Some weeks back I had a customer doing a 3SGTE swap into a '91 Celica that I did a wiring conversion for. After he got it back and installed, I asked him for the part number on his ECU since I've seen many situations where the importers send the wrong ECU for the year of the harness. Sure enough, he had a '91 Harness but a '93 ECU. I advised him to get a '91 ECU, but he was having a hard time locating one.

About the same time, I started gathering parts and doing research for making jumper harnesses for various Toyota applications. I located the supplier for the female ECU plugs for a few different Toyota harnesses. When I got one in that matched the 3SGTE harnesses, I though, why not make a jumper harness that goes from a '91 harness to a '93 ECU, or a '93 harness to a '91 ECU? Then customers who run into this situation don't have to find another ECU or repin the whole harness.

Since I had this customer, Bryant, who had this very situation at hand, and since I happened to be going near where he lived on a recent road trip, I decided to whip up a prototype and give it a try.







There it is plugged into a 3SGE ECU as an example. This first one came out a little rough, the production model will be cleaner.

And here it is plugged into the car:



The jumper harness worked PERFECTLY. It fired up the first try and is running great, no codes and no problems at all

If anyone wants one of these jumper harnesses let me know, I'm currently building them to order.

Other applications for this setup include plug and play jumper harnesses for standalone units that don't already have a plug and play setup, like perhaps 3SGTE/Autronic, and so on.

-Doc

nice work tweek.

Thats cool you are doing this. I was one of the people that had the wrong ecu. I was trying to locate someone with connectors for doing exactly what you have there. But I had no such luck. I got lucky and found an ecu. Great work!

just when you think he couldnt do anything better .....
HE DOES!
GOOD WORK DOC!
Whats next jumber harness for piggy backs...
keep up the good work...

Thanks guys

Now that I have access to these female ECU plugs, if you guys have any other ideas for what they could be used for, just let me know and I'll see what I can make for you

-Doc

I love your soldering skills

$199, in stock, if you want one, email me at drtweak@phoenixtuning.com

-Doc

i have a 92 ecu with a blown 92 block and crank... so i picked myself up a 93 longblock and am going to use its block and crank and pistons... am i going to have any trouble with the knock sensor between the two or any other problems?? i wouldn't need something like that since i'm using a 92 head and everything else?

thats some nice work! now get started on a 3sgte to 6th gen version.
btw, what company did you outsource to make these for you?

This post has been edited by lagos: Dec 27, 2007 - 1:49 PM

You know what I'd like, ST185 -> ST205 ecu.

This post has been edited by Supersprynt: Dec 27, 2007 - 6:58 PM

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Not allowed to say

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Yeah actually I can do that for you, what year is the ST185?

I have a 92. I am sorta thinking out loud, but it would be great to put that in and get rid of the AFM.

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I thought about this at one time and then did a little research to see what was involved. Suffice it to say, it doesn't really make economic sense.

Gen II to Gen III ECU Swap Thread

Hmm, yes I understand. Stand alone much more worth it.

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Please could you summarise what is in that thread for those that aren't members on that board?

This post has been edited by BloodyStupidDavey: Dec 28, 2007 - 5:54 AM

Well if you can't inference it from what we've both said, it's quite expensive to find all the parts necessary to make it work, around $1,000. So it would be much more worth it to apply that to a much more useful stand-alone EMS.

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Erik answered your question. I post here to encourage you to sign up for an account at mr2oc.com. If you want good 3sgte information, that is the best source, IMO.

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I can easily put one together for you. You can do it for a pretty fair price if you shop around for parts, and there's nothing like having a stock ECU running your engine. We work on a lot of cars that are running standalones or piggybacks and it seems like the headaches never end.

One thing you would need is an MSD RPM-activated switch to control the TVIS.

-Doc

I thought about doing this in the past, but like jay said, it almost doesn't seem worth the cost.

