🛠 Drive-By-Wire or Cable Throttle? | TECH TUESDAY |

Cable or Electronic? One has been around for ages and has plenty of supporters, the other claims to be better, quicker and more adaptable. In this episode of Tech Tuesday Scott gives you a brief overview of both systems and offers his opinion on this polarizing subject.
----------------------------------------­----------------
Like this video? Here are some more like it:
----------------------------------------­----------------
For more Haltech goodness check out our:

-~-~~-~~~-~~-~-
WATCH NEXT: "🏅 Jason Waye's Barra Powered Fox Body | HALTECH HEROES"
-~-~~-~~~-~~-~-

[haltech]

Cable or Electronic? One has been around for ages and has plenty of supporters, the other claims to be better, quicker and more adaptable. In this episode of Tech Tuesday Scott gives you a brief overview of both systems and offers his opinion on this polarizing subject.

[nickamarit]

I prefer cable for its directness and simplicity.

Swapped from an engine with DBW back to an older one with cable, and it feels much much better.

[warrenzonator]

I have plenty of experience with both. I'd argue there's no throttle motor that is as fast as my foot, but that's hardly an issue. My issue is definately the feel - being able to adjust throttle directly and load the engine predictably without any electronic adjustments. Also, like was mentioned, factory cars seem to have a delay (my manual Audi sure doesn't, but the newer FCAs do), and they also don't seem to be 1:1, they lurch or come on far too quick for smooth driving. Speaking of smooth driving, I can put my foot back on the throttle and cancel cruise control comfortably, unlike drive by wire

[Songtester]

I watched this video about a year ago when i was making my mind up about going DBW or staying cable. I ended up going drive-by-wire and honestly i cannot recommend it enough. throttle response and rev-matching is so perfect. There is no input lag whatsoever, idle is perfect. If anybody ever tries to tell you that cable is better - tell them to stop living in 1995.

*edit: 400kw RB25 S15.

[cazsmith]

For anybody in europe, all the peugeot 2.0hdi(306, 406 expert etc)
from the 90's had the same style of cable to throttle sensor set up
Might be easier to source

[maxtorque]

One major advantage of ETC is the linearisation of engine torque across all engine speeds. A throttle plate sized to provide little restriction when wide open at peak power engine speed (say 7, 000 rpm) will effectively be wide open at a much smaller angle at lower engine speeds. On typical OE sized throttles, "effective wide open throttle" (ewot) can be as little as 30% of it's full travel range at just 2000rpm. By Mapping that into the throttle maps vs engine speed, the engine torque is better controlled and because the throttle is always closer to ewot, it is able to faster influence flywheel torque (ie is ewot is 30%, and the throttle is (pointlessly) at 100%, then it must close by 70% before it has any effect on torque!)


Secondary, the concept of controlling "pre-throttle boost" becomes possible (to minimise turbo lag) and in conjunction with the "Fast path" ignition angle control provides decent torque back up for any driving dynamics situation.


I run electronic port throttles on my competition car, with a strategy i have written called "fast-WOT" which detects a rapidly applied accelerator pedal position input, and actually gets the throttle plate open around 30ms BEFORE the driver has got their foot all the way down on the accel pedal (which typically takes 100ms to do). If the driver doesn't actually go to WOT, then the system re-blends the plate angle back to the pedal demand over a few hundred ms in order to avoid excessive torque

[philippe]

With cable you learn how to drive the car. After a couple trips you master the power delivery. With an electric one the engines "tries" to make your decisions better, but there is always lag, and inconsistency

[Thomas-cuhp]

Most OEM return-less fuel systems can't cope with sudden throttle inputs. So electronic throttles are used to limit opening speed

[tprojectpl]

Early versions of Honda K20 were based on cable (ex. EP3), later on, were available versions with cruise control, VSA and Drive-by-wire.
In case of Honda Accord, between 2003-2005 there were available K20 (based on cable), and K24 (drive-by-wire) with VSA.
To reuse a lot of components, like pedals, brackets etc. Honda decides to use adapter cable-to-wire used in K24 and in K20 since 2006.
This adapter after few years is starting to be problematic, because inside there is an electronic potentiometer. Potentiometer starts to wear out and the dust begins to affect its operation - but can be opened and easily cleaned up, after it should work correctly again ;)

[MitchJ]

Best Tech Tuesday yet tuning fork! Really informative and entertaining keep up the good work!!!

