My tune sucks balls

3_97_Sports

3_97_Sports

2nd Gear Poster
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Joined
Sep 24, 2023
Messages
122
Location
BC Canada
Vehicle Details
1997 4.6
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I am tired of my 97 sitting here undriveable, and need someone to look at what they did to my tune .
When I first got the tune it was pinging, but went pretty good.
I talked to the tune guy, who apparently is a mn12 god of some sort, told him I am in canada, he adjusted it for more ethanol, and then it ran like shit since.
Shifting is good, the pinging is ridiculous, and I can make it ping at will by pressing the gas pedal.
Is there a computer program I can use to see what my tune is doing?
I want to drive it and post it so you guys can see what is up and advise me on the next step like which tuner I can use to fix it and what exactly he did wrong.
I have a 1997 4.6 with jmod 373s and pi heads.
It is a lasota tune i have right now.
Is there a better guy?
A simple tune one would think, but the car drives like a hunk of shit.
 
Stock maf, 91 octane, xcal4.
If i put the stock tune back in, it runs without the pinging, but then the good shifts are gone.
 
Did he ask you for datalogs to dial in the tune after sending it to you? Do you know if it was Don himself that you worked with, or perhaps does someone else do the tuning for him now? Don was one of the early members of SCT and he contributed heavily in those early years. But that was 20 years ago now, and while I have no idea how old he is, he's got to be getting up there. 🤔

WBW I had Don write a mail-order tune for my car (which worked fine) and when I installed the PI heads a couple years later, I just bought the PRP and his tuning manual and learned to tune the car myself. He sent me the tune he wrote for me before as my base tune, and I was able to go through and see what had changed.

Other than buying the PRP from him to tune the car yourself, I don't know of a good way to see what was done in the tune.

Doing a quick Googling, Canada's Ethanol content in fuel isn't any higher than what's here in the States (E10) so there shouldn't really need to be any drastic adjustments to fueling.

You're right, it is a very simple tune combo. I'd almost ask to confirm which value files they used when building the tune. It should be the stock 97 tune with a PI heads/91 octane value file (to be transparent, when running 93 on my combo I had to make some rather significant adjustments to the spark tables because it was pinging under load because of too much spark), no adjustments to the MAF transfer function or injector flow tables, and the 4R70W value file with whatever shift schedule was added in. It's possible they overlooked the fact that it's a 97 NPI block with PI heads with a higher CR, and loaded the wrong value file (e.g. for a PI engine with 91, which will have more spark than an NPI block/PI head combo).
 
I have only read about data logs, is that something I can print and post up?
The tune is a couple years old now, so the odds of him revisiting it without charging me for a new tune is probably nil,
And if i have to pay again, I would rather pay someone who will get my simple combo right, and at least share with me how to follow up and get adjustments so that it at least runs correctly.
Never even made an effort to look at what my car is doing, just sent me a shittier tune.
Our 91 octane at esso has zero ethanol in it.
 
Yeah, that does not sound at all like the experience I had with Don in 2012. It sounds like the business may have been handed off to other (lesser) people. :(

You can log data with your X4 and a laptop with a USB cable and the LiveLink software. There are various PIDs (parameter IDs) you set up in advance that record data - e.g. RPM, fuel trims, spark advance etc. That's how to verify what the car is actually doing vs. what it's programmed to do.

One option is David Dalke at Super Coupes Unlimited - I haven't had him tune anything for me, but I know he's the go-to SC guy. The 4.6 combo you have is pretty straight forward, and he should be able to accommodate that.

One other option is to buy a license for the PRP and tune it yourself... if you have more mods planned down the road, it would be a long-term savings over constantly having to have it retuned via mail-order. With your build, it would be a safe combo to learn on without risk of doing any kind of major damage.
 
I spoke to don back when I bought the prp, and he was very helpful, even tho I bought my tune from Lonnie Doll.
I'd contact him, politely mention the problems, and go from there.
If you never datalogged it, you really never finished the tune sequence; a blind tune like that can suck for several reasons.
You'll need an older laptop running xp or win7, the Livelink program from sct, and a usb cable, and your xcal.
Oscar wrote a tutorial on datalogging; If it's not here, it should be.
Anyone got Oscar's number?
 
+1 on datalogging, part of what you get with the price of a custom mail order tune is troubleshooting support, they’ll tell you what to log, how to drive it and after you save it you send it to them, they’ll examine and find the fault and send you a revised tune file you can load into your Xcal via livelink software


It is surprising to me you’re having these issues though, I do my own tuning with PRP and when I did my PI headswap I literally just copy/pasted the PI head value files SCT gives us as a starting point, never even tweaked them, car ran like a champ
 
theterminator93 said:
Yeah, that does not sound at all like the experience I had with Don in 2012. It sounds like the business may have been handed off to other (lesser) people. :(

You can log data with your X4 and a laptop with a USB cable and the LiveLink software. There are various PIDs (parameter IDs) you set up in advance that record data - e.g. RPM, fuel trims, spark advance etc. That's how to verify what the car is actually doing vs. what it's programmed to do.

One option is David Dalke at Super Coupes Unlimited - I haven't had him tune anything for me, but I know he's the go-to SC guy. The 4.6 combo you have is pretty straight forward, and he should be able to accommodate that.

One other option is to buy a license for the PRP and tune it yourself... if you have more mods planned down the road, it would be a long-term savings over constantly having to have it retuned via mail-order. With your build, it would be a safe combo to learn on without risk of doing any kind of major damage.
Click to expand...
Don still answers the phone. We have had 3 tunes done with him in the last two years. I think his son is there too. If that info helps..
If I recall correctly Lasota will modify the tune within 90 days of purchase.
 
Agreed; 99% of my tunes were transmission tweaks, the engine stuff was all value files. Don literally wrote the book on tuning.
 
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