We probably get 20 emails a week of the form:

“Dear Moates,

My name is ________ and I have a _________ Ford.  Can I use your products to tune my car/truck/van/etc. ?”

Identifying J3 Port ECMs

Our Ford products (F3 chip module, Quarterhorse) will work on pretty much any ECM that has a J3 port.  This is 95% of 87-2004 vehicles.  Most ECMs have a black plastic protective cover over the J3 port.  The picture below shows what a J3 port looks like with the protective cover removed:

Again, our hardware products will work on any 1, 2, or 4 bank EECIV or EECV ECM that has a J3 port.

Software Support

I bet you thought that was too easy!  It is…

Our HARDWARE works on just about everything Ford ever made with a J3 port,

***BUT software support for Fords is not as guaranteed***

There are three applications that are known to work well with our hardware – TunerPro, EEC Editor and Binary Editor.  Each application supports different vehicles.  Some vehicles are supported by all three, some vehicles are supported by only one, some vehicles are supported by NONE.

We need to know some information about your ECM in order to be able to tell whether there is support for your vehicle.  This information is the “Strategy” (or “operating system”) that your ECM uses, which can usually be determined from the “Box code.”  Your “box code” can normally be found in the center of the label with the barcode where the wire harness connects to the ECM.  See picture below.

Once you have found your box code, you can take a look at the box code-strategy cross reference to determine which strategy your ECM uses.  The list of supported strategies will then tell you which (if any) software supports your ECM.  If you can’t find your ECM, please email [email protected] and remember when you contact us inquiring about vehicle support, please include the “box code” pictured above!  Without this information, we cannot provide you with accurate information about software support.

Although you can use our Ford hardware ( F3 Jaybird QuarterHorse ) on just about any 86-2004 Ford, software is much more lacking.  Currently (2021) there are three primary software packages that support our Ford hardware – Binary Editor, TunerPro RT, EEC Editor.  Each software package has a different set of ECMs that it works with, although there is quite a bit of overlap on more popular strategies.  US ECMs are best supported – Australian ECMs and European models are quite lacking in comparison.

There is a section of this site dedicated to answering what you need for some common specific Ford vehicles.

Note that most of the information about software support on this page will deal with STRATEGIES not processor codes.  We also have a box code-strategy cross reference.  If you don’t see your box code listed there, we will generally be able to help you figure out which strategy your ECM uses most of the time from its box code – send an email to [email protected].  Worst case, you will have to read the stock computer (with QuarterHorse or F2E ) and do the reverse engineering work to make a definition yourself.

The following information is REASONABLY up to date as of 2020.  (I will try to update it periodically)

Binary Editor Supported Strategies

The best way to find out if your strategy is supported in Binary Editor is to download the software and install it!  Let it update itself.  It should download the latest and greatest strategies available.   You can also take a look at the strategies download page at EECAnalyzer.net for more information. Strategies are stored in “C:\Binary Editor\DEF” in a unique folder for each definition.

Please note: datalogging and editing are controlled by the same definition file in BE.  You will have to load the definition along with a tune file to get an accurate idea of what exactly is supported.

Please also note: some definitions (that end in “.xls”) can be used by anyone with the software.  Other strategy files (those with the “.cry” extension) require additional registration with their author to use them. Derek Fenwick is a particularly excellent strategy author to look for.

Supported Strategies:

(This list last updated 1/3/2018 – always check http://www.eecaalyzer.net for a current list!!!)
Free strategies (vehicles) included “out of the box” with standard version of Binary Editor:

CBAZA (94-95 Mustang/Cobra V8)
CDAN4 (96-97 Mustang and Cobra 4.6L V8, others)
ELK1 (? – check)
U2L1 (? – check)
FBJR3 (? – check)
GUF1 (Fox body MAF – auto)
GUFA (Fox body MAF – Cali?)
GUFB (Fox body MAF – manual)
HWAD4 (? check)
KMAK6 (? – check)
LA (? check)
LA3 (? check)
LB2 (? check)
LHBH1 (? check)
LUX0 (87-88 Mustang 5.0 speed density)
NVMG8 (? check)
PE (? check)
VEX1 (94-95-ish MAF trucks)
VHAF7 (? check)
VP1 (? check)

(This information was gathered from looking at http://www.eecanalyzer.net/index.php/strategies-calibrations and is provided without any guarantee for fitness. You should always check compatibility with your application before purchase. This is simply a list of free strategies available for download. They were not checked, validated or otherwise examined in any way. Do not assume that these files have all the parameters you require to change or have complete logging capabilities before examining them yourself, which can be done with the free trial version of BE)

Binary Editor – Core Tuning Strategies:

Core Tuning offer (arguably) the most comprehensive support for a wide range of vehicles out of all the software which works with the QuarterHorse.  Many definitions for popular EECV applications which are not publicly available otherwise are available on a paid commercial basis from Core. You can purchase them from www.coretuning.net if you are interested.

Here is a list of their supported strategies:  http://www.coretuning.net/index.php/strategy

Important: it is almost always cheaper to buy a “QuarterHorse bundle” from CoreTuning directly versus buying hardware from us and then software from them.

