When do you consider your car's ecm "tuned"? Really, this is not a joke!! The more I learn about ecm tuning, the more needs done to my chip. I can get drive ability and a/f ratio better than stock. But there seems to be an endless amount of things I can do to make a better tune. So when do YOU call it quits and stuff the ecm back under the dash?

If you have a Jeep like me...NEVER

whenever you feel satisfied with it.

It doesn't end if you caught the bug (sounds like you did).
Oh, and my ecm is half in half out. It hangs down just enough to get to the zif socket and my little cherry electronics binary switch for switching between the 8 stored calibrations on the fly.

Argeed,
I Don't think it will ever end if you like to do it..... Its the middle of winter and I keep finding reasons to try different things just to drive my car.
Lately I have been scaling down my A/E - Car is very responsive, I just want to see how little I can get away with.

Happy tuning.

When you've dinked with every thing you can dink with and have them all optimised.
And then start all over to make sure you didn't miss anything.
In some stuff, with no true MAT corrections, there is no end to having it correct.

I agree but there has to be a line. There must be some way to confirm the ecm is 100% tuned. Otherwise we'll all be tuning the same engine 10 years from now. I guess that's fine with me because it'll take that long to finish modifying my engine. I have caught the bug, about 3 years ago. I think the point I'll be happy with the chip is when I'm done modifying my engine. It seems like every little thing I do to the engine the ecm needs compensated. I gain power and drive ability with every ecm "tweek".

What do you consider 100% tuned?

I agree with that also. I like to start from scratch sometimes. If I haven't messed with my car for awhile or something it helps to go though the tune. Once I'm done, I'll redo it again to double check my work.
I'm also aware of stuff like that. With that (statement) I wonder if it's possible to get a 100% tune w/o knowing assembly language? I have realized that assembly is over my head. Don't think I'll ever learn it. I'm a HS dropout. I made straight f's from 6th grade up to 10th. So I guess 110% is impossible, for me....

I kinda think 100% tune is what you make it so to speak.

A perfect "tune" in my book may not be what you like your car to react or drive like.

I just tried out that little patch I got in an e-mail and so far so good .
Definatly like having a more useful IAT table.

Its done whenever you think its done.

I tune mine till I feel its right, and I leave it alone unless there is something I am unhappy with like performance, mileage, or theres a driveability problem that pops up someday. Then I'll make a change.

If Grumpy and RBob are full time, then I'm part time, and you must be non union.
I too only tune when there is a problem. Funny thing is that when I tune out a problem it's usually a mechanical problem (fuel pressure, burned plug wires, un-known timing, bad gas), lol.

YOU ARE DONE WHEN GM OFFERS YOU A JOB IN R & D. i really think it is when your knowledge is to a point where 99% knowledge produces the result that knowledge offers. i think i recall a car that was recalled lately(nissan) that stalled in traffic. fix was to recallibrate ECU. even the pros can improve on calibrations as needed.

No its not...

If you have come this far with tuning, then you have the brains to learn assembly. Agreed its not easy Tim. I first learned assembly in 11th grade.. in 1983-84. Picked it up again in Tech school in 94. Still.. its confusing for me. What you need to do is just start working with it. Really.. its more becoming familiar with the nomenclature than any thing. Like the tuning curve your well aware of.. the same curve exists with assembly.. just keep plugging at it.

Then.. on to base2 to base8 converting.. and back. or.. binary to hex.

Hehe.. BW

Just to put some numbers to things.
On one code for the GN, I had it really close in about 2 dozen chips. The first 747 I did, which was back before Programming 101 was over 400. I'm on chip 57 for the truck, but most of that's been tranny changes (PCM). There were a series of altered logic chips for the MAF on the GM, that probably ranged in several hundred, but that was going where no one's been before.

If you want to try developing a new code, ie all new. You can figure on 100 or so on the bench before starting the car. Doing patches and trying new things, the mind she boggles on how many that'll take.

