1999.

My engine is the Moto Guzzi California 1100 EFI with a MagnetiMarelli IAW 441 ECU, which translates to the WMP8. Cliff originally provided an upgrade kit for this(called MyP8) but no longer does so because of the difficulty in obtaining the P8 case and connector second-hand.

Ideally, when you build your ECU it’s desirable to keep your old one intact so that you can keep driving until the kit is built and tested and so that you’ll have a spare in case your new one fails. The lack of second-hand WMP8 cases makes it very difficult to do that.

To overcome this, he designed the MiniMyP8 which is functionally the same as the MyP8 but fits inside the smaller WM16 case. This case is fitted to a wide range of cars as well as motorcycles and is readily available second hand. I was able to buy a 16FM ECU from a Fiat SeicentoAbarth for £15 off eBay and since I only needed the multi-pin connector and the case itself it didn’t matter whether the ECU worked or not.

Having got a case and connector I bought the MiniMyP8 kit which arrived a couple of weeks after ordering, together with a £27 UK customs fee to pay before actual delivery.

Building the ECU

The kit arrives as a Printed Circuit Board (PCB) with a number of components such as resistors, capacitors, diodes, transistors as well as a couple of integrated circuits and holders. The components are fairly easily identified and the board itself is printed with most of the component locations so deciding what goes where is relatively easy. However, most of the components are now surface mounted and are quite minute, which stopped me in my tracks for a while. I’m used to working with older types of circuit boards which have drilled holes and larger components with wires on the end that can be mechanically held in place by pushing the wires through their holes before soldering.

Surface mount components are generally placed by machines onto circuit boards and the boards go through solder baths and ovens in order to solder them to the board. Not only does the soldering method present a challenge to the home constructor but the components have to be held in place whilst soldering as they are so tiny that they will stick to the soldering iron. There is also the problem of seeing what you are doing.

I therefore invested in an illuminated desk mounted magnifying light and put a ceramic tile on top of a book to make a heat resistant mini work station at the right height. I used a pair of tweezers to pick up and identify the components under the light and to hold them whilst they were soldered. For the soldering itself you have a couple of choices.

You can buy small tubes of solder paste that you apply to the component mounting pads and then place the components onto the pads. The paste is sticky so will hold the components in place temporarily. You then put the board into an oven for a period of time so that the solder melts and joins the component to the pad. It is also possible to use a hot air gun apparently. I didn’t use either method because I’m not used to it, the components all have to be on the board before heating it up and I couldn’t know for sure if the joints were all good.

I went for conventional soldering and used a small Antex 7 watt soldering iron with a proper stand to hold it. I also used a good quality flux solder. My method was to apply a very small amount of solder to the pads first. Then I would hold the component with the tweezers in the correct position and apply the soldering iron at one end so that the solder melted and held the component in place. I then soldered the other end properly, feeding solder into the joint and when it had cooled soldered the original end again. This produced a solid looking joint with a good body of solder at each end of the component. The disadvantage of this method, if it is one, is that the initial pads of solder you place on the pads will usually form a hump so that the component does not sit entirely flat on the board and may end up with one end slightly higher than the other when fully soldered. Also, the tiniest movement whilst soldering may result in the component not being straight on the board. These things don’t really matter and in all honesty the board is so small that they can hardly be seen with the naked eye but one can’t help being a perfectionist sometimes!

The picture on the right will give you a sense of scale as to what is involved in handling and soldering the components and I wouldn’t advise taking on the task without a magnifying light etc as described.

The instructions from Cliff for mounting the components are comprehensive and best viewed using your computer as you build the board as they are semi interactive. For example, step one might mention resistors 1 to 6 and when you click on that step it will show you a schematic of the board with green crosses highlighting where the components should be placed. This carries on so that you build the board in a set sequence. I did this over several evenings, taking my time and rechecking the work I had already done. Eventually the point arises when you can test the board before installing the integrated circuits. For this you will need a multi meter capable of reading up to 12 volts DC. He recommends using a small 9v battery (a PP3 in my generation) and then checking voltages at various points on the board. Assuming this is ok the rest of the components can be installed and the board voltage tested again. Having done this, the board is ready for communication with the outside world and for the multi-way connector to be soldered on prior to mounting in the housing.

