I spent a long time cleaning up the wiring on my friends car. Here's the results-

Before-


After-
new panel to go in place of the heater has the computer stuff mounted on it


Everything is pretty much in except for the coil packs. The brake booster and ABS will be removed soon.


new switch panel


This is where I need help- This car was originally one of the first GEN VII setups on an LS1. The ECM itself seems as if it's an LT1 unit that was modified according to the part number. There's a unmarked black box that connects to the GEN VII that reads the crank and cam sensor and also drives the coil paks. I've never seen the car run but the owner tells me it ran with the GEN VII before he had the engine rebuilt. He came to me because the wiring was such a mess that it was a fire hazard and he wanted it cleaned up before he ran the new motor. I carefully cleaned up the wiring harness, about 80% of the wires were no longer used with the ABS, AC and whatnot being removed. Now we're trying to start the new engine but we get no rpm reading in Cal-Map when we crank it and we get no spark.

I don't know if it's a configuration problem, a wiring problem or a sensor. We don't have a backup of the configuration file that the last motor ran on and we're unsure of what's in there now. I tried to check the signal from the cam and crank position sensors but I'm not sure what type of signal they output. The sensors have voltage and they seem to be doing something when I check the output for voltage, frequency and duty cycle. I wanted to check my wiring, I found a pinout for the GEN VII but I can't find a pinout for the unmarked black box.

The owner told me that whoever configured it last time was having trouble getting the right settings for the crank and cam sensor. Maybe with this being an early LS1 setup the configuration was special. I don't know, I'm out of ideas. This is all that's between us and a trip down the drag strip. Anyone have any ideas on how I can figure out why the unmarked black box isn't working? Please help!

 

First things first make sure you have power to the switched 12 volt ( pink) while cranking.... check that then post back up...

 

Also make sure you have battery power to the ignition control box, there are a couple big red wires that need unswitched power.

If you need a working LS1 file to check the config I can e-mail you one of my old ones that worked.

 

I have some really heavy wire going right to the battery for the unswitched power with it's own 30 amp fuse. Right now the car is 70 miles from me. I'm having the owner of the car check the switched and unswitched power right at the terminal strip while the key is on and also while the key is on and cranking. I'm sure I used a switched source that stays hot while cranking but then again like Joe says it's best to check the basics. I've had the basics kick my *** before.

If you could email me an LS1 file to use as a refference I would really appreciate it. serpent99@charter.net

Thanks for your help guys.

 

we have power with the key on and while cranking. I learned that there's a screen where you can see the cam sensor and crank sensor signal. One other thing that was probably screwing us up is that as a safety feature whenever there's a change made to the ignition parameters the ignition must be shut off for 20 seconds in order for the settings to take. I'm going to try to talk the owner of the car through this or maybe I'll take a ride out there.

 

This is where having everything on a panel is going to pay off. I spoke with the people at Accel and I made arrangements to send the entire panel in to be tested and also have the latest firmware burnt into the ECM. They said they would hook it up to their LS1 dyno mule and check it all out for me. I labeled all the wires, all they have to do is hook everything up and then connect a 12 volt constant and a 12 volt ignition switched wire to the terminal strip. The panel was a little extra work, but this is why I built it this way. I knew it would pay off in the long run, I didn't expect to take advantage of it this soon. I probably screwed up a wire somewhere but between getting the firmware upgrade and not having the pinout for the ignition translator box it was better to just send it in to Accel. The people over at Accel were very easy to work with, they cared and listed. They work hard to make sure the customer has whatever information is needed. They should have a schematic with the pinout for the ignition translator box available soon, it will probably be integrated in the next version of cal-map. With their help we should be tearing up the track in no time!