knock retard vs knock counts?

[eman035]

knock retard vs knock counts.......what's the difference and is there such a thing?

i have a cheap scan tool (monitor 85) that says "knock retard" but I don't believe it. reason is...the car seems to run good but the scan tool will continually count upwards 1 2 3 4 5 6 7...........30......etc.... I should also note that it only counts upward when i'm acclerating pretty hard (around 10 lbs boost). If i just drive normally and keep my foot say 3/4 throttle or less, then the scan tool just stays at the same number it left off at. And if i get into it again the numbers continue to climb. The only time the number goes back to zero is when the ignition is shut off and then turned back on, as if its re-setting itself. The reason i don't believe this is knock retard is because 1) the car runs good, with no pinging and 2) i don't see how a car can run with the timing retarded that much (30...50...100...).

Is this something different then knock retard? Do any other scan tools do this? Sould I be concerned?

Any info on this would be appreciated. Oh yea, the car is mostly stock, rebuilt a few thousand miles ago, and i'm running 93 octane in it. And I just got a laptop so I do plan on getting turbolink hopefully soon.

Thanks,
Eric

 

[esinger]

I think this is your O2 cross counts, but they should increase while driving normally and once they hit 255 they go back to zero.

 

[eman035]

i thought O2 crosscounts can fluctuate, am i wrong? I didn't know they go to 255 and then back to zero. The numbers i'm getting aren't even close to that number. The highest i've seen it was around the 100 mark, and that was about a 3 hour drive at 80 mph. The reason I asked this to begin with was because there is a video on razor's site of a run, and in the bottom right corner shows the scan tool. There are some values like mph, rpm, tps, and knock retard as well as knock count. The knock retard fluctuates from 0 to about 2, while the knock count is at about the 100 range. Is there anyone who knows how this value is determined? Is it just a simple count of how many degrees have accumulated while the car has been running?

here is the link to the video:
http://www.bmcomputersource.com/pachires.wmv

thanks again for any help.

 

[esinger]

I happen to have a Monitor 85 as well, but don't really use it anymore since I bought a scanmaster and switch to the 87 ECM. On the front of my monitor 85 it says that mode 18 has Knock Retard on the left and Throttle Body Backup on the right. I've honestly never heard of "Throttle Body Backup", so can't explain what the number is. Are you running in mode 18?

I took a look at the video and it sure does look like a knock counter that increments when knock is present.

 

[eman035]

yes, i am in mode 18. it seems to me that it has to be some kind of counter because of the way it acts. well, thanks for the replies.

 

[SLOW_85]

The counts can fluctuate. It is counting and sorting noises.
It's trying to determine what's knock and what isn't.
So you can get alot of knock counts but knock retard is what counts.

 

[eman035]

ahhhh i see. makes sense, i just hope my scan tool is wrong/mis labled and i'm actually getting 0 knock. that would make my year, or at least give me a sense of security. I really need to invest in another scan tool. Thanks for the insight.

Eric