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Question for someone with XiED's installed

4K views 9 replies 3 participants last post by  Joe_ 
#1 · (Edited)
I did search and read a couple of threads here about the use of the XEID's on the Victory bikes.
I saw that at least a few folks on this board are running them on their bikes.

The question that never came up in the threads as far as I could tell was Does the addition of the xied's to your bike improve your gas mileage on long trips when you were running along mostly in closed loop?
I'm hoping that someone who has the Xied's on their bike can answer that question.


My experience with tuning HD Delphi open loop fuel injection on a bike with stock heads and a more free flowing exhaust and air cleaner as well as mild cams was that running around 13.9-14 gave better gas mileage than running the mixture at
Stoichiometric. Couple of miles to the gallon. It was enough that you could not ignore it. Probably would never see it on the dyno but in open road data recording it was obvious.
I believe this happened because the motor was making slightly more torque for the same volume of air passing through the throttle body at the same TPS reading. Lean/rich vs power air mixture charts also support this. I just don't know how it translates out to actual recorded mileage on other engines.
I was wondering if your experience with gas mileage was the same on the Vic once the exid's were installed and the close loop mixture slightly richened as it was on the HD motor I tuned.

HD has a terrible port/head configuration that practically excludes intake track tuning where Victory seems to take full advantage of their better design. That and other feature of the head of the vic could make it an apples and oranges comparison.
What worked on an HD may not have the near the same effect on a Vic as it is a much more efficient design so I'm really curious.

Also does anyone know if having XiED's installed voids the warranty on the bike?

Thanks in advance.
Joe
 
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#2 ·
Hi Joe,
I have experimented with the ViED's (adjustable XiED),on my 2012 Cross Roads, running less restrictive mufflers and 4 degrees injector and spark advance. I think the gas mileage was close to same, maybe a few mpg better than without ViED. Here's the thing with the Vic, the ViED will trigger a Check Engine Light during every warm up, start and restart. The low voltage is out of range until the o2 sensors see some heat. On a HD when that happens it stores a code, on Vic you get CEL. The other more important difference on a Vic, is that you can simply disconnect the o2 sensors with no CEL at all. This will achieve slightly richer results than what is possible with the ViED's according to dyno runs at crusie done by Rylan. If you could disconnect the sensors on a HD like you can on a Vic, the XiEd, ViED, would never have been invented.
Mike
 
#5 ·
Hi Joe,
I have experimented with the ViED's (adjustable XiED),on my 2012 Cross Roads, running less restrictive mufflers and 4 degrees injector and spark advance. I think the gas mileage was close to same, maybe a few mpg better than without ViED. Mike
Thanks. That is what I wanted to know.
I'm not unhappy with the performance. It is just right for touring which is what I use it for.

I keep my bikes forever. Our sidecar bike has at least 150,000 miles on it probably more and I have a shovelhead that has probably the same on it. I like them to last as long as possible between rebuilds.
Lowering the combustion temp a little is all I am looking for. Perhaps vics don't really need that but I at times tend to run a motor quite hard. I like to baby them in between. I generally am the guy who has to fix what gets broke and I am lazy.
I am guessing I should wait till my warranty expires before I install them.
Ma vic probably would have a cow if I had a failure and they were on the bike??
 
#3 ·
I ask Rylan at the Vic shop about them and he said it was not worth it and you will find very little benefit.
Keep in mind h-d's have a more sophisticated Ignition then ours. We can unhook our 02's where they can't
 
#4 ·
I have read about unplugging the O2 sensors to put it into it's limp mode map. Apparently that works well on some of the bikes but additional felt performance isn't the only thing I am after. I'd like to take advantage of the close loop tuning available stock.


The reason is pretty simple. My bike is almost stock. It has an air cleaner and the baffles have been modified in the mufflers to make them compatible with a stage 1 download. It runs really good and gets about 42- 45 miles per gallon average. Sometimes better. Life is good.
I'd like to lower the internal engine temp a smidge. I'd like to not hurt the gas mileage. Everyone is different. Those are my goals.

The map in my bike right now with the exception of the blocks that are used for closed loop are probably richer than is optimal now and I have no desire to make them richer yet. Doing so will only hurt performance and gas mileage though performance more than mileage. I don't spend much time at WOT all and all.

I know there has been a lot of conversation here about EFI so let me add to that.

.
A few years ago I spent a great deal of time trying to understand what HD was doing with their stock fuel injection map.
I bought and read a lot of books over a couple of years and spent way too much time going way to fast up and down mountain passes with a data recorder on the bike I owned with a laptop in the tourpack. Then I would come home and sort through the dozens of runs to figure out where I was at and where I needed to go. This is what I think I know after that.


