The problem was something very weird.
Thread Starter
Le Mans Master
Joined: Oct 2006
Posts: 6,842
Likes: 285
From: Palmdale CA
Update: Talked to tech support at AEM here in Hawthorne California and they are going to repair the gauge for $50, plus $20 handling. Drove the car in this morning and it ran really well. It idled easily, right out of the garage and made it here to work, with no problems. I have no doubt at all, as the gauge did it's weird intermittent grounding, totally separated from anything on the vehicle. That in turn, when it was hooked up to the fuse panel, was intermittently grounding the whole panel! Amazingly enough, the gauge functioned totally normally. It must have had enough 'steady' voltage' frequency to keep it running. Very weird, but that's the analysis. Will update when AEM finished with the repair in three to four business days and tells me what they find. They weren't aware of any similar problems, but laying out they symptoms, the guy at tech support didn't doubt me either. I have a background in electrical and electronics.
Last edited by F22; Jun 6, 2019 at 12:37 PM.
Thread Starter
Le Mans Master
Joined: Oct 2006
Posts: 6,842
Likes: 285
From: Palmdale CA
AEM shipped the gauge back to me, telling me, that it does what it's supposed to do and there's nothing 'wrong' with it. Bull$hit! You can't install this gauge in a car, I told them, that has any kind of electronics (like an MSD) or it will disrupt the whole fuse panel (which it did). MSD's don't like this kind of high frequency power interruption, that's for sure. The car ran rough, because of this. Once I removed the fuse, it ran totally smooth! I isolated the gauge and you can see the high frequency grounding in the video. I made them check it out the video today and they're going to take it back. I couldn't post the link, but you get the idea. The Power Probe was going crazy, when I applied power to the isolated gauge.
Last edited by F22; Jul 1, 2019 at 05:19 PM.
Le Mans Master
Joined: Apr 2011
Posts: 6,284
Likes: 1,171
From: Hermosa
Nice trouble shooting! Your electrical back ground came in handy. Finding the actual problem is 90% of the battle. Most techs today just start replacing components until the problem goes away and charge for all the parts you didn’t need replaced as well as the one that did.
