Speeduino custom board for Ford CVH 1.

6 EFI
A contemporary upgrade for ‘80s and ‘90s Ford EEC-IV engine management systems

Gianfranco Bazzani Valledeperez, Manuel López de Miguel

Dept. d’Electrònica i Biomèdica,
Universitat de Barcelona

Abstract—An option to upgrade and improve the efficiency secondly, the Motorcraft EDIS4 which controls spark coils and
and performance of obsolete Ford EFI (Electronic Fuel Injection) manages engine synchronism via a VR (Variable Reluctance)
systems are presented. This option is composed by a standalone sensor interface.
ECU (Electronic Control Unit) board and a wiring loom which
altogether can provide a substitution of stock Ford engine
management systems. Furthermore, a Speeduino based system
gives new features and functionalities to ‘80s and ‘90s Ford
engines from an open source basis. This document describes the
design process of this electronic system.

Keywords—Speeduino; ECU; EFI; engine managment; Ford;

efficiency; performance; open source

I. INTRODUCTION
Speeduino was created by Josh Stewart in 2013 as a project
with the goal of developing one low cost and an open source
Software /Hardware system, with the capabilities to manage an
internal combustion engine. The Speeduino core consists of an
Arduino Mega board with an expansion shield, to which all the
power electronics and sensor interfaces needed to run an
engine have been added.
Speeduino was born with the premise of being developed
by the community for the community. Any user can analyze
and help to improve their core, to develop new software and Figure 1: conceptual schema of EEC-IV system. The EDIS-4
hardware, make documentation, contribute with their ideas, etc. module senses the crankshaft angle, controls the spark coils,
By offering code, hardware designs and great documentation in and communicates synchronism info to the EEC module. The
an open way, Speeduino gives to the users the opportunity to module (EEC) mentioned previously reads all the others engine
train themselves and customize the application in a way that sensors and controls the injectors and other actuators like fuel
suits their interests. Thanks to this philosophy, a huge pump or idle valve.
community has been created around the project, in such a way
that new ideas are brought in every day, functionalities are
added, improvements of software efficiency are made, and Although the EEC-IV is functional, it is at the same time
proposals of new hardware alternatives are implemented. Over upgradable for the current automotive standards. A big
time, Speeduino has become a product that is revolutionizing inconvenient of this system is the difficulty of the injection’s
the world of engine enthusiasts and hobbists. modification and spark advance maps. To do so, it is needed to
access physically to the EPROM by desoldering it.
The electronic system, which will be described lately, is a Furthermore, a specific acknowledgement or specialized
custom implementation of Speeduino hardware designed on software are needed to interpret the Ford stock memory map.
purpose for the replacement of the electronic part of an ‘80s In addition, neither the EEC-IV has a way to monitorize engine
and ‘90s Ford EFI cars’ system EEC-IV. variables nor a breakdown diagnose method. On the other
hand, this system presents features to improve. Even though
II. FORD EEC-IV they are effective, they have high fuel consumption and
unstable idling problems.
Ford EEC-IV, which was developed by Motorola, first
appeared in 1983 in Ford cars. EEC-IV ECU is composed by
two principal electronic modules: firstly, the EEC module that
is the main board, which controls the fuel dosing, and
 • Compatibility with map (Manifold Air Preasure)
III. SPEEDUINO PROJECT ORIGINAL PCB sensors with voltage output (the stock Ford’s map
The last published version of the Speeduino project PCB is sensor has a frequency output)
the V0.4.4. This board is a shield for Arduino Mega. From an
• The possibility of implementation of a closed loop
electronic engineering point of view, it is quite upgradable.
control by adding an O2 sensor (lambda sensor)
Bear in mind that the goal of the Speeduino project is to
achieve a low-cost and easy-to-implement device. By deleting • The characteristic of centralizing all control in a single
these requirements from the equation, it is possible to develop standalone ECU (avoiding the decentralized
better electronics. With a hardware redesign it is also possible EEC/EDIS IV Ford systems)
to optimize this for the application.
• A method of real-time monitoring and modification of
The first point that can be improved is the type of engine variables and parameters via Tunerstudio PC
components used, as they could save a lot of space and reduce engine tuning software
parasitic effects by using SMD components instead of axial
components. On the other hand, it has one area to add custom • And, a constantly updated and upgraded firmware
circuits called proto area. If an already custom design is made developed by the huge Speeduino community.
it will not be necessary to add this part. A built-in MAP
pressure sensor, which is present in Speeduino, is not necessary
in the application, the stock car sensor will be used. Depending
on the type of crankshaft sensor, the Arduino may or may not
interpret its information. If it is a VR (Variable reluctance)
sensor, which is this case, it will be needed to have an interface
circuit. In the original one this is a small accessory plate that
plugs on top, which could be improved by incorporating this
circuit in the design. The Speeduino firmware natively supports
the connection to Tunnerstuido software using Bluetooth.
Although Speeduino does not include a Bluetooth module, it
could be improved by adding such a module. Lastly, the
Speeduino PCB is focused on being valid with a wide range of
engines, it includes unnecessary circuitry that would not have
to be used. Everything needed to control a 4-cylinder engine
without a camshaft sensor is maintained.

