Question re: SCT Tuner Devices

Race Red Boss

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Have a question for all you guys with knowledge around tunes/SCT hand held tuners.

My car was tuned with an SCT Livewire...vintage 2010/11. Unfortunately, when I received the tuner from the previous owner it had given up the ghost and no longer worked.

My question is: What are my options if I want to take the car in to have it re-tuned?

I thought it might be as easy as just buying another SCT hand held tuner and using that, but I've heard you need to return the car back to stock (with the original hand held used to tune it) before you can do that? Otherwise you have to re-flash the PCM? <<<< How would one do this if required?
 

Catmonkey

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What is it doing? I sometimes have problems with the cable on my X4. I don't use the LiveWire.

I'd call SCT support. Those guys have worked near miracles for me before.
 

Race Red Boss

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What is it doing? I sometimes have problems with the cable on my X4. I don't use the LiveWire.

I'd call SCT support. Those guys have worked near miracles for me before.

No power whatsoever. Screen just remains black/blank when plugged into the OBD port.
 

Willie

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I too have had a cable go bad. A new cable resolved my issue, but I would try the following first: If you have a USB interface cable for the X4, connect it to your PC / laptop just to see if it powers up. If it does, I'd say you have a bad OBD-II cable.
 

96gt02

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if the car is only tuned with the sct canned you can just flash over those tunes with another, sct tunes do not change the strategy from the stock code so they can be flashed over and then your current tune becomes the "stock tune" on the new tuner
 

Race Red Boss

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if the car is only tuned with the sct canned you can just flash over those tunes with another, sct tunes do not change the strategy from the stock code so they can be flashed over and then your current tune becomes the "stock tune" on the new tuner

Thanks. The car has a custom dyno tune on it.
 

Race Red Boss

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I too have had a cable go bad. A new cable resolved my issue, but I would try the following first: If you have a USB interface cable for the X4, connect it to your PC / laptop just to see if it powers up. If it does, I'd say you have a bad OBD-II cable.

The unit I have is almost 10 yrs. old I believe. Not even sure it can be used anymore, outside of using it for the tunes that are on it for my car. Owner said a custom 91 octane and 93 octane tunes were done with it on a local dyno. Here's a pic of the unit.

The only cable that was supplied with it is the one for connecting to the car. Guess I'll reach out to SCT and see if they can help.

SCT Livewire pic.jpg
 

DSG2003Mach1

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Thanks. The car has a custom dyno tune on it.

The same thing applies, if you get a new device it'll download the current tune and consider it to be the stock tune. The new tunes then overwrite the current one. Unless you had to flash back to factory stock from time to time to pass inspection or something I see no reason to need a copy of the actual stock tune.

The unit I have is almost 10 yrs. old I believe. Not even sure it can be used anymore, outside of using it for the tunes that are on it for my car. Owner said a custom 91 octane and 93 octane tunes were done with it on a local dyno. Here's a pic of the unit.

The only cable that was supplied with it is the one for connecting to the car. Guess I'll reach out to SCT and see if they can help.

View attachment 1669512

there should be a standard USB connection as well, can't remember which one. If you have android phones, old cameras etc... go hunting through your USB cables.
 

Race Red Boss

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Thanks for the help boys! I'll see if I can find a cable to try and connect to my laptop. Do I need to download anything for the laptop itself from SCT? Windows 10 is what I'm using...
 

DSG2003Mach1

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Thanks for the help boys! I'll see if I can find a cable to try and connect to my laptop. Do I need to download anything for the laptop itself from SCT? Windows 10 is what I'm using...

right now - no. the point here is to see if your device to OBD2 cable is bad or the device is bad, if it powers up then youve got an obd2 cable issue most likely (make sure theres actually power at the obd2). If you want to put new tunes on the device then you need to download their device updater software. To datalog you need livelink
 

Race Red Boss

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So I got a response from SCT. The tuner is no longer supported, though they did provide a link to the last of the s/w they have for it.

