Click here to go back to the fuel system page.

Disclaimer: If you attempt to do this mod to your car and in some freak accident you burn your eyebrows off, or your car to the ground, or your garage, or anything else that could possibly burn to the ground don't blame me for your accident. If you do this to your car and an accident happens I hope you don't come looking for me because I am not forcing you to install anything on your car but just trying to give you some guidance. As with anything that has to do with fuel try your best to resist getting fire or sparks near the car when you are working on this install (Pretty much a no brainer but then again some people seem to forget that thing about gas fumes and sparks).

Some advice and things to consider......


Depending on how many tools you have at your disposal this shouldn't be too difficult even for those who have just a few screw drivers and hand saws (more difficult for those who are lacking in the tools department but not impossible). Depending on how your fuel system is setup my how-to might be a tad different. So rather then attempt to cover all of the wide array of fuel system setups I will just give you a how-to on how I did mine which should get you in the ball park (or atleast help you find the ball park) on how to do this to your own fuel system. This how-to is also wrote in the hopes that you already have a return line style system setup on your car as opposed to just the returnless setup that the car comes with. Make sure you have extra EFI rubber fuel line and fuel line clamps (not those stupid worm clamps) at your disposal because you never know when you will need extra stuff and you might not have a second car in your driveway to go looking for spare parts and tools. Before you get crazy (with the cutting torch) and start pulling parts off your car I suggest you take a look at your fuel system and map out what you want to do and what it is going to take to get you from the beginning of this install to the end without a hitch (or aleast with the least amount of problems as possible). Another tip is to read through this entire how-to several times so you can get an idea as to what you are getting yourself into.


Step: 1


Remove the negative battery cable or just remove the who darn battery. I didn't do this step but then again I was very careful when I was messing with the fuel system. Hindsight I should have removed the battery but no worries the car didn't burn to the ground.......


Step: 2


Loosen fuel filler cap to your fuel tank as per the FSM (That's Factory Service Manual for those that don't know).


Drain the fuel from the feed line and return line. All I had to do was jack the car up and remove two (2) fuel system clamps (again not those stupid worm clamps the can damage the rubber fuel line). And pull the hose off the two fuel lines to let the fuel drain into a plastic cup (don't use a styro foam cup). After the fuel has drained I suggest you put something over the lines (I used those little wire splice caps that have a spring in the top of them) to keep stuff from getting into them while you are working.


Step 3:


Remove the cap to the fuel rail schrader valve and proceed to use a schrader valve stem removal tool. Be prepared to have a rag or cup handy when you take the valve out because there is going to be quite a bit of fuel in the rail.


Step 4:


Remove the fuel line that goes between your fuel rail and your rising rate regulator.


Depending on how you mounted your rising rate regulator this may or may not be a difficult task. You may have to remove the entire regulator just to get the fuel line off the back of it to take the line off the regulator like I had to do. I would suggest you remove the regulator even if you can get to the hoses easily so you can drain the fuel line going to the regulator before you spill gas everywhere. Once you remove the regulator with the line still attached hold it up about a foot above your engine to let the fuel drain into the rail. Be sure you have that cup near the shraiter valve hole because fuel is going to be in the line to the regulator and we don't want the fuel finding a new home on top of your map sensor. This would also be the time that you remove your fuel pressure gauge unless you don't have one and now might be the time to start thinking about having one.


Step 5:


With the lines removed you need to think about where you would like to mount your new 1:1 regulator. Make sure you purchased one before you attempt this install.



It took my father and I atleast a half hour to find a home for the regulator but in the end we found a good spot. The spot we picked was the transmission mount frame bracket that is part of the subframe of the car (not gonna go anywhere).



Step 6:


Once you have a good spot picked out you need to fabricate (yes fabricate as in build from scratch) a suitable bracket to put your new regulator that is unless your regulator comes with a mounting bracket that you can actually use. The first step here was to break out the cardboard to make a template of what we wanted the bracket to look like.




Next we went and traced the template pattern onto some scrap 1/16" thick steel plate that was just begging to be put into my car.


The final product looks a little rough and I could care less because the car looks rough too and as long as the bracket does it's job then life is good.