You would need:

205 ecu (pricey and hard to find)
550cc injectors
igniter
map sensor
air intake temp sensor
intake manifold temp sensor w/ adapter
tvis rpm switch

You could also just repin your harness to make it work. It fairly simple to do, but the adapter harness would be nice in case you need to go back to the stock ecu.

Since the only real benefit to doing this would be to convert to a map based system, you could make it more simple by just buying a used vpc.

This post has been edited by lagos: Dec 29, 2007 - 6:02 AM

I was curious about the mark up on this so I did a little research. These are the part numbers and prices from Toyota:

26 Pin Connector
90980-11390 $5.09
?alt?90980-11423 $5.09 ?alt?

22 Pin Connector
90980-11392 $5.06
?alt? 90980-10765 $5.66 ?alt?

16 Pin Connector
90980–11391 $5.07

Not 100% sure about this one since it didn't have a picture:
PCB Connector 64 pin
90980-11576 $8.52

The terminals that go inside each connector are easily obtainable from places like mouser.com or digikey for pennies a piece. The terminals with wires pre-crimped are also available from Toyota but without some in front of me I couldn't tell which ones they were.

The $199 price tag must be in the time it takes to assemble... which, with the proper tools shouldn't take too long at all. You've got a very profitable product there Dr. Tweak, as long as there is a demand for it.

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Nearly all the connector housings are not available from Toyota. Many of the loom connector housings don't even have their own part numbers. Furthermore, while some of the pins are available from mouser and the like, the connector housings generally are not. They are only available from specialist parts distributors and then typically only in multiples of 3000 or so.

Given that the total market opportunity is so small, plus the assembly and testing time needed plus the likely parts wastage, $199 seems like a fair price.

This post has been edited by BloodyStupidDavey: Jan 2, 2008 - 4:38 AM

I used to make these adapters. I sold one for $50.
And trust me, I will never sell them at that price again.
It just doesn't worth 2 hours doing it.
Soldering almost 50 wires onto those pins that are 1/8" apart is royal PITA.
Then again, if the adapter costs more than an ECU price, most people will just go buy a new ECU.

>I gave you multiple part numbers. They are all available on more than one online Toyota parts catalogs. I can post the .pdf with the part numbers for hundreds of connectors if you'd like.
Mouser and Digikey are more than willing to supply lower quantities. Last I checked Mouser will even help you with the order if you don't know what terminal connector you need. Just mail them an example and they can find it for you.

Do you have any real experience with this subject?

Woah, how did you find the PCB part number? I've spent hours looking for it and talking to Toyota to try to find it and I've never been able to, I had to get them from the manufacturer.

At any rate WannabeGT4, you're making a real jerk of yourself trying to say that I'm making such a fortune on these. Gary knows exactly what he's talking about when he says how hard they are to make. In fact, I'm going to call you out on this right now. You go and get the parts needed to make these, the PCB header and the three plugs, all the pins and wires, solder, epoxy, and heatshrink, and then keep track of exactly how long it takes you to put one of these together at the SAME level of quality that these are, and then multiply what your time is worth by the number of hours it took you to build it AND include the hours that you spent researching and ordering the parts, plus the time to test them to make sure they are right, plus the cost of all materials, and see what number you come up with. I'm really curious, because if you think you can do them so cheap, I'LL FREAKING HAVE YOU MAKE THEM AND BUY THEM FROM YOU!!!

-Doc

This post has been edited by Dr_Tweak: Jan 2, 2008 - 11:51 AM

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Try actually ordering them. Connectors that are used in current-generation cars are generally available but many others are not. It also tends to be fairly difficult to find related parts. For instance, 90980-11009 and 90980-11019 are available from Toyota but try to find the female housings that mate to these male housings. Or find the terminals for 90980-10789.

Mouser and Digikey are both great companies but neither stock the vast majority of the connectors used by Toyota as they are far too specialised. For instance, the housing for 90980-11390 is Tyco 917992 and the housing for 90980-11391 is Tyco 917981. Neither Mouser nor Digikey stock these connector housings. BTW, I have overstock of both these connector housings if anyone needs them. As you can probably tell by now, I do have some experience in sourcing automotive electrical components.

