Intermittent problem on my F40 solved by Dave Helms! Thanks Dave!

I had this intermittent problem with my car under hard acceleration where it would occasionally fall on its face and all the boost would bleed off completely and then all of a sudden come back. It would essentially boost up hard, bleed off and stumble, then re-boost again. Sort of like a miss, too much fuel, not enough fuel, or some other issue that would cut off power/boost and then allow it to come back on almost right away. It was annoying when you needed the power the most. However, it was intermittent and usually didn't happen if you rolled into the power and did not simply mash the throttle.

Having read all the potential F40 problem threads I thought it might be a wastegate problem where the hat needed cleaning or the diaphram was bunched up. The hat and diaphram were both in perfect condition so I knew it wasn't that. I called Dave at Scuderia Rampante and explained the symptoms. Almost immediately he asked me if my "slow down" ecus were black or green. Of course I didn't even know what a slow down ecu looked like let alone where they were on the car. He explained exactly what I needed to look for and where it was located. As you can see from the pics it turned out that I had one black and one green ecu. Dave figured that the problem might have been evident at one time and one of the ecus had been changed and had solved the problem. Now the second one was failing and needed to be replaced as well. Bottom line? If you have black ecus - throw them in the trash. You need the GREEN ones!

He told me to call Daniel at Ricambi. Thanks Daniel for getting that ecu to me so quickly. Five minutes with a nut driver and the new GREEN ecu was connected and in place. 20 minutes later the engine was warm after a short drive and ready for me to TEST! Needless to say ... GREEN is the way to GO! No more hesitation, no more loss of boost, and an even smoother idle! Who could have known that this small green box could do so much! Anyway, thought I would post this so all of you can check your ecus tonight!

P.S. They are not exceedingly expensive believe it or not! Daniel at Ricambi has two or three left (I think).

Thanks Dave for your help!
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Hopefully this will solve the problems that other F40 owners were having! I believe Coachi had the same type of power loss you did.

 

Good looking out for the other owners who may have had an issue!

 

If there is a god, s/he/it answers to Dave Helms.

 

FYI my F40 had very similar symptoms as described in Jeffrey’s post. Also, in fact, I had one green and one black ECU just as in his pictures (same left/right).

I finally broke down and got a green one from Daniel, installed it, and yippee, it worked! No more power cut under hard throttle applications. Way cool.

It was an easy, somewhat inexpensive, fix for an embarrassing (when the power would cut right in front of someone watching) and chronic problem.

Tim

 

That happened shortly after I did the major on what is now WCH's car. The car drove perfectly for several weeks after, then fell on it's face under high-load conditions.

I fussed with it for some time (damned near did the service over again, found nothing amiss), then sent it down to FOA (on my dime, wiping out any profit from the service), then FOW SD-2'd the car at the track (they found nothing amiss), then FOA rebuilt the top end at great expense claiming that the valve springs had gone bad (?!?!?), whereupon at Roebling Road, first time out, it did the same thing! <grin>

That is exactly what was wrong. Thanks, Dave. No substitute for experience and boy, am I glad I'm out of the wrench-turning business! Much easier to teach people how to drive these car and more fun, too. <very big grin>

 

Dear Comrade Tipo815,

Thank you for troubling to post this element of the most vital of information. Absolutely superb and particularly that it is something that could prevent untold grief - not to mention the potential costs involved in diagnosing the problem.

A really great post and thank you very much indeed.

With kind regards,

512 Tea Are

 

Nice work on finding your problem. I hope to see your car someday.

 

Dave Helms is the man!!

I found out that he is only about 1600 miles away from me. So in 2009/10 rolls in, I think I might drive my 348 over for a well done 30k

 

Instead of throwing them away, I would happily pay shipping to obtain one to tinker with .. let me know via PM.

 

Consequently ... the other two F40s being serviced along with mine at the local dealership both have the "black" ecus. I would suggest that both their owners look into this as it is inexpensive preventative maintenance! Glad this thread has helped many others!