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Dealer filled my new FRS with 87 octane; Should I flash ECU?
Hello,
I bought a 2014 Scion FRS a few weeks ago, and about a week ago I found out the dealership filled the initial tank with 87 octane. Upon contacting the dealer and notifying them that their own car requires premium, they at first tried to deny it; but upon providing clear evidence they admitted that it does indeed require premium and that, "It will be fine, just start filling up with premium from now" I am now running on 92 octane (highest I can get in Washington), but I'm wondering if that inital tank of 87 octane might have permanently set my ECU's timing down. The car does not seem to perform as well as other FRSs out there, anecdotely... It may just be my imagination, but I figured I would check with you guys and see if anybody else has found a confirmed answer to this question. Should I go back to the dealership and ask them to flash my ECU? Or will the ECU slowly learn back it's timing with 92 octane gas? Thanks!! |
The ECU will slowly learn, and you should be taking it easy on it and varying your RPM during the first couple tanks anyways.
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Thanks Tut!
Just a quick aside, I have to admit that I accidentaly (Honest.. Lol) pushed the RPMs to 5,500 once. It only stayed that high for a split second, and I have not pushed it above 4,000 since. Should I be worried? I was mortified when I realized I did it, after reading the warning in the owner's manual. Thanks again for the advice! |
nothing to worry about, the dealer did the same with mine... after i ran that tank empty, i only filled with 93 shell gas and the car runs nicely
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LOL :lol: |
You are fine. Just drive till the gas is gone refill you are ok. If you are worried about the ecu just pull the negative terminal off the battery for a few minutes.
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No, you needn't worry. Your wonderful new car is just fine. While I am "old-school" in my break-in methods, I know of no long-term studies showing it to be any better for durability or longevity or even performance. I once had an experienced Honda dealer ask me if I had installed a different chip in the Si we were trading in; he thought it performed better than anything he'd driven before. It was stock, just normal tune-up specs done by me. Who knows whether break-in methods really matter at all. But, one thing is certain: An occasional excursion to higher rpms during break-in is not going to do any harm, either short- or long-term. Rest easy, and enjoy that terrific new car! :) |
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I'm going to allow the ECU to adjust slowly, as it does seem to be getting better everyday I drive it. Thanks again everyone for your responses! :respekt: |
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Its funny because of that. I work at a car dealership I see it every week. :mad0259: |
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Unless you make them, no dealer puts the expensive stuff in, why would they? Maybe expensive cars but even then I doubt it. Who's going to pay someone to test their fuel on the first tank to find out?
They knew what it takes, it says so right there when they open the fuel door, and for that exact reason. How could anyone work at selling cars and not notice ever in their lifetime that the fuel door tells you what to put in it? Of course they knew. The manual also says emergency runs over 4k are OK. |
UPDATE:
After another tank of 92 through the engine and not a lot of performance increase, as well as a few odd issues that seemed timing-related, I decided to go ahead and reset the ECU. I filled it up with Lucas Oil Octane Booster + a full tank of 92 octane Shell V-Power, then pulled the plug on the battery for a few hours. Upon reconnecting the battery, I drove it 60 miles in varied environments (on and off the highway), then sit it over night, then drove it another 60 miles the next day. The results have been really good. It seemed to be something of a magic bullet, solving numerous small issues I was having with the car. Issues include: -Not rough, but maybe.. Shaky idle? A bit of hunting, and the engine just didn't seem to like idling. -Throttle Delay. Not to be confused with the throttle dead spot you get after resetting the ECU for the first 100 miles, it just seemed that when shifting into second or sometimes third gear, there would be a slight hesitation in the throttle, like a latency almost. It didn't affect first gear or 4th/5th/6th. -White Smoke coming out of exhaust at idle. It would happen about 75% of the time, warmed up or not. It only came out at idle, and if I was actually moving at any speed beyond 1mph there would be no visible exhaust smoke of any kind. -Slight "Rattle" noise coming from the engine compartment. It was clearly audible in second and third gear acceleration, but not in first or 4th/5th/6th gear. It would happen about 75% of the time, about the same rate as the white exhaust smoke at idle. It sounded sorta like there was some change rattling on top of the engine... Very odd sound. I am happy to report that one ECU reset & 150 miles later, ALL of the above problems have been resolved. There is no more exhaust smoke at idle, once warmed up. The rattle has completely dissipated, and the engine feels solid at idle. It does still hunt occasionally, but way less often, and the engine doesn't feel shaky when it kicks in. The "Throttle dead spot" was definitely there for the first 90 or so miles, but it went away and the car now accelerates very naturally and the engine sounds super clean on higher revs. When shifting into second and third gear, there is no more "hesitation". Oh, and on top of all that, my fuel economy increased from 23.5mpg average to 29mpg average! WOW! Just wanted to share my results with others that may face this issue. If your dealer does fill your first tank up with low-quality/low-octane gas, I HIGHLY recommend the ECU reset after you've run a few high octane tanks through the engine. It has breathed new life into my car's performance. |
Hi i've read your post about your dealer having filled your tank with low octane fuel. In my case I bought my Scion or FT 86 cause i'm in argentina, I took my new car of the dealer a couple weeks ago.
