I could not agree with you more! Hang in there!

 

This is a good reason to get a FAST or Big Stuff 3. With the wideband you will have the car running great on the first try. The dealers for these systems are the best of the best. Just be sure to stay away from some one that is not a direct distributor. The tech support is the reason they are qualified to sell these units.

I started out tuning DFI when the units were first released and would not use the current GEN 7. ASSC Racing sells all three and have been since all three were released so they would be worthy of serious consideration. They can be reached at 847-473-4720.

The cost of the units may seem high but mail order chips on serious engines are risky and can melt pistons and wash rings. One rebuild and you are money ahead. Also the wide band and data logging will help insure you protect your motor if there is a fuel problem during a run.

 

Dude
Save your $ and get DFI Gen 7 from TJWong on the forum. ABout the tuning issues. The only way to tune it right on dead on is to tune it on dyno. Mail order tunes some time can be difficult, even if you supply with all the information. Some time you got lucky it will be right on and most of the time it will not be right on.

Shalin, he don't post here anymore since he own a Viper car. He is well known for tuning LT1/4 N/A and blown setup. Most people will call him the master tuner. He has done tuned over 400 cars over the year, that was 6 yrs ago. Yet he refused to do a mail order tune period. I had him dyno tuned my old combo few yrs back, I am from NY and he is in Annapolis MD than. WHen I was up there, he has people are coming in for tunning, from all over the state. So I guess is a dyno tune or save $ for the DFI, screw the mail order stuffs you will be a happy man.

 

Zelement went with a Accel Gen 7 system that I supplied to him earlier this summer. He had a few issues that I helped his mechanic correct. Mainly it was wiring issues and what to connect to what. Z had chose to replace his complete GM system in his car which caused a few issues that could have been easily dealt with by using a Fast Track Performance piggy back harness. Which I had tried to explain, but at the time it was Z's choice to go with the complete DFI system and harness as supplied by Accel. So far from all indications his car is running very well. With my new engine I may have to do the same thing, but I am going to try to deal with controlling the EFI with the GM PCM as it is. I feel for my application that it will work fine. Not to mention I have 24hr access to a chassis dyno, so tuning on a dyno isn't an issue for me

My engine combination will be very similar to Z's combo. Although mine is a LT4 engine vs his L98. Even with that, he is running a Mini-Ram vs my LT4 shoe box, which is very similar in design and flow characturistics. I am also running a T trim Vortec with 14 psi of boost as well. The one difference is thaat Z is running NOS in his car, I am not planning on running NOS in mine. My engine internals are probably similar to Z's combo as well. With forged billet peices used throughout the engine. I too plan on running an alky/water injection system for intercooling. I have given up the use of a air to air intercooler. So now I have this rather expensive custom intercooler with no home Anyone knows of a nice C4 home that needs a spearco intercooler that is polished and has polished piping to go with it?

 

While I have not used "ski's" chips, I too had similar experiences with the mail order programs. I used Jim Formato (~$500) on a blown 350 that ran great. It took two tries, but was good enough to go very low elevens at high 130s. I ran his prom for over 5 years. Then I "lifted" a ring land and it was time for a new engine. 11.4:1 scr and 11 psi boost only lasts so long.

When I was deciding to go with the new motor, I used the fact that the factory ECM "should" be able to control ~400 ci engine as a deciding factor for the final displacement. I worked with both Jeremy and Eileen Formato with the new fully built 408. There were probably 10 chips exchanged over the course of 3 months with only $200 additional charged. Bottom line, the motor was just "too far" from the factory settings that were meant to be controlled by the ECM.

I spoke with both Eileen and Jeremy over the course of the next 6 months as I decided on the FAST B2B w/ WBO2. Jeremy even went so far as to assist in some basic timing/fuel curves during the first few months of tuning. I have now become quite proficient at tuning FAST and DFI (along with my son), such that now I have many forum members asking me to assist on their tune. Necessity is the mother of all inventions. My new adventure is with the BS3, as I am assisting a friend with this install.

Bottom line, I never harbored bad feelings towards "Faster Proms", I had just gone too far. I will never return to burning chips, and the mail order approach.

Aaron

 

Here's another analogy - you are a plummer, you are hired to replace some wall mount faucets in a shower. The shower head's pipe leaks inside the wall. You replace the faucets which are what you are told to do. The owner calls you afterwards to complain about the leaky pipe he never told you about. Both are in the shower, is his logic.

 

I too, am a little leary about mail-order chips. Fortunatly, I live only about 3 miles from Exotic Muscle, so I was just able to leave the car there and have Trevor burn me a chip and I have absolutely no complaints

 

You guys have to learn to do your own tuning. Its not that hard, and sounds like it would be cheaper than the mail order chips you are buying!
For $175 you can have a prominator or moates ostrich, the software is free (tunerpro) and all you need is a cheap laptop. All the info you need is available online at thirdgen if you are prepared to read and learn. If you read back thru the posts on the thirdgen 'diy prom' board, you will see that ski's very first, and very basic question was posted there just over 2 yrs ago, and now he's the 'expert'! http://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/show...threadid=38620

The outcome will be a tune thats much better than ANYONE can achieve from 500 miles away!!
I've said it before, but would you mail your carb to someone to be tuned for your engine, so you can just wait for it to come back in the mail and be bolted on?? Its the same thing!

 

I just had my 385 motor finished about a week ago and had the tuning done at Next Level Performance (Mike Norris) by Jim Smith. They spent the whole day tuning my 92, and it took them 12 pulls I believe before it was finally all sorted out. I believe they picked up over 40 horses before the 1st and last pull. My final numbers were 415 rwhp and 417 rwtq

The torque curve is very flat and the a/f is a flat 12.7/1 from 3k to 6k rpms. They did a fantastic job with it! It idles at 950 rpm and I got 26 mpg on the only highway trip I have taken so far (mostly 5th gear)!

