Tuning

[aim]

Ok dumb question incoming, so if you don't have anything constructive to add to a dumb question please read no further!

Ok I hear a lot of people talk about tuning and how a badly tuned vehicle can be under powered and inefficient. I sort of get what tuning might do, but how it's done is where I'm lost. Do you replace hardware, or plug your laptop into the ECU kind of thing? Can it be done at home? Are Dyno-people able to do it?

How do you know if your vehicle is out of tune?

[WRXER]

With ur current ECU if it is stock, you really can't "tune" it per say. Best thing is two unplug the battery for 10 mins which will reset it. Tuneable ecus are in the later model wrx's 5/6+ I think. I know u can reflash v7+ for sure, but majority of subarus the best thing is to replace it with an aftermarket ecu like a Link. Of which this allows u to both tune it urself if you have the knowledge otherwise chuck it on a dyno and the technician will hook it up and do the work. So yes majority of dyno people can do it.

Tuning wise reqiures tweaking of air/fuel mixtures and compression rates. At this point it is above my head in knowledge so I leave it to the experts. However Im sure there is more then enough knowledgable people on here to give u an in depth description of exactly what dyno tuning requires.

[aim]

Ah so most vehicles (that aren't performance orientated) are setup with stock compression rates (which is?) and a air/fuel ratio and are designed to stay that way?

I realise what compression is, it's like the length of the stroke times the bore or something along those lines. However, how can you have a 'rate of compression' is it just compression x revolutions per second? How can you have a stock compression rate?

[Guest boostin]

To most people a tune is to replace spark plugs and air filter, and maybe oil and filter. Otherwise its as WRXer says, tuneable ECU time.

[aim]

 boostin said:

To most people a tune is to replace spark plugs

That would be a much easier task if we didn't have boxers

[nt_a_foz]

AIM you werent in Tairua round new years were you??

Lol recognised your car with the patchy spoiler you put the photos up with

[Guest]

 WRXER said:

With ur current ECU if it is stock, you really can't "tune" it per say. Best thing is two unplug the battery for 10 mins which will reset it. Tuneable ecus are in the later model wrx's 5/6+ I think. I know u can reflash v7+ for sure, but majority of subarus the best thing is to replace it with an aftermarket ecu like a Link. Of which this allows u to both tune it urself if you have the knowledge otherwise chuck it on a dyno and the technician will hook it up and do the work. So yes majority of dyno people can do it.

Tuning wise reqiures tweaking of air/fuel mixtures and compression rates. At this point it is above my head in knowledge so I leave it to the experts. However Im sure there is more then enough knowledgable people on here to give u an in depth description of exactly what dyno tuning requires.

Tuning is getting the right air/fuel mixtures, ignition timing, boost and on later models with variable cams - cam timing.

You can't alter compression on most cars.

[WRXER]

Ah I never knew how the whole compression thing worked, always read guys discussing different compressions so assumed it was part of the tuning. Good little bit of info to know.

[aim]

 nt_a_foz said:

AIM you werent in Tairua round new years were you??

Lol recognised your car with the patchy spoiler you put the photos up with

Tairua? South of Whitianga?

Uh no, sorry

[ReubenH]

If i recall correctly from school, Compression ratio is the ratio between the volume of the cylinder with the piston at bottom dead centre, to the volume of the cylinder at top dead centre. I.E. 9:1 Basically boils down to how much the mixture in the cyl is being squeezed by the piston.

Just a bit OT.

[nt_a_foz]

 aim']

[quote name='nt_a_foz said:

AIM you werent in Tairua round new years were you??

Lol recognised your car with the patchy spoiler you put the photos up with

/quote]

Tairua? South of Whitianga?

Uh no, sorry

lol you sure like exactly yoru car with the pathcy paint you posted the pics of lol ....

[aim]

Nah mate, I was in Hawkes Bay over the NY period Don't think I've ever been to Tairua haha

[DRFVDR]

 aim said:

Nah mate, I was in Hawkes Bay over the NY period Don't think I've ever been to Tairua haha

But where was your car

it may have gone wandering

[Swindog]

YOu can rechip factory ecus. Mate did this on his v3 i think. Tuned for a vf22 and yellow injectors and fuel pump.

[aim]

 DRFVDR said:

But where was your car

it may have gone wandering

Pretty unlikely as I was in it most of the time

[Hailz]

Yeah the ECU's in your model arent tunable but you can however get a chip made up to over ride some of the original settings which will cost you about a grand as I've been quoted by NZEFI in Chch, they even say there's not a whole lot of performance to be gained but they did say with the TT ones that they run quite rich factory and they can safely fix that aparantly - so you might get a fuel saving, as for aftermarket ECU's for the TT, well there's not a whole heap of options really, NZEFI told me it'd cost about $4,500 for an aftermarket ecu, as I soon found out after buying my GTB, if you want a heap of power - should have brought an STi !!! Or single turbo conversion mught be the way to go, not my cup of tea though.

[aim]

That's some serious prices, the price of the ecu is more than the value of my car

[ReubenH]

Yeah, if it's your car you want to tune, forget it, there's a bit more work to do to it before then.

Once you're ready, talk to dirty-sanchez, he's the twin turbo tuning maestro.

[Durty-Sanchez]

You're in luck.. I can do your car. To the PM mobile!

[aim]

I wasn't actually enquiring, just curious

[B4 2000]

I got my car tuned at NZEFI chch a while ago, so yeah you can tune some factory ECUs. However, my ECU can be tuned a bit but not reflashed. I been told you may tuned it for a better fuel economy not a power gain (maybe few kw) unless you get a chip or aftermarket ecu and even with that I won't gain much power because of the TT.

[Durty-Sanchez]

 aim said:

I wasn't actually enquiring, just curious

All good.. your car *is* tunable, it just needs some extra circuitry added. That'd allow you full blown access to the entire firmware code, inc. parameter tables, the works. As the milder alternative you can chip it, which will sort out the retardation of the timing at low rpm's (and beef it up at higher rpm).. it'll also do the cuts and a few other tweaks. Drop me a line if you ever get around to it

[aim]

Thanks, but it looks like I could be selling the '94 for an '00

If all goes according to plan...

[Guest]

The tune of a car does make a huge difference to how the car behaves over all.

Tuning not only comes down to the air fuel ratios, but how much timing advance you can put in as that affects burn speed and peak cylinder pressure at the correct time.

on most carsyou would be putting in approx 7degs advace of ingnition timing over stock over most of the map. witch equates to a fair bit of power gain.

The air fuel ratios coming on to boost also affect how the car drives off boost and as its coming on boost.

I wouldn't reccomend a generic 'trademe" chip as every car is different in to what it wants to make maximum power and torque. We have done this test with LINK G4s in 2 identical cars, took the tune from one and put it in the next one and it ran a fair bit worse, the 2nd engine ended up making more power on less boost, with less fuel and more timing.

We have also done meny stock ecu verse LINK g4 ecu verse chipped ecus and the differences are huge. stock is approx 145kw, trademe chip is approx 165kw, Link G4 is approx 205kw+ on a TD05 ej20 with front mount and exhaust on 14psi.

Although when you consider a tuned chip for your car is approx $1000 and a plug in link G4 tuned is $3100+

The gains and other benfits of aftermarket ecu is well worth it as the gains you get are the best and biggest you can get for the money you spend with out changing turbos etc and any faults with sensors can be found quite easily.

[Guest]

when you said $3100 for a link and tune i thought yo were talkin BS. but just had alook at link G4 prices, they have gone up ALOT, i got mine much cheaper than ones around these days. any idea what has caused the sky rocket in price?

-smurff