I want to get a air/fuel gauge in my car. My car only has a complete exhaust and I am curious on how bad I need a tune. The thing that I can't decide on is on a narrow-band or a wide-band gauge.

It is my understanding a narrowband is basically a light show and not very useful.

The only real problem with the wideband is the price and really only needed if you are tuning not daily use. I don't want to spend the money if it is mostly not needed.

I do plan on a rebuild with a heads and cam hopefully by next winter too.

Basically I want to know when is it a good idea to use a wideband A/F guage?
Thanks

 

If your spending money on an air/fuel ratio gauge wideband is the only way to go. Anything else is just a waste of money. sure there cheaper, but just as useless as not having one.

 

Thanks Learjet.

OK cool that's what I thought. Just wanted to make sure it wasn't like putting a 58mm throttle body on a stock car. Overkill and not required unless you have serious mods.

 

A wideband A/F gauge won't do anything without a wideband sensor. You will need the WB sensor, computer brain box thingy, and gauge. A narrow band sensor won't tell you anything useful, but it looks neat. Expect to spend between $400 and $500 for a decent wideband setup. I'd save your money and put it towards something useful like a Scan Master or your motor build.

 

Will a Scanmaster work on an OBD-II car?

 

A narrowband sensor is useless. You can buy a new genuine AEM wideband gauge (with sensor and all) for just over $200 on ebay. Mine has worked great.