A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

I am seeing a lot of threads, questions and inquiries that relate to the DIY Engine Management out there and I need to address a trend with these issues. Some of the elders will chime in here as well and I need them to, to make sure its not just me. :-\

But, I see a LOT of questions about Uberdata, TurboEdit, even Crome from time to time (lately)...coming from new users. Examples..."This doesnt work, how do I do this, well this sucks, I got Uber and now it sucks, I got a Code 6-40 so why cant I tune" ...and on and on.

Realize users, future users, my clients, Kevin's clients, etc that this is DIY. That stands for DO-IT-YOURSELF. Now dont get me wrong, we are all here to help, but do not jump into this game thinking that these COMPLETELY FREE Rom Editors, Datalogging Softwares, chipping kits, RTP boards, etc are easy and plug and play. They WILL require work, they WILL require you to think and learn, there WILL be problems (especially with older cars). Expect that there will be challenges to overcome and obstacles to find your way around.

This software isnt perfect, but it certainly shouldnt be to blame FIRST, when something goes wrong with your car shortly after adding, TE, UD or other DIY Engine Management. Out of all the threads, PMs personal tuning sessions that I have seen first hand lately...90% of the problems were either User Error (#1) or mechanical problems with the cars. The other 10% are legitimate bugs in the softwares or things that have been known issues and are being worked on (for free) as diligently as possible.

With that said...I await your comments (I will have more). I just want EVERYONE who is interested in getting involved (because thats what it requires) with DIY EM, to know what they are getting themselves into. O0

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Sticky material. I agree 100% Chris.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

as far as im concerned, im still new to diy rom editors, but im using turboedit, i have learned a lot and try to learn as much as possible, there are some aspects i dont think i'll ever fully understand, but despite any problems i have while using turboedit, im still very greatfull that it exsists and i have the option to use such a great tool, im also very thankfull that all you guys who are "gurus" at this ---- are around to help me out and give me advise, and even if i made a post that i was having a problem with turboedit, it may come across that im trying to blame the software, but in reality i love the software, im not blaming it, i just dont fully understand it, so i need help with it, i think that may be how a lot of the guys who are new to the diy rom editors feel......let me end with THANK GOD FOR TURBOEDIT!!!!!! oh and thank jason parker a little bit too :P

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

No Chris, it's not just you; this has been bothering me lately as well. To be specific, I want to start throwing spinkicks everytime somebody says something about a 'boost cut'. Yes, this was a problem before. NO, it does not exist anymore. Several people have successfully used this code. If it were a problem in the code, everyone would be having problems.

On the other hand, there may be some legitimate problems in the code. A recent thread on pgmfi brought up something about the 3.0 bar columns not being accurate. As far as I know, this is the first person who has tried the new 3.0 bar bin. So maybe something really is wrong. Or maybe his car has issues. Who knows. We're going to work with him to see what's going on.

I have no problem helping people understand things (ask anyone who's hit me up on im before). In fact, it makes me feel good to know that I helped someone learn something new. But yeah, I wish people would do some research before jumping in and then getting all pissed off when something goes wrong.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

99% of the problems have with these programs are user error, whether it be with the program itself, burning the chip correctly, or chipping your own ecu. the remaining 1% can be blamed on the programs themselves, but that's the price you pay for paying no price at all :P guranteed, if you search either pgmfi, uber forums, or even the forums here on HMT, you will find the solution to your problems. i've been running uberdata for at least a year and a half personally, and have been chipping ecu's and tuning others cars since this past summer. my point is, it takes a while to learn, you can't just come in and say "i tried uberdata/turoedit/crome/etc. yesterday for the first time and it doesn't work!". if you want to run one of these programs, have someone chip your ecu and burn a basemap if you can't wait to learn it yourself, then learn as you go, that's how i started, as i am definitely not one of the pgmfi pioneers. you're not going to understand fuel maps, timing maps, multipliers, latency, ideal a/f ratio's and how to apply them etc. in a day or even a month more than likely. now that i think about it, i don't even know what the ---- i'm saying or if any of this even pertains to this thread in the first place, but what it boils down to is: read, study, experiment, trouble shoot, and if you still can't find an answer, then post a ------- question.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