I had asked about options under the current circumstances of having an useable SCT device, including getting a newer SCT device, and was told the following:

"As far as the tune that is on the vehicle, you either opt for getting flashed at the dealership to get back to stock, or we could potentially assist you with a recovery once you have a newer device."

My assumption from this is that the original SCT device is associated to the car and therefore without being able to use it to return to stock cfg., I'd have to have the PCM re-flashed.

I think I'd rather pursue the 2nd option of getting a newer SCT hand held and getting their help to recover things....though I'm not sure what he means by "potentially assisting".

Here's the pic of the two ports on the device. I'm not sure which one would connect to my laptop? I'm also not sure if I need some SCT software installed on my laptop first.....or if the device installs the drivers itself (assuming it works when connected).

I've got an Samsung S8 Android cell phone....but doesn't look like the interface fits either of these two ports.

SCT Intefaces.jpg
 

DSG2003Mach1

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So I got a response from SCT. The tuner is no longer supported, though they did provide a link to the last of the s/w they have for it.

I had asked about options under the current circumstances of having an useable SCT device, including getting a newer SCT device, and was told the following:

"As far as the tune that is on the vehicle, you either opt for getting flashed at the dealership to get back to stock, or we could potentially assist you with a recovery once you have a newer device."

My assumption from this is that the original SCT device is associated to the car and therefore without being able to use it to return to stock cfg., I'd have to have the PCM re-flashed.

I think I'd rather pursue the 2nd option of getting a newer SCT hand held and getting their help to recover things....though I'm not sure what he means by "potentially assisting".

Here's the pic of the two ports on the device. I'm not sure which one would connect to my laptop? I'm also not sure if I need some SCT software installed on my laptop first.....or if the device installs the drivers itself (assuming it works when connected).

I've got an Samsung S8 Android cell phone....but doesn't look like the interface fits either of these two ports.

View attachment 1669550

port on the right for the usb, just google mini usb and youll see what youre looking for. When you plug the usb cable into the device and your computer the screen on the device will either power on or it won't, no drivers needed for that part.

I dont know if they are implying it might be possible to copy the tune from the pcm into the new sct device to be usable or what. The only time you need to re-write the stock tune is in the process of un-marrying the device from your car so it could be used on a different car.
 

Race Red Boss

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port on the right for the usb, just google mini usb and youll see what youre looking for. When you plug the usb cable into the device and your computer the screen on the device will either power on or it won't, no drivers needed for that part.

I dont know if they are implying it might be possible to copy the tune from the pcm into the new sct device to be usable or what. The only time you need to re-write the stock tune is in the process of un-marrying the device from your car so it could be used on a different car.

Thanks, i'll give the mini USB a try. And yes, returning the car to stock is what I understood to "unmarry" the device from the car.

I thought it might be as simple as uploading the current tune (custom) to a newer SCT device but apparently its not that simple. The car runs great with the current tune. I do like some of the additional functions of the SCT though to monitor different performance areas though, like Air/Fuel ratio, IAT's, coolant temp, etc. Their newer Live Wire provides some nice graphic outputs. Again, could I just connect it to the car as it is and it would work or would I again be faced with the issue of having an existing SCT tuner being "married" to the car and not allowing it?
 

03cobra#2

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Don't over think this. Don't worry about not being able to return to stock, stock tune stuck in the old device, having a dealer reflash the car, sct potentially assisting you with a recovery, ect. Not needed.

Take the car to your custom tuner of choice. Buy a new a hand held from them and have them tune the car. Simple
 

DSG2003Mach1

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if you dont have a copy of the current tune on a computer/disk/usb then no it's not that easy sadly (as far as just having the current tune on a new device).

the whole marrying thing is ONLY on the device side, the car doesnt know and doesnt care. You can throw that current live wire in the dumpster right now, buy another tuner with a tune for your car on it, flash it and go without issue.

if you're happy with the tune you can also look at things like the torque app using a blue tooth OBD2 connector and monitor all that stuff on your phone
 

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