Binary Editor – Derek Fenwick’s definitions

1DEB – Australian EB series 5.0l XR8
1DGA – Australian EB series 5.0l XR8
2DCA – Australian EB series 5.0l
A4A1 – 94 Lincoln Towncar
AHACB – covers a variety of trucks, e.g. VEX1, WAY1. HOG0
ANY1 – covers a variety 4.0L ’93/94 Explorers and Rangers
C1A1 – ’92/93 2.3L Mustang (C1A1 and D1L1 catch codes)
CAW0 – ’91/94 F series TCM (CAW0 catch code)
CBAZ0 – ’94/95 5.0L trucks and 3.8L Thunderbirds
CBAZA – ’94/95 5.0L Mustangs
CCAQA – ’94/95 4.6L Thunderbird, Cougar and 3.8L Mustang
CCAQE – ’94/95 4.6L Thunderbird, Cougar and 3.8L Mustang
CDAN4 – ’96/97 4.6L Mustang, Thunderbird, Cougar, Grand Marquis, Crown Victoria, Towncar and 3.8L Mustang, Thunderbird, Cougar
CDAN6 – ’96/97 4.6L Grand Marquis, Crown Victoria, Towncar
CNAB1 – ’98 4.6L F series
CZAJL – Lincoln Mk VIII
CZAW0 – ’94/95 3.8L Thunderbird
DC – ’87 5.0L Mustang (DC and DE catch codes)
GHAJ0 – 2.0L Escort Cosworth
GSALC – ’91 3.8L and 5.0L Thunderbird
GSALI – ’92/93 3.8L and 5.0L Thunderbird
GURE ’89/90 3.8L Thunderbird, Cougar
LHBL0 – ’93/96 covers a variety of Lightnings and other trucks
LHBL1 – covers some trucks (e.g. P2Y0 catch code)
LHBL2 – covers some trucks (e.g. ALT0 catch code)
LUX0 – ’87’88 5.0L Mustang
NVAF91 – a variety of Australian EF series 5.0L
NVMG84 – a variety of Australian EL series 5.0L
NVMG85 – a variety of Australian EL series 5.0L

To purchase a registration to use any of these definition files for Binary Editor contact him directly.
be sure to include your machine code from Binary Editor’s Register >> Strategy Menu, type the “Strategy Name” just as its listed above
in the “Name of creator of the Strategy file” type in “Derek” with no quotations.

Strategy files are $25 each and gives you the ability to tune an unlimited amount of vehicles with that ECU strategy.

TunerPro / TunerPro RT Supported Strategies

TunerPro RT supports the QuarterHorse as of version 5.0 but QH and strategy support is still sparse.  There is extremely solid support for GUFB (A9L / Fox body) and CBAZA (T4M0 / J4J1 / 94-95 Mustang). You can download the TPRT5 specific files here from our site.

Most of the EECV support has been done by Michael Ponthieux.  EFI Dyno Tuning has a wealth of information and definitions for using TunerPro for tuning.  There is a comprehensive list of definitions along with starter bins for various conversions.

EEC Editor – Supported Strategies

The best way to find out what strategies are supported by EEC Editor is to download and install it!  After you have updated the software, you can see all supported strategies by looking in the directory “C:\Program Files\EEC Editor\definitions”  which contains a file for each strategy EEC Editor can open and edit.  You can see which strategies support datalogging with the QuarterHorse by looking at the directory “C:\Program Files\EEC Editor\dlms”  Please download the software and play with your computer’s definition / DLM prior to purchase as not all strategies are equally complete.  EEC Editor is not currently (2021) very actively developed but it does have support for some vehicles that none of the other software packages do.

Supported strategies:

1990F250.DEF (edit only)
1DDB.DEF (edit only)
1deb.def (edit AND datalog)
1dec.DEF (edit only)
1dga.def (edit only)
2dbd.def (edit only)
2dca.DEF (edit only)
2dda.DEF (edit only)
3dea.def (edit only)
a9u2.def (edit only)
AGANF.def (edit only)
AKAM9.def (edit only)
akama.def (edit only)
AKAMH.def (edit only)
akc0.DEF (edit only)
AOAG3.def (edit only)
ATAN0.def (edit only)
bnaf9.DEF (edit only)
boae4.def (edit only)
c3p2.def (edit only)
C3W1.DEF (edit only)
cbaz0.def (edit only)
cbaza.def (edit AND datalog)
CCAQA.def (edit only)
CCAQE.def (edit only)
CDAN4.def (edit only)
CDAN6.def (edit only)
CDAP3.def (edit only)
cdba4.def (edit only)
cfak7.DEF (edit only)
cmai3.def (edit only)
cmai7.def (edit only)
cmai9.def (edit only)
cmba0.def (edit only)
CNAB0.def (edit only)
CNAB1.def (edit only)
cqab1.def (edit only)
crai8.def (edit only)
CRAIA.def (edit only)
CRAIB.def (edit only)
CRAIC.def (edit only)
craj0.DEF (edit only)
ctbae.def (edit only)
cvae6.DEF (edit only)
cvae7.DEF (edit only)
CVAF1.def (edit only)
cvba0.DEF (edit only)
cvba2.DEF (edit only)
d9s.DEF (edit only)
DA1.def (edit AND datalog)
GVAKA.def (edit only)
gvakb.def (edit only)
gufa.def (edit AND datalog)
gufb.def (edit AND datalog)
gufc.DEF (edit AND datalog)
gure.def (edit AND datalog)
hug02.DEF (edit only)
HWAD3.DEF (edit only)
icy1.def (edit only)
kmak6.def (edit only)
kqad2.DEF (edit only)
kraf5.def (edit only)
LA3.def (edit only)
LB3.DEF (edit only)
m2y.def (edit only)
maag4.DEF (edit only)
MMAH0.def (edit only)
MPAM1.def (edit only)
mrad2.DEF (edit only)
mrad3.DEF (edit only)
odal1.DEF (edit only)
ODAL1.def (edit only)
OMAD3.def (edit only)
OMAD4.def (edit only)
OMAE1.def (edit only)
OMAE2.def (edit only)
p2y0.def (edit AND datalog)
PCAG2.def (edit only)
PCAG6.def (edit only)
pf3.def (edit only)
pybd3.DEF (edit only)
pycl5.def (edit only)
PYCL7.def (edit only)
QAAC5.def (edit only)
qbaa0.DEF (edit only)
rbadb.def (edit only)
rbaed.DEF (edit only)
REAC3.def (edit only)
reac4.DEF (edit only)
RGAF2.def (edit only)
rhagb.def (edit only)
RQAD6.def (edit only)
rtai0.DEF (edit only)
rtai1.def (edit only)
rtaj0.DEF (edit only)
RVAF1.def (edit only)
RVAF3.DEF (edit only)
rvafa.DEF (edit only)
rvafb.DEF (edit only)
rvai1.DEF (edit only)
RWAI2.def (edit only)
ryae0.def (edit only)
RYAF0.def (edit only)
RYAF1.def (edit AND datalog)
ryak1.DEF (edit only)
RYBE2.def (edit only)
RZAN0.def (edit only)
RZAO1.def (edit only)
rzao2.def (edit only)
RZASA.def (edit only)
rzaso.def (edit only)
tauf0.DEF (edit only)
VET1.DEF (edit only)
way1.def (edit only)
X2S2.def (edit only)

