Sleeping dawgs...

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4 months 1 week ago #66032 by catman
Sleeping dawgs... was created by catman
Sleeping dogs 
 
I'm a from scratch dyi guy trying to take his knuckle busting to the next level before I run out of money buying parts. 
Something from several of the videos stuck with me.  KNOW YOUR TOOL. 
My Expeess van had so many codes to chase I was about to give up when I realized I didn't even understand all the functions on my scanner. 
So I decided to light the candle on the other end.  I put my scanner on my 2008 Honda Element AWD Automatic Trans and 172k miles.  Much to my nearly uncontrollable bliss it showed NO CODES! Then, after meeting the road test criteria I began going through the functions one by one. I won't say I completely understand each and every one of them but I'm to the point now where I know what they are and what they are generally used for. Despite no codes I noticed what I thought was an anomaly and then ran across some fails, major fails when testing the fuel injection section, which brought me right back to my anomaly. 
'Normal' limits can't apply to all cars equally in all cases?  How can I find out what normal is for my vehicle for all the various readings?  (This from a guy that has an upside down "why be normal" bumper sticker on his car)
MAP and MAF readings for example?  Are the parameters specific for all vehicles, in other words are they used to measure the degree to which they change or do the numbers themselves inherently give specific readings for any given condition no matter what car tested?
My anomaly showed up in my fuel trim. Thank you Paul for making fuel trim the very first thing I look at after plugging in my scanner.  It was not 'Normal', with normal being zero for both the S and L. My one Bank O2 sensor was functioning properly and within parameters so when I noticed my LTFT with a rich condition reading -11.5%.  The stft was steady just below 1 at idle... Never going low enough to show a rich condition. It moved as one would expect with fluctuating throttle inputs increasing it's lean reading to compensate for the rich reading in the LTFT.  One could argue that I was within 'normal' when STFT got up around 2 or 3  because combined it put the overall within the plus or minus 10% that we look for and even at -11 I wasn't running that rich. 
With no codes and it running reasonably well had I not hit those failures I might have ignored the condition.  I have a fail of the  ERG test, the VAP also indicating a vvt solenoid and  or clogged oil lines.  
Not sure where to proceed because I'm still going back over chapters 1 and 2 everyday trying to refresh my memory on everything I've just learned.  As you must imagine I question myself constantly not having confidence that comes from experience. 
I've done two things experimentally to see if there was a change. 
If you promise not to laugh (to hard) I'll tell you the first thing I did was to put four or five ounces of seafoam in my crankcase and dump the rest of the can in with the gas that I put in it to top it off. (Past history; made this a logical choice for me. I've kept up on my oil ever since but I had run over, well over, my mileage once and it began to perform horribly.  I took it to my wife's mechanic who said that my failure to change the oil had clogged it up and that they had to flush it once, whatever that means, and change the oil again before they could get it to perform correctly.  The VVT solenoid failure suggested to me that it was a result of accumulated grime.
My MAF was functioning from a 35 at idle to 75 at throttle which I think is also acceptable but not perfect according to the lean condition examples so far. I had a rich condition but I decided to check out the maf sensor anyway as it was a first for me, easy to find and simple to perform I popped it out and though it looked fairly clean I thoroughly doused it with carburetor cleaner and reinstalled it.  
Much to my surprise my fuel trim ratings at warm idle are as close to normal as I can possibly hope to get...I think? LoL 
I was going to ask with no codes and the fuel trim and to the best of my knowledge everything else is looking good and it's running good should I even bother with the VVT solenoid?    But I've decided, especially since I just saw how easy it was to access, to pull the bolt out holding the VVT solenoid in place and give it a thorough cleaning.  I'm really curious to see how dirty it is since it got a fail test. 
That leads me to wonder and really the main question I have from what I've learned so far but its kind of a subjective one. At what point do you kick the dog and make him get off the porch? 
An old friend once pointed out to me, all perspective is personalized. 
I'm suspecting that most of you are here as experienced mechanics hoping to hone their skills or ranging up to top notch technicians who have already forgotten more than I'll ever know, so my guess is most of you would say hell no let that dog sleep.  Getting paid by the hour it makes sense to me to get on to the next car as quickly as possible. Correct me if I'm wrong but unless the owner specifically asks you to see to every little detail that could possibly be wrong there wouldn't be any reason to do what seems like preventative maintenance on the ERG valve and VVT solenoid. 
However, I am not getting paid so it cost me nothing out of pocket no matter how much time or energy that I spend which is why I decided to tackle the VVT solenoid anyway today. 
I'm looking forward to what today will bring. Cleaning the solenoid should have some effect on the fuel trim if not the fuel mileage. I'm a little confused as to if the Element even has an actual ERG valve with all the different responses that I've found digging around the internet but I'm going to clear that up too. 
Since I decided to move forward and won't hear from any of you until I've done today's work I guess my real question is how is my thinking on all of this so far? 
Something else I heard in a video was practice makes perfect but I disagree completely.  Only perfect practice makes perfect because no matter how much you practice doing something wrong...
That's why I'm wondering if the foundations I'm starting to build here are not being built on sand.  I'd appreciate criticism for any glaring holes in my logic here. I already know I'm pretty much a dumbass when it comes to this stuff!  And maybe even with no pretty much about it! 
Thx for any feedback provided. 
catman...ttyl
PS... Just for the record, I've never kicked a dog for any reason in my entire life.  That's not to say that when they get a little frisky with the chickens that I'm apposed to breaking out the bottle rockets...with report. (30 year R Ridgeback lover)

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