Anyone else with a MBC (such as dawes) having probs with the boost solenoid playing up?

Mine is only connected to the intake with the other ends blanked off, i.e. not part of the actuator control.

But during tickover and slight acceleration it's clicking away once or twice a second. Is this normal? the clicking is quite loud and I could not hear it before before fitting the MBC.

i'm wondering if I could disconnect the power to it completely since is isn't doing anything apart from click away or will this produce an ECU fault? I would imagine the ECU would be able to detect solenoid failure to prevent further engine damage.

Any advice appreciated.
Rich

 

Rich,

I set mine up as John/Harry suggested and I can't hear any clicking noises at all.

Damian.

 

My car's WG solenoid has always produced a quite loud ticking (with a small pressure on the throttle), and it is unmodded as far as that is concerned. I had never questioned it before, but now I want to know whether it is normal / OK for it to produce this noise.

 

Just checked it again and it's stopped doing it - strange.

I noticed it after a 15 minute run about an hour ago - restarted straight away and it was still doing it. Then left the car to cool for an hour and hey presto, no noise, no solenoid switching.

i'll keep a check on it in the next few days and see what happens.

My system too is set up like yours - runs great, limiting to just under 15psi with excellent spool up and no overshoot.

Rich

 

take it that the car drives okay,

I started a thread to see if anyone had tried a Dawes and left the solenoid connected as we thought the solenoid may kick in and oscillate boost.

 

The car drives better than ever -

The solenoid is not connected to anything except the pipe going to near the air box, which is before the turbo i.e. at atmosphere pressure. Even though it is oscillating it should not be doing anything to the boost.

Still, i was suprised it was oscillating at idle and mild acceleration when the MAP should be reading a vacuum.

Just tried a further run with no sign of the problem.

Rich

 

Normal for it to click, but it sits on rubber mounts to shut it up. Put it in contact with something metal and you will have a 13-14Hz orchestra

If you disconnect I think you would get a check engine light. Those that have made boost controllers by attaching their own electronics to it have put a resistor (of a suitable value!) across the pins where it would live to fool the ECU.

Notably I tried my solenoid again tonight having had it disconnected for 4 weeks and capped off, and it still works fine.