Australian EEC Support list

Tuner Pro seems to be the weapon of choice for most Australian EECs.  You can get more info and an updated list of supported cars, box codes and strategies here:

Australian EECs : http://www.tiperformance.com.au/technical.html

PCMHacking.net also has some Ford information.

Questions you may have coming in:

• How do I determine what is needed? Keep reading!
• What vehicles are compatible? Hardware will work with all 2004 and older Ford vehicles with a J3 port, depending on software support.
• What are the capabilities of Moates hardware? Realtime tuning, logging live data, burning chips, switching between multiple programs
• What hardware and software options are available, and at what cost? Keep reading!
• How do I learn to tune EEC? What learning resources are available? Keep reading!  We’ll provide references.

Vehicle Compatibility

• Hardware is compatible with all year/model Ford vehicles that have a J3 port.  This generally covers 86-2004 model years.
• If you already have a binary file (bin) or hex file (hex) that is tuned for your vehicle. you can use one of our chips.
• If you need to make changes (tune) to get your vehicle where you want it, you are limited by software support.
• Some ECMs are simply not supported in software that works with our hardware because of lack of definition information.
• It’s important to check for software support before purchase. If you have an uncommon vehicle (for example, a 1995 Festiva) you may be out of luck with our products.
• We need certain information to tell if your vehicle is supported. (click)  Email us to check before purchase!

Overview of Tuning Process

• Determine your target vehicle boxcode and strategy.
  • The Boxcode is typically a 3 or 4-digit letter/number code on the EEC computer. ( ‘A9L’  or ‘T4M0’ for example)  This represents a calibration for a particular engine/transmission using a particular strategy.
  • A Strategy is the set of procedures that the ECM follows to run an engine.  Combined with a calbration, this determines how the engine will operate.
    • The strategy will determine things like whether a MAF or MAP sensor is used, how spark and fuel are calculated, how idle is controlled, etc.
    • Each strategy needs a definition (or ‘def’) to work.  The definition tells the software how to interpret the binary and display it in a format you can understand with tables and real-world values.
    • For instance, the A9L boxcode, belongs to the GUFB strategy.  The A3M boxcode also belongs to the GUFB strategy.  You can change a bunch of parameters on a A3M computer and have it run 100% identical to a A9L computer.
• Review your software options in terms of availability.
  • First: figure out which software supports your box code.  Support varies from package to package.  Check with each software vendor for the most up-to-date supported options.
  • Next: download software and install it.  You can check out the interface and features at this time without paying for anything.
  • Finally: After you have found a software package with an interface that you like which supports your strategy, go to our web store to purchase.  You will need to have already installed software prior to purchasing in order to provide us with information to license it.

• Determine your tuning needs to guide your purchases.
  • Do you just need to burn chips?
  • Do you want to be able to make changes while the vehicle is running? (emulation)
  • Do you want to be able to log vehicle parameters while the engine is running? (datalogging)
  • Do you want a more accurate measure of the air/fuel mixture? (buy a wideband)
  • Decide what capabilities you need and then purchase hardware as appropriate.

• Install hardware.
  • Clean that J3 port PROPERLY!
  • To clean the J3 port, you generally must remove the case from the ECM, gently rub the J3 port with Scotchbrite or a mildly abrasive kitchen scrubber.  (‘mildly’ is important – you do NOT want to rub hard enough to remove the copper traces from the circuit board!)  A final clean with brake clean, starting fluid  or another mild solvent doesn’t hurt.  A properly cleaned J3 port will have a very, very slight crosshatch visible on the ‘fingers’ of the connector.
  • Golden rule: ALWAYS TAKE THE KEYS OUT OF THE IGNITION (CAR OFF!!!)  WHEN INSERTING OR REMOVING THINGS ON THE J3 PORT. Failure to do so can result in a fried ECM, fried chip/QuarterHorse or both.
• Install USB drivers
  • The same USB drivers are used for all Ford products
  • USB driver is a free download from the webstore, it comes with config instructions. (download)
  • If you need more visual directions, there is an install guide available on the Moates support site.
  • If you have trouble with the install, there is troubleshooting guide available on the Moates support site.

