Thank you... you just answered my question.

 

Stock sure sound's good after reading a few of these threads.

 

There are hundreds if not thousands of tuned C6's on the road. The only problem I've read about on various forums is one owner said his fans stayed on all the time, which sounds like a tuning table error.

If you're not willing to take an extremely slight risk in obtaining all the benefits of a tune, keep it stock; simple as that.

I will be having mine tuned.

 

My question is this:

C6s have had crank bolt failures, and in some cases that has killed the engine.

If you are running tuned software on your car, and then the failure occurs, will GM replace the engine under warranty?

 

Yes, they should. They have a cause of the problem and should act correctly. It this case they would not be able to link it to the tune.

Here is some lite reading for your pleasesure.

http://www.enjoythedrive.com/content/?ID=8124

http://www.magnacharger.com/magnusonmoss.htm

MAGNUSON MOSS WARRANTY ACT

US Code - Title 15, Chapter 50, Sections 2301-2312

Legally, a vehicle manufacturer cannot void the warranty on a vehicle due to an aftermarket part unless they can prove that the aftermarket part caused or contributed to the failure in the vehicle (per the Magnuson Moss Warranty Act (15 U.S.C. 2302(C)) . For best results, consider working with performance-oriented dealerships with a proven history of working with customers. If your vehicle manufacturer fails to honor emission/warranty claims, contact EPA at (202) 260-2080 or www.epa.gov. If federal warranty protection is denied, contact the FTC at (202) 326-3128 or www.ftc.gov. For additional information, check out the following links:


I have never had to use it, but I am keeping this in my back pocket if I do.

 

This is a "feature" that Carputing implemented in LS2edit. Other tuners do not lock out the GM updates or prevent you from retuning the PCM using another software application. Bottom line, this was done by Carputing, it is not optional, it does it to all LS2edit tuned PCMs, and only the original tuner can return your PCM back to stock. They own you.

And a new LS2 PCM is not $250. Maybe LS1, but not LS2. Besides, why pay for something that should be yours anyway.

 

HP Tuners. They should have their LS2 tuning software out in the next couple months. If you have a tuner do your PCM, ask them what software they are using. If it's LS2edit, they own you.

 

Straight from the horses mouth. They don't even see why it should be a problem. Talk about out of touch with your customers.



Sorry for the delay in replying, I was travelling all day yesterday.

After tuning with LS2-edit, all scanners (like Tech2) will continue to work just fine. Whenever your ECM/TCM is custom tuned (by your tuner), other reprogramming software or other tuning software will not be able to read or change the ECM/TCM. However, your tuner can simply return your ECM/TCM to stock, and then all other reprogramming tools will work just fine. Once a dealer (or you) reprogrammed the ECM/TCM with a Tech2 type programmer then it would be back to stock anyway, and you would still need a new tune from your tuner, since you just lost your custom tune by doing this.

Thanks,
Dave @ carputing.com

 

If you read my story about my Volvo, you'll know I have experience with this.

The problem with an engine control chip is that it interacts with so many components on the car. That was my issue. Plus, if there is no "smoking gun," then it could be debatable as to what the exact cause of the problem was.

Also, the corporation has time and money on its side. If they can delay you and also force you, the individual, to have to invest capital up front for a lawyer and to start fault tracing/analysis, then they can dissuade you from doing it, ESPECIALLY when the outcome is uncertain.

With chips, it is very uncertain. Code is a sticky business, and if it went so far as to go to court, the decision-makers could easily be confused.

I consulted a lawyer in my case who said I probably got screwed, but given all the facts there was no way of gauging whether I'd win or lose in court. So there was no way I was investing a month or two plus thousands up front with no guaranteed return at the end. David vs. Goliath... but David can't do anything here.

