My Mitsubishi 3000gt / Stealth ECS Controller Project

[duke3k]

So I've been working on a project for my '98 VR4 for a couple of years now that recently also turned into a project for my wife's '95 Spyder. This is not the ECMCU project mentioned in the other thread - who knows that may happen someday.

This original project started off as jealousy on my part because my '98VR4 didn't have the controllable strut system that the early model 3000gt's / Stealths had. I thought of adding an aftermarket system like the Tein adjustable system & their EDC controller - but the cost was high and I have heard mixed reviews on the system -nothing bad - just that mainly that its not really suitable for a street ride and has a really rough ride. I don't race - but I wanted better suspension and I wanted control. The stock '98 non-ECS suspension just does not have a good ride - it was way too sloppy and it was driving me crazy. Mitsu put a lot of design effort into the original ECS suspension and alot of people think the system is well tuned for our cars.

What to do. Well what I did for my '98 was build a custom ECS controller prototype that can control the factory '95 model year ECS struts. I didn't need all the fancy sensors - they actually seem to cause a fair number of failures. I just wanted straight forward manual control -so that's what I built. I ordered a set of '95 struts -Tein H-Techs & stuffed them in the car - wired up my controller and some switches and LED lights & presto - a '98VR4 with '95 ECS retrofitted in... with the cool ability to be able to use the struts in Medium mode - which you can't do with the factory ECS unit .

I posted about the project on Colorado3s.org and got the inevitable - hey I might be interested in one of those.... so... I'm sitting there looking at my car and looking at my wife's Spyder and realizing that in a few years her factory ECS unit will likely fail - it seems they all do at some point.....

So to cut to the chase - what I did was take my first prototype - and re-worked it into an ECS controller that can be used as a plug n play replacement for the Mitsu Factory ECS controller AND the same controller can also be used as a retro-fit building block for those industrious do-it-yourselfers who want to use the Mitsu ECS struts in the Non-ECS Mitsu 3000gt's & Stealth models. This new unit is what I've got running in my '98vr4 and the same unit is controlling the struts in our '95 Spyder using the factory wiring setup. Well there you go.

Here's a demo / overview of my controller - hope you find it interesting:


Please don't start asking me about price or anything like that in this thread - I don't want to violate any forum rules.

P.S. - I would just like to point out that only a crazy engineer would build something new like this for an obsolete car - you just gotta luv this platform.

Cheers,
Duke