• Setup software and perform initial configuration
  • Establish communications, check settings – this procedure will vary depending on software package you are using.
  • Select the appropriate strategy for your box code and load any appropriate definition files.
  • Program hardware with a calibration to serve as a starting point.  A stock tune with a few key parameters modified to suit the vehicle at hand is great.  You’re just looking for something good enough to get the car to fire and (hopefully) idle.
  • If you are datalogging, select and configure datalogging payload matrix (PIDs) – i.e. what you’re interested in monitoring.

• Gather performance data, analyze it, and make changes toward an optimized result.
  • Parameters are gradually adjusted to achieve desired targets.
  • This is an iterative process, where adjustments are made and the results are evaluated followed by further adjustments.
  • Please see our subsequent chapters on Ford Tuning (available separately).
    • Basic Tuning Techniques and Common Examples
    • Advanced Tuning and Tricky Combinations

Chapter 2: Hardware Selection and Installation

Several types of hardware are available and needed depending on desired functionality.

Laptop PC

• Windows XP/Vista/7 are all compatible with the Ford tuning software.
• Something 5 years old or newer is recommended (no old 486 machines!).
• Internet access is recommended to facilitate licensing and software installations.
• USB ports (at least 1) are required. All needed cables are included with the hardware.
• If logging wideband, a serial-to-USB converter may be needed. ($37 on our webstore – link)

F3 Chip modules

• These modules install onto the J3 port of the EEC box.
• One per vehicle, $60 per unit – link.
• J3 port MUST be thoroughly cleaned, both sides, before installation!
  • Disassemble case, scrape off coating with non-metallic scraper or fingernail.
  • Clean both sides with Scotchbrite, not sandpaper.
  • Don’t be too rough, just polish it to a nice crosshatch, not down to the copper.
  • Clean with paper towel and alcohol or toluene.
• Two-position switch capable with user-added toggle.  Directions for switching are on support site.  (link)
• Reprogrammable many times using Jaybird.

Jaybird mini-USB chip reader/writer

• Small size, low cost, $75 – link.
• Allows reading and writing of the F3 modules.
• No datalogging or emulation with the Jaybird. No EEC box reading.  Most basic chip programmer available.

Quarterhorse Realtime Emulator and Datalogger

• Hardware unit is $249 – link.  All cabling is included, along with ferrite shields and USB bulkhead connections.
• Optional rotary switch ($30 – link) can be used to select from several different programs on the device, switching on-the-fly.  Works for EECIV ONLY.
• Fits onto J3 port like a chip module –  port MUST be clean as with F3 modules.
• On some early EEC boxes, several components will need to be gently bent out of the way for clearance during installation.

• The Quarterhorse is an integrated unit that can do several things:
  • Realtime Emulation
    • Changes in the calibration take effect immediately while engine is running.
    • No disturbance in engine operation or communications.
    • Changes in software are synchronized on the Quarterhorse.
  • Datalogging
    • Requires special definition file with ‘patch code’ written for the QuarterHorse, allowing RAM on the EEC to be shadowed onto the Quarterhorse.
    • Unprecedented access to variables and sensor values through the QuarterHorse without additional datalogging hardware.
    • Logging rates in excess of 5 kHz possible.  Most software logs around 20 Hz, which is great for tuning.
  • EEC Reading
    • EEC must be installed and powered in-vehicle with QH installed.
    • You can read the tune from the EEC box and save it to file.
    • This can be done with a stock EEC to acquire the base calibration.
    • You will be able to harvest the active calibration that has been programmed with a flash programmer this way.

Burn2 with F2A and F2E adapters

• The Burn2 ($85 – link) is a general purpose chip programmer that can be used for many different devices.
• When used with the F2A adapter ($10 – link), it can be used to read/write F3 modules.
• If the F2E adapter is added (another $10 – link), you will be able to read EEC boxes.
• No emulation or datalogging – this is a simple chip programmer only.
• This hardware combination is best suited for people that plan to tune vehicles from many different manufacturers.  If you plan on tuning exclusively Fords, consider the Jaybird as a less expensive alternative.

F8 chip module with Destiny programmer

• No emulation or datalogging – this is a simple chip with switchable tunes.
• Available exclusively through our distributor DP Tuner
• The $165 F8 module holds 8 switchable tunes and can be reprogrammed in-vehicle without removing the chip from the EEC!
• The $150 Destiny programmer is used with a 4-pin switch cable while F8 module stays installed on EEC.
• Once programmed, the $30 rotary switch can optionally be connected as a calibration selector.

Wideband O2 Sensor and Controller

• Used to sense your engine’s Air-Fuel ratio through exhaust gas analysis.
• Units such as the Innovate DB-Red LC1 Gauge Kit /w/ O2 ($209 – link) are very affordable.
• Software (discussed separately here) supports direct logging of the Innovate device data using a serial interface.  This is the preferred method of logging wideband data because it avoids all the pitfalls of using analog signals.
• Analog outputs from the wideband (such as the LC1) can be connected directly to the EEC in some cases (unused EGR pin on A9L for example).
• Wideband O2 readings critical for tuning fueling parameters.

