LOL your check engine light will not burn out but your sparkplugs can melt out of a lean condition,or a piston or piston ring can give out do to been lean.its your car you could look at the situation however you want but bottom end is you really need a tune.im guessing since you havent invested in a tune you havent put your car on a dyno either to see how your a/f is.just be carefull with what you do and what you adjust,you might be making things worth instead of fixing them.i have a friend that used to make fun of me because i used to spent money in dyno time and getting my a/f where is suppost to be while he used to tune his car on the street by feeling the car(thats what he called it) well short story long his piston number 1 and 5 exited the block on one of his runs at the track.

 

Whoaa That's no fun - Alright then - Dyno Time- And gonna pull the plugs and have a look - ahh about how much estimated $$ should I have on hand for dyno tuning?

 

dyno tunning is expensive, around me is 300 to 600 dollars.what i did was i order two tunes from bama.i order the 93 race tune for DD and i got a performance tune with timing pulled back for nitrous.then i rented an hour on the dyno(100 dollars here)and dyno the car with the nitrous to make sure my a/f was on the money and i wasent going lean.totaled spent was about 250 dollars plus plugs .by the way i had bought the sparkplugs before the kit.i went with brisk one step colder and so far i got about 100 passes and they still look good.
i read another post that you are dying to spray your car,well your a/f needs to be around 11 to 11.5 on the bottle,thats were mine made the most power.

 

dude i just put a bbk cai on and it did the same thing.... but i did this and the check engine light went away. all you do is take your negative terminal off your battery for about 10-15 seconds and put it back on and it should go away. let me know if it works.

 

I've researched CAI's pretty extensively this past month and had many conversations with people about them. The bottle line with CAI's is that you NEED to have a tune done for the simple fact that you're now requiring your engine's cpu to run on different air:fuel ratios that it wasn't programmed for. There's no way around it. 1) you get the best performance out them, 2) installing a CAI without a tune can throw engine lights, and 3) installing a CAI without a tune could possibly lead to engine damage down the road.

So, for anyone looking to install a CAI, definitely get a tune. Another issue with CAI's is a voiding of the factory warranty for that part and any engine parts it interacts with. If warranty is a concern of yours, you can speak with your ford dealership and have ford racing performance part CAI installed with a tune. Many of the dealerships, if you allow them to do the install, will honor your factor warranty down the road IF anything goes wrong. Other dealerships might not, but that specific dealership will if they have good service men.

So as much as I dig all the after market CAI's, it really seems like your best bet (if warranty is a primary concern) is to go with the FRPP CAI + tune.

If warranty isn't a concern, the BamaChips and Brenspeed have both established fantastic reputations on these forums, and many others. So I'd recommend getting a tune from them if you go with a non-FRPP CAI.

 

And just exactly what are the signs of a lean running engine?
Lean seems to run better but its dangerious. It causes all sorts of problems.
Its a fine line between rich, optimum, and lean running.

Who sold you a BBK without a tune?
An engine rebuilder?
Higher Octane fuel will not compensate for the PCMs inability
to widen the injector pulses for more fuel. The trade-off with
a CAI and a TUNE is that you have to run higher
Octane fuel with the TUNE. Not the other way around.
Higher Octaines provide a more heat stable fuel for the higher
compression engines to help prevent predetonation. Not to
compensate for more air flow and no more fuel to compensate
for the increased air flow from a CAI.

The airflow excedes the PCMs injector pulse width durations.
No higher Octane fuel will cure a lean running engine.
CEL for a few months and it all seemed fine?

All you are doing is resetting the adaptive learning and making the
lean condition that caused the CEL to be worse until it relearns
and throws the CEL again. What a vicious cycle to be playing.
Just keep ingnoring it until a piston shoots thru the hood at WOT.
That will get your attention....

 

If I have a C&L intake and 93 race tune that was created with the intake in mind, do i need to worry about engine knocking or running lean if I am not getting CEL and am not hearing anything identifiable as knocking?