I only have to pay the $45 if I want another tune added. I had issues with mine originally and just sent it back. Fixed and returned no charge. Now had I the hardware, and the know how, I would be doing this all on my own. But if I plugged my computer into my truck...i would probably be watching it go up in a ball of flames. HA!

 

I am not sure where you are going with this, yes you have the right to ask anything, but do you deserve an answer?

If the lawn takes 20 mins, or 2 hours.. was it done, was the price the same as the other guys, what is your time worth..

I do believe that tunning your own truck would be fun, but I am not at a point where I would risk tunning my truck. IF I happen to do something wrong, what will be my out of pocket expense to repair/replace/rent until I repair and ect.

 

ABSOLUTELY!

I went from about 18mpg to almost 23mpg, (if I behave which isn't often)

And the smile factor is also worth it.

 

ok let me try another way, to do a properly built tune you have to have that respective vehicle on a dyno and spend hours tuning sections then re dynoing it and then that tune is custom tuned to your truck. unless any tuner did that for each and every truck they are using a "blanket tune" for everyones truck, now after talking to someone and they say they want say a firmer or softer shift pattern then the tuner knows to go in and change the shift points or firmness etc.

you all say stuff like dont buy an edge because its a generic tuner and not custom tuned to your truck but in reality there are more people out there running an edge than anyone running a custom chip simply by sheer size the edge then comes with a certain amount of pre-engineered tunes and from what i can tell is that is probably where most tuners started from, took a read of the factory stock bin and compared it to an edge or some other companys tune and then figured out what the two tunes have differently and started adjusting from there.

i will put it as clear as i possibly can, is each individual tune worth the asking price that the custom tuners are asking and if so why?


p.s.
with your lawn comment "If the lawn takes 20 mins, or 2 hours.. was it done, was the price the same as the other guys, what is your time worth.."

if the price was the same as the other guys and they all new about it that would be price gauging and they have laws specifically against that in the business world, not that it always gets abided but i remember a king of the hill cartoon where all the local propane company's heads got together and started raising prices because people could only buy propane from them this caused the "propane" commission to come in and put a stop to it because it is illegal even though people were paying for it.

so if all the neighborhood kids that do lawns got together and started raising there prices would you then continue paying it just because that was the "going" price or would you say enough is enough and do it yourself or would you talk to all the neighbors and get them to say we are not paying this anymore?

i am refering simply to the lawn comment for this statement

 

how many tunes do you have and do you think each individual tune is worth the individual price? if so why?

maybe i started this wrong i do that sometimes, especially when i am tired.

 

Are you asking if tunes from a custom tuner are better and worth the extra $ over canned tunes from places like Edge, Bullydog, Superchips etc? If so, that's been hashed out for longer than I've been around here. If you don't believe they are better and don't want to take the word of people that say they are, then you'll have to buy both yourself. But I have yet to see anyone that has switched from an off the shelf tuner to something from PHP, DP, TW, etc say anything less exciting that how the new tunes made them **** their pants.

As for business side, maybe someone who has started their own is willing to take the time to explain to you how it works. I bet if you called the inventor of the Turbomaster, Clay@Riffraff, Diesel O-rings to name a few and ask why they charge so much for something that doesn't look like it should be expensive they will let you in on how it takes weeks and months to develop something, several prototypes, a lot of testing, advertisement, packaging, finding a reliable supplier, to get something to market. To keep it short, it's not a matter of spending 2 hours in the garage making something and saying here, buy this. You have to test it, makes sure you can get the parts, the machine work, the packaging, etc before selling it. Because if it ends up being problematic or you can't keep stock, words gets around and you'll be ruined. In the end, these guys aren't making as much as you think they are. But they have to paid for their time, knowledge, and rewarded for coming up with an idea on their own. It's business. No ones stopping you from making your own stuff if you don't like the prices. Not to mention, what other countries have all this stuff readily available to them like we do? Go to a site, pick of the phone, break out the card, and viola...you have parts. Used to be you made your own stuff.

