Potentially damaged kpro 4

[Burnt_throwout]

Hi.
I have a kpro 4 I bought from a UK retailer a few years back.

After getting the car out the garage where it overwintered I have had an ECU fault.

Long story short it needs at the very least a firmware reset and is possibly physical damage to the ECU so I wanted to investigate my options.

To give a brief description.
Car started and ran fine for about 10 minutes then cut out.

Car would restart then die 10 seconds later with fuel pump and main relays spasmodically clicking.
Did this a few times then plugged my laptop into the ECU.

Kpro is detected with ignition off. When the ignition is turned on the kpro disconnects after a few seconds.

With ignition off I can run a self check and most come back green. But unfortunately the owner details and firmware version readouts are totally corrupted. Like comical movie level random shapes and symbols.

I am hesitant to try pushing firmwares incase it makes the problem worse. When power cycling sometimes the relays click once after the 10 seconds ok window. Other times they flicker rapidly on and off for multiple seconds.
Seems an odd failure mode, I was wondering if you had seen anything like it before.

I eagerly await any suggestions you can give.

Thanks.

[Spunkster]

What is the serial number that is on the K-Pro board inside the ECU?

From Help, About, what is the version of software you are using?

What is the voltage measured at the ECU with a multimeter when cranking?

[Burnt_throwout]

Hi.
My apologies for the delay I was going through the retailers process.

Kpro board is number 52121 on the sticker. And 32653 in the softwhere

Softwhere is showing as 14.9.15.1 and firmware as 24.00

Voltage is 11.8 while cranking. But starts fine then dies after 5 to 10 seconds with relays clicking randomly.

I suspect it needs a new kpro board after some disassembly I found some darkened traces. And the MCU chip on the kpro was getting hot enough is was uncomfortable to touch after only about 30 seconds of bringing plugged in to usb power supply only. Unconnected from the main honda ECU.

PXL_20250330_111203011.jpg

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PXL_20250330_110408854.jpg

[Spunkster]

IT looks like something has been wired incorrectly and it has put power through circuits incorrectly burning tracks on the board.

What vehicle is this in?

[Burnt_throwout]

Yeah that's the conclusion I came to. Based on some signal wires that got hot I think it has somehow put power down the digital input. As the 3.5mm aux cable on the wideband shows some sign sof melting.

Car is my k20 swapped MR2. ECU is PRA I think. For UK spec Cars has been Dyno tuned in 2022 and has done 4k miles since then no problem. Only thing that had changed was I left the battery conditioner connected (connected to the car not mains) when I started it. This first time round. It ran for nearly 10 mins before cutting out. So I guess some kind of odd ground loop went through the wideband controller and then the kpro board. Kpro was mounted to the firewall and battery conditioner was wired into a stud a few inches away.

Tried it again this weekend. With only the harness plugged in and the ECU isolated from touching metal, car starts and runs for 10 seconds before relays click randomly and it cuts out again. I managed to get a video this time.

Honestly I'm pretty sure kpro board has had a fairly horrendous problem. The fact the usb disconnects the moment the cars ignition is switched on doesn't bring me joy. Feels voltage regulator related And I am unsure how to tell if the base ECU is ok. It starts and runs the car fine but if it's a voltage issue it's possible it could take our another kpro.

What are my options in terms of getting a replacement kpro? I see you have upgrade a kpro option on the store for $300. But I'm guessing that's because you can resell the old one, and that doesn't work so well if it's dead.

Do you have any recognised repair places in the UK?

[Spunkster]

This is not something that can be repaired. The K-Pro will have to be replaced. There is also a chance that the ECU has been damaged.

Send an email to support <at> hondata.com with the following and I will issue an RMA and give you further
instructions:

Name:
Address:
Phone:
Email:
Serial#:
Description of problem:

include a link to this thread.

[Burnt_throwout]

Hi.

Thanks again for the quick reply, and sorry for my delayed one, my email notifications must be broken.

I understand for yourselves it's probably not economical to fix.

What sort of money would I be looking at here? I built the car over 3 years while I was an apprentice did all the work myself exhaust welding engine mounts ect. And I have now graduated but with graduate pay it's going to be difficult to pay full price again.
I could probably manage the $300 plus shipping upgrade option but I understand a dead bit of hardware cannot be resold so that may not be an option.

If it would cost much more then the $300 I will struggle to manage it at the moment. As I am also replacing the wideband controller, rather than risk another issue.

I am happy to take this discussion offline if you would prefer.

Looking at parts and the kpro again. I think I can use several jumper wires to bypass the traces that were overloaded, and a new MCU of the same part number appears to cost between £13 and £20 depending on retailer. Hot air reflow should allow me to replace it. It's a bit bigger then the qfp 64 packages I normally work with but a microscope and some time should be doable.

I have access to a known good kpro 4 fitted to a known good PRA ECU. I can't run it in my car as it is needed for another car but it would allow me to take voltage measurements and test combinations of kpro Vs ECU to confirm if a repair was successful or not.

Main issues I see is programming the new MCU, I don't know how the k tuner software works but I assume it is looking for serial numbers in an existing firmware. The current MCU is too corrupt for me to feel comfortable imaging it (plus I suspect it has read protect fuses set).

Would it be possible if I did the repair work to send it back to yourselves or a UK distributor to get a base firmware flash back on it? I can then update to latest fw via the application. (Assuming my standard PRA ECU is not damaged.)

Thanks again for your time.
Tom

[Spunkster]

This is not something you can repair yourself. It will have to be sent to us and once we have diagnosed it you can decide what you want to do.

[Burnt_throwout]

Thanks for the reply.

I appreciate it being a difficult situation. I will fill in my details for an RMA Request.

Ta