Fuel System Mods for E85

[Mikepol2]

FWIW I contacted Wengerd and asked if he'd tune me for E85 if I added the DW400 to my existing setup of BAP and GT500 injectors and he said he'd like to see a Fore return system. Unfortunately that knocks me out of the E85 game which sucks because I really loved it before going FI. Not spending ANOTHER $2,000+ on a fuel system and too happy with Wengerd's tune to risk switching tuners (not to mention the cost of another tune). I'll have to suck it up and be happy with 700-ish.

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[SheepDog]

he said he'd like to see a Fore return system.

Like others have said, it's simply because he already has all of the data built into files that allows him to make very few changes otherwise, so that he can send you one or two revisions and be done.

These days, Fore is the worst option, not the best.

Here's the thing - Your tuner doesn't actually know what type of fuel system you have, aside from a couple DTC's they shut off related to the FPCM not being connected to the pump.

 

[beefcake]

These days, Fore is the worst option, not the best.

just becuase their lead times are longer right now, doens't make them the worst option. that would be like saying when whipple went from 4 weeks to 20 weeks they were a terrible option.

they moved facilities, then had a major machine go down. and they didn't ship anything for a month.

they will get back to 1-2 week lead times at some point, same as whipple will get back to 4 week lead times at some point.

on average we sell 6-10 complete systems per week, every week, every month. every customer is getting their stuff, just takes a little longer.

if you order a cervinis hood, its 6-8 weeks, if you order it painted its 10-12. doesn't make it bad. it's just their longer lead times.

if you need something like this week, then we do have other options as well, but fore is still by far our #1 fuel system provider

 

[RNM]

just becuase their lead times are longer right now, doens't make them the worst option. that would be like saying when whipple went from 4 weeks to 20 weeks they were a terrible option.

Having a return style fuel system on a modern car is so ass backwards.

 

[SheepDog]

just becuase their lead times are longer right now, doens't make them the worst option. that would be like saying when whipple went from 4 weeks to 20 weeks they were a terrible option.

they moved facilities, then had a major machine go down. and they didn't ship anything for a month.

they will get back to 1-2 week lead times at some point, same as whipple will get back to 4 week lead times at some point.

on average we sell 6-10 complete systems per week, every week, every month. every customer is getting their stuff, just takes a little longer.

if you order a cervinis hood, its 6-8 weeks, if you order it painted its 10-12. doesn't make it bad. it's just their longer lead times.

if you need something like this week, then we do have other options as well, but fore is still by far our #1 fuel system provider

My comment has absolutely nothing to do with wait times. I didn't even know there were delays.

My comment is based on the evolution of fuel systems, tuning, and overall design that have progressed (in some cases, by members in this forum) whereas Fore has not changed their recipe in 15 years. Does it work? sure. Is it anywhere near the best? not even close. It isn't 1978 anymore. Return style fuel systems that use an open pump hanger, a 200 dollar dumb controller (that is really just a fancy relay box) and brushed pumps that are both inefficient and generally ran at 100% output to kill a fly with a sledgehammer- really are not the best option.

Ford didn't go through all of the trouble in developing very sophisticated PWM control strategies (and a proper venturi system in the bucket) for no reason. Any high end performance machine (talking OEM here) uses a returnless system with a brushless pump. There is no reason that aftermarket solutions for these Mustangs and F150's cannot do the same. In fact, we have proven that it can be done.

I understand that Fore is your go-to fuel system, and it works as intended, but there are too many drawbacks to its antiquated design- especially for street driven and daily drivers. A full on drag car that has a full tank of fuel all the time and is ran for only a few minutes is really the only strong use case for such a system.

 

[beefcake]

My comment has absolutely nothing to do with wait times. I didn't even know there were delays.

My comment is based on the evolution of fuel systems, tuning, and overall design that have progressed (in some cases, by members in this forum) whereas Fore has not changed their recipe in 15 years. Does it work? sure. Is it anywhere near the best? not even close. It isn't 1978 anymore. Return style fuel systems that use an open pump hanger, a 200 dollar dumb controller (that is really just a fancy relay box) and brushed pumps that are both inefficient and generally ran at 100% output to kill a fly with a sledgehammer- really are not the best option.

