Plenty of time to put a bigger camshaft in it and add a water/meth kit. If you have the ostrich connect it and log some intake air temps under boost, it's crucial data that has long been missing from threads of this nature. It will help prove, or bust a lot of the speculation involving boost cooler types and their effectiveness based on location in the Fiero.
Water/meth has not received the respect it deserves here and I have seen far more documentation showing its effectiveness but nothing by way of data to support the claims of those on the forum who suggest otherwise.
Don't come back to this forum after the dyno session without video, and don't edit music into it, I hate when people do that, you can't hear the engine.
[This message has been edited by Joseph Upson (edited 10-08-2008).]
Here's my $0.02 if anyone's interested. The mail order tunes I make are only as good as the information I get from the customer; but because of this, those tunes are custom-taylored to each specific vehicle. So could you use a tune I made for one guy's car on another with an identical setup? Probably. But I doubt it would be perfect. It could come down to simple geography that could be the cause for the two cars not running the same. Barometric pressure, humidity, temperature, etc all play a big part in tuning. Even on my own Turbo 3800 I have 3 basic base chip programs I have to use to keep the engine running 100%: cold weather, warm dry weather, and warm humid weather. Trying to use the warm humid weather chip in cold weather results in very lean AFR's and too much ignition timing. The biggest problem I have run into on these "boosted" engines with GM fuel management is there is no compensation for humidity, and currently no way to add it. So if I had to make ONE tune that worked in every possible weather/driving condition, it would be a compromise which wouldn't give you the best performance in any one condition. That's just the name of the game.
Dyno tunes are great for tuning cars in controlled conditions. Trouble is once you leave that dyno cell your car may NEVER see those same conditions again. Both of the dyno shops I have been to in my city have terrible atmospheric conditions inside the cell, even on the best weather days (probably due to poor circulation). And every car I have tuned in the cell has always run more rich in that cell vs. what it does out on the road. A lot of this probably has to do with the fact that while running on the dyno, there is not near as much airflow going past the car as it would see on the road at speed. So in the dyno cell all your car is getting is "dirty" air. You wouldn't believe how much this affects a tune.
The best tunes I have been able to make have been in real-world conditions; and that's on the street. Basically during a tuning session, the best thing you can do is duplicate as close as possible to the exact conditions the car is going to be operated in. Like Will said earlier, GM spends hundreds of thousands of hours in perfecting these tunes and a lot of that is done on an outdoor test track, not in a dyno cell. The tune you are going to get in a dyno session is probably going to be perfect for just about any dyno session you plan to run the car in, but it probably won't be perfect for the street nor for the dragstrip. Don't misunderstand tho, getting a hands-on tune even in a dyno cell will probably improve things for you overall if you are having issues now -- but that depends on if they are going to tackle idle and part throttle tuning and not just WOT pulls on the dyno.
As far as my mail order tunes are concerned, I do those just like I would if I had the car here. That is I have the customer collect certain scan data, then I make changes based on what's in the data and we run that and see what the results are. The reason why mail-order tuning seems to be so painfully slow is because of lag times in shipping or operating hours. The only way to improve this process over distance would be if the customer had wireless broadband on their laptop, an emulator, scanner, and go-to-my-pc or something like that where I could actually tune on the car from a distance in REAL-TIME like I was there. But even then I'm not physically in the car, and I can't "feel" nor "hear" what is going on with the engine and how it reacts to changes in throttle application, and certain driving conditions. There's only so much information you can get from scan data logs. Given the choice I would much rather have the opportunity to tune a car in person vs. mail order no matter how much hardware/software the customer has. But that option simply isn't available to every person, so we do the best we can with what we have to work with.
If 3.6lvvt6spdgt wants to go to another tuner (closer to him) to get his car dyno tuned; I have absolutely no problem with that. And I'm sure that tuner will probably be able to improve performance thru hands-on tuning vs. what I have been able to do for him thru the mail. I just hope they aren't going to just tune WOT pulls for the price they are charging and ignore everything else; and I also hope at least at some point they verify their tune outside of a dyno cell in real world opeerating conditions.
-ryan
------------------ 5+ years on this same swap -- NO engine or transmission failures... Custom GM OBD1 & OBD2 Tuning | Engine Conversions & more | www.gmtuners.com
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07:51 PM
Bremertonfiero Member
Posts: 390 From: Bremerton WA USA Registered: Sep 2008
Originally posted by Darth Fiero: Barometric pressure, humidity, temperature, etc all play a big part in tuning. Even on my own Turbo 3800 I have 3 basic base chip programs I have to use to keep the engine running 100%: cold weather, warm dry weather, and warm humid weather. Trying to use the warm humid weather chip in cold weather results in very lean AFR's...
Is that basically because... ...colder air means denser air... ...which means more oxygen... ...which means a greater theoretical ability/need to ingest and burn more fuel... ...which then could realize more horsepower?
