The Project Pad

No better place to start then here! I was invited over by a member from another forum and asked if I wanted to post up my little project. I have a 2006 Lamborghini Murcielago that was wrecked when I purchased it, motor was bad and exactly what i was looking for to do my 4.2 swap. I have about a million questions and I'm not far into the swap. Right now I have a 98 A8 4.2 car that i have completely dismantled and have for a donor. Im not looking for the same power the Murci had I'm just looking for reliability and comfort with less maintenance. I have all of the Murci wiring all figured out. Don't know if may people know but the Murci's are just pretty much Audi's under the body. Every wire on the car is labeled VW/Audi, every connector, master cylinder, brake booster is all off an Audi car. So this seemed to be the only direction I wanted to go is use the 4.2. I really don't want to run a stand alone engine management (but not opposed) I like having the knock sensors, etc.

I am looking for any info I can get on how to eliminate as many wires as I can off of the Audi harness to where I can just hook up the lamb harness into the Audi computer.

All the Murci wiring is there, intact and working. Murci PCM all works fine, instrument cluster is fine, Climate control all is good, windows, locks, everything on the Murci is good. Even have the factory ignition wire ready to hook up to the starter solenoid.

So a few questions, right now I'm trying to just get it to fire up off the factory wiring that is spread out, however my only draw back is I don't have the neutral safety switch, I left it attached to the transmission when I sold it (only thing I have gotten rid of)

Secondly the RPM speed sensor (I think) it went in the Quattro transmission the transmission I have doesnt have a place for it will it run without it?

Third does the instrument cluster and shifter need to be hooked up to run, I have it all hooked up now just for verification. I didn't know if anything was drawing through them for power, etc.

Lastly, since this was a Quattro car and I'm running a manual what do I do with the auto transmission control unit?

insane project! Welcome, excited to see the progress.

dana wrote:insane project! Welcome, excited to see the progress.

Thank you, there are actually 3 of us doing the Audi swap. One is the old Orange County Lamborghini's old GTR race car, he is running a 4.2 with a stand alone from DTAFast and his is running, still working out a few details on the clutch, etc. Another guy is putting a Audi V10 in his and is currently wiring on an adapter to get a tranny to work with it.

I sold the 6.2 they are just too much maintenance, This car was originally an E-Gear car so depending on your driving style you get 10-12k out of a clutch and if you change it yourself it will cost you 5 grand. they get 8-12 mpg and they are just almost not even enjoyable to drive with the power band. not to mention they run on 2 computers that think they are running 2 v6's, everything is 2 on the v12's, 2 fuel pumps, 4 throttle bodies, 12 cylinders, etc they are a nightmare to work on when you have a problem. I'm ready to just get in and cruse getting 20-25 mpg and not worry about the motor.

Oh this is going to be good. Thanks for choosing to post here. I'm sure we'll be able to help you out along the way.

Sorry I can't answer any of the questions at the moment due to my lack of knowledge with the stock ecu, but I know others who do know will be here soon

Here are a few more pictures...

Epic project! I know you have the 98 A8 motor already, but if you are able to source an S8 4.2 (ABZ?) it would rev a bit higher, and I think the compression is higher as well for a bit more power.

Low comp will be better for those EFRs that it will need!

Awesome project, thanks for sharing!

ringbearer wrote:Low comp will be better for those EFRs that it will need!

Extremely valid point!

k2exoman wrote:Epic project! I know you have the 98 A8 motor already, but if you are able to source an S8 4.2 (ABZ?) it would rev a bit higher, and I think the compression is higher as well for a bit more power.

Ive learned that after doing further research after I got the donor car. Only thing I have thought now is that the lower compression will actually help not blow the heads off if i decide to turbo it. Also will more then likely end up going with a different transaxle since the one that I have is off of a early boxer 5 speed. All the post's help so thank you for the input. What motor is this considered to be (its not an ABZ I'm guessing)

k2exoman wrote:

ringbearer wrote:Low comp will be better for those EFRs that it will need!

Extremely valid point!

Exactly what i was thinking.

Welcome - this is def the place to be

Here are a few pictures of the fitment, should be easy to work on when needed.

Glad you made it over here!

Curious why you don't just go standalone? Vems is a pretty good bargain, even with a PnP harness from Marc @ EFI Express, and there is a lot of support available.

PRY4SNO wrote:Glad you made it over here!

Curious why you don't just go standalone? Vems is a pretty good bargain, even with a PnP harness from Marc @ EFI Express, and there is a lot of support available.