Ford didn't go through all of the trouble in developing very sophisticated PWM control strategies (and a proper venturi system in the bucket) for no reason. Any high end performance machine (talking OEM here) uses a returnless system with a brushless pump. There is no reason that aftermarket solutions for these Mustangs and F150's cannot do the same. In fact, we have proven that it can be done.

I understand that Fore is your go-to fuel system, and it works as intended, but there are too many drawbacks to its antiquated design- especially for street driven and daily drivers. A full on drag car that has a full tank of fuel all the time and is ran for only a few minutes is really the only strong use case for such a system.

I have daily driven on coyotes with this style since 2011. I have coasted in to gas stations on 0 to e before under no power, pushing the system. I just did a video last week driving around with like 5 miles to e left in the tank.

Would i race on 5 miles to e, no, but i wouldn't race any car under 1/4 tank of fuel. I will drive to 0 to e though on them. When people say you can't daily drive or need 1/4 of 1/2 tank of fuel. That simply is not true. I like to call it Urban Legend.

There are 10's of thousands of people running these systems with 0 issues, they work well, easily serviceable, and do everything they need to. We do over pwm solutions and others as well.

 

[Headless Horseman]

When KPM released the 1000 HP Drop in module, I contacted Wengerd and asked if i could run this with boost and E85 without anything else he said yes and he'd tune for it. Maybe he misunderstood me or maybe one of you. I sent him a link to the one I was referring to. KPM recommended I use a high flow filter in my fuel supply.

 

[SheepDog]

I have daily driven on coyotes with this style since 2011. I have coasted in to gas stations on 0 to e before under no power, pushing the system. I just did a video last week driving around with like 5 miles to e left in the tank.

Would i race on 5 miles to e, no, but i wouldn't race any car under 1/4 tank of fuel. I will drive to 0 to e though on them. When people say you can't daily drive or need 1/4 of 1/2 tank of fuel. That simply is not true. I like to call it Urban Legend.

There are 10's of thousands of people running these systems with 0 issues, they work well, easily serviceable, and do everything they need to. We do over pwm solutions and others as well.

Well Sir, the primary driving factor in why you sell so many Fore systems, and why you will continue to do so is because it is the Easy Button for tuners. They no longer have to come up with calibrations from scratch, when every customer is forced to use a similar system. They simply input a few changes like injector data, and can otherwise "tune" someone's car in a revision or two.

Fuel starvation is only one of the many short comings of a return style system like Fore. You also completely lose the feed forward capability of the PCM, the diagnostics, and are forced to run giant power wires through the car. This adds weight and additional points of failure. Another problem with these ancient systems are that they heat the fuel unnecessarily. Not only because the pumps are running full tilt, but the return fuel is heated from the engine before it goes back to the tank.

Fore (and others) will eventually be forced to innovate to more modern systems, when customers demand it with their wallets. This will also force tuning companies to be more flexible and educated on the matter. I understand that it works, but it is no where near as good as it can be.

 

[NGOT8R]

Can a tuner program the factory ECU to shut down spark on a SC or turbo car that reaches a preset low fp threshhold to save the motor?

 

[engineermike]

Can a tuner program the factory ECU to shut down spark on a SC or turbo car that reaches a preset low fp threshhold to save the motor?

The factory gen3 pcm is always calculating the airflow it can support at max injection duty cycle, and the duty cycle is calculated using actual fuel pressure. Basically, unless a tuner unwittingly disables this, it will shut the throttle if it thinks it’s running out of fuel injection capacity. I have several logs showing that it does this. Some tuners hit the easy button and disable this feature though, to make sure the throttle stays open.

 

[beefcake]

Well Sir, the primary driving factor in why you sell so many Fore systems, and why you will continue to do so is because it is the Easy Button for tuners. They no longer have to come up with calibrations from scratch, when every customer is forced to use a similar system. They simply input a few changes like injector data, and can otherwise "tune" someone's car in a revision or two.

Fuel starvation is only one of the many short comings of a return style system like Fore. You also completely lose the feed forward capability of the PCM, the diagnostics, and are forced to run giant power wires through the car. This adds weight and additional points of failure. Another problem with these ancient systems are that they heat the fuel unnecessarily. Not only because the pumps are running full tilt, but the return fuel is heated from the engine before it goes back to the tank.