This may be user error to on my part.....not really but you guys still may be able to clear it up. http://uberdata.pgmfi.org/forum/inde...;threadid=2927

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

i have no personal experience with a y8 nor have i EVER heard a clear answer to that question (you're not the only one who wonders). the only way to find out is to experiment with different static timing and check with a timing light. you're ignition is based off of the timing in your maps, so if you have it set at 16° btdc, that's what you'll be running, so if you leave the stock p28 uber timing maps in and check your timing and it's advanced, just keep pulling timing until you hit the marks on your crank pulley and you'll have the real answer to what the y8 timing is set at stock. the only problem there, is if the timing maps have the same slope as the z6/p28, if so, it's simple, pull as much timing on the whole map, as you had to at idle, if not spend a whole day tuning an ign map from scratch (and then share it with everyone else ;) ):P

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

This thread expresses my thoughts perfectly.

I know I come off as an -------, that's just how I come off. However, in a "one-on-one" IM setting (I hate PMs by the way), or something I have no problem helping people with legitamate problems. Let me tell you what is NOT "legitamate" problem.

A problem that A) has already been answered B) is brought to me with the user having NO knowledge of what the hell is going on C) the user hasn't look (by downloading and installing) the LATEST *STABLE* software and the LATEST *STABLE* ROM (always available from the http://www.TurboEDIT.org website) and D) the user has not put 5 minute sof time to sit and think about what they're doing.

Outside of this, I'll help anyone with anything, and ya, I take offense when someone says "TurboEDIT sucks!" or "I just installed TurboEDIT and my car runs like ----!" ..because I, and a lot of others have put time, effort, sleepless nights (ask my girlfriend, she ------- HATES even the slightest mention TurboEDIT) and missed days at work just to code. A small bit of appreication by the users expressed by simply respecting the product, and taking the time to understand your issues would be GREATLY rewarded by the developers.

..just my $0.02.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

I'll tell you what I like that I see...

I see that Honda-Tech (as a whole) have turned around from a Hondata loving bandwagon to established members referring noobs to the Uber forums! People are reffering the CRX guys to TurboEdit and not ZDYNE anymore...

I see all you guys referring the DIY stuff at the various other forums you post on...this is great!

See the problem that occurs when someone doesnt take the time to do the proper research and immediately pushes the blame on the product and not on themselves (I used to be guilty of this myself so I can relate). This demotivates the programmers, the PGMFI coders, and even the testers. When they arent motivated to make improvements and search out new features, we all lose.

It just so happens that these guys are all VERY motivated in the past few weeks. Let's keep up the motivation by donating $$$ to these guys. Keep it up by thoroughly testing issues and problems and reporting back with details and conscious effort. Addresses are below to where you can send paypal to these fine programmers.

JParker - TurboEdit - jparker@driftkids.com
Blundar - PGMFI.org - admin@pgmfi.org
Blake - Uberdata - uberteg@cox.net
Synoptic - ECUControl - nic.mailloux@videotron.ca

I will personally be donating to all of these fine gentelmen over $100 total from my website's sales on March 31st. I encourage you all to donate what you can!

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

don't forget john :D

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Will you know i was just messing with you when i told you turboedit sucks right?

ps - d16 > turboedit stil :-*

i personally would never say that any of these software rom editors suck, its more than i could ever imagine of doing. I do however not know how to use them yet, mostly because i havent had a car or the equipement to mess with it yet.

i would always try to look up an issue i could potentially be having on the related forum before I just started pm'ing the ---- outta you guys.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

money sent!! TURBOEDIT thumbs up X10..

