Am I running too rich/too lean?

Hey guys, I did a quick search and found only 1 thread, not even relating to my question.

1st things first:

'01, Borla cat-back, hollowed out my cat, IAT relocate, home-made K&N FIPK, TB spacer, Bosch Plat +4s.

I just recently (<1 wk ago) removed the honeycomb from the cat. Part-throttle performance increased a LOT, but not so apparent at full throttle. Also, added acetone to the gas last night. I can barely keep her under 40MPH now in 4th gear (AW4), w/ or w/o tq conv lockup. Still, little/no effect @ WOT.

Now, this either means that conditions have been corrected at partial throttle that were not affecting the performance at WOT, or I am unable to supply the motor with enough fuel to maintain a stoichiometric mixture. I understand the stock injectors are good for c.220HP, which I must be approaching/broached. Is there a way to check for lean running conditions other than checking the spark plugs (since they would probably not show any evidence this soon)? Is there a way I can monitor the voltage of the O2 sensor to determine what mixture I am running? Can I splice in an A/F guage into the stock O2 sensor? If so, which wires would I use (I know 2 are used for pre-heating and the other 2 are the output but I know not which are which)? Will the super-decreased backpressure affect the readings of my O2 sensors?

Oh, btw, she seems like she's running a bit hotter, but I think that was a pre-existing condition, as opposed to caused by lean running conditions.

Thanks guys!

EDIT: There is no additional smell of unburnt hydrocarbons, maybe a little right at startup, but no black clouds or anything - nothing that I could have expected with the removal of the honeycomb from the cat - ...

If you are running lean it's not because of your mods.

Your injectors will have more than enough to handle the modifications you have done to your rig.

The only good way to tell how your currently running would be to pull a plug and check out the colour of it. Tan to a grey sort of colour and you're good. White, you're lean, black could be oil leak or too rich.

#1 if you have the coil over plug set up-01 should be-distributorless ignition-dis-needs 1 return path for the plug to see waste spark-bosch plus 4 plugs with 4 prongs are GARBAGE and do nothing if hinder performance on dis set ups and may even cause unstable idle.#2 if you have hollowed out cat the rear o2 sensor will see the cat as defective and lean out the mixture.when the cat is hollowed out the rear o2 sensor shuold switch slowly as compared to the front one when the cat is no longer in play the rear o2 sensor switches too rapidly and the pcm will lean the mixture due to no cat efficiency.you could get an o2 simulator which will slow the rear 02 signal down look at www.jeggs.com for an o2 simulator to fool the pcm as seeing a good cat to bring it back to correct a/f ratio.i think it is for gms but can be made to work.

:huh:

huh? on what issue. if u need esplaning let me know i would be more than happy to do that.

Uhhh.......yeah.....I have coil-on-plug setup. Also, only 1 O2 sensor, well pre-cat, so lack of honeycomb wouldn't affect it at all. Also, can't check plugs (as exlained in my original post). The Platinum +4s have worked fine for me on 3 vehicles now.

I'm more interested in finding out which wires are which on the O2 sensor. I want to hook up an oscilloscope to an AC/DC inverter, and have the O2 giving input to the oscilloscope, but don't know what range the voltage should be, etc.

you have only 1 o2 sensor ? there should be one after the cat.......or is it just not plugged in?

I was amazed as well, I assumed (being that my '99 had 2) that this one did as well. But I was doing work on it, as previously described, and it has only 1, in the header tube for cylinder #4.

yeah strange....i will look at a web site for you to let u know what wire and color u need for signal...hold on brb

the upstream o2 sensor signal wire is the black with dark green stripe it does show a down stream o2 that color is tan with a white stripe good thing u dont have a california model...it has 2 upstream o2s and 2 down stream, o2s---like um a ford does hold on i will get some info as to readings brb

ahh i see y there should be 2 mini cats at the manifold the 1 y mention is to monitor the mini cats .and they work like any normal o2 sensor 0-1 volts to determine oxygen content---not the latest wide band set up