What is this and how expensive is it to do ?....when its done....what is its purpose for the car ?...i have a LT1 and just curious....

Jamie

 

i'm new to the C4 stuff, but i have "street-tuned" my honda with the help of the internet.

long story short, i have a lot of modified internals and bolt-ons, which have the potential to make the motor faster, but the stock computer is expecting stock parts, so the modifications will not be very effective. so, i got a wiring harness to go from obd2 down to an obd1 computer, where there is plenty of tools to adjust your computer's settings such as fuel and ignition maps, as well as injector size. Once you have a basemap, you pop the new chip in and fire it up...but you also need tools like a fuel pressure guage and a wideband o2 and an air/fuel guage and an adjustable Fuel pressure regulator to get the motor stable. drive around, take notes, burn another chip if necessary, repeat until happy.

ideally you take it to a dyno and let a pro do it.

 

Call Alvin at http://www.pcmforless.com/index.php?...tpage&Itemid=1

 

any ideas on what this would all cost ? i'm lookingfor just a little bit more, but dont have thousands to stick into it...not that it really needs it now

Jamie

 

With pcmforless.com:

85-93 you receive a memory adapter that plugs between you chip and ECM. $175+shipping

94-96 you have to send you ECM to have it programed or them ship one to you and you pay the core charge (refund given if you send yours later). $175+shipping

There is a build sheet you fill out with your needs and mods.

http://www.pcmforless.com/index.php?...id=2&Itemid=43
http://www.pcmforless.com/index.php?...id=5&Itemid=43

It's a good deal and you will more than likely see improvements.

 

I am having PCMFORLESS do mine in a few weeks I can't wait

 

I say, do the research and do your own tuning.

 

agreed. pgmfi.org is a great place to start learning.

i still have not taken my honda to the dyno but it is fully modified and i burn my own chips as needed, thanks to freeware and a usb-eeprom burner.

i can't wait to start learning how to hack the c4

 

If your LT1 is stock the GM factory tune is the best combo of performance and efficiency. You'll gain no seat-of-the-pants noticeable power by custom tuning a stock motor. The GM tuning for the spark advance tables is optimized for a fuel grade of approximately 91 octane. If you can consistently get 93 octane at the pump then you *might* gain a little more power by tweaking the spark advance tables, but you also have to know what you're doing. I bought a tune from PCMFORLESS a few years ago for my stock '95. Although I specified my car has a 2.59 differential ratio (GM1 RPO code) I received a PCM image for a 3.07 ratio (G92 G44 RPO code) car, whether that was it or not (shift tables would not have matched my car well) I noticed no seat-of-the-pants difference. That is part my fault for expecting to be able to feel a difference from a tune on a stock motor.

 

Bad tune with heads and cam netted me high 13's at 100mph in the quater. Alvin's first try took me to 12.79 at 111mph. That was a solid 1.1 second and 10mph gain for $150, the best money I have spent to date.

 

How do you know that? Personal experience with tuning a stock motor and discovering that no improvements were possible?


A mail order one-shot-in-the dark tune is not the same as extensive datalogging+tuning or dynotuning.

Plenty of people have seen mpg and emissions improvements from corrections to the fuel and timing tables on a stock engine.

Simply changing TCC and DFCO parameters to suit one's driving environment can make a noticeable difference in fuel economy.

Alvin has posted here before that he sees some HP improvement on stock engines with a dyno tune, but as you say it's not large enough to notice SOP.

How is the stock tune then the best combo of performance and efficiency?

 

Start here:

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/showthread.php?t=202488

 

To add a little more about tuning, and again, i've only had the c4 for a month so my expierence is with my 2000 Si: my civic was rated by the EPA at 25-31 hwy mpg. the first 2 gas tanks, we broke it in and indeed got good mileage. for the next 172k miles, we revved that thing to 8grand everyday/all-day and got 25mpg.

then one day i decided to yank the motor and learn how to build it. After a year of research, shopping, machining and reassembly, i now run close to 12:1 compression on pump gas AND i have gotten up to 34mpg(!), with 28-29 being the new average. i do not have datalogging equipment but i drive by constantly watching the wideband's air-fuel ratio, and i can adjust the fuel, timing and ecu until it's stable.

spend a weekend reading through the forums at pgmfi.org. that's a good place to start.

BTW, I agree with Vis Croceus, this is a better place to start. It is geared for the corvette, whereas pgmfi.org is more general. honda guys have very little to go on, but that site has enough info to get the job done.

good stuff

 

JH23, I paid a guy around $400.00 to do a mail order tune on mine. Had problems with it and sent it back and forth 3 times. He kept telling me the problem was my car. Well it turned out it was his tune. Anyways I then purchased a chip reader and burner, datamaster for scanning the car, and cats for reprogramming. The problem I had was finding info on tuning. There just is no book out there like the service manual for your vehicle that gives you step by step instructions. All I could find was bits and pieces of info. I soon realized it was going to take me a lot longer to learn to tune then I was willing to invest.
I then decided to have it dynotuned. Well I contacted Alvin at pcmforless and made an appointment for one of his group dyno tunes in SE Pa. The appointment was made about 1 to 2 months in advance. Anyways, Alvin sent me his mailorder tune (based on my car mods) via e-mail so I could drive the car to the shop. I loaded it and I could not believe how much better it idled and ran. Well time went by and I went to the dyno tune. The car only picked up about 6 hp with his dyno tune over his mailorder tune. Im telling you, unless you do some strange combo of mods, he does very well based on his library of tunes and experience.
And the price for the dyno time and tune was less then $300.00. IMHO that has been the best bargin I have had with the car to date.
In short, his mailorder tune is a good buy especially considering how high mods are on these cars. Good luck with your decision.

 

If you really want to make your head spin from information overload, go here: http://www.thirdgen.org/techboard/diy-prom/

The Third Gen tuning board is top notch and the stickies are LOADED with good information.

 

*bookmarked*