Tell me more? I'm not set on using the factory ecm, just figured it wouldn't be hard plus all of the safety features in the factory setup it would be the way to go. I'll order one today if it's the better way. I'm ready to get this thing going. What's the PnP harness consist of?

Check grillage's build thread, I believe he used a Vems PnP harness for his v8 swap into a Cq.

Marc Swanson @ EFI Express is the man. He can also build you a harness for a reasonable figure and help you tune your beast, either remotely or on his AWD dyno (if you're ever on the east coast, that is).
http://www.efiexpress.com/catalog/produ ... ducts_id=8

I used an ABZ harness and re-terminated all the ends to fit the VEMS box. Having it to do over again, buying one from Marc would be an easy solution and well worth it.

Here's my thread
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=1219

I actually have a 95% completed ABZ-to-VEMS harness adapter if you are interested in it.

great build. I've always thought about a similar flooded/blown up supercar build. plenty of tasty options show up on copart and the like all the time.

got your email, will reply shortly.

loxxrider wrote:I actually have a 95% completed ABZ-to-VEMS harness adapter if you are interested in it.

My understanding is that this isn't a ABZ engine, am I wrong? I would defiantly be interested if it could be used!

Marc wrote:great build. I've always thought about a similar flooded/blown up supercar build. plenty of tasty options show up on copart and the like all the time.

got your email, will reply shortly.

Awesome Marc! Email or PM me a price on a complete setup including harness I may just go your route! What are the outputs for gauges options?

usmc_butler wrote:

Marc wrote:great build. I've always thought about a similar flooded/blown up supercar build. plenty of tasty options show up on copart and the like all the time.

got your email, will reply shortly.

Awesome Marc! Email or PM me a price on a complete setup including harness I may just go your route! What are the outputs for gauges options?

you've got a bunch of gauge options.

if you want to replace all of them with a tablet, vems will talk over bluetooth to any android device. see here:

http://vems.hu/android/

if you are looking to keep some of your existing gauges you'll have a bit of digging to do to see what drives them. chances are good the Murci uses CAN protocol to drive a good number of them which vems doesn't yet support. so you'd have to drive the gauges analog like with a p259 output out of the vems to a more universal tach like an autometer unit (for instance).

usmc_butler wrote:

loxxrider wrote:I actually have a 95% completed ABZ-to-VEMS harness adapter if you are interested in it.

My understanding is that this isn't a ABZ engine, am I wrong? I would defiantly be interested if it could be used!

It is actually. The ABZ is the standard A8 V8. The S8 is an ABZ with some upgrades to the heads, cams, etc. I'm not sure if it has a different engine code or not, but the harness adapter I have was built for the regular A8 engine anyway. Only problem is that I work all the time and probably won't be able to check on it (or even figure out exactly where I have it) at the moment. Talk to Marc, and see what your options are, and if you think the money this might save you would be worthwhile, then let me know and I will round it up ASAP.

If not, no worries! Marc might have a more straight forward option for you. Just depends how much money your time is worth to you

usmc_butler wrote:

loxxrider wrote:I actually have a 95% completed ABZ-to-VEMS harness adapter if you are interested in it.

My understanding is that this isn't a ABZ engine, am I wrong? I would defiantly be interested if it could be used!

It's an ABZ if it came out of a ''98 A8 quattro (FWD got a 3.7L).
We didn't get the 32V S8 here in the US, the D2 S8's were 40v 4.2L

Well... holy crap. This should be an interesting project! I will be watching very closely! Keep us updated! Just for curiosity sake, have you ever had the chance to drive a stock Murcielago?

loxxrider wrote:

usmc_butler wrote:

loxxrider wrote:I actually have a 95% completed ABZ-to-VEMS harness adapter if you are interested in it.

My understanding is that this isn't a ABZ engine, am I wrong? I would defiantly be interested if it could be used!

It is actually. The ABZ is the standard A8 V8. The S8 is an ABZ with some upgrades to the heads, cams, etc. I'm not sure if it has a different engine code or not, but the harness adapter I have was built for the regular A8 engine anyway. Only problem is that I work all the time and probably won't be able to check on it (or even figure out exactly where I have it) at the moment. Talk to Marc, and see what your options are, and if you think the money this might save you would be worthwhile, then let me know and I will round it up ASAP.

If not, no worries! Marc might have a more straight forward option for you. Just depends how much money your time is worth to you

Gotcha, thanks for the clarification! Been talking with Marc about a plug and play setup let me see where this goes and ill defiantly keep in touch one way or another!