84Toyota4x4
Well-Known Member
Is there a link you know of somewhere that explains these diesel tuners and how they work or compares their functions/abilities you could point me to? If not, continue reading and see if you can help me out, haha.
It seems there are the "big brand" tuners out there such at Edge, Banks, Hypertech, Bully Dog, etc which are basically a box you somehow interface with the vehicle and you can load various tunes onto the ECU. Is this done via OBD2 port? I assume the tuner is somehow matched to the ECU and can only be used on one truck at a time? Can these tuners support "custom tunes" loaded onto them and selected as you desire, or are you stuck with "off the shelf" tunes? How are these different from EFI Live I keep hearing so many good things about? It seems that this is more of a "tune it" type setup versus a setup where you get "off the shelf" tunes, am I right? If that's the case, I assume you need to find someone who has experience tuning them, or can it be tuned via logging and sending maps back and forth to a tuner to be tweaked, reloaded, logged, rinse and repeat? Does the EFI Live system also involve some kind of hand held unit to interface with the truck? I am seeing tune tools and scan tools on their website, but I thought most of the tuners also had the ability to scan codes as well? Is that not the case with EFI Live?
I guess my basis for comparison is coming from Subaru cars which had hand held tuners you could use to monitor engine parameters, load different tunes, read engine codes, etc but it was locked to one ECU at a time. It came with off the shelf maps you could chose from which best fit the modifications your vehicle has, but you could also either tune it yourself with their software and load that map, or you could have it pro tuned somewhere and they would load the map onto it for you, but those maps couldn't be shared with other ECUs.
The other Subaru option was "open source" tuning, which is what I was doing when I had mine. It required nothing more than a laptop and appropriate USB to OBD2 cable, and a couple software programs you can download for free online that are developed as "open source" software (hence the name of style of tuning). It allowed the user (either a pro tuner or a vehicle owner who knows what there doing) to use the factory flash mode of the ECU to read and write ROM images that you could tune and change as you wished, to include turning on and off monitor functions that triggered various check engine lights. For instance, I could turn off the CEL code for catalyst efficiency below threshold because my car didn't have one, or I could change the temp threshold the cooling fans kicked on at, I could change the rev limiter, etc.
Now, this kind of brings me full circle to where I am going with this. I have read that SOME trucks with the LBZ engine have tossed EGR flow check engine lights after putting exhaust on them, but not all. I am putting exhaust on mine probably next weekend, so I was basically wondering if there was some kind of tuner that would allow me to tell the ECU to ignore that code IF it even shows up. Of course, down the road, the ability to block off the EGR with no additional codes popping up would be nice as well.
The only other option I have seen would be to buy one of those "finger stick" things and splice into the wiring, and I don't like that idea. The benefit of having the ability to tune the truck and potentially get a little better economy or make a little more power would just be a bonus really. Like I said, with a Subaru, turning a code like that off could be done open source for free by a friend who has the right cable (like me). Is this possible for a diesel engine tuning system as well?
~T.J.
It seems there are the "big brand" tuners out there such at Edge, Banks, Hypertech, Bully Dog, etc which are basically a box you somehow interface with the vehicle and you can load various tunes onto the ECU. Is this done via OBD2 port? I assume the tuner is somehow matched to the ECU and can only be used on one truck at a time? Can these tuners support "custom tunes" loaded onto them and selected as you desire, or are you stuck with "off the shelf" tunes? How are these different from EFI Live I keep hearing so many good things about? It seems that this is more of a "tune it" type setup versus a setup where you get "off the shelf" tunes, am I right? If that's the case, I assume you need to find someone who has experience tuning them, or can it be tuned via logging and sending maps back and forth to a tuner to be tweaked, reloaded, logged, rinse and repeat? Does the EFI Live system also involve some kind of hand held unit to interface with the truck? I am seeing tune tools and scan tools on their website, but I thought most of the tuners also had the ability to scan codes as well? Is that not the case with EFI Live?
I guess my basis for comparison is coming from Subaru cars which had hand held tuners you could use to monitor engine parameters, load different tunes, read engine codes, etc but it was locked to one ECU at a time. It came with off the shelf maps you could chose from which best fit the modifications your vehicle has, but you could also either tune it yourself with their software and load that map, or you could have it pro tuned somewhere and they would load the map onto it for you, but those maps couldn't be shared with other ECUs.
The other Subaru option was "open source" tuning, which is what I was doing when I had mine. It required nothing more than a laptop and appropriate USB to OBD2 cable, and a couple software programs you can download for free online that are developed as "open source" software (hence the name of style of tuning). It allowed the user (either a pro tuner or a vehicle owner who knows what there doing) to use the factory flash mode of the ECU to read and write ROM images that you could tune and change as you wished, to include turning on and off monitor functions that triggered various check engine lights. For instance, I could turn off the CEL code for catalyst efficiency below threshold because my car didn't have one, or I could change the temp threshold the cooling fans kicked on at, I could change the rev limiter, etc.
Now, this kind of brings me full circle to where I am going with this. I have read that SOME trucks with the LBZ engine have tossed EGR flow check engine lights after putting exhaust on them, but not all. I am putting exhaust on mine probably next weekend, so I was basically wondering if there was some kind of tuner that would allow me to tell the ECU to ignore that code IF it even shows up. Of course, down the road, the ability to block off the EGR with no additional codes popping up would be nice as well.
The only other option I have seen would be to buy one of those "finger stick" things and splice into the wiring, and I don't like that idea. The benefit of having the ability to tune the truck and potentially get a little better economy or make a little more power would just be a bonus really. Like I said, with a Subaru, turning a code like that off could be done open source for free by a friend who has the right cable (like me). Is this possible for a diesel engine tuning system as well?
~T.J.
