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V3 MicroSquirt® - QuickStart Guide

Congratulations on the purchase of your V3 MicroSquirt® EFI controller. This page gives you an outline of the steps required to get your engine running with your V3 MicroSquirt® controller. Each step has a link to more detailed instructions (and most pages of detailed instruction have links to the theory behind those instructions).

Click on the accompanying links for more detailed instructions on any of these steps.

1. Install your chosen fuel system. Your MicroSquirt® controller can work with either throttle body injection systems, or port injection systems. If your engine is already fuel injected, you can skip this step. You will need fuel injectors, a fuel pump, fuel pressure regulator, and EFI-rated hoses, clamps, etc. Click the links for more information.

2. Install your chosen ignition systems. Your MicroSquirt® controller can work with many distributors, crank wheels (of the form M-N), and cam wheels. It can also be triggered off a coil's negative terminal, if you do not want to control ignition timing. Click the links for more information.

3. Mount your V3 MicroSquirt® EFI controller. Your MicroSquirt® controller should be mounted in a cool dry location (not under the hood). The enclosure is 'water resistant. It can easily be made to be fully sealed by using sealer on the top/bottom sections of the case. The ampseal connector already is sealed with its own gasket so just sealing the top/bottom case sections will seal it. Click the links for more information.

4. Install your throttle position sensor, coolant temperature sensor, intake air temperature sensor, exhaust gas oxygen sensor, and manifold absolute pressure sensor (MAP) (and/or mass air flow sensor (MAF)) on your engine. Click the links for more information.

5. Wire the sensors, actuators, and power supply to the 35 pin Ampseal harness.
   • Click here for a summary of your MicroSquirt® controller's connections.
   • Click here for a details of your MicroSquirt® controller's connections.
   • 
     Click the image for a large wiring diagram.
   • Click these links for specific information on various ignition systems:

     GM HEI GM DIS Ford EDIS Ford TFI Bosch 0 227 100 124

     MSD6a Toyota VAST (4AGE, etc.) Missing Tooth Crank Wheels Setting Dwell Other Distributors Dual Spark

6. If you are using a manifold absolute pressure (MAP) sensor alone to help determine engine loading (i.e. not MAF only), connect the MAP sensor's nipple a full-time manifold vacuum source using a vacuum hose. Don't worry about the length of the hose. Pressure changes move at the speed of sound (~1100feet per second) so any delay is negligible. If you are using a MAF sensor, install it now. Click the links for more information.

7. Install the TunerStudioMS tuning software (and MegaLogViewer, if you wish):
   1. The tuning software for your V3 MicroSquirt is TunerStudioMS (aka. "TS"). You can download it from here.
   2. To view datalogs of the engine output channels that you have recorded on your laptop, you can use the software called MegaLogViewer (aka. "MLV"). You can download it from here.
   Click the links for more information.

8. Apply power to your V3 MicroSquirt controller with a relay and a good ground on the vehicle (or on the bench if you are testing). This will bring your V3 MicroSquirt® controller to life. Click the links for more information.

9. Establish a serial communication link to your PC. If your tuning laptop does not have a serial port (most don't), you will need a USB/serial adapter dongle. Install the USB/serial adapter driver software and hardware, supply power and ground to your MicroSquirt controller, and open TunerStudioMS. Go to 'Communications/Setting' and 'Detect' the connection to your MicroSquirt® controller, then 'Accept' the connection when it is found. You need to set the "ECU Type" to MicroSquirt^® the first time you run (click the "burn to ECU" button for this and any other change to stick). Until you set the ECU Type, all the other parameters will be grayed out. Click the links for more information.

10. Calibrate your external sensors. You must set-up the:
    • throttle position sensor (TPS),
    • exhaust gas oxygen sensor (EGO, aka. O2),
    • manifold absolute pressure (MAP) and/or mass air flow (MAF) sensor(s), and
    • coolant and intake air temperature sensors (CLT, IAT).
    If the resulting sensor values look good in TunerStudioMS, this means the TPS values aren't backwards, you have set the correct MAP sensor values, etc., you may be just minutes away from starting your engine with your MicroSquirt® controller engine. Click the links for more information.

11. Adjust the basic configuration settings to match your engine and fuel/ignition systems. This includes the cranking pulse widths, number of cylinders, etc. If you are using a toothed wheel with 1, 2, or 4 cylinder wasted spark, or 2 cylinder sequential (with an additional cam sync signal) in one of the Dual Spark ignition modes, configuring this setup is now easy with the AutoTrigger mode. Click the links for more information.

12. Check that your V3 MicroSquirt® controller recognizes the tach signal while cranking so it knows how fast the engine is turning. Remove the fuel pump or injector fuses and crank the engine for a few seconds with TunerStudioMS connected and running. The tach in TunerStudioMS should show 150 or more rpm while cranking. If it does, you have good ignition input(s). If you do not get a tach signal, re-check your ignition input configuration. Replace the fuses you removed earlier. Click the links for more information.

13. Now you can begin to tune the MicroSquirt® controller's parameters to make your engine start, warm-up and run well. Start by trying to get you engine to start and idle, then progress to higher engine speeds and loads. You will need to set up the cranking parameters, the afterstart enrichments (ASE), the warm-up enrichments (WUE) and idle air controller parameters, a volumetric efficiency (VE) table, the air-fuel ratio (AFR) table, and the spark advance table. If you have not tuned an EFI system before, please review the basic EFI tuning guide. Click the links for more information.

14. If you have any questions or problems that can't be answered from:
    • the links above, or
    • a search the MicroSquirt^® manual: ,
    you can ask questions at the MicroSquirt® support forum which is at: www.microsquirt.com Click the links for more information.