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Calm down. I said in my post with part numbers that the price must be in the time it takes to make these. Everyone knows that there is an investment in R&D that isn't recovered until a few units are sold. Then it's all about the profit margin. With the prices I came up with for connectors and assuming a reasonable $.10 per terminal connection, those materials should cost about $30. Add wire, solder, heatshrink tubing, and postage and the total can be rounded to about $50 (high estimate) and that's a $150.00 difference which is left to labor(pure profit if you're building these yourself.. Take longer than two hours to build this and there's something wrong with you. Unless you think your time is worth more than $75.00 per hour this is quite profittable. Prove me wrong and post your itemized pricing... Yeah, didn't think so.

I can understand your defensiveness but calling me a jerk for providing a possible alternative is not very professional. Everyone knows you're making money on these or you wouldn't be selling them. Some people would rather do it themselves than pay someone. Others won't mind paying for the service.

This post has been edited by WannabeGT4: Jan 2, 2008 - 4:06 PM

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I have no desire to actually order any of these parts as I have no use for them. I'm just posting the information I've gathered so that others may persue it further. Mouser and digikey were just examples. There are plenty of other parts suppliers out there. If it's not available, oh well. Go to the salvage yard and get the connector from one of the hundreds of toyotas or hondas they have.

Thanks for the information. If I'm ever in need of hard to find parts I know who to talk to.

No dude, I'm serious. I really want you to make one and put together a total cost. If you could consistently do it as the same quality using all brand-new parts, then I'll buy them from you. You think that you can consistently get brand-new parts for $50 each and it only takes two hours to make? And your time is obviously worth less than $75 an hour from your post, so what is your time worth? $10 an hour? $15? Seriously.

Considering that most shops charge an hourly rate of $60 - $80+ an hour, a shop is already overbudget if it takes you two hours and the parts cost you $50, not to mention that you would make zero profit because PROFIT what you SELL the item for minus the COST of the parts AND the COST OF MAKING IT.

Now sure, if you're big on doing it yourself, you could go find a Toyota ECU and hack the PCB connector off, find a harness and hack the plugs off, and then spend half a day trying to solder the wires to the right pins without melting the plastic housing and dislocating any of the pins, then yes, you could do the whole project for... pretty much nothing. People like that would never buy this product and wouldn't need help making one, so it's a moot point anyway.

What REALLY irritates me is that all day long I read people complaining that there aren't enough products for our cars out there and they wish someone would step up and make this or or that or this, and EVERY TIME I come out and actually produce a product or service and provide it to the community at a price that is reasonable while putting some food on my table, I get someone like you or Lagos saying, "Oh well, I guess Tweak is making a mint off of selling these/doing these swaps/wiring that engine...., you guys shouldn't buy this, or have him do your swap, you should just do the swap yourself or find some crappy used parts and solder them together and it'll be just as good..."

Here's a big to you!

-Doc

This post has been edited by Dr_Tweak: Jan 2, 2008 - 1:39 PM

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You ever stop and think that maybe it's your attitude that may be what's motivating us?

I said unless you think your time is worth more than $75 an hour this is quite profitable. If you're making these yourself there is no shop overhead to factor into the hourly rate. Just a flate rate of $75 per hour. It's just like you had a job doing work for $75 per hour.

If you disagree with the prices why don't you put up an itemized price list... Yeah, didn't think you were going to do that.

This post has been edited by WannabeGT4: Jan 3, 2008 - 7:39 AM

You're right, it's my attitude.

6GC Community, I'm very sorry for trying to make a living providing high quality parts, swaps, and wiring to you. I'll be sure it doesn't happen again.

-Doc

This post has been edited by Dr_Tweak: Jan 2, 2008 - 2:17 PM