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

damn even i agree with everything you guys are saying and i haven't even tried to mess with the maps on uber. i am slowly learning about all the features and when i get a chip burner and WBO2 i will start trying to tune for myself. just about everything is covered either here or the ubersite, and if you can't find an answer then post on the uber forum.
and like you said nothign DIY is plug and play, well almost nothign. everything is gonna take some messing with to get it right. kinda bothers me when people think they can just bolt a turbo up to their car and everything will run like stock from that point on with out tuning and troubleshooting little problems like boost leaks and stuff like that.
whe iget money i will deffinatley donate because i love uberdata, best thing since sliced bread.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

I dont know John's paypal ID, please post it if you do.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

i'm smart, i'm having leed tune up my ecu chip with uberdata :)

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Dont take this the wrong way but this is half the problem. People are too dependent on the Lead guys and don't bother to learn the program, use it or buy the proper equipment. This brings you into problems during motor or turbo upgrades. You have to find someone willing to help you out. Its easy at HMT to find willing people to help but people in general have to learn to be more self sufficient. When I first thought about turboing my car I did as much research as I could. I decided that Uberdata was the way to go. I taught myself to chip my ECU, I bought a burner, I learned the software, (Kevin I will have a definate answer on the Y8 question soon) and I blame myself if something is wrong. I had VTEC CEL issues that Kevin and the Uberdata forum helped with and thats what they are there for, but people are totally leaning on others to tune their cars and are gone afterwards. The issue comes down to money for the most part. If you dont have the time to learn or the money to tune at a dyno or a good tuner you shouldn't use DIY fuel management.

Its nice to be able to lean on your HMT brothers but some of these guys think you owe it to them.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

i see nothing wrong with getting others to set up and tune your car if you don't know how to use the programs and don't feel like investing in all of the equipment and time to learn, hell i reccomend it. it's a lot cheaper to pay someone to tune your car than it is to invest in a wideband, chip burner, romulator, lap top, etc. and some people don't have the desire to learn the programs, nor care to be able to tune their own car, but that doesn't mean that they should be denied the chance to take advantage of a much cheaper alternative to get their car running good.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

I have been running TurboEdit for about a year now and yes I have had some problems(like putting the chip in upside down ::)) but like you said, most of them were my fault. I have tried to read as much as I can about tuning with this program and I find the basics are fairly easy to learn. I am not a computer guy and that has been the main thing that has slowed me up with all this. This year I have bought an Innovative LM-1 WB and now I hope I can finaly get the power out of my ZC that I should be. I was running a BIN file for the 3 bar that I got from the PMFI board last year that worked pretty good but without a WB I was just lost as far as tuning goes. I was signed up for the tuning class for TurboEdit this winter but I don't think it was ever held. The one thing I would ask is that someone would post a method of tuning a car. Like after you install a base map then what do you do next? Work on the WOT AF first? Vacuum AF? When and how do you figure out the timing should be? Timing first or AF first?

I would like to say that I can't thank you guys enough for all the work you have put into these programs. Without TurboEdit my ZC would not be in one piece, it would problably be where my first motor is,in the junk with a BIG whole in it :o

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

That right there is the exact problem. These "Can you make me a basemap?" tunes that are being -----d around the board are not tunes. They're someone guessing at values based on the motor and what psi and injectors they're running.

That's not tuning. That's guessing. Then when something doesn't run right, it's the software's fault, of course, *EVERYONE* knows how to make a basemap, and Internet Tuning is the latest and greatest thing. Just ask Mase...

But I do understand where you're coming from, however, a certain amount of responsibility needs to be taken on the part of the user. Their expectations need to be set that no one is going to tune thier car perfectly over the Internet, hell even decently is a far cry over the Internet. And anyone who know anything about actually tuning a car would know this. It takes time to get a smooth tune. Trial and Error is the only way to get a good tune. This "basemap owns all" philosophy needs to end. :-\


And as far as us helping... I wouldn't mind sitting in on another TurboEDIT Class. There are a lot more members people using the software, and this is great, but we need to make sure people are using it correctly, and the rumors, and misinformation are cleared up as well.

Chris, ...shall we host another class in a couple of weeks? Showcase new feature, put to bed any misinformations, show how-tos, and answer tuning questions?