Chapter 3: Software Selection, Installation, and Licensing

Several different software packages currently work with our hardware.  Cost varies considerably considerably from package to package along with capabilities.  Each software package also has its own unique flavor of interface – you will probably like one better than another.  Luckily, you can download and check them out prior to purchase.  Also remember that support for various box codes / strategies varies considerably from package to package.  It is important to investigate not just whether there is ANY support for a particular strategy but whether the items you require to tune your vehicle are supported – definition files vary considerably from software to software.  Fortunately, the availability of ‘trial’ versions makes it possible to ensure you to find a software package that fits your needs without having to purchase each one.

Binary Editor ( http://www.eecanalyzer.net )

• Written by Clint Garrity.
• Currently has the largest user base.
• Cost is $80 for the base application which is registered to a specific PC.
• Includes many of the most common and popular definitions (GUFB, etc) with no additional cost.  ( this list has almost all the “free” definitions along with some pay defs )
• Other ‘premium’ encoded definitions available at extra cost ($50-150+) from the definition author.
• Tends to benefit from a faster/newer laptop. Code is a bit heavy, so older PCs are taxed.  Think 2Ghz P4 / 512Mb ram realistic minimum.
• Includes EEC reading, chip reading and burning, datalogging, and emulation capabilities when used with the appropriate hardware.
• Also includes logging for wideband (Innovate, PLX, etc).
• Also includes optional support for standalone dataloggers, J2534 interfaces.
• Companion software EEC Analyzer is available for an additional $50. Not necessary, but it helps with data interpretation.
• Licensing occurs after you install the software from the available downloads, through a menu item within the BE and EA software programs.
• Both BE and EA licenses can be purchased from the webstore with information from the program.  See webstore product page for further instructions.

EEC Editor ( http://www.moates.net )

• Written by Paul Booth.
• Fairly lightweight software – does not require a very fast PC to work well.
• Cost ranges from $20-65 for each strategy depending on options.
  • EEC-IV is $20 for editing DEF (emulation and chip burning) plus $25 for datalogging (DLM) .
  • EEC-V is $10 more ($30+$35).
  • In order to have a comprehensive tuning solution for a typical fox body Mustang, you would need to order the GUFB def ($20) and the GUFB DLM ($25) along with a QuarterHorse.  This would allow you to tune any number of vehicles using the A9L, A3M, etc. processor codes.  You can also burn chips with the Jaybird/BURN2+F2A for any strategies you have purchased.
• Includes logging for Innovate Wideband (LC1, LM1, etc) at no additional charge.
• List of available supported strategies is listed on the webstore.

TunerPro RT v5 ( http://www.tunerpro.net )

• Written by Mark Mansur.
• Software license is optional (nag screen) but encouraged for $30.
• Editing portion of software *extremely* lightweight – can run well on older PCs.  Parts of logging engine considerably more demanding.
• Many definitions are available for editing only, see Tunerpro.net and our website for details.
• Editing, chip burning and emulation are supported by TPRT V4 and TPRT V5.
• Datalogging using the QuarterHorse is supported by TunerPro RT V5 via new the ADX format.  See here for updated definitions.
• QuarterHorse vehicle support is very limited compared to other software, but some of the most popular ones (GUFB CBAZA etc) are well-developed and available at time of writing (December 2010)

Flash & Burn Interface ( Moates/TunerPro )

• This is a low-level utility for reading and writing F3 chip modules using Jaybird or  BURN1/BURN2 + F2A
• Capable of reading EEC boxes using BURN2+F2A+F2E.  Does not work with QuarterHorse
• If you have a raw binary file ( bin ) you can use Flash n Burn to program a F3 chip module
• No cost, can be downloaded from the webstore.

F8 Destiny Utility ( http://www.moates.net )

• For use with a Destiny and F8 multi-position in-situ chip module.
• Allows easy management of stacks of tunes on the module with PC-based selection.
• No cost, can be downloaded from the webstore.

USB Driver ( Moates.net / FTDI )

• Needed to allow PC to communicate with the USB hardware (Quarterhorse, Jaybird, BURN2, etc).
• In many cases, working drivers will be detected by Windows via plug n play.
• If you need more visual directions, there is an install guide available on the Moates support site.
• If you have trouble with the install, there is troubleshooting guide available on the Moates support site.

