Crawford Eco Block
- Thread starter Canazes9
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Jetboy
New member
That is a patent, but not a patent for this product. I think you grabbed the wrong link.
Here's the one you were looking for: https://patents.google.com/patent/U...e&inventor=crawford&oq=crawford+intake&page=1
Oddly... it says exactly what I said it does - "The invention causes changes in the air fuel ratio and ignition timing of the engine 10 by manipulating the voltage from the sensing head to the engines control unit. For example, use of the invention can change the air fuel ratio from 12.6 to 1 at full throttle to about 13.1 to 1, resulting in less fuel going into the engine 10 at full throttle, thus increasing fuel mileage, reducing emissions and increasing power."
Along with being misleading about emissions - it increases the worse emissions it also is simply dishonest about other "facts" such as "most automobile manufacturers have designed their engine control units to operate the engines at approximately 80% efficiency". If anyone believes that - I'm not even sure what to say. It's nonsensical claims like that that scream fraud.
The tornado fuel saver has a patent too... doesn't mean it works. https://patents.google.com/patent/US6837213B1/en?q=fuel&q=saver&oq=fuel+saver
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That looks like a C&L patent, not one for Crawford Performance. Same concept, different execution.
Fixed the link, and yes patents only protect an invention for a period of time... they do nothing to verify the performance claims of the invention.
Pathfinder!
New member
Holy crap, I've been using ask jeeves all this time. Why did no one mention google to me after all these years?
quoting myself because i really wanna know what you guys think
Jetboy
New member
I don't know much about it. IMO using electronics is the correct way to modify the signal. I'm a physicist by education - so I could sort out the fluid dynamics to make a spacer for lean burn during WOT - but I wouldn't. I'd tap in to the electronic side. It's a much more precise way to tune it. A good analogy would be moving your thermostat to a cold place in the house to warm it up as compared to turning the temperature up on the screen. It does mostly the same thing. One is controlled. The other is more of a crude guess. The O2 sensor effectively flutters around the ideal AFR - so in closed loop the readings from the MAF sensor are probably only considered on a "nominal" number basis and used for verifying the fuel trim. The primary fuel balance is performed on the backside through the O2 sensors. However, the gas pedal is really more of an air pedal, so you could possibly adjust throttle response to some degree. When you press the throttle it's calling for x amount of air, if you trick it to think it's less than that, it'll act like you gave a little more throttle, but it should also re-balance fuel trim almost instantly.
In WOT the fuel map is probably designed for something like 12.5 AFR. According to Toyota that's where peak power/torque lives. This depends on engine design. Not all engine designs have similar ideal AFRs. Part of the reason they run a little bit rich in WOT is to account for things like variation in fuel delivery, air flow between cylinders, etc. So running 13 AFR (leaner than OEM) may mean that 4 cylinders run at 12.9 and one runs at 13.1 and one runs at 13.3. 13.3 is too lean. So you could end up with accelerated wear on one cylinder for example. With Toyota's typical very conservative tuning and build quality it's probably pretty unlikely. But still possible.
The big advantage to doing it electronically is that you can tune it to work under certain situations. For example you could adjust the signal only above a certain flow rate, so it would function only during WOT and above 4000 rpms. Or - only during WOT and below 4000 rpms. Or any variation of that. Either way it's likely only going to work at all during open loop mode - and that's pretty rare on these engines. It makes a pretty dyno chart, but probably does very little for 99% of your miles.
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wfo9
New member
It's a hack, but that is all that is really available for these trucks at the moment.
Ideally, all these garbage electronics and tricks could be eliminated and the ECU calibration could just be fixed with direct access like pretty much every other vehicle in production today.
I've noticed some very strange things about these ECUs. They actually run lean... and avoid PE which leads to worse MPG because it has to be pushed to upper RPMS to actually get power. It's the oddest thing I've ever seen. One of the things that makes LS engines so good and efficient from both power and MPG is the amazing ECU and calibration from the factory. These are basically the opposite of that. LOL I've never seen anything quite like it.
The fact that people actually claim better MPG with a sprint booster should tell you something.
That is why I think this ECO block could work. It's a hack, but these things are so jacked from the factory the bar is low.
You just have to try things and get some scanning and monitoring in place. Gather some data... But is the juice worth the squeeze? Probably not.
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As others have stated, the patent has been finalized for over a year now. We also have a second patent that is in the pending stage for another similar product.
As for CARB approval and a few other government approvals, we are in process. When these are done we will also finalize an insurance policy to protect our customers in case they have a problem with their engine from our product. I do not expect any engine problems unless there is a big air leak from a poor install, but the overall cost of the insurance to us is so low that there is no reason not to offer it.
Quirt
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whats does PE stand for?
Jetboy
New member
The problem I have with this is that everybody lies. They want to confirm that they're doing better than they really are to justify the purchase. Or they're comparing different driving circumstances. The sprint booster just changes the pedal position. So you could drive exactly the same by moving your foot a little further.
Jetboy
New member
It's usually a term for Power Enrich mode. Usually associated with WOT or near WOT operation. I'm not an expert by any means. But IIRC typically most EFI's ramp into PE mode at about 85% throttle. It typically means it runs richer at WOT to for engine longevity. You can lean out the AFR in PE mode on other engines via tuning software that provides more power and you can also often set them to ramp into PE mode as early as maybe 35% of throttle input at high rpms. PE mode is usually a combination of RPM and throttle. Higher RPM requires less throttle input to go into PE mode. The result is often better power and MPG - at the expense of more emissions and shorter engine life.
Most of this is based on an assumption that the ECU works like most 15 year old engine technology that assumes things like non-learning ECUs, and even the existence and/or need for a PE mode. No one outside of Toyota and maybe the Israeli tune shop that's apparently cracked the encryption and Magnusson? know what's happening with ECU. It's an old engine design so it probably is still using some static operational maps for fuel, spark, etc.
It also might be a completely dynamic algorithm that has no PE mode. Any advanced software would likely eliminate PE mode entirely and simply have a single learning dynamic fuel, spark, timing, valve timing, mode. Every generation of ECU eliminates more and more of the open loop operation and adds more range of operation into the closed loop base operation mode. I'd guess all new engines eliminate open loop entirely other than sensor failures. There's no reason in today's world to have base fuel/spark maps other than for the first startup and to use during limp mode if a sensor is out.
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Here are the results from the first tank of gas after installing the Ecoblock. I would estimate this tank at about 60/40 city/highway.
The total drive time was right at 12 hours - there were about 2 hours of that where the 4Runner was idling while I was taking phone calls and not moving.
325.9/17.769 = 18.3 mpg
I'll let you draw your conclusions from this data point.:cheers:
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tristero
New member
60% at 19-20mpg and 40% at 16mpg is 18.4. So you saw a 0.1mpg decrease? Must have been all those phone calls.
It was 60% city and 40% highway. You have it flipped around.
tristero
New member
Now it's not funny. I shouldn't be on the forum when I'm at work anyway. :banplease:
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