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

lol, mase whoring himself out on the internet dyno too :D and when i said "i don't see anything wrong with having someone set up and tune", i meant just that, physically tuning the car, not a basemap taht was tuned for a similar set up or what not. i make sure to tell everyone that what they're getting is a basemap, and the car is not going to have a perfect idle or run as good as it should until it's tuned with a wideband.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Kevin I meant really TUNING a setup. Most of these guys think because they got a chipped ECU with a chip with a basemap then they are done. Then the posts start flying about fouled plugs, shitty gas mileage, blown motors, etc. I guess my point is that is the "customer" doesn't fully understand that a long distance tune is really good for nothing but getting to the dyno or to get to someone with a wideband to street tune it. Also it puts the burden on people like you, Chris, or whoever to fix the problem. It just seems like the more business you do the more headaches will come your way if you have uninformed customers. I do stand by my statement that people should learn the program they are using. If you can't take the time to learn how your management works then you probably have a shop installing your ----. I really have no respect for that. If you are building a car, build it, don't pay someone to do it for you.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Example: I threw a basemap in Josh's GSR last night.(His chip ---- the bed but was basemap anyway.) He knows not to beat it and stays out of boost for the most part. Should he buy a burner and learn the program? Yes and he said thats what he is going to do. Any changes to his setup leaves him dependent on someone to reburn his setup. Though He knows that the map is just a get around map. He is goning to have Phiz or Chris throw a tune on it.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

---- that 140 boost eff. and beat the piss out of it :D

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Ill ask Josh if he wants a quick reburn! ;)

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

I've wanted to do this for MONTHS!!

I know BigWig at one point wanted to do this for Uber as well. If someone helps me run the Reflector, I have no problems with setting it all up...

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Ok, I'll get with Dave and get it setup...

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as a newbie looking in. I found it to be too much tech for me, so I let Blundar handle my chippage.

I know what I want done, he just types in numbers. In return, I do his tranny work.

Give me a carb, mech/vac advance dizzy with points, I'll hold school then.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Hahaha..

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

dont you think ther should be a sticky explaning/ what turboedit is /what it dose/what you have to do/

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

haha, ok. Now I can see why you guys get agrivated. ;D

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Start here: http://www.pgmfi.org/twiki/bin/view/Library/WebHome

then check out www.turboedit.org and www.-------------

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

I'm 100% with you guys.
Turboedit has helped me alot and there is no better deal if you want to tune your...
I have since moved on to OBD1 and I'm running crome.
Right now I'm almost done tuning my turboed ZC with a WBo2...I'm also busy testing the motorlla 2.5 bar map on crome....it runs pretty good right now. I'll be done this week and post the bin on pgmfi ;)

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Yo ! i personally can admit to asking " hey , anyone have a good basemap?" but thats becuase ive been lazy. however, lately i have found myself doing ---- on my own and learning how to make basemaps. I still have problem but rather than say " TE sucks [and i never d=had] i try and figure it out.

Im glad there are people like blundar/rory/turboEF9/xenocron/projecteg/leed and other. without them i or anyone else for tha matter would be SOL.

thanks guys and i will be donatiing soon!

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

i'm with you on this one...i've talked w/ a few folks and had a couple cars brought to me to be tuned that had issues that had i not ironed out prior to tuning would surely have been blamed on the diy engine management. there is an expectation that it's going to fix their issues w/o addressing the issues before hand...it's the answer to the wrong question.

as for a turbo edit class...that's cool. crome and uber seem very straight forward, but i haven't had the patience to sit down and learn turbo edit yet.

Re: A trend I'm seeing that has me concerned...
 

Hahaha, I seperate some windows, and all of a sudden TurboEDIT isn't straight forward... Sheesh. ::D :D :D

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Yea, its funny how that is. If I had a OBD0 car to run I would use turboedit a little more often, but it seems to have a lot of features on the new version that I really like. ;)

But I have to agree with almost everyone in the thread so far. I think that people should do a little more research before asking questions, but then again the new guys don't know where to go and we always click on the threads that involve uber or turboedit, so we are the ones always answering questions. The way I see it is if we atleast help some of the people learn the program just a little bit, then they will take care of the rest with research. I know it does get old, and I hate all the threads asking the same damn questions over and over. I really think there should be a sticky on every forum that says "uberdata questions and asnwers" and it links you right to specific problems on the uberdata website. Same goes with crome and turboedit. I know we are suppose to keep the questions on the uberdata forum and what not, but this way people are both getting their questions answered that were answered like 2 years ago in a prior thread. I have already put together a little FAQ thing that could be stickied and links to specific problems.

Ok I am done now.