In regards to the C6 crank pulley, they could easily claim that the higher output of an aftermarket tuned engine could torque the bolt loose and causing it to fail on a car that otherwise wouldn't have failed. There are cars in the affected VIN range that have NOT had failures (mine, for example). But what if it fails after I do a tune? They could easily lay the blame on it... even though it's a known problem on stock cars, modified cars are a whole different ball game.

I'm willing to bet GM would try to work its way out of it.

 

HP Tuners

 

this would prevent the dealer from accidently removing your $$$$ PCM tune. i would think a lot of owners with modified PCMs would welcome this feature.

 

100% with everything you have said. And the Magnusson Moss act is barely worth the paper it is written on. All it does is give you an avenue to sue should you be denied warranty coverage. It hardly guarantees that you will win.

Hiring a lawer, expert witnesses, taking time off your job going to depositions, etc. is on you. ...........and you still may not win your case.

Make programming changes and they can potentially argue that those changes resulted in failure of a number of components. From your automatic transmission, engine, differential or electrical components.

Their expert is going to argue that the precise reason why they have the stock tuning the way they have it is to avoid the very problem you happend to show up with and others like it. He is likely to say that their engineers knew that certain safeguards had to be in place to avoid problems such as the one you are having.

When it comes to ECU tuning, AS FAR AS THE C6, not much is printed about what GM can and cannot find out should they scan your ECU. There have been a number of changes in the LS1 and LS6 tuning and what we are now seeing with the LS2. I had a little experience with HP Tuners with my C5. Now things are quite different. Not only will the old software not work with the LS2, the OBD cable won't either.

Can they tell if your ECU has been flashed even if you show up with a stock tune? Can they tell if your car has ever been tuned?

Well they can tell what the car was doing several seconds before the air bag deployed. Can they tell what the car was doing just before the car experienced a catastrophic failure and seconds later set a check engine light?

 

Basically, anyone who is considering a custom tune should invest in a spare ECM. You can always swap out the ECM prior to going to the dealer. Or will the damn black box record the swap and the change in program?

 

I don't see what the big deal is. If you've got a tune and you're not a "do-it-yourself" type, you don't want the dealer trying to reflash your PCM anyway.

If you are a DIY person, you should have HPT and can reflash anytime you want, even back to stock. 2.0, with LS2 support, is expected to ship within a week.

Lots of GM techs have posted on here that they don't have the ability to tell if a custom tune is loaded. They just reflash if there's a PCM problem, and if that doesn't work, they replace the PCM.

 

No they would not and if GM wants to know if code was tampered with it is very simple to find out.
Don't make me laugh, that MM act is a roost that only can have some impact IF the lawyer you hired wins and GM has a whole room of lawyers on the payroll waiting for such a flag waving of the MMA and would hold you up in court for months.
Anytime the VCM has been changed by anyone other then GM they have violated not only GM warranty but also a federal law that says (per EPA) that the PCM cannot be modified and whole reason GM has security code/lock because EPA mandates even GM must lock the code up since EPA owns the VCM. its a smog device and why it also holds a smog warranty period and not the car warranty

Carputing learned a hard lesson with LS1edit for others just backward engineered what their product did and then claimed they designed their tuner product so now carputing is playing hardball and we'll see how much longer it takes from others coming out with a LS2 programmer which BTW will be useless for 2006 since GM redesigned the way the VCM and TCM functions again and another new VCM and TCM hardware

 

Simple .. If you can't pay, then don't play!

If you are hand wringing over this you should stay in the bleachers where you belong!

 

[QUOTE=

Carputing learned a hard lesson with LS1edit for others just backward engineered what their product did and then claimed they designed their tuner product so now carputing is playing hardball and we'll see how much longer it takes from others coming out with a LS2 programmer which BTW will be useless for 2006 since GM redesigned the way the VCM and TCM functions again and another new VCM and TCM hardware[/QUOTE]

This is pure bulls$$$. First of all, none of the tuner's software is loaded into the PCM. They only download new data into the existing tables used by the GM software. You cannot create a tuning application by looking at the data tables in the PCM. All their software is on the laptop computer, not the PCM.