But to my suprise, the ECU at first showed an average of 50 Litres / 100km and I SAID WHAT!!! it's shown in Litres per 100km not in MPG. Then it came to my mind could this unit be defective? Am I pushing the gas pedal too much .. too much revs? not really cause I was way below 3000rpm. Thing is I didn't travel that far with my car, only did city trips to the supermarket didn't take it to the highway. Then I said well I might no be doing a precise timing on shifting the gears.. So i enabled the G-on which shows on the dashboard the gear you're in and and a small triangle blinks when you got to make the other gear.. Well it helped a bit the ECU showed 25 Litres/100km .. but it's still TOOO MUCH! SO what's going on with my new car? is the ECU Faulty? could the fuel my dealer filled the tank with be of low octane and is influencing the fuel consumption? don't know what else to do . please hep me out thanks |
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btw, I am a certified EFI tuner |
Can someone help on my previous post.
Thanks |
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Hi what do you mean by having resetted it ? help me a bit here.
Update: I think you may point to resetting the dashboard MPG function, which I did actually. And the values changed from 50Litres / 100km to 25litres for every 100km. |
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The FRS/BRZ has a very broad band of fuel consumption depending on ambient conditions and how you drive it! |
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But I had the tank filled completely by the dealer. I setted the trip B option to 0km when I took the car out of the dealer. and I measured the first quarter of the tank which would be equal to 12.5 litres. I only did 36KM. That really annoyed me. Then I enabled the G-on function which tells you how to shift gears.. after I did that the fuel consumption monitor went from 50 to 25 litres/100km but it's still being too much. any ideas? My car is brand new |
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The current fuel consumption will read as high as 50L/100km to as low as 0 while driving, this is normal. |
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Monitor it yourself. Fill up, reset your trip "a" or "b" and if you don't get atleast 500km per a tank of super gas, you have a major problem. You could also try disconnecting your battery to reset your ecu. More likely it's a faulty mpg device than your actually going through that much fuel. |
guys thanks for all your tips. I'm going to recheck again, re fill tank entirely. I talked with the guy from tech support of the dealer.
I told him about the fuel consumption that I did 1/4 tank and had 36km and he said that's far from acceptable. I told him I was given the car with the tank filled up. But he said maybe it wasn't topped entirely.. so he said to go and fill again the tank to be sure it's completely filled though I could see the needle reaching the top of the tank it might not be filled. So as to be sure. Then drive it again.. and see if the Litres per 100km do change on the ECU. But I'm going to do like you guys say. Thanks again for all your tips. I was getting worried I had a faulty unit :( |
Something I forgot to tell you all, is my car came with R16 wheels Yokohama not R17 (Michelin), could that impact more fuel consumption I inflated with 35 PSi.
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Also realize that how and where you drive has a HUGE impact, some members report they don't get any better than 20 mpg (about 12 L/km), in stop and go driving like you describe (no highway) you're not going to get great mileage. |
Well then I would suggest that you try a little less throttle and shift below 3000 rpm for a tank and see what results you get. Gord-zenith is right about the fuel consumption can be high in the first part of the tank. The more starts from stop in first 1/4 tank, the worse the average, while the average will come down with longer highway runs. Try monitoring your driving with the FE monitor set to instantaneous to see what results you get and gauge it relative to your driving style. I think then you may be better able to see what is going on. If you are getting high instantaneous numbers all the time you won't get low averages!
The best average I have seen is 5.0/100 km after 100 km of pure highway driving at 100 kmph through foothills. My worst average on a fill is around 9.1L/100 km. lots of winter, very short city trips. And that is from fill-up calculations, not the computer. |
Please do yourself a favor and stop gauging fuel consumption from the dash meter.
It is not at all accurate. -alex |
Hi thanks for your reply , can you tell me again what you told me to monitor in realtime the fuel average.. you mean to switch the option to showo n the dahshboard and see in real time the fuel consumption?. Again what about the revs I should be shifting gears.. I'm using the G-on feature. to switch gears properly on each gear.. which shows a triangle blinking when you got to do make the next shift.