This was $500, but well worth it in my opinion.

Mike

 

Mike,
It idles at 950 and gets 26 mpg. Does that strike you as strange that from the factory it idled at ~450 and now it idles at 950? Shouldn't that idle be a bit lower? Unless you have a HUGE cam, I do not understand that level of idle RPM.

Aaron

 

Z, Blown Vette, Bruce, Tom, Aaron, thanks for all the info on the DFI! I'll more than likely be contacting you very shortly for additional details. Once again, thanks much!

Lichen - I wish I lived as close to a tuner that you do!

Ben73 - it definitely looks like I'm going to have to do some reading. Very interesting about the thirdgen board. Hmmm... Kind of confirms my experience.

Mike - it sounds like I'm going to have to do something like you did to see the maximum potential from my setup. I know that with the mods I have done, this car has a lot more in it. Now if I can only nail down the "driving issues"

 

[QUOTE=cprgmr]Z, Blown Vette, Bruce, Tom, Aaron, thanks for all the info on the DFI! I'll more than likely be contacting you very shortly for additional details. Once again, thanks much!

QUOTE]

You are welcome for the information. Just for the record I would stay away from the DFI and look at the Big Stuff 3 or FAST. Call ASSC when you are ready and they will tell you about all three as the have been selling each one from day one.

 

[QUOTE=cprgmr]Z, Blown Vette, Bruce, Tom, Aaron, thanks for all the info on the DFI! I'll more than likely be contacting you very shortly for additional details. Once again, thanks much!

[QUOTE]

You are welcome for the information. Just for the record I would stay away from the DFI and look at the Big Stuff 3 or FAST. Call ASSC when you are ready and they will tell you about all three as the have been selling each one from day one.

 

You are welcome for the information. Just for the record I would stay away from the DFI and look at the Big Stuff 3 or FAST. Call ASSC when you are ready and they will tell you about all three as the have been selling each one from day one.

 

trust me, I have wasted so much money and countless hours of headaches with mail order tune. Ed W. is in Ok and I am in CA, not to mention his accent. Every time I talked to him on the phone it was like talking to an alien, I just couldn't understand anything he had to say. I say this, if you have a mild heads and cam setup a mail order tune is probably fine. My car ran very well with the Ed wright tune with the ZZ4, Hot cam, miniram, and AFR 195.

However, my combo has changed about 6 times in the last 4 years that I had to pay for a new chip almost each time. Not to mention that they are NEVER right the first time or probably second time.
I finally just said F' it and jumped on TJ's deal with the DFI. Seriously the best money I have spent. Tom, is EXTREMELY HELPFUL! I have called him at all hours, he even walked my mechanic through the install and drew up wiring diagrams for him. Till this day, I still call tom and ask him questions regarding general DFI questions and tuning issues.

My car runs like a champ like NEVER before. It is finally right, and this is with my own SOTP tune. I have to admit, at first it was very intimdating, for someone like me. i am not good with electronics and techno stuff but once you have installed playing with it is the best part. I have a dyno tuning session scheduled the first week of the new year and we'll see what happens.

 

Since when did the car idle at 450 rpm from the factory? I know mine didn't... at least I don't recall it ever being that low and I have owned the car for 10 years. I believe mine was somewhere in the vicinity of 8 - 900 or so. Maybe automatics have a lower idle, I couldn't tell you.

BTW, my cam is just a 224/230 with a 113 LSA, but it has the 3100 series lobes which produce .605/.622" lift with 1.6 RR's. It is still a very streetable cam. My problem is the Street Twin clutch... not as easy to launch anymore, since I can't slip it.

Mike

 

My 94 M6 idled at 750 rpms, with the stock tune.

 

My lessons learned on chips.

1. No chip can compensate for engine problems.

I was frustrated at first about my tuner chip performance levels being well below my expectations. While I kept my it to myself...my first inclination was to blame the tuner. It took me a while to track down injector and spark problems.

2. If you are first starting out doing your own chips, it may be a good idea to start with a tuner chip and tweak from there.

I do my own chips for my car. However, I started with a tuner chip after major mods. MAF tuning requires TLC. Going from a TPI setup to a MR or SR requires significant changes to full throttle and part throttle fuel and ignition tables. Having help from someone who had experience with your head/cam/intake combo can greatly jump start the process. Comparing the before and after tables can also help you learn which tables are important.

3. For a beginer, getting the chip right requires lots of iterations in small increments of change.

You can hose an engine if go at the engine tuning too agressively. Fortunately, I did not make this mistake.


While I burn my own chips, I feel that people like Ski_Down_It provide an invaluable service. No matter how good you are, your going to occasionally have unhappy customers.

 

Free RPM idle is set at 450 for '87, and 425 +/-25 RPM for '88-90. This setting is with the manual in neutral and the automatic in Park. Maybe, the idle was a bit higher for the LT1s, though hard to believe it was 8-900 RPM.

As a side note, mine currently idels at 875, so I have no room to talk.

Aaron

 

So what is the solution from a business perspective? For every one or two customers (yes, there are more than just me) that are unhappy, do you not satisfy them? From all the money made off of forum members, is $260.00 really worth the expense of losing potential customers?

All of the business classes I had in college dictate that the customer is always right and the business owner should do everything in their power to correct the situation (even if the business owner feels the customer is incorrect).

I've given ski the chance to provide a better tune than what I have now. If it were my business of burning chips for profit, I would either:

1. Provide the customer at least an equal if not a superior chip than the one they have now.
or
2. Refund the customers money if I couldn't meet the aforementioned criteria.

Obviously, there is a disparity in business acumen from forum vendors here.