Chapter 4: Suggested Techniques for Effective Calibration of EEC Systems

Vehicle Inspection and Preparation

• CRITICAL part of the tuning process. Start here, really.  If you fail here, you will never succeed.
• Several areas of the vehicle should always be analyzed before you begin the effort.
  • Smoking – learn to identify fuel (black) vs. oil (grey-blue) vs. coolant (white/sweet smelling).  You cannot fix oil smoke or coolant smoke with a tune.
  • Compression – you should have all cylinders within 10% compression of each other.  If smoking, damage to old spark plugs or general appearances make you suspicious of the motor’s health, check it before you start.  It’s a lot easier to deal with a motor with poor compression BEFORE you beat the snot out of it in the course of tuning it.  Many people skip this but it is something to think about because a motor that is already hurt is very likely to blow up or experience a catastrophic failure during tuning.
  • Check base timing, adjust as needed. (all vehicles with a distributor)
  • Evaluate TPS voltage.  Minimum/maximum values should be within acceptable limits.  Check for reversed wires – voltage should increase as throttle opens.
  • Look at MAF intake routing, make sure there are no obvious vacuum / intake leaks between the MAF and the intake valves.  Think cracked/split/loose hoses, bad gaskets, open ports, dry rotted couplers, hoses connected both before and after the MAF, …
  • O2 sensors should be operational without any exhaust leaks before the sensors.  For some reason, cut and soldered “extensions” for long tube headers often cause problems.  Plug and play extenders are *highly* recommended.  If you know that you do not have proper stock O2 sensors, REMEMBER TO TURN OFF O2 FEEDBACK!!!
  • If you are using a wideband sensor, you need to make sure there are no exhaust leaks before the wideband.  Flex tubing, poor joints between headers- midpipes and cracks in tubing can all create havoc.
  • If applicable, pay attention to which bank the wideband is installed in – bank-bank differences can be a powerful diagnostic tool.  Pay attention to how far the wideband is from the engine’s exhaust ports – there is always some lag between combustion events and measurement.  When things are changing quickly, this is critical.
  • Widebands need calibrated periodically, generally in free air.  Wideband sensors need replaced periodically.  Leaded fuel kills them very quickly.  Proper care and feeding of widebands is crucial to their effectiveness.
  • Be aware of catalytic converters.  Always tap them (GENTLY) and listen for suspicious noises that would indicate a catalytic converter that is degrading.  Clogged cats can rob literally hundreds of horsepower.  It is possible to place a wideband sensor AFTER a catalytic converter but remember that the cat will very slightly skew readings.
  • Make sure you have enough fuel pump and injectors for the power level you are looking for.  For a V8, “Injector size in #/hr * 14 = max hp” is a crude rule of thumb.  There are tons of injector calculators to be found if you want a better idea.
  • Ensure that fuel pressure is sane.  40psi with no vacuum reference is generally about where most OEM regulators are set.  You should be able to see a difference in fuel pressure between key-on-engine-off, idle and blipping the throttle.  Fuel pressure should be lowest when vacuum is highest.  Fuel pressure should increase when you blip the throttle as manifold pressure increases.
  • You need a MAF capable of metering enough air for your power goals.   There are ways to increase the metering capacity of a given meter, but tuning that properly is an advanced topic.  Keeping it simple: get a meter that can handle your airflow needs.
  • You need a functioning alternator and battery.  Battery voltage plays a role in crucial things like injector opening time and coil charge duration.  If your charging system is not functioning correctly, your tune may drastically change if/when you fix it.  Rule of thumb: if your battery voltage ever drops below 13 volts with the motor running, you will run into trouble.
  • On a similar note, underdrive and overdrive pulleys can cause real issues.  Pay attention if you see them.
  • Check for emissions hardware ( purge, smog pump, EGR, etc. ) that is missing.  In many cases these items can be disabled but you need to pay attention to what is present compared to what the ECM expects.
  • Basic maintenance should not be overlooked.  If it is important for a “normal” car it is twice as important in a performance application.
    • Spark plugs: correct heat range, appropriate gap, not fouled.  Consider power level, fuel and ignition system.  AVOID PLATINUM PLUGS FOR PERFORMANCE APPLICATIONS!!!  Copper or iridium will serve you much better.
    • Plug wires: no cracks/arcing, properly crimped ends, appropriate length so there isn’t too much tension
    • Firing order: firing order is determined by the camshaft (mostly) not the block or computer.
    • Spark boxes: great for distributor engines, unneeded/problematic for mod motors
    • Coil packs: Coil-per-cylinder (99-04 generally) applications like ***OEM*** coils best. (according to Dave B.)  MSD, Accel, Granatelli, … are all cause for concern especially with boost.
    • Oil and coolant: always check fluids before starting.  Quick check, potentially horrible consequences if low/out.
    • Fans / overheating: it is always a good idea to check that radiator fans work.  A car that overheats cannot be tuned.
    • Belts and Idlers: All serpentine belts must be in good shape.  Cracks, missing ribs, etc. will all cause problems.  Any idler pulleys must spin freely.
    • Tension:  Belt Tensioner should not be extended fully with the engine off.  Adjust belt length so that tensioner is in the lower third of its adjustment range with the motor off.  (i.e. it can move 2/3 through its range to increase belt tension – it should be mostly compressed when motor idle)  This is particularly important for supercharged applications.
    • Fuel filter: Fords are *horrible* about clogging fuel filters.  Especially if the car has been sitting for any significant period of time, change the fuel filter.  Motorcraft/OEM filters seem to hold up better than many cheap aftermarket ones.
    • Fuel age and type: Gasoline degrades with time.  Do not expect fuel that is more than a month or two old to be of the same quality as fresh gas.  Be particularly careful with heavily oxygenated fuels (i.e. VP Q16) and alcohols (ethanol, methanol, E85, etc.) in contact with fuel system components for large periods of time.
    • Clean air filter and MAF.  Oiled filters generally cause MAFs to get dirty.  Clean MAFs only after they have had a long time to cool – hot MAF+liquid=death.  Clean *GENTLY* with brake clean, starting fluid, or other organic solvents.
• Remember, you can’t fix mechanical or electrical issues by reprogramming the ECM!!! The results you achieve with tuning will only be as good as the material you start working with.  Garbage in, garbage out.

