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Wiring CA18DET engine and ECU with CA18DE wiring loom

By Carl Rickards (dattofiend)

dattofiend@pnc.com.au

I decided to document something for those of you wondering about wiring in your CA18DET motor into your existing EXA wiring loom, as when I did it it was more of a word of mouth thing.

I’m not sure how much of this will be different for FWD motors if any, but I used a RWD s13 Silvia motor for my conversion. If you have any questions about this conversion, you can get in touch with me on the above email or thru nissanexa.com pm’s. There are a few others on the forum who have also done the conversion who can give advice.

Here’s what needs to be done:

 

• CA18DE ECU converted over to CA18DET ECU. This involves the swapping of about 60 odd wires, but is not hard. I have provided a diagram and table below showing exactly where to swap the wires to.
• New injector plugs fitted
• Dropping Resistors wired into the injector hot wires
• Extension of wires to AAC valve
• You may also need to wire in a Silvia O2 sensor, I have not determined whether this has to be done yet but I will update this when I find out.

You will need:

 

• CA18DET ECU plug – I got mine from an import wrecker for $20, ring around you should find one fairly easily. Just make sure you get one with enough wire coming off it so you can connect it up!

• New injector plugs (get part no. from Bosch and source thru Repco, Super Cheap etc.) mine were $25 each.
• Dropping resistors – 4 10 ohm 10 watt resistors, source from Jaycar. Dick Smith don’t have them.
• Soldering iron, solder, heatshrink tube, electrical tape, 13mm corrugated loom tube, some heavy guage speaker wire or similar, gas match or pencil torch, wire strippers, side cutters.

Installing new injector plugs and dropping resistors

The CA18DE injector plugs will not fit properly on to the CA18DET injectors, so we have to fit new plugs on to the loom. We also have to wire resistors into the loom because the DET motor uses low impendance injectors. Working one by one, follow these steps to wire in the new plugs and resistors:

1.    Cut the loom close to the old injector plug, leaving a bit so you can identify which side to wire into.

2.    Remove old heat shrink tubing around the two wires, either pull it all off or strip it back.

3.    For all except injector 4, you will have one coloured wire and one black wire. We have to wire the resistor into the coloured wire. On injector 4, you have two black wires but one has different markings on it (I think it has two orange squares instead of one about every 6 inches) to the black wires on the other injectors. This is the wire to add the resistor into for Injector 4.

4.    Cut off a short length of speaker wire, roughly enough to go from where you have cut the wires to the injector. Strip back the wires on one end of it.

5.    Crimp the wires on to the pins for the new injector plug. I soldered here as well. Push the pins into the new plug, and slide the rubber boot on from the other end of the wire.

6.    Identify using the old injector plug, which side of the plug should be the earth wire. Then slide some heatshrink tubing onto the black wire on the loom, take the corresponding earth wire from your new injector plug, and solder it to the black wire on the loom. Slide the heatshrink tube up over the connection and heat with gas match or pencil torch until it shrinks tight.

7.    Cut about 4 cm off the coloured wire on the loom to allow for the resistor to go here. Strip back and solder one end of the resistor to the loom. Then solder the other end of the resistor to the remaining wire coming from the loom plug. Electrical tape over the connections, and then put loom tube over the wires from the injector plug back to the loom.

8.    Put the new plug on the injector (you need to put a bit of pressure on there so it clicks on properly) and you’re done! Repeat for the other 3 injectors.

Extension of wires to AAC valve

This is a very simple process, just using the same wire as you used to extend the injector loom, cut into the wires, measure how much you need to add, and soldering/heatshrinking or using crimp connectors, add in the new piece of wire making sure you link up the wire on the loom to the corresponding wire coming from the AAC valve plug. Insulate well and cover with loom tube for neatness.

Converting from CA18DE ECU to CA18DET ECU

This is for sure the biggest job that has to be done here. It took me about 5 hours to do. Basically what we have to do is one by one, cut the wires going to the pins in the 4 CA18DE ECU plugs and connect them into the wires from the corresponding pins in the CA18DET ECU plug. It’s really not that difficult or as daunting as it sounds as long as you take your time and go one by one. Ok here’s the diagrams of the pinouts of the plugs, and the table that shows where to connect them!

CA18DE (EXA) ECU plug pinouts. I know this diagram is a bit hard to make out, but if you look closely you will see that the pins go in sequence, starting from the bottom right on the second plug down they go 1, 2, 3, etc. to the top and then up the other side, leaving out the pins marked with an X which have no wires coming from them. If anyone has a better resolution diagram of this, could you please e-mail it to me and I will update this.

Please note that here we are looking at the front of the plugs, not the back where the wires go in.

CA18DET (s13) ECU plug pinouts. I don’t know if this is the same for all CA18DET engines, so you should check the factory manual for your model to confirm that it corresponds with this before following the table below. Also note that here we are looking at the pins on the ECU itself, not the front of the plug. This means that this will correspond with where the wires come out of the back of the plug. Look at the plug and ECU when you get them and you will see what I mean.

This table shows which wires from the EXA plugs to connect to which wires on the CA18DET ecu plug. So basically all you have to do is work through the four EXA plugs, individually following the steps below. You will find that the wires from each EXA plug actually tend to group together on the DET plug, which makes it much easier. Credit to datnet.org, and hairball from the nissanexa.com forums for sources for this table.

• Cut wire off about 1” away from the EXA plug.
• Identify from EXA pinout diagram which wire you have cut
• Check on table which wire from Silvia plug this wire connects to.
• Identify from Silvia pinout diagram which wire from the plug to connect to.
• Slide some heatshrink tube over one of the wires you are connecting, strip them back and solder the wires together.
• Slide heatshrink over connection and shrink with gas match or pencil torch.

Repeat these steps for all of the 60 odd wires! You will find that you have quite a few wires left over on the DET ecu plug, that’s ok they are for functions which we don’t need. There will also be a couple left over from the EXA loom, same deal.

When you have done all of them, plug into the CA18DET ECU and test run! If you have any problems, check your wires against the diagrams.

Ok you’re finished! I will update this if I discover any extra things that need to be done while I’m finishing off my conversion. Good luck!