If so, then conversely, would it also follow that trying to use the cold weather chip in warm humid weather would result in very rich AFRs?
truth be told darthfiero is awsome in any regard. in fact after i get the dyno-tune im planning on sending some data log information to him to see how every thing is running, and if any thing needs minor tweeking in real weather conditions he is mostlikly the one that will do it. thanks darth for all your help and you will be hearing frome me next month.
the main reason for this hole thread is to get the tune close to whare it needs to be(hopfully perfect), and to save time. i realy liked the idea of having 3 bin-files, i might do just that.
Darth what do you think about the dyno tuned bin would it be worth $75.00 and would it realy help otthers in tunning there car? all the shops that ive asked say yes, but i would like to know what you think.
[This message has been edited by 3.6lvvt6spdgt (edited 10-08-2008).]
Is that basically because... ...colder air means denser air... ...which means more oxygen... ...which means a greater theoretical ability/need to ingest and burn more fuel... ...which then could realize more horsepower?
If so, then conversely, would it also follow that trying to use the cold weather chip in warm humid weather would result in very rich AFRs?
my bet is yes i imagine if you set it for inbetween your local weather extreams it would run reliable but not perfect all the time for here that would be about 63 degrees being 25 in winter and 100 in summer.
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09:12 PM
Will Member
Posts: 14249 From: Where you least expect me Registered: Jun 2000
Originally posted by Darth Fiero: Even on my own Turbo 3800 I have 3 basic base chip programs I have to use to keep the engine running 100%: cold weather, warm dry weather, and warm humid weather. Trying to use the warm humid weather chip in cold weather results in very lean AFR's and too much ignition timing.
What's the difference between the warm dry tune and the cold weather tune?
What's the difference between the warm dry tune and the cold weather tune?
Not so much difference in fuel but there is a big difference in spark timing. In cold air I have to dial back the timing by about 4-6 deg vs. where I can run it in warmer weather just because of the denser air charge. My MAF sensor does a pretty good job measuring air density changes as long as it is only a temperature change. But the MAF sensor cannot measure humidity so it has no way of compensating for that.
Now on the other side of the scale, just to give you some kind of idea how much full I have to pull out for humid vs. dry weather; it's about a 10% decrease in fuel I have to pull out in PE mode for the humid conditions. This also holds true for every dyno I had the car strapped down to; again because of the "dirty" air present in those dyno cells.
And to give you an idea of how many hours I have wrapped up in the tuning of my own car, I would have to say collectively it is probably in excess of 200 hours. But that's not all just tuning fuel and spark, there's a lot of little things I like to tweak in the programming from transmission shift points to idle control to get the car to react the way I like it. Most of the stuff I mess with on my own car would probably not be of any use to most other people.
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04:40 AM
Darth Fiero Member
Posts: 5921 From: Waterloo, Indiana Registered: Oct 2002
Darth what do you think about the dyno tuned bin would it be worth $75.00 and would it realy help otthers in tunning there car? all the shops that ive asked say yes, but i would like to know what you think.
Can't really say. My guess is a good dyno tune for your car would probably work OK for someone else's application as long as they had a very similar, if not identical setup to what you were running. But I'm sure some tweaks would need to be made to that program so it worked great on their car.
I've got a bunch of baseline chip programs stored on my HDD for many different applications. Case in point, for your application I already had a tune I made for somebody else's car (very similar setup to what you had) that ran really good. And when we started with your tuning, I started with that programming as a base and worked up from there because it didn't work perfectly with your car. So this should be a standing example that shows you that what works well for someone else's car doesn't always work well for yours and vise-versa.
-ryan
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04:45 AM
Will Member
Posts: 14249 From: Where you least expect me Registered: Jun 2000
Not so much difference in fuel but there is a big difference in spark timing. In cold air I have to dial back the timing by about 4-6 deg vs. where I can run it in warmer weather just because of the denser air charge. My MAF sensor does a pretty good job measuring air density changes as long as it is only a temperature change. But the MAF sensor cannot measure humidity so it has no way of compensating for that.
That's what I thought. Isn't there a temperature compensation table for spark timing? Seems to me that factor would be VITAL to tuning an engine for boost.
Can't really say. My guess is a good dyno tune for your car would probably work OK for someone else's application as long as they had a very similar, if not identical setup to what you were running. But I'm sure some tweaks would need to be made to that program so it worked great on their car.
I've got a bunch of baseline chip programs stored on my HDD for many different applications. Case in point, for your application I already had a tune I made for somebody else's car (very similar setup to what you had) that ran really good. And when we started with your tuning, I started with that programming as a base and worked up from there because it didn't work perfectly with your car. So this should be a standing example that shows you that what works well for someone else's car doesn't always work well for yours and vise-versa.
-ryan
cool so if some one wanted to have a 3.4l turbo they could get the same things as i have aka 30# injectors and same size turbo and be close enuff to save them time on tuning and money on a dyno tune. what some fail to relize is the idea i had with this was; a relitivly easy turbo setup for the 3.4l PR that doesent require the time or mass amounts of money to do. and no research needed just get what i got and go.
i bet if i had the same setup as the car that you got my bin file from, then i would be way better off.
[This message has been edited by 3.6lvvt6spdgt (edited 10-09-2008).]