Datalogging: What’s important and what does it mean? What should we be interested in? What to select?

• There are certain sensors that you will almost always want to keep an eye on because they are critical to engine operation:
  • RPM – how fast the motor is spinning
  • MAFV / MAF counts – a “raw” value representing the reading from the MAF sensor
  • Airflow – a value calculated  by the ECM from the raw sensor MAF voltage that represents how much air is being ingested by the engine.  This is often represented in some form of “real world” value, like Kg/hr or Lbs/min
  • Load – from 94-2004 “Load” is the main factor involved in determining spark advance.
  • Spark Advance – when the ECM is commanding sparks to be fired.
  • TPS – Throttle Position Sensor.  How far open the throttle is, i.e. how hard you’re pressing the gas pedal
  • ECT – Engine Coolant Temperature(how hot or cold coolant flowing through the engine is)
  • IAT – Intake Air Temperature (how hot or cold air entering the engine is)
• Depending on what you are trying to do, there are other items you may want to pay attention to as well.
  • Injector Pulsewidth – How long the injectors open.  This can be useful both for “sanity checking” and to ensure you do not run out of injector – there is only a fixed time available at a given RPM to fire injectors.
  • HEGO1/2 – Heated Exhaust Gas Oxygen sensor.  Measures the presence or absence of oxygen in the exhaust in order to try to determine whether the motor is running rich or lean.   Watching the raw HEGO voltages can give you some kind of very basic indication of fueling.  These sensors experience a large change in voltage in a very small area centered around a stoichiometric mixture ( 1.0 lambda or about 14.7:1 Air-Fuel Ratio or AFR)
  • STFTs – Short Term Fuel Trims.  These are IMMEDIATE changes the ECM makes in response to HEGO readings in order to steer the air-fuel mixture towards desired targets.   If your EEC uses STFTs effectively (i.e. all modular motors) then these are generally more effective as a tuning tool than looking at raw O2 voltages.
  • LTFTs – Long Term Fuel Trims.  These are the long term difference between programmed values and target values.  Think of them as the average of STFTs over a long time.  If your EEC uses LTFTs effectively (i.e. all modular motors) then these are one of the most effective pieces of data provided by the stock computer for tuning fueling.
  • WBO2 – Wideband Oxygen meters can measure a much wider range of rich-lean conditions than standard HEGOs.  Having wideband data is often preferable to HEGO/STFT/LTFT.  In many cases (i.e. 86-95 in my opinion) it is often easier to disable closed loop operation/the O2 sensors completely and tune the car exclusively using a wideband.
  • ISC Integrator (‘integrator’) – this represents the difference between how much air the EEC is using to hold and idle versus how much it is commanded to hold in the tune.  Critical for proper tuning of larger camshafts and larger displacement engines.
  • Boost/MAP/Pressure – Although MAF systems do not differentiate between boost and vacuum, it is often very handy for sanity and safety to have an idea of how much pressure there is in the intake manifold.  For positive displacement blowers (roots, TVS, twin-screw) make sure you take pressure readings AFTER the blower on the lower plenum.
  • Pressure drop across injectors / FPDM duty cycle – most 99-04 cars control fuel pressure electronically.  These values are critical to a properly operating fuel system on these vehicles.

Recalibration: Modifying Parameters and Values to Achieve a Target

• First step: decide on target operating parameters for the engine
  • This may seem obvious, but something as simple as “make the most power” or “improve fuel economy” isn’t going to be be enough.
  • Second step: take a general goal like “make the most power” and decide on appropriate engine conditions to achieve that goal.
  • If you read these rules of thumb and say “this isn’t right for my engine” – GREAT.  You already know more than the audience these rules are aimed at.
    • If in doubt, “0.8 is great” – blatant simplicity.  Quoted me to once by someone who did OEM calibrations for Honda for a living.  It is very difficult to break anything due to fueling from running a vehicle at 0.8 lambda (about 11.6:1 AFR Gasoline)
    • 1.0 Lambda represents a stoichiometric mixture – exactly enough oxygen is present in the air to burn all the fuel supplied.  This is normally the best mixture for minimizing emissions.
    • Most vehicles make best power around 0.85 to 0.88 lambda (12.3 – 12.7 AFR Gasoline) – slightly richer than stoich
    • Most vehicles achieve best fuel economy at around 1.05 to 1.1 lambda ( 15.2 to 16.0 AFR gasoline)
    • Most vehicles need more ignition advance as RPM increases
    • Most vehicles need more ignition advance under cruising/low-throttle conditions than WOT
    • Knock is most likely close to peak torque, at high loads/low RPMs or at peak horsepower
• Next step: Get familiar with the strategy your vehicle uses.  Fueling, timing, idle, open-closed loop and just about everything else vary considerably from one strategy to another.  Being familiar with the strategy your ECM uses will help you figure out which tables to modify to acheive the results you seek.
  • eectuning.org is a good place to learn more.
  • the ‘Education’ section of moates.net is another good place to get information
• After you figure out where to look: set up what you can based on what you already know
  • Setup Engine Displacement / displacement of one cylinder
  • Setup injector size
  • Setup a reasonable rev limiter based on what you know of bottom end and valvetrain
  • Setup a reasonable (perhaps a little high to start) value for target idle
  • Setup a reasonable base calibration for MAF sensor.  If sensor came with a calibration sheet, this would be great time to use it.
  • Setup a reasonable target air fuel while in open loop
  • Setup a reasonable timing map.  A stock timing map adjusted for mods is always a good place to start.
  • Setup a reasonable pattern from switching from closed loop to open loop.
  • Enable or disable hardware such as O2 sensors, EGR, Purge/Evap, automatic trans
  • If you take your time to create a sane starting point before you turn the key on you will save yourself countless hours of time!
• Finally: Start your engines (and your datalogger) and make final adjustments
  • Are air fuels not matching what you command in open loop?
    • Three pieces of the fueling puzzle:  MAF transfer, Injector slopes(size), Injector offset (battery compensation – latency)
    • How do you tell what is going on?  STFTs, LTFTs (if O2s are enabled) combined with a wideband.  STFTs/LTFTs are great while O2s are active – i.e. part throttle
    • Leanest at idle, small pulsewidths but perfect at WOT/higher throttle -> increase battery offset
    • Lean – rich – lean patches as you gradually increase throttle -> wrong shape of MAF curve.  systematically tune it
    • Entire range of engine operation uniformly off from commanded values -> either injector slopes (size) or entire MAF transfer function is off.  Let load determine which one to multiply/divide in order to fix things
  • Idle issues?
    • Make sure your MAF transfer table, injector slopes and injector offset are sane before trying to fine tune idle!
    • Follow the integrator – a good place to start is to add the integrator (or subtract if it is negative) from the Neutral Idle Air table (in neutral) or Drive Idle Air table (if in Drive for automatic cars)
  • Performance
    • ALWAYS TUNE FUELING FIRST BEFORE TACKLING TIMING!  You are *much* more likely to break your engine if your mixture is wrong.  As long as your timing is good enough to light the mix, you can tune fueling adequately.
    • Tuning timing without a dyno is hard.  Accelerometers and a dragstrip can provide crude but repeatable feedback.