That's a line of BULLS$$$ that Carputing is spreading and it's not based on any facts just Carputing spreading a bunch of BS.

"First get your facts, then you can distort them at your liesure".

All of the other tuners give the tuner the option of locking the tune, but it's an option that is known by the customer and the tuner. Carputing does not do this, it's not an option.

If I want to modify MY TUNE, which I PAID for, then I should be able to modify it. I should not be at the mercy of my tuner who I PAID to create the tune.

Ask yourself why doesn't Carputing come on here and defend themselves. Is it because they know this is BS and we will call them on it?

Go ahead and do what you want, as for me, I'm getting HP tuners, screw Carputing.

 

Talk about a line of BS, Hptuners does not even have a LS2 product and your making claims of what it will and will not do.
Anyone knows if you can attach a RS232 analyzer and capture a sesson with a tuner product doing its thing you can see what they are doing and then compare the bin file it created.

As to the customers knowing that their PCM was locked you must have been sleeping for the last 3 years for many many people did not know their PCM was locked or modified in such a way that other tuner products could not read the flash file or a GM tech-II could not install a update to a PCM and guess what its been done with other tuning products other the LS1edit and others who make changes use a hex editior, a simple change of the CRC can confue all other tuning tools from reading or editing that flash.
Ohh and some tuning software does indeed upload a small program into the flash and then uses that to scramble the flash data as it sends it to users P/C as a flash file.

Right now all I see is a bunch of BS as exactly who is doing the locking, the tuning product or the person using the product so that no one but that tuner can tune that PCM and force the car owner to only go back and use that vendor.

While we are at it Hptuners has one software switch, once set ALL VCMs are locked without any imput by anyone so someone using may not even know flashes are being locked so this whole locking issue smells for ALL of these products and not just carputing for at least in the LS1edit version there is NO tuning lock switch at all.

Why carputing is not here defending themselves, why is not GM here to explain CL or clutch failures or why is not other tuning vendors here defending why they even have a PCM lock function
Sounds like the nornal lets bash one vendor and kiss *** another when they all are equally sucking on our wallet

 

Well no, you can't. But if you can download and read the file from the VCM of a similarly modded car, and compare it to a stock table, you now have the information to tune other cars similar to the first one, to your heart's content using whatever tuning software you wish.

Case in point. When I had my C5, I was running a Predator custom tune. I later switched to HP Tuners and downloaded the present Predator tune from my PCM and was able to save it in case I needed to reload it using HP Tuners, and read it. I was then able to compare it to a stock tune and see every change in every table that had been made in that Predator tune vs stock.

Had I been some unscrupulous tuner with a shop, and the ability to tune C5s of every year, I could have "stolen" the Predator tune and started selling it under the guise of it being my own custom tune.

Tuners are very protective of their tunes. They don't want to do the work and have another tuner, or DIYer gain access to it and start tuning the cars of their own customers and friends. Thats why peoples PCMs get locked.

There are a lot of tuners who will lock your PCM and they may or may not be using Carputing software. They don't want their tunes stolen.
And they may or may not tell you that your PCM is locked.

Well, the Version 2.0 is not out yet for the general public. You cannot tune your LS2 with their present 1.7 version. There are post on their forum regarding beta versions of 2.0 being tested by a few tuning shops. But the version 2.0 is not out yet and there is no telling when it will be out, or what it will cost.

 

Straight from HPT:

"To give you guys an update,

We're still tweaking 2.0's installer.. it is taking longer than I had expected.

Right now I see us releasing, at the earliest.. probably sunday..

The installer has to be correct before we deploy or people will have to manually unininstall before our next version.. and our support boxes will be flooded. "

It may or may not be this weekend, but either way the wait isn't exactly going to be the issue that everyone's making it out to be. I'm hoping to have mine up and running within a week.