Drawbacks to a mail order tune

[kelley@vectormotorsports]

Originally Posted by Ron@Vengeance

Kirk, all sarcastic comments aside. I encouraged the customer MANY times to work with Vector on this. I even called you personally to explain the problems we were working against. After several ignition cycles we were finally able to throw a DTC for crankshaft correlation. We knew at this point the tune was not the issue, BUT we could not perform a case relearn using our EFI Live OR Tech II because the PCM is locked. Not being up to speed on Vector tunes the only other option was to get a new PCM and start from scratch. Today when the PCM arrived we went to our local GM dealer to flash the VIN into the new PCM. Luckily they were able to complete a case relearn with the original computer and the car has been running/driving great with no starting issues.

FWIW, Vengeance Racing tunes with EFI Live software and there is ZERO need to disconnect the battery for ANY reason after making any sort of PCM/TCM changes. I apologize for not being more educated on your software.

In regard to the tune, the customer needs to email you a copy of the air fuel so you can make a few tweaks. Air fue ranges from 12.7 to 13.6 and timing spikes to 31* and drops to 22/21 thru the run.

All things considered the car performed very well for a mail order tune.

I appreciate you returning my call yesterday and thank you for your willingness to help out. We now know to disconnect the PCM after making a change with Vector tunes

Sorry for the smart ass comment. I was barraged with PM's and phone calls yesterday telling me we were being bashed on this forum, for no good reason. Most were from our current Camaro customers that knew the battery cable just needed to be removed but wanted me to be the one to say it.

I may have missed your phone calls, but I did not get any voice mail either. Just one voice mail or the customer showing you the instructions would have saved him a lot of money and you a lot of time.

I know you guys are a stand up company that knows your stuff. You just were not given the information needed to ues our software.

Kirk

[Frost]

Originally Posted by 2SSCAMARO

huh??????? ... BTW regardless of what your pro tuner and the dealership allegedly said, HPT beta software and VMS software for the 2010 camaros both need the negative battery terminal removed for about 5 minutes after a write to prevent problems such as you experienced and hard starting.

Yeah the early HPTuner's betas LAST YEAR had this problem (needing the battery disconnected to nake all the modules start back up in the correct order, fuel pump module in particular) but it was fixed like 4 or more revisions ago. I know going back to late Jan that it hasn't been a problem. It was never a problem that I could see with EFI Live.

Originally Posted by DSteck

I'm genuinely interested in why a CASE relearn was required from a PCM reflash. I wonder if that was just a fluke of two things coinciding.

The CASE data is stored in flash memory and some flash methods are not careful to preserve it. When you do the CASE re-learn, the new value is held in RAM. At key-off for the fist time after the process, the data is moved from ram to flash memory.

[DSteck]

Originally Posted by Frost

The CASE data is stored in flash memory and some flash methods are not careful to preserve it. When you do the CASE re-learn, the new value is held in RAM. At key-off for the fist time after the process, the data is moved from ram to flash memory.

Good thing I've never had a problem with HPT on this then.

[Tech]

I actually learned alot through this post. No matter the case or issue, I believe these forums are here for just this reason. Sometimes they turn into what people believe is a "bashing" thread but all in all i think everyone can take everyone's experiences and either prevent future problems or improve future situations like this so they don't have any negative effects on the customers or the venders...

[Dr Jkel]

Well from a Noobs point of view and just installing a Jannetty Racing Tune on my cam/header/cai package that was installed it seemed like a pretty good deal. From what Little I know no matter what you do you have to TRUST the person doing it. Dyno tuners sometimes lean them out and advance the timing to make unsafe HP, then you toast the motor and your stuck. I chose Jannetty for a couple of different reasons that I won't get into but fully believe that folks like Jannetty, Vengence, and Vector do not get clost to the edge on their tunes, Reason? Forums. Forums you ask, yes forums. Take me for example if Jannetty's Tune blows my motor slap up, do you think it would not be posted on this forum, thus killing his business. (( On a personal note if that did happen, I think if Ted's tune broke my car, he would fix it ))

So I think mail order, box tunes or whatever you want to call them are pretty good especially if they come from a performance shop that installs the products they are tuning, JMHO

[itsadryheat79]

This is very educational!

After reading this if I ever get a tune I will call the tuner or vendor's help line and ask them some simple questions like:

1) If I run into problems on "give day of install" will someone be able to help me?
2) What kind of turn around time can I expect when I run into problems?
3) Please remind me the easy steps to install/uninstall your type of tune.
4) I will verify that I have up-to-date manuals, instructions and backup software.

Please feel free to post Anything I missed!

[JR-Vette]

If you mean you mail the PCM to a tuner.

Many times I have found the PCM sent back to the car owner from a tuner was NOT the original PCM thus the CKS has to be relearned and maybe the PCM to BCM seed exchanged.

Tuning in the blind you might get away with it doing a tune for stocker but the more mods added the better chances are, esp with CAM grinds that the ONLY valid tuning method is seeing OBD-II recorded data to slant the tune for each car's makeup.

Being the PCM was without power being round trip shipped then of course within a few minutes relearned values are gone so there would be no need to connect PCM to power and disconnect again.
There could be a chance in swapping CAM and fighting on/off crank pulley that CKS was disturbed and requiring a CKS relearn but locking a PCM should in no way effect a OBD scanner used and it's bi directional control to send the CKS command.

Hard starting in the beginning could be it is not the same PCM and the PCM/BCM seed exchange relearn had to be done.

I will not do mail tunes other then for stock or a few slight changes.

Best case is to own a tuning tool and then email the flash files and we require a good OBD scanner be used in record mode and then also email that to me which I analyze to include car's elevation, type of gas used, and driver's style on how to slant each cars tune.

This also assures the PCM does not get locked or hacked in a way that dealer tool or another tuning tool cannot be used.

[Ivan @ Southwest Speed]

Kirk and Ron...nice professionalism.

I appreciate you both compromising egos and emotions for the better of the forum and the people reading.

Truly inspiring.

PS-Thanks for the time on the phone Friday Ron. Pleasure talking to you and I look forward to giving you a hollar this week again.

Keep up the good work both of you,
Ivan

[Ron@Vengeance]

Thanx Ivan!!! Pleasure speaking with you as well!!!

[Josh @ Spartan LSX]

Just for the record, the early beta version of HPtuners did cause a hard start/battery disconnect for me as well.. It's not the tuners fault, more so the software that was being used.

[Scott@Bjorn3D]

Hey would not the fuse pull of fuse 5 and 20 to the ECM be easier than disconnecting the battery. Also must remember there is a small battery backup between the battery and ECM and it has taked days for it to drain before. 2 hour fuse pull seems easier.