 

I guess the way I look at it you have 3 options:

1: buy a Superchips, Edge, BullyDog, etc. and get a mild performance increase

2: buy a custom tuned chip from known tuner, get far better performance increase and driveability, at a slightly increased cost, with ability to go back for improvement when changes have been made on the vehicle

3: get your own software and tune your own vehicle

These questions you ask are only relevant to a completely stock truck (except intake & exhaust). You start making changes like turbo, injectors, HPOP, transmission; you don't have much choice but to run a custom tuned chip. You can't buy anything from Banks to run single shot injectors.

The reason for the cost is as mentioned before. At the equipement manufacturer I used to work at, we had seed hoppers made from plastic. They are a relatively cheap item being made from plastic. They are made from injection molding, and to get a form for that is at or above $100k by the time you have a few prototypes made and get the tolerances exactly where you need them. You cannot charge the first person that purchases a seed hopper $100k, then the rest of the people that make purchases the cost of material. You'd never get the first one sold.

 

I can't vouch for the company for which I am currently working, but I can say that in my own personal tuning (that I do locally) that what I do is completely open. If I'm tuning your truck, you can sit there and watch what I am doing. It's no secret to me because it's not like anyone that is watching what I am doing is understanding what is going on anyway.

 

so you are a tuner then? ok so you tell me are company ****'s tunes worth it to you would you pay them said asking price each tune? or would you tune yourself? i am by no means a tuner but i am familiar with binary editor and a few others that i used while playing with my tweecer and my focus.

and if you were closer and i brought my truck to you to tune and i was sitting watching it i feel i have a comfortable skill level to be able to watch what you were doing, would you feel threatened by that? if i then took your tune you did for my truck to my home town and started "copying" that tune and selling it would that be justified? (not saying thats what the custom tuners are doing but they all had to start somewhere and look at some tune already done, to get an idea of what needs to be done)

 

Have you ran the Edge yet, versus the a Custom tune?

As far as a custom Tune, I am not qualified for an exact answer, but when you order from a PHP or my favorite DP, they ask for your PCM code, as well as your VIN, so although there may be a "shared" program, it is only shared amongest certain VINS, I believe this is where you get the performance gain as compared to buying the Genaric stuff, like Edge.

 

actually they ask for your vin and pcm code so they can exactly identify what your truck is equiped with and then access the "catch" code or strategy as some call it. two identical trucks could use 2 different "strategies" and if you load one into the incorrect computer can reak havac, i found out on the focus, the orginal strategy for my focus was saar6 the first one i got was like saar4 or something it didnt run right.

the generic stuff like edge identifies that either when you order it or when you plug it in and then it "loads" the proper strategy. it cant work any other way if it doesnt load the proper strategy then it wont work right, the edge then locks out all other strategies so you cant slap it in another truck but they are still there.

the performance gain comes from tweaking a tune, so say you have an edge and a specific field in the bin file says over boost at 24psi(stock over boost point i believe) and you edit that tune to say over boost 28psi then you dont have the computer triping out when it hits 24psi instead it waits till it sees 28psi(this may be a little over simplified but it can be that easy when changing things around) high idle is litterally one field in the bin that is edited from 700 to 1400 or whatever you want to put in there(that was the first tune i gave my focus, 1200 rpm idle just to learn)

 

Flame away.

 

This thread is boarderline on getting closed.

To the OP if you feel comfortable tuning your own truck buy the software and do it yourself. If not then pay for the custom tunes such as myself and many others here have done. I personally am not comfortable tuning my own truck so the $45 per tune is well spent for a professional to do it.

Would you rather have a jack of all trades do electrical work in your house or have a lic electrician with the knowledge and the insurance to back him up?

 

It's done, Jim.

 

megawatt00
why would this thread be dangerously close to being closed? am i hitting to close on something? seriously i am not trash talking anyone i am not calling any name or anything like that so what would it be violating? you yourself said you were subscribing to this thread was that a threat to me to stop posting? if you want to close it fine, but im just going to post up asking you why you closed a perfectly valid thread? etc.

sorry i do not feel this thread is violating any forum rules, it might be upsetting some people because they dont want to have to justify there purchase if thats the case simply dont post.