Whilst you have the ECU kit on your bench having successfully verified the voltages etc it’s a good idea to check you can communicate with it before mounting it in the housing. The ECU kit ships with a Bluetooth dongle which you will have to solder to a supplied Ethernet cable. This is plugged into the ECU Ethernet socket and when the ECU is powered up you should see a small led light up or flash. Once this occurs, start the optimiser app (which will ask to turn Bluetooth on if it’s not running already) and it will then attempt to connect to the ECU. The dongle led will either turn green or stop flashing depending upon which model you have and the optimiser should show the ECU as connected.

Communicating with the ECU

One of the key benefits of the ECU for me is that fine tuning the engine is no longer a closed book, requiring specialist attention or expensive add on chips. Instead, Cliff has written some software, known as the Android Optimiser which you need to install on your phone or tablet. Once it’s installed you can connect to the ECU via Bluetooth and create and download new ECU maps, adjust settings dynamically and log engine data. In addition, you can set the optimiser running, go out for a drive and it will make suggestions as to where the engine map can be altered to improve engine power and efficiency. How cool is that?

You will need to download and install the Android Optimiser on your phone or tablet and since it is not obtained through the Google Play Store it probably won’t install at first. You will most likely have to go into your phone settings and in the security section where it says “Allow installation of apps from unknown sources” enable the setting. You will get a warning about possibly compromising your phone etc but ignore it, install the optimiser app, check it loads, then go back and disable the setting so that once again only apps from Google Play store can be installed. The next step is to connect to the ECU.

At this point, I decided to load an engine map that I had found on Cliff’s web site for the California to fully test the communication out. This was a map that he had developed over a number of test rides and I thought it would be a good starting point for my own engine anyway. You can of course follow the method he recommends in his instructions, whatever suits you best. I successfully loaded the map onto my ECU so I was now ready to install it in the housing and then into the Triking.

The ECU housing

As previously mentioned, I bought a second hand 16FM ECU from a Fiat car for my ECU. This is a sealed unit comprising a die cast aluminium casing with a pressed metal lid that is an interference fit with the casing plus a sealant bead to make it watertight. I carefully removed the sealant with a sharp knife and was able to remove the lid with some careful prising. Once inside it’s a simple matter to remove the PCB with the connector which you need to remove from the PCB. For this task, you will need a reasonably powerful soldering iron and some type of de-soldering tool. I used one with a spring loaded plunger that you press down and latch and then hold it over the joint whilst applying the soldering iron. Once the solder has melted you release the plunger and it sucks up the solder into the tool. Next time you press the plunger down the solidified solder is ejected.

The tool I used had replacement nozzles available and came from Rapid Electronics. It usually takes several goes to remove all the solder but at least you don’t have to worry about over heating the PCB as you’re going to throw it away anyway. Once the connector had been removed I used a miniature file to clean any older blobs off the pins, then soldered it onto my new board. Once that had been done, I mounted the new board into the casing and was now able to try it out in the Triking.

The moment of Truth

Cliff suggests warming up the Moto Guzzi engine thoroughly with the original ECU before trying out the new ECU. I did this and then connected the new ECU. Cautiously I switched the ignition on (as if it would make any difference!) and phew, no smoke or anything, the fuel pump ran for a few seconds and then stopped, as it should.

I cranked the engine over and it fired up, ran smoothly, but it wouldn’t idle very well and died unless throttle was applied. This is to be expected as Cliff states on his website, and just requires settings to be altered through the Optimiser interface. At this point, I decided not to spend hours tweaking the engine map as I intended to convert the engine to “closed loop”, which basically means putting a Lambda sensor into the system and letting the ECU adjust the map based on feedback from the sensor. The ECU worked which was the main thing and so my energies turned to this next part of the process.

I’ll detail how I installed the Lambda sensor and my experiences with running closed loop in a follow on document but for now I’ll leave you with some pictures of where the ECU is fitted in the Triking.

So, the first picture is a top down view of where the existing ECU sits on some rubber mounts, the next picture shows the “new” ECU sitting on top of the existing one. I’m going to leave the existing ECU in situ and fabricate a mount for the new ECU so that it will be very easy to swap between the two if I have any problems in the future.

Thanks for reading and I plan to write up my experiences running closed loop in the not too distant future.