I thought I read somewhere that the ECU's in our cars are programmed to make the car run a little richer than normal, direct from the factory. Is this the case, and if so....why are they like that? Would an SAFC help smooth things out more if you're just running regular bolt ons?

 

Yes... very rich.

And the SAFC helps as long as your are willing to reset the ECU all the time and tune only at 90% throttle or more.

 

I'm working on creating something for us. It will take some time. Basically, our cars run rich. Right now you can adjust up to 5% by tuning the intake air temp sensor. Our cars could use more then that though.

 

They do It for warranty purposes really
Rich is better than lean...rich won't blow engines as quick

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (faithofadragon @ Aug 6 2010, 11:33 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>They do It for warranty purposes really
Rich is better than lean...rich won't blow engines as quick</div>

its a hard thing to do...cause the leaner it is the easier u'll pass smog tests...but richer potentially saves the engine
but like u say...manufacturers tend to lean toward the side of caution and richen it

 

Not hard to do with a 4 banger
My car passed a sniffer with no cats