TABLE I. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN CUSTOM DESIGN AND SPEEDUINO

Speeduino PCB feature Custom design variation Figure 2: Proposed EFI system schema which shows the
4 injector channels Are kept only 2 engine’s actuators and sensors and how they must be
interconnected to the main Speeduino board. This schema is
4 ignition channels Are kept only 2 useful to define the input and output lines of the ECU and to
A MAP sensor interface is show how the power and signal lines must be routed between
CLT, IAT, TPS and O2 analog
added, and all inputs are the components.
signal output
protected
Optional variable reluctance The interface circuit is added
interface mounting socket to the design To recapitulate, the proposed solution consists of a
It is removed from the design
Built-in MAP pressure sensor as an external one MAP is standalone and custom open source basis ECU, and a wiring
used loom. They altogether form a PnP (Plug and Play) engine
Socket for mounting stepper management system fully compatible with ‘80s and ‘90s Ford’s
Removed from design
motor driver EFI car engines (only for those which have EEC-IV like a
4 multifunction high current It holds only one for fuel pump stock EFI system).
outputs control.
ProtoArea section Deleted

IV. PRESENTED SOLUTION DETAILS

Through an analysis of the engine actuators and sensors, a
new control electronics system is presented. This system has
the characteristics of being compatible with the engine stock
sensors and actuators. Moreover, it provides new features such
as:
• Improved current electronics components compared to
the ones in the ‘80s.
 processing which should have been done by the
microcontroller.
V. CUSTOM SPEEDUINO ECU BOARD
A custom hardware layout fully compatible with Speeduino
software can be seen in the following picture.

Figure 4: internal structure of MAX9924 IC. The main

components of the dispositive are an opam and a comparator.

Figure 3: Custom Speeduino ECU block diagram.

A detailed description of every block of the presented

layout is explained below.
Facts such as inductive load switching events and having an Figure 5: conceptual schema of how the synchronization
alternator/battery system may cause a hostile environment in system works. The square signal is digitally read by Arduino.
automotive electronics. For this reason, a power conditioner
stage is needed. This stage is composed by a varistor, which The microcontroller cannot directly drive the inductive
protects the board of voltage spikes, a bypass capacitor tank engine actuators. They claim a lot of current, therefore high
designed with the electrical resonance point at 16MHz current output drivers are needed. To control the injectors, that
(Arduino clock frequency) and a current inversion protecting are the idle valve and fuel pump relay, the main component of
diode. A 5V linear regulator is also present in this stage and its these drivers is an N Chanel automotive MOSFET’s in open
function is to supply stable tension to the microcontroller and drain configuration. Otherwise, to control the ignition coils, an
other IC’s. automotive IGBT is used in open collector configuration. In
addition, the driver has a gate protection resistor that limits the
Moreover, analogic sensor interfaces are needed to adapt current through the Arduino output pin and a pull down resistor
the signal of every sensor and protect Arduino from to avoid false activations.
overcurrents and voltage spikes. These interfaces are formed
by a pair of noise suppression capacitors, a resistor to limit the Finally, the last component of the system is a Bluetooth
current in the line and a thyristor/diode structure that encloses module which allows wireless communication with PC. The
the voltage in the pins between 5V and GND. main component of this module is a Bluetooth-UART bridge
IC.
Furthermore, the design includes a VR (Variable
reluctance) sensor interface. To handle the synchronism
between the engine and the electronics, the angle of the
crankshaft must be known by the microcontroller. This can be
done via a cogwheel and a CKP (Crank shaft Position)
magnetic sensor. This interface transforms an analogic signal
generated by the CKP into a square signal which can be read
digitally by Arduino. The main component of this stage is an
IC MAX9924. The presence of this interface avoids software
 REFERENCES
VI. PNP WIRING LOOM [1] Robert Bosch GmbH, 2006, “Gasoline Engine
Management”, Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 10: 0470057572.
A wiring loom has been designed to interconnect the ECU
and the engine transducers. The sections of the wires have been [2] University of São Paulo, 2018, “Model-Based
selected based on the amount of current that flows through.
Development of an Engine Control Module for a Spark
The color palette has been chosen to facilitate assembly stage
Ignition Engine”, IEEE. [On line]
and reparability. The characteristic that makes this wiring a
PnP item is that it interconnects the components using
compatible quick connectors avoiding the need to cut solder [3] Bell, A. Graham, 1997, “Modern Engine Tuning”, J H
wiring. Haynes & Co Ltd. ISBN 10: 0854299785

[4] Bell, A. Graham, 1998, “Four-stroke Performance

Tuning”, J H Haynes & Co Ltd. ISBN 10: 1859604358

[5] Matt Cramer & Jerry Hoffmann, 2010 , “Performance Fuel

Injection Systems” , Penguin Publishing Group.
ISBN 10: 1557885575

[6] Speeduino Community, 2020, “Speeduino Manual”,

Speeduino. [On line]

[7] MegaSquirt®, 2020, “MegaSquirt and MicroSquirt

MegaManual”, MegaSquirt®. [On line]

[8] M.Melito S.Palara S.Sueri A. Galluzzo, 1994, “Modern

Electronic Ignition in VIPowerTM Technology” ,
Co.Ri.M.Me. Research Center. [On line]

Figure 6 wiring loom layout schema.

VII. PROTOTYPE VIEW

Finally, to test the design and find possible bugs, a prototype
has been physically implemented. This prototype has been
tested in a ‘93 Ford Escort S.

Figure 7: Image of the built prototype.