One probably on good day, might get close in a dozen chips. But, that's not having a *What If* attitude. Any one can say close enough, and be happy. Trouble is when you really get to see what good really is, for some of use the motive is if it's that good, I wonder if I can make it better. As you learn how things interface, then the combos grow expendentialy. Then there are the personal goals one can set. ie, can I break 30 MPG, can I run on 87 with little to no lose of HP, what benefits can I see from say running a low timing chip, or can I use Open Loop more effectively.

Or maybe try some other ecm. Maybe try one system back to back with another. Or just trying something new.

To some everyday holds the opportunity to learn something new, for others since they know it all so have no interest in needing or wanting to learn anything. Lots of folks like to do just enough to get by, and not a whisker more.

Once ya get into the Zen end of things, it all gets readily apparent. We each have a combination of gifts that we can use. You can do what you will with those gifts, and that'll define who you are.

I have tried to lean more(assembly) but always hit a roadblock. Maybe someone can make a post with a snipet of code. Give the "logic" and then quiz. I'll be making progress once I can answer questions. Have a better idea? I would love to learn it but need to jump in.somewhere....
(reading endless manuals has not helped, need some "hand on")

Based on the posts, think I have the official answer.

For most people 100% tuned means fixing the problems that got you involved with "chip burning".

For others, ecm tuning is a hobby. There will never be an end.

agreed?

after reading many threads i have to agree, i want to run a 350 and it won't run great with a 305 chip, so it would take me some chip tuning to get it to good performance,

and the hobby would be, the prominator, with ideal settings for specific conditions, winter, fall/spring, summer, drag, auto-x, gas milage (long trips), city performance, letting the kids drive, and on and on.........

What did the patch do? Expand the table rather then jsut have the lower limit? Include one for timing as well? I was experimenting with some revised IAT code that expanded teh tabe and doubled the resolution but after calibrating the sensor and seeing how far off a cheap OEM RTD is i sort of jsut scrapped it alltogether. This probably explaines why the changes I made to teh IAT table in my 8063 really never seemed to work at low and high temps. Teh damn thing is jsut too far off. MAybe Ill have to go buy a quality RTD of the same specs. and use that in the IATs place.

You need to survey alot of people to draw that conclusion, and not just here, otherwise this is just a working definition for you.

Other then for different octane levels (or fuels), it can all be had on one chip, from what I've seen.

:lala:

I agree! There is endess reasons to do some ecm tuning. I have hauled stuff before with my formula. Ya know, the usual....like a minivan using a tow strap. Running richer helped the engine.
OR (*** forbid) sombody uses my car. I can set the mph/rpm limit to something more reasonable in that case.
Missouri can be 70*f one day and 30*f the next. Technically you can tweek things out for that. If you was racing at gateway then it's a must.

This is going to sound corny no matter how I say it so I'll just let it flow.
Like most that get into the hobby now a days, I too just wanted to get my engine running better than it was with the stock chip.
Then I got excited about the endless possibilities. The kick start was the tcc controls and ability to adjust everything that GM had to play with.
My car is like nobody else’s and it's because I was given the ability to play *** over it. This is an automotive engineers dream. Even suspension and brake engineers like the idea of having the ability to make a non-stock engine run like an OEM setup. This is why I haven't stopped. Then given the ability to data log has opened up another door to me for extra fine tuning and car processing. I have the ability to analyze the effective input/output speeds and access the efficiency of my torque converter to optimize the rest of my car be it drag racing or just picking a good transmission with the proper gears. Heck, the data has helped me cut my 60' times down to 2.01's on all-season 245/50-16 tires in full street trim. I'm not bragging but compared to my past best of 2.2+ a few years ago I think it's a big improvement.
Using these tools I'm in control of my future and nobody can deny me the fact that my accomplishments are mine alone and not shared with anyone else. To DIY is to be free from guilt while paying to copy another person's combo is nothing more than a compliment to the person you've copied. This is why I know the DIY and Power adder boards on this forum are looked at as being full of elite.
This is why there is no end. I'll consider my car's tune as it sits only when I have the ability to get on a dc electric engine dyno and test everything from ignition systems to fuels and oils. Then I might slow down .