Fore (and others) will eventually be forced to innovate to more modern systems, when customers demand it with their wallets. This will also force tuning companies to be more flexible and educated on the matter. I understand that it works, but it is no where near as good as it can be.

but, if the tuners can tune the cars accurately , and quickly, and the systems do exactly as needed , what makes that a bad thing?

as far as "heat", most customers "stage the pumps" so one pump runs all the time, the others under load.

i do the same thing on all the cars, even our feul cell cars with aeromotive pumps, we control the amount of fule off a pedal or hobbs switch.

if the tuners tune the car qucik and accurate, adn the results are great, why would anyone want to spend extra hours tuning each one and making multiple revisions, when you can almost be a one and done and operate perfectly

 

[NGOT8R]

The factory gen3 pcm is always calculating the airflow it can support at max injection duty cycle, and the duty cycle is calculated using actual fuel pressure. Basically, unless a tuner unwittingly disables this, it will shut the throttle if it thinks it’s running out of fuel injection capacity. I have several logs showing that it does this. Some tuners hit the easy button and disable this feature though, to make sure the throttle stays open.

Copy that. Thanks!

 

[SheepDog]

what makes that a bad thing?

It isn't that it is a bad thing, but it also isn't as good as it could or should be. Carburetors worked perfectly fine for decades, until they didn't.

"stage the pumps

This brings up another good point - multiple pumps. Multi pump systems present another issue when circumventing the OEM controls for fuel. Since these return systems take the very intelligent fuel system control away from the PCM, the PCM now has no idea what the pumps are doing, and especially when one fails. With the Hobbs switch configuration, you never know when that second pump or the hobbs switch fails until it's too late. You go WOT thinking all is well, and then run the motor lean and melt something.

A single DW810 pump can deliver enough fuel, through the OEM 3/8" line to support 1000 WHP on E85. No return necessary, no -8 or -10 feed line necessary, and no giant power wires that increase the chances of a fire or system failure. If the pump dies, the engine shuts off.

A single DW400 and a BAP, can deliver enough fuel for 800 WHP, and maintain all of the Ford OEM controls.

Why does Ferrari and Porsche and Koenigsegg and Bugatti and McLaren and Lamborghini etc. use returnless fuel systems with a single Brushless pump? Because it's better, not because they couldn't call up Fore and buy a fuel system from the 1980's to get the job done.

 

[KPM Fuel Systems]

The reason KPM designed high performance direct fuel systems is the following

• Suited to modern high performance MODERN VEHICLES and systems
• Full OE manners including correct fuel scavenging allowing the user to drive/race perfectly to a near empty tank
• Correct feed back to the factory ECU -All diagnostics maintained.
• Ability to deliver fuel from the pump more efficiently
• Increased power advantage due to cooler dense fuel vs a return system
• Ease of fitment. 800 and 1000HP systems -remove and replace
• Integration into OE system means perfect tune-ability
• No modifications

One of the great features on our KPM Fuel System is massively reduced labor times.
Especially our 800 and 1000hp systems are a direct 20min remove and replace.
No tuning required.

Check out the video below where we compare direct vs return fuel systems
In the video we talk about our KPM1500 HP system using the KPM PWM.
Please note this is ALSO 100% relevant to our KPM800 and KPM1000hp systems utiling the Ford OE FPCM (PWM.)

 

[beefcake]

The reason KPM designed high performance direct fuel systems is the following

-Suited to modern high performance systems
-Full OE manners including correct fuel scavenging allowing the user to drive/race perfectly to a near empty tank
-Correct feed back to the factory ECU -All diagnostics maintained.
-Ability to deliver fuel from the pump more efficiently
-Increased power advantage due to cooler dense fuel vs a return system
-Ease of fitment. 800 and 1000HP systems -remove and replace
-Integration into OE system means perfect tune-ability
-No modifications

One of the great features on our KPM Fuel System is massively reduced labor times.
Especially our 800 and 1000hp systems are a direct 20min remove and replace.
No tuning required.

Check out the video below where we compare direct vs return fuel systems

we are running the 1500 system on our 2024 car.

we are making 950 wheel with it so far on race gas.

once tuning is available, we will see how far we can push this on E85

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