The reason the non cruise cells particularly those in or near WOT are too rich in a stock map is because the low speed cruise map is kept so lean by the EPA. This causes the combustion chamber in a motor to be hotter than optimal in most cases. Definitely for an HD and a VIC too.
The exhaust valves are very hot.
If the factory were to set your afr at it's optimal setting at WOT the motor would be prone to detonation when the throttle was suddenly thrown wide open.
Under load it wouldn't just be prone to it, it would do it and it wouldn't be pretty.

The ecm guys at the factory strive to make those upper cells as resistant to detonation as possible which means adding extra fuel to the cell. Excess fuel in the cells does that. An over rich mixtures retard your timing as well as lowers the combustion temperature.
To cool things down further they also use the FI equivalent of an accelerator pump that adds extra fuel momentarily. They probably back off the timing too but I don't know that for sure. I could not access that.
The fuel and accelerator pump I am sure about.
As I recall 60%- WOT throttle position sensor setting(TPS) and above 3500 rpm on a five speed bike are all max power to approaching too rich. In the very low 12's. 12.0 and even high 11's could be seen in the blocks 90% tps and above and 4000and + rpm. They don't want to have to warrantee those motors because of not giving them enough fuel. That's for sure.

Remember air cooling is not linear the more power you make the less the percentage of the heat by product you can get rid of.
At the bottom end you are finned to get rid of 100hp and making 10 at the top end you are finned for more hp (more air moving over the fins) but not that much more. However you are making much closer heat to the amount of cooling capacity you have so you must control the temperature with fuel and timing.

No one spends much time WOT anyway. No one looking for fuel economy is running WOT.


So.......
Now for the limp mode map.
I believe a limp map would be even richer to ensure that the engine was not damaged due to injector or sensor partial failure.
If it is, that means that unplugging the sensors will only make the bike go slower when I really need it to be fast. (WOT) Something I don't really want. It will help where you spend most of your time driving (low throttle position sensor numbers). Over rich motors feel like over rich motors. Slow..


That is why I am thinking of going a different route and massaging the close loop. I am hoping to keep the great WOT performance and keep the engine healthier in spite of my driving style. I may do nothing too. It does run very good and I know that it takes about a year for a team of engineers with a bunch of dyno's and state of the art equipment to build one of those maps. Without a cam change I really don't need another map so my thoughts are why put myself through something I can avoid.

Anyway I hope what I wrote helps someone else here.
All of you have been really great to my wife and I.
Thanks
 
#6 ·
Joe,
Most of us here run our o2's unplugged. It is not putting the ECM in limp mode. It is using the open loop map with all sensors, air temp, baro, oil temp tps, everything but o2. The closed loop operation will try to idle and cruise from 14.7- 15.1 according to Rylan's dyno testing. Unplugged same bike same day, cruise at 14.1. Both ways went to 12.5:1 on full throttle. Most of us here get close to the same mpg's plugged or unplugged, some report better unplugged. To repeat, if you unplug both sensors, you will not be in limp mode and no CEL. Unplug only one and you get CEL.
 
#7 ·
Perfect.
I'll give it a try.
Thanks a lot. When I get time I will unplug the O2 sensors and see if I can get my 02 meter on it and give you some more feed back on what is coming out the exhaust. Gonna be a while though. It runs so good right now that I am enjoying riding it when I am able. Not having to work on it has been a treat.

Thanks for the help.
Joe
 
#9 · (Edited)
42 to 45 mpg is about perfect as you can get it.
Is that with the 02's hooked up or un hooked?

If you want the motor to run cooler take the cats out of the exhaust

what year h-d did you have where you were playing with the FI
sis you have h-d's tuner in it
 
#10 · (Edited)
42 to 45 mpg is about perfect as you can get it.
Is that with the 02's hooked up or un hooked?
It is with a stage 1 download and O2 sensors hooked up.


what year h-d did you have where you were playing with the FI
sis you have h-d's tuner in it
It was a 2004 flhtcui.
Terrible motor. It had Andrews 32 cams installed on top of a stage 1 download, air cleaner, more free flowing exhaust, Daytona twin tec fuel controller.
I have a twin scan with wideband 02 sensors that allowed me to record the TPS, map, rpm, afr etc The tuner had individual cells as well as an accelerator pump function that you could add or subtract fuel as needed to each cylinder independently. You just couldn't over ride the ignition timing.

If you were willing to work at it long enough you could tune with it quiet well. However, it made you very aware of the short coming of FI very quickly.
 
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