Ok...You can see my TPI combo here to refresh if you want. I have a few questions.

https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sho...threadid=72591

I'd like to get this combo sorted out before I swap it into my 69 Camaro (sorry 3rd genners). I have a few *mis-matched* parts and I'd like some ideas on what I could do.

TPIS chip: I paid $575 for a level 5 chip recommended by someone who considered them an excellant source. Apparently them aren't too highly thought of here. Without knowing exactly what has been programmed into or out of this chip, any speculation on whether this chip will be as good as stock, worse than stock or will it even let my system run at all? You guys have me really paranoid over this chip now!

110* LSA cam: When I inquired to TPIS about my combo they told me it would work with a custom chip, thus the above chip. My present cam is an XE262 with 218*/224* 110* LSA flat tappet. I came across some extra $$$ so I thought I'd run a hyd roller instead. So, I bought a hyd roller with the same duration and LSA as my flat tappet cam. I do know that a 110* LSA will idle rougher than a 112* LSA but it also brings the torque band down in rpm's too. Thats where my thinking on this came from.

ZZ3 Vette style heads: I know these heads aren't the state of the art but they were the best I could afford $$$ wise at the time. I am not a head porter. I'm doing good the port match. I'm also not rich enough to pay someone to port them or I'd buy me a set of state of the art heads.

Hot rodding is making the best with what you have. Any ideas on what I can do to help me make this setup work? This car will be a driver and I plan of putting many miles on it this coming summer. Is this car going to run worse than a stock L98, as good as one or even have fuel mileage so bad that it's gonna eat me out of house and home? I need ideas here guys. I'm still learning what will & what won't work with TPI/EFI.

Thanks guys!!!

With a TPI intake, I would have gone with a cam one step smaller. My reasons are the TPI intake is going to limit your flow just short of the peak HP that cam is capable of.

I am not sure what you are prepared to change, obviously having those heads ported will help, but the stock intake will still be a limitation. Madmax did a post on siamizing the base and combined with semi-siamised runners would remove the intake as a limitation and would probably be a good match for your cam. Alternatively, you could look at an aftermarket intake like a Superram.

As for the eprom, I am for "burning it yourself" which gives you the ability to tune it to how your engine performs best. Are you using MAF or SD? If it is MAF, most of the MAF guys have great luck with using the ARAP BIN as a base and then optimizing it for their engine. I have one friend running a 383 Miniram, AFR 195 Competition ported heads and a cam one step larger than yours. He's using MAF (cause he wanted to see how far he could push MAF) and has been having very good luck tuning it. The MAF Scalar tables are virtually unchanged from the stock ARAP BIN and most of the tuning has been in the spark advance area.

For SD, there is not a comparable BIN like the ARAP but tuning the VE tables is not that hard. Easily done in a couple of days, and then you can fine tune as your drive. In all honesty, I too (I have SD) have spent far more time tuning my spark advance too; trying to find the combination that provides most power while not causing knock to occur.

The cost of getting into eprom burning is not that much money ($150 for the burner, $100 for the BIN Editor if you go TunerCat and there are plenty of "freeware" for scan tools). You don't even need to use a UV Eraser anymore, you just swap the standard Eprom for a AT29C156 Flash Prom (costs only $1.00 more than the Eprom) and then you'll never need a UV Eraser and probably never "wear it out". Eproms can only be reprogrammed about 25-50 times. A Flash Prom can be reprogrammed virtually indefinitely (in the thousands of times).

I should add, that based on your other post that "tuning" an engine is something you feel very comfortable doing. If so, generally, these are the guys who have the best results in tuning eproms. The concepts are the same, just the method of doing it. The thing that makes burning your own eprom appear overwhelming is that you have so many things that you can alter and play with. But, in all honesty, that is what makes burning your own eprom so attractive; you can do far more inside the eprom than you could ever do with just a carb and a regular distributor.

The comment I generally hear from "old-timers" that have lots of experience with engines, but not EFI is "and I didn't even get dirty doing it!"

Most guys think that you have to get into the actual "machine code" (or the actual instructions). This is not true. In fact, I would say 95% of the guys who burn eproms don't even know the actual Assembly Language and don't need to. Virtually everything you need to do to tune an eprom is done inside "tables". There ARE advantages if you DO get into the actual Assembly Language Programming, but it is not necessary.

Thanks for the reply Glenn. Unfortuantely I'm not much of a tuner. I find it hard to understand how tune a carb and timing so I feel like I'm in way over my head the way it is and due to my job as a truckdriver I don't have a whole bunch of time the way it is. I didn't really want to get into burning my own chips for that very reason. I'm not that good at knowing what flow and timing needs an engine requires at certain loads, rpms, etc. hehe....that's part of the reason for my decision to go with some type of fuel injection. Set it and forget it. What I really need is a program that lets me run my car and the program can optimize my setup. Unfortunately, I don't think one like that exists. So...knowing that TPIS knows more than I do, thats why I paid good money for them to burn me a chip. I knew it was't gonna be 100% optimized for my particular needs since they didn't have my car there on a dyno. I don't even know of a place in my area that has the knowledge to do that. LPE is about a 4 - 5 hour drive from me so maybe, if my car will even run with either a stock chip or this TPIS chip then I'll let Big John or one of his guys dyno it and build me a chip. If I can even afford that. *sigh* Ever heard of floating up a certain creek without a paddle...well...sometimes I feel like I ain't even got a boat!!!

Thanks!!!

I am NO expert in this matter BUT just to let you know, I got a TPIS level 5 chip for my 383 about a year ago and it runs pretty darn good. Granted its probably NOT the optimal chip, BUT it runs perfectly and idles perfectly and I drive it every day!

*WHEW* Thanks for the reply Bob! You don't know what a relief it was to hear that! I realized when I had em do it it wasn't going to be exactly spot on, but then it's a street car. I'd rather enjoy it that to get ever last ounce of performance outta it.

BTW Bob...not knowing how you use your car or how radical your eng is, you getting any fuel mileage from it...presuming it's a street car?

Thanks for easing my mind Bob!

Doug

I don't actually know what my milage is... I have the 4.10 gears in there and never upgraded my speedo and I'm not sure of the exact conversion (i.e. 1 mile on my speedo really equals .85 miles).

My engine is not radical at all (all my stuff is on my web page)... I have the edelbrock heads, zz9 cam and the tpis chip. I have kept all of my emmission equipt in tact and passed PA emmissions with flying colors Infact, I'm gonna be ordering some bigger injectors soon (30lbs I think) and I'm gonna let tpis upgrade my chip for 100 bux.

The way I look at it is like this.... I would LOVE to learn how to program my own chip. From what I understand, its a lot of trial and error. To me that means it'll take ME 20 times longer than usual to figure it out. At least with the TPIS chip, I can still drive my car WHILE I learn. Otherwise, my car would still be sitting in my driveway undriveable.

Good luck!!!