Thanks. Why is that the first quarter won't reflect the normal fuel consumption ? sorry I'm not that knowledgeable I just supposed guiding myself from the first quarter tank to see the fuel consumption would suffice. But I guess it's not.. I also don't know if the fuel the dealer gave me the car with it's RON98 or it's lower.. i've read in a couple forums that if the car it's meant to be for RON98 and you add a lower octane fuel it would have an impact on fuel economy how true is that? |
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My dash says I get over 30MPG. My Fuelly says otherwise, currently around 25MPG combined after I put on 18" wheels with larger rolling resistance. Keep in mind the dash gauge is estimating your mileage based on ECU conditions such as throttle position, O2 readings, knock/timing, etc. It will never actually be close to what you'd get in real world conditions, unless what you drive on daily is exactly what the computer fuel consumption map is like programmed from the factory. -alex |
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Maybe I should disconnect the battery and reset the ECU. It could also be the fuel on the tank it's not RON98 .. bein a lower octane. Honestly I'm out of ideas. what's your bestadvice? |
Inexpensive fix:
Drive until cheap fuel is gone. Refill with higher octane. Disconnect battery overnight. Drive normally. Expensive fix: Pump your gas out. Refill with higher octane. Disconnect battery overnight. Drive normally. If your fuel consumption doesn't improve after 2 tanks, document it and take it to the dealer. -alex |
Dssence
I would suggest the following: 1) the computer in the car makes changes to the timing based on many parameters. The reason the lower octane fuel gives poorer fuel consumption is that the car's knock sensor retards the timing when it hears knock due to the lower octane fuel. Once you get higher octane fuel in the car this should help fuel consumption from this perspective. 2) in the owners manual there will be section that describes the dash buttons and the two that are used to reset the odometer, select the odometers, select the outside thermometer, the average fuel consumption display, the instantaneous fuel consumption display etc. Read this section, understand it and figure out what buttons to push to change the display value you see and how to reset those that are resettable. 3) the average fuel consumption dash readout tends to show a little better than real life calculating the fuel consumption from the km. driven and the fuel added. 4) you should read and record the average fuel consumption, at refill time and then reset the average fuel consumption readout to zero. This will tell you what the computer thinks is going on. Record the odometer mileage since the last refill to full(keeping in mind the instructions on the inside of the gas cap regarding how full full is). Add fuel, and use the fuel amount added and the km. since last refill to measure the real world fuel consumption. You can then compare that to the computer readout to see the difference. Do this for 2-3 tanks of fuel( go down to 1/4 to 1/8 left in the tank before fill up). 5) Driving Style: fuel consumption from a driving style perspective will be a function of when you shift up and down and how much throttle you use. You can see the impact of throttle and shifting by setting the dash readout to instantaneous fuel consumption. It will read blank when stopped and change as you drive with how you use the throttle and shift, but go back to no value when ever you stop the car. The average readout will always show a number greater than zero until you reset it to zero. That is one way to tell the difference between the two read outs in addition to the fact that the average fuel consumption readout screen says avg and L/100 km while the instantaneous readout just shows L/100 km on the screen. 6) you will see some very high instantaneous fuel consumption readings as you accelerate but lower values when cruising. The shorter the duration of higher values and the more time at low values will result in better fuel consumption. If you are seeing real world fuel consumption worse than the worst at the fuely website for this car then you may have a problem. If you are in the range shown there then you probably just need to work on your driving technique to improve to the better end. Try this for a few tanks of fuel and see what you learn about your car and fuel consumption. Just a suggestion. Please note that if you have the dash readout set to avg fuel consumption, your readout can show a higher value because the first thing you do after fill up is accelerate away which uses way more fuel (particularly if you are heavy on the throttle) than cruising on the highway. Over the time to next refill, the average should even out depending on the mix of city and highway driving. Remember the throttle is not an on/off switch! You are allowed to use less than full throttle to accelerate!! Cheers |
Hi thanks so much for such a compltete answer. Sorry I didn't answer but I had some personal problems. let me go bit by bit through all your help :)
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It is difficult to analyze fuel consumption over a short interval, there are too many variables. |
Hi honestly not that much, around 40km , with around 1/4 tank.. using AC. Some guy from toyota told me the car needs to be rolled at least around 100km for the ECU to properly adjust.
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There is a button on dash that is marked DSP. If you press it, each press should cycle through the options that include "out side temp", "avg L/100 km", and "L/100 km". if you press and hold when showing "avg L/100km" the average will be reset to zero. Suggest you read about it the owners manual!
Yes, using air conditioning a lot will lead to higher fuel consumption. I think you may just have a heavy foot. My automatic accelerates adequately with very little throttle application. You need to read the manual and drive the car to find out how it works. Yes it will be quite different than late 70's Celica that was probably carburetted. Come back after 2-3 tank fulls of experience. |
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