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01:10 PM
Darth Fiero Member
Posts: 5921 From: Waterloo, Indiana Registered: Oct 2002
That's what I thought. Isn't there a temperature compensation table for spark timing? Seems to me that factor would be VITAL to tuning an engine for boost.
Yes, there is. But it's not perfect because it can't account for humidity changes. And as you know colder air cannot hold as much moisture as warmer air. So during the early and late summer nights, we have those very cool evenings around here where it can get down into the 50's, but most of the time, there is so much humidity left over from the warm day it pretty much maxes out the humidity gauge at night. But during the fall and winter seasons, the air dries out pretty bad around here even when the temps are getting up into the 50's so what works in the humid cool weather won't work in these conditions.
The exciting news coming from the aftermarket is there are all sorts of new companies getting into making aftermarket MAF sensors that have neat new functions. My only hope is some day somebody comes up with one that has some kind of a humidity sensor on it that can be used to alter the output of the sensor for us boosted guys.
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02:16 PM
Oct 10th, 2008
Will Member
Posts: 14249 From: Where you least expect me Registered: Jun 2000
Yes, there is. But it's not perfect because it can't account for humidity changes.
I know about humidity. I'm just puzzled at why there would be a difference between a warm, dry tune and a cold, dry tune. *Theoretically* one should be able to tune one in and then tweak the temperature compensations to dial the other in and have one tune that works well for both.
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01:11 PM
sardonyx247 Member
Posts: 5032 From: Nevada, USA Registered: Jun 2003
I know about humidity. I'm just puzzled at why there would be a difference between a warm, dry tune and a cold, dry tune. *Theoretically* one should be able to tune one in and then tweak the temperature compensations to dial the other in and have one tune that works well for both.
yeah GM did by spending thousands of hours tweaking it. Stock chips are set for the variances of engine manufacturing, they have to set it for the worst engine to come from the factory and the best, and then dial it all back a little to be safe, and economical. The problem with dyno tunes on other cars is, usally the dyno tunes go for max power just under detination <~~KEY WORD so in car B it may be perfect, car C mabey not enough gains, car D detination=destroyed engine. And like Darth said alot dyno tunes only go after WOT and not everything in between. Take a hyperchip for example, all they did was change timing at the top end, alot of people say it works great, and alot of people say it sucks badly.
and oh yeah thread topic, no I don't want one
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01:50 PM
Oct 11th, 2008
Will Member
Posts: 14249 From: Where you least expect me Registered: Jun 2000
Yes, there is. But it's not perfect because it can't account for humidity changes. And as you know colder air cannot hold as much moisture as warmer air. So during the early and late summer nights, we have those very cool evenings around here where it can get down into the 50's, but most of the time, there is so much humidity left over from the warm day it pretty much maxes out the humidity gauge at night. But during the fall and winter seasons, the air dries out pretty bad around here even when the temps are getting up into the 50's so what works in the humid cool weather won't work in these conditions.
I was curious, so I looked up a psychrometric graph.
At 25 C (~70F) and 10% humidity, air contains about 2g/kg of water As the same temp and 90% humidity, air contains 16 g/kg of water
So the mass fraction of air changes from 0.998 to 0.984. A pure 12:1 AFR will supply 83.3g of fuel for every kg of air. The actual fuel flow required for the .998 concentration is 83.1g, so the ideal is pretty close. The humid case of the same 83.3g of fuel in .984kg of air will give an actual AFR of 11.8 instead of 12:1.
At 90 degrees and 90%, one could have over 30g/kg, which would push the dry weather 12:1 down to 11.64.
That's @$$uming correct metering of the air. The heat capacities of humid and dry air are different and I think that this is much more likely to throw off a hot-wire MAF based calibration than solely the composition of the air.
[This message has been edited by Will (edited 10-16-2008).]
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11:15 AM
PFF
System Bot
Steven Snyder Member
Posts: 3324 From: Los Angeles, CA Registered: Mar 2004
If that is the case, would a speed density system be more useful for situations with varying humidity? Could this be why MAF-only systems were used for a short time, and now MAF/MAP combination systems are used in production vehicles? Speed density air flow calculations would be more tolerant to variations in heat capacity of the air than hot-wire MAF-based calculations.
So what if you want to make a mild turbo mod and want the car to run like a stock turbo car? way away from being the most HP just a nice kick in the pants like most stock cars are set for. then can you make 1 chip and replicate the hell out of it for everyone?
If I made a turbo kit, I should be able to sell a chip for it that will work with anyone who uses my kit. Not going for max HP would not even need dyno time. Just a weekend of getting it to not detonate and drive decent.
So what if you want to make a mild turbo mod and want the car to run like a stock turbo car? way away from being the most HP just a nice kick in the pants like most stock cars are set for. then can you make 1 chip and replicate the hell out of it for everyone?
If I made a turbo kit, I should be able to sell a chip for it that will work with anyone who uses my kit. Not going for max HP would not even need dyno time. Just a weekend of getting it to not detonate and drive decent.
am I right or am I way off?
as far as ive been told your rite you could have one bin for all weathers and all seasons but it would effect the performance of the car aka never be perfect but not going to blow your engine if the weather changes. just like most stock cars detuned for reliabillaty. bad spelling lol
