I believe he was working with a 350Z. What's that got to do with an xB? Study up on cause-effect relationships. Now about that PROOF??????

 

I'm familiar with your approach to mods scott. Not interested in trying to convince you of something you are not capable of being convinced of.

 

Maybe you'll get like 2 crank HP out of an xB which would nearly double it j/k

Gains would really rely on the application but a smoother idle and quicker throttle response has been witnessed by many on nearly all applications and are well worth the $20-$30 IMO.

 

Exactly. Even if there was NOT any whp gain, the additional benefits to your electrical system are certainly worth a $20 mod and measurable. It most certainly does not justify ridiculing someone that does this mod.

 

Oh and the cause and effect relationship comment. Scott, I am willing to state I have probably forgot more about cause and effect, stats and what you are trying to apply with your fallacy of logic than you currently know. Go back to pretending to be a toyota tech

 

Not ridiculing anyone that does this, just trying to ebb the flow of dis-information spouted as FACT on the forum. Now try real hard to remember some of that good stuff you have forgotten and educate us with your PROOF. At what point did the rumor become FACT? I am always eager to learn but slower to speculate. Could you please enlighten me? I'll be pretending to be a Toyota Tech in the meantime.

 

Provide one statement that was dis-information, yet spouted as fact. Because no one with an Xb did this mod and dynoed it for your proof or showed you a smoother idle and better throttle response? I believe someone with an Xb did the before and after voltage measurements. From an "ELECTRICAL" standpoint, problem is solved for the Xb voltage potential issue, just like what resides in ALL new and used autos.... Now, if you truely understand electronics and what a difference in ground potential can make to your ECU, sensors, audio, etc, you will also see the "Cause and Effect" of this mod. Go ahead, grab a meter and make some measurements and let us know how fantastic the ground system is on a stock Xb.

 

Mikochu already did ground voltage comparisons on the xA:

This was listed in the Tech article listed below:
https://www.scionlife.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=29261

Come on guys, can't we all just get along? :D

 

Oh yea, Scott and I are just yanking each others chains.....At least I am and I sure hope he is.

 

Ok, I'll bite, When measured at the head and coil pack there was NO difference. When measured at the body(wherever that is) he observes a 2.9 Mv difference. Exactly where were these measurements taken and was the body part tested ground down to bare, clean metal? How does any of this correlate to a decrease in performance and for what reason. When all these ground issues are addressed, what about the positive side? Wouldn't it be lacking too? Those that understand will, those that don't won't. I didn't fall off a turnip truck. If adding some wires to your car makes you happy, do it! But I am not convinced that it will improve anything. The one thing I am sure of is that most folks on this forum who suggest at how stupid and uninformed I am, are quite shy when it gets down to YOUR explanation, so we can all understand. Then you explain that someone else explained it a long time ago and I must have been absent that day. All I am asking is that with your clearly superior intellect, please explain it to me so I can educate myself to approach your level. Don't be afraid to use big words or technical terms, I'll look it up if I have to. Let's not just call names back and forth, ENLIGHTEN US!

 

Judging by the following picture, it looks like points A & E (tv network?) are the places he tested.



Now then based off the info (I think I understand) from Engifineer, if the ECU was grounded at either points A or E then that could cause some issues with it, hence the cleared up idle and throttle response due to better ECU function.

In my field I see similar situations. I've seen quite a few computer glitches due to bad power, even blown capacitors on mainboards in computers that are even on surge protectors. Then I have to use a line voltage regulator that conditions the power so that it's clean enough so electrical components function correctly again.

Bad power reeks(sp?) havoc on computers and I'm sure our car's ECU is no different.

 

subscribing...

 

Can you describe the blown caps on the computer mainboards? What do they look like when they blow?

 

The tops of the caps were raised, not flat, and the fluid inside the cap was leaking out the bottom. I had to replace about 7 caps on the mainboard before it functioned normal again.

The thing kept shutting down without warning or cause, so I suspected hardware failure and was right. Since replacing the caps, the computer has run flawlessly.

In the event of extreme cap failure, it will explode. You will definitely know if this happens because it'll sound like a 12-gauge shotgun just went off followed by smoke and some lovely confetti will be inside the case.

 

=Fun. Never had it happen in anything...but I've wired some directly to the wall

 

Yeah when I was taking electronics in high school (God has it been 10 years?), we would hook one up to a power supply...backwards! About 3 minutes later ... BOOM! ... nearly gave my instructor a freakin' heartattack and left a nice lil' crater in the workbench. :D

And that was just from a little 3.5V 1A cap, now imagine one of those stiffening caps used for car audio blowing, pineapple grenade comes to mind.

