I currently have a 90-92 speed density 5.7 L ECM. I bought the whole ECM with the chip "custom" burned by Howell Engineering. Well, I took apart the ECM the other day. I popped off the metal plate and removed the long plastic piece that has the actual PROM chip and a small circuit board. It looks like Howell put glue between the board and the PROM, and they did some very fine soldering on the PROM chip to the socket. I asked my friend who is an electrical engineer about it and he said he probably wouldn't be able to desolder it and remove it. Why would Howell do this? Anyways, I have 3 extra blank PROM chips that I will be using for burning, and I also have the entire ECM from an 89 MAF 5.7 Trans Am GTA. My question is, since the long plastic piece (that has the chip and the circuit board) on my 90-92 ECM is pretty much useless, can I use the plastic piece from the 89 with a 90-92 PROM chip in it and plug it into my ECM? Are these "holders" or whatever they're called exactly the same? What about that circuit board that is by the PROM? Are they the same for 89-90? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

I mean this in the nicest way ... I don't think you know what you are talking about. You just described a stock '90-'92 MemCal. The PROM is suppose to be soldered to the carrier and the circuit board is suppose to have that coating. Its all normal.

Tim