I'll post here since the HPT site is down

I have had HPT for over a year (last April) and I have just begun to be comfortable to start woking out my truck's issues.

I am making progress and it is very fun when you start figuring things out, as I am sure I did not need to revise my VE 10 times

Find a mentor, local better to show you the ropes.

dont get discouraged by the HPT fourm it is sucky to put it best. There are many resources for you to learn what you are doing w/o driving your mentor nuts, then when you get stuck you can call them.

I just put three new tunes in the truck this weekend and 'almost' fixed a suring problem with just attention to detail (my lover VE table needed some work) its exciting to know going down the track what could give you more.

 

Oh man, I'm really torn. I'd love to learn to tune for myself but 800.00 is an awfully expensive ticket price. Especially when I can pay less than half of that and have an expert do it.

What to do...
What to do...

 

Along with BlackGMC too, I started over 5 years ago. You have to setup the right PIDS to monitor properly in the scan tool. You have to understand what they mean and how it works, if you don't you won't understand which way to go with things. It takes a lot of time and patience, and I still learn something most every time I hook u to a car...lol.

Tuning fuel, to do it right, you have to start with the maf disabled, nail the ve down and move on to the maf. Those values are blended to come up with the fuel mapping at part throttle so tuning the ve with the maf enabled is like pissing in the wind. Also the commanded fuel tables for open loop need a little help the radical the setup is, they are very rich in some spots, and for a cammed engine that idles at a higher kpa, it can really choke it out and cause some startup and driveability problems.

At WOT the ve means virtually nothing over 4000 rpms unless you are running in speed density. The maf is where you will do your work here to get your actual fuel to line up with what you are commanding in power enrichment. And for the love of god, please dont jack with the p.e. values to get the afr close (i.e. commanding 11.5 afr to see 12.7 on your wideband). Damn it, commanded should equal actual.

Timing, every vehicle is different and generally the more efficient the head/engine combo, the less overall timing it needs to make max power. My old small blocks liked 36-38* at wot, I have never seen an ls setup that mad max power over 30*. There are multiplier tables that effect the final timing. Most of the time I use the fuel mixture spark correction table to add timing when in p.e. mode rather than doing it straight in the high octane table. Some exceptions are operating systems that didn't use that table from the factory (like the f-body's).

Idle tuning. The fun ****...lol. One thing I have seen is that A LOT of people hack this area on cammed setups, they throw rediculous amounts of air in the desired airflow table to get it to idle. The truth is (especially on cable driven setups with iac's), you want to either crack the blade open some or drill the hole out some. Why? Because the iac can only do so much, and the more air that is commanded in the desired airflow table, the closer the iac is to being maxed out. That doesn't leave any room for it to be able to help on decel or in coasting situations and can cause a bucknasty surge that goes away when you stop. And I've also seen that the pcm is going to try and curb that overspeed condition however possible, so if the idle airflow is too high via the desired airflow table, it will retard the timing and can cause a violent swing in rpms that doesn't want to stabilize. You need to mechanically introduce more air in the engine to allow lower commanded values in the desired airflow table for best results.

Cam, converters, and pullies can and in most cases will cause misfire codes. That needs to be addressed in the mifre section obviously. Other codes can be turned off also, all that done per application.

The trans tuning is not bad, tune to your desired feel and set the shift points. it will take time to get all the downshifts and upshifts where you want them, but its worth it. Watch the abuse mode and the trans slip tests, they can cause a limp mode with aftermarket converters and higher power levels. Most people disable both of those.

Just a few pointers that I have learned over the years.

 

My friend has EFI Live, and I have been messing around with it for about 1 year. I am just at the point where I am starting to feel comfortable with it. I hired my tune out, and the first guy just caused confusion, and a waste of time. The second guy knows what he is doing, and has really made me a believer in the software. Just don't think that you are going to purchase the software, and be a tuner. I would suggest to get the software to tune yourself if you are the **** type that wants to make sure it is done right. I would start with a stock vehicle and make changes on it. Don't start with something that needs to have everything changed.