Step 7:


Install your new bracket and fuel pressure regulator. Make sure before you install the regulator that you have all of the proper fittings already installed on the regulator. Just before I did the final tightening of the fittings that Dennis supplied with the regulator I put some plumbers teflon paste (not the stupid teflon tape because that will not work) on the threads to keep the fuel from attempting to escape. You can pick that stuff up from just about any hardware store.






Step 8:


Install the new EFI fuel hoses between the rail to the 1:1 regulator and from the 1:1 regulator to the rising rate regulator with fuel system clamps (as before not the stupid worm clamps). If you are installing a fuel pressure gauge for the first time you need to make sure that you either have it plumbed into a fuel pressure reference port on the 1:1 regulator or have it "T"ed into the fuel line before the 1:1 regulator. Make sure that the fuel hose is EFI rated fuel hose because there is a difference between the carberated and fuel injected hose (If you don't get it then you might be on the news later that evening for burning down your car, house, etc....).



Step 9:


From here everything is pretty much done in reverse order: Reattach RRFPR (Rising Rate Fuel Pressure Regulator) to where ever it resided before you disturbed it, put schrader valve back into the fuel rail, put cap back on to schrader valve, reconnect the fuel hoses near the fuel pump, tighten up fuel filler cap, and reconnect battery. Make sure you recheck everything several times before you crank that baby over. When you do look for fuel leaks because it is good to catch them now before they become a problem when you are driving which would suck.

There that wasn't so hard now was it......

Ahhh but we are not finished yet.

Step 10:


If you have a Cartech unit like I have you should have have had your Cartech hooked up like this before you did this upgrade to your fuel system: Vaccuum "T" just below throttlebody, Vaccuum hose from throttlebody to check valve, check valve to Cartech w/ restrictor, and Cartech venting to atmosphere off the needle valve port.


The new way your Cartech will be connected is as follows: Vaccuum "T" just below throttlebody, Vaccuum hose from throttlebody to Cartech w/ restrictor, Cartech needle valve port to check valve. Basically you are now allowing the Cartech to see vaccuum which is the way it is designed to work. For further information on what you are doing go to the Cartech Installation Guide which will explain it better then I can.


Tuning:


Basically I did a very simple tuning job in my driveway so the car can be driven around town without much fear that it will explode but mind you it is running really rich.Here is what I did: With car running and in park with e-brake pulled you first need to set your static fuel pressure with your 1:1 regulator. Don't ask me what yours will be because I have no clue how to figure out the static pressure for a car. I do know that with my setup Dennis told me I needed about 18-20ish psi for it to idle properly. Remember to hook your Cartech up the way that the website outlines with the checkvalve on the needle valve.


Next you need to remove the boost reference line to the Cartech which will either stall your car out or shoot the fuel pressure through the roof. What you are doing next is adjusting the pressure for the transition between vaccuum and boost. With the reference line removed from the Cartech you look at your fuel gauge and adjust the center adjusting screw until your fuel gauge reads about 35psi (which could and probably will change after you drive the car). Next you need to reattach the boost reference line to the Cartech.


After you do that you need to take your needle valve and adjust it clockwise until the needle valve bottoms out which will give you the maximum amount of fuel pressure gain per pound of boost. Here are some tips from the turbo god Dennis: "Be GENTLE with the needle valve on the Cartech because you can damage the needle and seat in it if you CRANK it down. Also, make sure that the check valve on your cartech flows more than the needle valve does. If not, no matter what you do with the needle valve, you won't be able to lower the fuel pressure under boost much, as the check valve will limit the amount of bleed instead of the needle valve. To check for this, remove the check valve (you will have a vacuum leak when not in boost, might get a MILF, and the car will idle high/funny) and see what happens to fuel pressure under boost."


The next step is to hit a dyno with a wideband O2 and adjust the needle valve for the rate of gain that gets your A/F ratio somewhere in the 12:1 - 13:1 range. After that phase is done you need to drive the car around to test your part throttle boost response. If you still get a stumble of sorts at part throttle boost you need to remove the refernece line to the Cartech and readjust the center screw on it until that stumble goes away which could quite possibly be at 45-50psi (I think I am hanging out at 40psi right now but it might end up being higher). I think that stumble is pretty unique to all cars and there is no one setting that will get rid of it so that phase will take some time and after that your are golden. Have fun and remember 2.4L's, turbochargers, or anything not OEM doesn't belong in Neon's.........you have been warned.

Click here to go back to the fuel system page.