How can I start tuning my own car?

TheGateKeeper

Member
Established Member
Joined
Jul 18, 2015
Messages
51
Location
Southern Maryland
Are there any self tuning programs for the 99-04 on the market without having to buy an entire new standalone race setup? It’s needed for a street car for minor adjustments so I don’t have to keep paying for revisions that don’t work.
My little bro has an SRT Jeep with a Vortech that he fine-tunes himself after the first major tune. (Those suckers are nasty btw.. 600AWHP!) But this is what I’m looking for.


Like right now my tuner has the car pretty close, but the power starts falling off up top where this car used to make all of its power. I’m not having much luck with tuners lately.

Oh and apparently SCT made some major changes lately due to this bully dog and all the coal rolling lawsuit. This tuner says there’s CELs he won’t be able to have turn off due to this. I keep getting rear O2 codes.
 

DSG2003Mach1

Well-Known Member
Established Member
Premium Member
Joined
Apr 15, 2004
Messages
15,913
Location
Central Fl
the EPA smacked them pretty hard so yes, it's hard to find people that will turn off the rear O2s now. I've heard that anti foulers may do the trick - its just a spacer you screw into the bung then put the sensor into the spacer. The reduced gas flow to the sensor will make it think everythings ok (so I've read). The other option I believe is to wire in resistors if you can't find the O2 sims anywhere.

If your tuner is charging you for revisions with no changes in your mods you have an asshole tuner. I've NEVER been charged for a revision if I didn't change a bunch of crap.

I would NOT buy SCT pro-racer at this point. If I was going to mess with anything I think I'd go the moates/quarter horse route or whatever it is. You have to pull the PCM and clean it like you would to install a chip. You install their piece that has a cable and hook it to a laptop. It lets you tune in real time without having to turn the car off, fix the tune, load onto handheld, load onto car etc...
 

Mojo88

"Hammer" Time
Established Member
Joined
Jan 30, 2017
Messages
1,319
Location
RI
Have you not searched here yet? This type of thread is becoming pretty common.

Yeah, it's common because there's a boatload of folks that would like to be able to do basic tuning themselves...... :p

My last car with self-tuning capabilities was the '68 Camaro in my avatar. It is a big-block that I put Accel DFI onto. It was a real pleasure to be able to datalog and make subtle changes (easily and quickly using a laptop) to really dial the car in using the Accel software.
 

DSG2003Mach1

Well-Known Member
Established Member
Premium Member
Joined
Apr 15, 2004
Messages
15,913
Location
Central Fl
When you say "self tuning" I keep thinking of some of the aftermarket systems that really do just that, you load a close enough base tune and it figures the rest out
 

TheGateKeeper

Member
Established Member
Joined
Jul 18, 2015
Messages
51
Location
Southern Maryland
The car made 487 with blown out ring lands on stock internals, 9psi and a single fuel pump two years ago.

The newest issue with the car was that it wouldn’t take any timing because there was a stray bolt stuck under the coolant tube with a thick washer on it that kept setting off the knock sensors. I ended up with 9* total timing and in need of a very simple email revision. It won’t knock at all. IATs stay under 140 and I’m running a twin division x hat with green top 255s and westerns dual drivers and BAP with 60# injectors. With the brand new fueling setup and forged build with 13psi made it made 430hp on the same type of dyno. It’s been a headache to say the least.

The issue I’m having right now with the tuner is he simply won’t email me back so I physically have to go put the car on the dyno again and revise. The place is 60 miles away and I live 15 mins from our track and our group stays pretty competitive. I’d be able to keep up if I could tune the car myself.
 

TheGateKeeper

Member
Established Member
Joined
Jul 18, 2015
Messages
51
Location
Southern Maryland
the EPA smacked them pretty hard so yes, it's hard to find people that will turn off the rear O2s now. I've heard that anti foulers may do the trick - its just a spacer you screw into the bung then put the sensor into the spacer. The reduced gas flow to the sensor will make it think everythings ok (so I've read). The other option I believe is to wire in resistors if you can't find the O2 sims anywhere.

If your tuner is charging you for revisions with no changes in your mods you have an asshole tuner. I've NEVER been charged for a revision if I didn't change a bunch of crap.

I would NOT buy SCT pro-racer at this point. If I was going to mess with anything I think I'd go the moates/quarter horse route or whatever it is. You have to pull the PCM and clean it like you would to install a chip. You install their piece that has a cable and hook it to a laptop. It lets you tune in real time without having to turn the car off, fix the tune, load onto handheld, load onto car etc...

I remember building the radio shack sims for my GT years ago before I got into tuning. Thanks for the reminder. I’ll have to give that a try. Still ridiculous they can’t turn this stuff off.

And he’s not charging me for email revisions... I can’t get an email returned. I have to schedule new dyno time to even talk to the dude.
My area has such a lack of tuners it’s ridiculous. Or at least ones that want to mess with an older 4v
 

TheGateKeeper

Member
Established Member
Joined
Jul 18, 2015
Messages
51
Location
Southern Maryland
When you say "self tuning" I keep thinking of some of the aftermarket systems that really do just that, you load a close enough base tune and it figures the rest out

I mean like my tuner tunes the car close as he can and then I take it down the road and for example... right now I can tell I need timing up top so I would add some total timing or some in that rpm range that will be happy with the fuel I have access to at the time.
 

Talleywacker

Active Member
Established Member
Joined
Jun 5, 2004
Messages
178
Location
Houston
My car is a track car, offroad use. If someone with SCT didn't want to tune my car with the egr/cats deleted then I'll keep looking. what I do with the car off the track is my business. I don't even have ABS or tloc
 

TheGateKeeper

Member
Established Member
Joined
Jul 18, 2015
Messages
51
Location
Southern Maryland

Looks like something I’ll be getting into next. But first I’m gonna drive it out there and strap this car up one more time, I’m gonna pay him the 275 for the revision dyno time and see how the car does without a bolt bouncing off the knock sensors like pong. If she makes over 500 then this thread is redundant and she gets a new set of sticky tires. If not then this tuner is afraid to blow my car up and I gotta tune it.
 

Users who are viewing this thread



Top