Good Morning Ladies and Gents

i was looking at getting a plug in tuner to give my truck a mild tune for towing purposes and I get all the pros and cons but I have yet to see this question asked or addressed:

Considering the way the VGT works and its use or lose it( ie break down) does a mild tune that gets things a little hotter, spools the turbo up more and asks the engine to work in a slightly higher rpm range going to help the overall reliability or am I just wishful thinking?

I have never used a tuner before on a diesel so this may be a dumb question, but feel free to humor me

 

I believe most of the milder tunes will lower your EGT's a little under normal driving; thus, it won't help in heating things up unless you really run it.

Mark

 

OK I get that but will the lower egt's help or hurt this turbo? I do know lower egts are supposed to be better but does that affect engine reliability at all? for better? or worse?

Just thinking out loud, thanks for the reply

 

Typically, what I have come to find is that a GOOD tuner will increase the reliability of your vehicle depending on your driving style. If you go beat the hell out of it, you're going to kill it. However, if you tune it, and drive like you have always driven, you will run the vehicle more efficiently, getting better mpg and increasing the life. As far as the turbo, you are still going to have to romp on it once in a while to blow it out, tuned or not tuned, daily driving no matter how well tuned is not going to clean up the powerstroke.

I just finished installing the tuner on my truck a few days ago, Matt at Long Island Performance did my SCT calibration, and right now I am running the race file which makes the truck absolutely fly, but probably not the best tune for daily driving. I would give him a call, and if you tell him what you want your truck to do you will be very happy having it tuned. This is my first tuner on a diesel too, and I was amazed, but after doing my research I would recommend against the plug and play tuners. Let someone do a custom SCT tune for you, make the tranny shift how you want it to, and set any other parameters you want. Good luck, hope you have fun with it.

 

psdiesel, thanks for the info, where on long island is he located?

Does anyone know of a good custom tuner closer to Massachusetts?

its my daily driver so I don't romp all; over it all the time at least once a day I open it up on the highway so I can blow it out but as a rule on the daily i never push it over say 2500 rpm for extended driving which is close to 95mph in my 2003 F350... shhh dont tell the police

 

You don't have to run it fast to clean it out. Heck, I hold the break down, drop the hammer and wait a couple seconds. Then she breaks the back tires loose and winds up nicely. Once wound up you let off the brake a bit and let her walk down the street sideways. Not fast, but REALLY fun. ROFLMAO It's amazing what an 8000 pound truck can do!!

 

sounds like a blast but an accident waiting to happen knowing my luck!!!