Knock/Detonation Sensor

Have any of you installed or considered a detonation sensor? I'm considering adding some sort of indicator light and am interested what others have done. The link has pretty much what I'm looking to do....not clear on the dual sensor part.

https://www.viatrack.ca/Knock/KnockAll.jpg

That is pretty cool. Would make me feel better on a road trip where I am getting fuel from unknown sources.

I have not tried it but, if it can be made to accurately and reliably, it is a great idea. Chuck

I'm not that hard of hearing yet

red351 said:

I'm not that hard of hearing yet

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By the time you hear it, may be too late.

I wonder if any of the available EFI systems have an input channel for a sensor like this?

Steve McMahan said:

I wonder if any of the available EFI systems have an input channel for a sensor like this?

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All that I've seen do.

Great idea. Where do you get it from?

You can not hear the detonation at high RPM and WOT. It will hammer rod bearings and break pistons. Basstrix, thanks for bringing this up, you have given me yet another rabbit hole to go down. Chuck

I do believe I am going to look to see if anyone offers an aftermarket detonation sensor and spark retard kit for an electronic conversion kit from points to all electronic. I have an MSD system on out 73 Mach 1, and am about to install a Pertronix kit on our 73 Mustang Convertible simply to video record how to do it correctly for a friend in Brazil. I know on our 73 Mach 1's MSD system I have a timing retarder control cox inside the car, but there is nothing tied to a detonation sensor. I, for one, would be very apt to get such a product feature if it tied into either or both of our aftermarket electronic ignition systems.

c9zx, I will see you at (or in) the rabbit hole!

There are stand alone units that work ok that you listen to via headphones and that have a display

From the tuning groups I am part of they tend to agree not to connect it to the EFI.

Output is not reliable enough and will cause other running issues that would be hard to replicate/see in logs for the computer to use the data.

But a great tool that you can use to fine tune your ignition

I did some digging, and stumbled on this site. This is worth looking at, IMHO:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neiyDK0wQRM

The site for Progression Ignition is:

https://progressionignition.com/


I have done a lot of hunting around, and so far see no aftermarket ignition system upgrade that includes a detonation sensor that retards timing on the fly. If something was out there I am certain I would have found it by now.

basstrix said:

Have any of you installed or considered a detonation sensor? I'm considering adding some sort of indicator light and am interested what others have done. The link has pretty much what I'm looking to do....not clear on the dual sensor part.

https://www.viatrack.ca/Knock/KnockAll.jpg

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Good find! I think for a non-computer car like ours you will go with the standalone option. I don't know if you would get one for each bank as dual or one bank.

Yeah, I looked at Progression about a year ago. It sounds promising but, my experimentation budget is limited. And my current MSD set ups are working fine, at the moment. I would like to find an alternative to MSD. Chuck

This is the one I was talking about.

https://tunernerd.com/products/knock-monitor-pro-v3

I ordered up the standalone one from https://www.viatrack.ca/

With a new generic knock sensor and shipping to the US it was $103. Will report back in a month or two on it. Right now my car isn’t roadworthy.

mrgmhale said:

I did some digging, and stumbled on this site. This is worth looking at, IMHO:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neiyDK0wQRM

The site for Progression Ignition is:

https://progressionignition.com/


I have done a lot of hunting around, and so far see no aftermarket ignition system upgrade that includes a detonation sensor that retards timing on the fly. If something was out there I am certain I would have found it by now.

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These folks have a module with programmable retard for knock. Also has a 2 stage rev limiter...looks to be a pretty nice unit. http://www.jandssafeguard.com/NewUniversal/UniversalVersion.html

Bentworker said:

I ordered up the standalone one from https://www.viatrack.ca/

With a new generic knock sensor and shipping to the US it was $103. Will report back in a month or two on it. Right now my car isn’t roadworthy.

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I emailed them on Friday...haven't heard back yet. Did you get a setup for single or dual bank? That's all that's holding me back...want to get one for each side of the engine.

Just an interesting factoid on Ford’s late 1980’s knock sensors on their EFI cars, the Intel computer that controlled the EFI systems on the 4 cyl and the 5l Mustangs (87-94), used essentially the same connector. When you look at the function of each pin on that 60 pin connector, like the wiring designations, function remains the same. As I’ve said in my previous build post, I think it’s great that Ford didn’t change the “function” of a particular wire color. I didn’t find any wires on the 87 TBird sway that were on the 73 that didn’t do the exact same thing. Sure, the 87 had wires for functions the 73 didn’t, but not the other way.

The reason I say all of this, is that pin 23 on that ECU harness is for the knock sensor on the turbo 4. On the 5l, it’s not used. I verified by examining the photos I have of the 60 pin connector. So, I’m just wondering, and this is probably a question for those expert guys on these EFI systems; is that pin active in the Intel computer if I connected the stock Ford knock sensor to it?



Could be.

basstrix said:

I emailed them on Friday...haven't heard back yet. Did you get a setup for single or dual bank? That's all that's holding me back...want to get one for each side of the engine.

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Single bank