What EFI setup are you running?

What engine are you thinking about installing efi on? We purchased the FAST EZ EFI 2.0 system for our '70 Roadrunner with a 383. There are several issues not covered in that Car Craft article. - (Although it is one of the more informative I've read)

We bought the entire system from FAST that included the in-tank fuel pump. Our Roadrunner had a factory 1/4" return line that we had to replace because it was smaller than the 5/16" line that FAST recommended. So, we replaced the factory return line with a second 3/8" (feed) fuel line that we had previously bought for our '68 Charger but not yet installed.

The Roadrunner had a new fuel tank under it and we didn't realize when we bought the kit that we were going to have to cut a hole in the top of it to install the pump assembly. Everything turned out nice, but it was a bit of a project making the needed modifications.

The pre-made wiring harnesses were very odd lengths. The power leads to the battery were barely long enough as were the wires to the O2 sensor and fuel pump. The wiring to the fuel pressure sensor was probably 15' too long. I realize that the lengths needed would be different for each application and how you choose to route your wiring, but the lengths supplied limited our installation choices.

My son wanted to utilize the ECU's ability to control timing. It is optional with the FAST system. We were already running an MSD Digital control box and billet distributor. After talking with the FAST tech support, we were told that this was an ideal setup to use but that we needed to purchase a phasable rotor. (we already knew that we had to lock out the mechanical advance) Not a big issue, but another unforseen delay getting the system running.

The setup wizard guided us through everything simply enough until it came to coordinating the ECU with the engine's timing. The ECU 'locks' the ignition timing at 20' at a step in the setup and you're supposed to verify with a timing light that the engine is truly running 20' advanced. We could not adjust the timing (as per tech support's directions) to get the ECU to agree with the timing light. So, we were told by FAST tech support to fudge the physical rotation of the distributor as best we could to get close. It took hours of tinkering with it to get a setting that would run acceptably. The tech support did tell me that these issues wouldn't have come up if we had purchased the FAST pre-phased distributor.

We were very pleased with the performance of the car once we took it out and made a few adjustments. We didn't dyno the car but it was obvious that we had picked up a lot of power. Very responsive.

But the system still had glitches. At first we tried playing around with wiring routing to eliminate potential interference because everything we were told or read said that these systems were very particular about noise. Now and then the car (though running great) would seem to stutter. It seemed to happen most often around 2200 RPM while moving at a steady speed but not always. We never noticed it during acceleration.

My son decided to switch out the MSD billet distributor for the one from FAST (another $400).

As you might expect, nothing seems to ever be engineered specifically for Mopar. I assume that's why the FAST distributor gave us problems. For starters, it would NOT drop into the motor. The distributor body was too large in diameter where the o-ring seal is. It was close, but we would have had to drive it in even without the o-ring in place. So we used some emery cloth to sand it until it would drop in. That's when we found out that the diameter of the distributor was too large for the (Chevy style) distributor cap to clear the stock head. So, we ground the head for clearance. We didn't have much, but it was barely enough to be able to rotate the distributor to set timing. We also had to move our wires in the cap to do this.

At this point we thought we had all of our problems solved. That is until we went back through the ECU's setup wizard again. We could not get the ECU to control timing after telling it that we were running the FAST distributor. We tried several times before putting the MSD distributor back in. When I get more time I will try to troubleshoot the problem again. - But the car is about 200 miles away from me at my son's apartment in Des Moines, Iowa.

I think the FAST system is very good for the efi but if I had my choice I would leave all of the timing controls to MSD. In all of the articles I've read the FAST system performs great, but I have yet to read one that speaks of testing with their timing controls.