Thread: Tornado Conversions

So....Lets see if I have this right

I can purchase lambda sensors and fit to my exhaust no problem...
To make them work I need to either replace the ECU and pay to get it resynched, or fit a tornado chip and it will find the sensors on it's own.

Puting aside any minor fuel economy benefits of "closing the loop" with the sensors to get the fuel to air mixture right, wouldn't the standard ECU still have the conservative Rover ignition timing which has been mentioned, in which case the power benefits may not be realised?....

Question is: Wouldn't the Tornado chip be set up to optimise the ignition timing as well as the fuel mapping? ie Benefits are greatest when used on early GEMS engines. Reports so far are that the benefits are not that significant....hence the confusion.

One a similar note: There is also talk on the RPI site that the standard Rover engine runs a lean mixture in the midrange, contributing to block cracking etc, which is cured by the Tornado chip. If the engine has no O2 sensors, I would assume rover would map the "open loop" mixture to be conservatively rich, and the engine will run cooler and have less risk of cracking.

The logical choice to me now seems to be either do nothing and suffer a loss of fuel economy (but lessen the risk of cracking) -vs- go all the way with O2 and Tornado (plus Bosch knock sensor as well if it helps)

Welcome any hard knowledge.
Troy N

Sounds about right yep - I've heard it said from some Rover mechanics I spoke to that they only started fitting lambdas to meet with tighter emissions laws introduced into Australia in the late 90's - and that if the law hadn't come in there'd be no lambdas on any gems P38 as their main purpose (in the P38) was for reducing emmissions, not economy or power.