Strange EcuTek problem

[BirdTRD]

Flashed a new tune file to my car this morning and needed to grab some logs for my tuner, something I've done many times before.

So before I hit the road, I connected my AC charger to a 12V power inverter then to my Dell laptop. When I tried to set up logging...I got several errors shown below. I thought maybe I knocked the EcuTek cable loose when I was plugging in the power so I checked all that...same problem. When I unplugged the laptop and went back on battery...problem disappeared! Confirmed that when I hooked up power back to the laptop...issue returned. (so I grabbed the screenshots)

Must be some weird ground loop or something through the inverter/power pack causing the problem. Maybe I'll try it with real AC power and see what happens?

I'm just glad I didn't do it during the actual flash process!

[Grady]

That is a strange one.
Yes you should never use an inverter plugged into the car when programing the ECU. Good way to make you a new paperweight.

[BirdTRD]

Originally Posted by Grady

That is a strange one.
Yes you should never use an inverter plugged into the car when programing the ECU. Good way to make you a new paperweight.

Agreed. Shouldn't do anything but sit on your hands when actually programming and be sure to have a fully charged, good battery in the laptop.

So I went and tried the same thing (logging) with the same set up except I used a real AC power source and all was well, no errors or oddities.

Lesson learned...

[steve99]

Most cheap inverters are not true sinewave or regulated or filtered well and introduce large amouts on electrical noise, somthing best avoided when flashing ecu, as is connecting battery chargers to car for same reasons unless they have stabilisied and filtered outputs