 

oh god, that'd be scary....i've never done anything other than the tiny ones. My roommate came across a bunch for some reason...I think it was from disposible camera flashes....that was a fun night...drink...zap someone...blow it up.

 

I did state that I am not advertising that the ground kit will noticibly increase performance. I am only clarifying the theory and technology behind it. It definitely does have an advantage.. only most likely too small to notice on a new car. The sound system however is a different story.

 

The benifits of better grounding does not have much to do with the car it is used on. The proof talked about here is that a better grounding system has an effect on the operation of the entire system. How much will vary depending on the application, but the principle is the same.

 

OK, I'll play Scott. Lets start with a monolithic IC, which consists of a semiconductor substrate called a chip or die, in which all necessary active and passive components are formed and interconnected to perform a desired function. A hybrid integrated circuit consists of an insulating substrate with deposited passive elements (resistors and capacitors) and metallized interconnected patterns, to which active elements are added in uncased chip form either by wire bonding or by other die- attachment techniques.

From an electrical standpoint, the silicon atom consists of a nucleus containing 14 protons (each with an electrical charge of +1) and three orbital rings housing a total of 14 electrons (each with a charge of -1), which electricall neutralize the protons of the nucleus. The outer most ring contains 4 electrons. Since the electrons in the two inner rings are tightly bound to the nucleus, they contribute nothing to the electrical properties of the atom and therefore can be disregarded. The 4 outer-ring electrons, however, are loosly bound to their neutralizing protons and can easily be dislodged from their orbits by some external force.

Are you still with me.

The atoms of silicon tend to arrange themselves into a crystal structure. With proper processing, the material can be of single crystal form, in which all atoms are arranged in a continous, well-ordered lattice. whereby each of the four outer-ring electrons associated with one atom forms a bond with one of the electrons of a neighboring atom so that every electron of every atom is tightly bound within the crystal lattice, Thus, while the four outer electrons of an individual silicon atom can easily be removed by an external force, once they have been bound in the lattice, they are very difficult to dislodge. Intrinsic single-crystal silicon therefor behaves like an insulator at very low temperatures.

Want me to explain what happens as temp raises?

Anyway, this is undesirable for any practicle use, except for maybe a temp sensor device. So, it is necessary to introduce additional charge carriers into the intrinsic semiconductor lattace.

Ok, now you have a primitive idea of the little black thingies in the ECU.

This could take a really long time to work up to the point in which ground potential variations have a dramatic effect on SOLID STATE ELECTRONICS. Let me give you a simple example to follow.

First, of course, we have a signal source. If it is an indash radio, the case (outer metallic shell) of the radio is electrically connected to the chassis of the vehicle at it's point of mounting. If the radio is mounted in plastic , the radio's ground wire will make the connection to the chassis. Realize that the ground wire of the radio and the shield of RCA cable are connected together inside of the radio. I know that some radios have some sort of isolation between the radio's case and the audio ground but most are connected directly to the case of the radio. The only exceptions that I know of are the head units with balanced outputs through RCA jacks.

Now, let's say that we have to send the signal to the rear of the vehicle (to an amplifier, let's say). Remember that the metal chassis of the vehicle has resistance and if we have current flowing through any conductor with resistance, there must be a difference of potential (voltage) from one end of that conductor (in this case, the chassis of the vehicle) to the other. This means that there is a difference of voltage between the grounding point of the radio (reference for audio signal source), and the mounting/grounding point for the amplifier (probably in the trunk). To complicate things, the current flowing through the chassis, is constantly changing. The chassis provides the return path (to the battery) for turn signals, brake lights, amplifier(s), fans, windshield wipers... Well, you get the idea. Now you can probably see that the difference of voltage from one end of the chassis to the other, isn't going to be constant because the current from all of those accessories is not going to be constant. This is why the audio signal has to have a dedicated reference connection. If the audio signal is sent to the rear of the vehicle, without the reference, and the amplifier (in the trunk) uses the chassis for the audio reference, the amplifier would not be getting an accurate (clean) signal and would therefore be amplifying a distorted/noisy signal. The actual input signal of the amplifier would be the audio signal plus or minus the voltage difference in the chassis between the mounting positions of the radio and the amplifier. When an amplifier isolates its signal input ground connection from chassis ground, and uses the RCA shield coming from the signal source, it does not have the error which would otherwise distort the signal. Since an amplifier may amplify the signal 100 times its original level, any noise added to the audio signal will be a serious problem.

Ahh, the world of modern electronics. Class dismissed