[mixalisstathis]

This is exactly what kept me busy for the last few days to retrofit to an MX-5 NA with a VVT-engine!
The hybrid cable/DBW wasn't coming to my mind until this video popped up.
I think that's the road I'm going to take.
Thanx Scotty!

[KENARDO]

As stated, a lot of the issues people usually have with DBW throttles are really down to factory tuning, with a few issues attributable to pedal assemblies themselves having unusual travel and in some cases non-linear potentiometers. Tuned properly, an electronic throttle can behave exactly the same way a mechanical throttle would. Of course, that simply adds a level of complexity to your tune, which can already cost hundreds of dollars in labor time just to get the engine reliably making power, let alone adding whole layers of drivability tuning when TPPS and TPS Demand curves are considered, not to mention the cost of finding and acquiring a suitable pedal assembly that fits your car, sits in a comfortable position, has a suitable spring rate and travel, and the process of mounting it in your car.

Like anything, there's no one right way to use an electronic throttle, but there are plenty of wrong ways, which have soured many people on them, and there are a lot of considerations when developing your own "right way" to throttle your engine. I went with a cable in my Nissan, but I'll be running an engine with an electronic throttle in my RX7. There are a lot of reasons why I've chosen these different paths, and in my opinion, both technologies offer their own advantages that best suit different kinds of builds. Think long and hard about what you want to accomplish, and throttle your engine with the actuator that best suits your needs.

[GabrielsTech]

The Saab Trionic 7 Management System also use a cable to e-throttle. The thottle cable goes all the way to the throttle plate where it is converted to e-throttle at the same place. Makes the pedal feel more old fashion, which in my mind is a great feel. I feel that newer e-throttle pedals are way to soft.

[KCadbyRacing]

There are a lots of motorcycles that have both cable and DBW throttle blades.
The lower "primary" throttle blades are cable and the upper "secondary" blades are DBW through the ECU (with Primary TPS, Engine RPM and Gear Position inputs) so we have quite a bit of tuning/control over them with ECU flashing...

[patx]

One downside of electronic throttle: it lacks the "gritty" or vibrating feel of a cable throttle as the engine runs. It also lack the feel of the throttle pedal suddenly popping when it goes from high vacuum to WOT. It also lacks the amusement of having the throttle pedal physically moving when cruise control runs.

Although that's nitpicking.

[Darkus]

Damn!
Thats an amazing tip about the Honda Cable to Ethrottle box!

I might just take that up in my MR2, should I need the upgrade!

[poptartmcjelly]

Being electronic and more complex there might be reliability issues, in case of a cable the major downside in my opinion would be a sticky cable, especially in automatic cars.

[karimxwoods]

The electronic ones fail faster than the cable ones due to failing sensor and/or motor

[SkyPirateU]

This might be the greatest video I've ever seen...

[warthog]

Meh, I have yet to drive a car with an e-throttle that feels “right”. Maybe it’s because when I started driving, everything was cable actuated. My biggest complaint is feedback. E-throttles just don’t have any in the foot - they’re dead feeling IMO. Case in point. My JDM WRX STI has a cable tb while the same vintage (02) exports of that car (UK for instance) went e-throttle. I like to believe it’s because Japanese performance drivers’ preference was still cable. Though more likely it had to do with meeting export (UK for example) emission requirements as it’s easier to manipulate engine management with that type of throttle, as mentioned in the video. While I understand the upside of etbs, I’ll stick with cable unless there’s no option - personal preference in my case. Anyone else feel similarly?