Data Analysis and Evaluation

• Once captured, the operational data can be analyzed and used to guide calibration effort.

(More to come!)

(below this line is draft / coming soon as of 2010-11-30)

Chapter 4:  Software/Hardware Initial Configuration with Tuning Session Start-Up Examples

• Physical installation of hardware is shown in more detail from Chapter 1 overview.
  • F3
  • Jaybird
  • Quarterhorse
  • F8/destiny and switch
  • Wideband

• Installation, licensing, initial configuration, and detailed hardware synchronization procedures for each software are explained and examples detailed. Initial basic calibration load-up for different hardware, as well as basic payload creation for datalogging, are explained and illustrated for each.
  • USB Driver
  • BE/EA
  • EEC Editor
  • TunerPro RTv5
  • Flash & Burn
  • F8/Destiny Utility

1. Data Analysis and Evaluation
   1. Once captured, the operational data can be analyzed and used to guide calibration effort.
   2. Several examples of logged data values and how they relate to calibration parameters are provided.

Chapter 6:

Case Studies: Example Modifications, Vehicle Combinations, and Rules of Thumb

1. Key Issues and Vehicle-Specific Examples
   1. How do many of the popular modifications on these vehicles affect the tuning approach?

i.      Bigger MAF

ii.      Bigger injectors

iii.      Cold plugs

iv.      Nitrous

v.      Gears and converter

vi.      Auto vs Manual

vii.      Emissions delete / racing modifications

viii.      Cam, heads

ix.      Headers/exhaust

x.      Cold air intake

1. 1. We look at a walk-through of important considerations and the thought process of tuning several different example combinations, with real-world dyno results.

i.      A9L/GUFB Fox Body, 1993 N/A 331 stroker, 24# injectors, cam, headers, 5spd.

ii.      CBAZA, same as above.

iii.      03/04 Mustang

iv.      SC A9L

v.      SC 03/04 Cobra

vi.      F150 Truck

1. 1. Achieving an Optimized Result: When is it good enough?

i.      What are your goals?

ii.      Do you plan for future modifications?

iii.      Rules of thumb for AFR and timing, NA vs boost.

iv.      What is safe vs aggressive?

>

>

>

> Vehicle Compatibility

>

> All year/model Ford 2004 and earlier with J3 port are compatible

***with our hardware*** but there may not be software support for particular models.

> Some vehicle year/model applications are simply not supported in the

> software because of lack of definition information. It’s important to

> evaluate the availability of your desired application as ir relates to

> the software selection process. You may be out of luck (for example,

> 1995 Festiva or such uncommon target).

http://support.moates.net/ford-strategies-supported/

http://support.moates.net/ford-box-code-strategy-cross-reference/

>

>

>

> Overview of Tuning Process

>

> Determine your target vehicle boxcode and strategy

>

>                                                                i.

> Boxcode is typically a 4-digit letter/number code on the EEC computer.

> This is the calibration code.

http://support.moates.net/ford-information-we-need-to-help-you/

>

>                                                               ii.

> Strategy is the ‘parent’ definition structure to which a boxcode belongs.

Each strategy is the set of procedures that are executed on your ECM to run an engine.  Sometimes more than one strategy can successfully run on a given ECM.  Normally we do not make many changes to the procedure part of strategies while tuning vehicles.  Instead, we change tables, functions and constants so that the engine receives what it needs to run well.  Each “box code” represents a configuration of a particular strategy for a particular engine.

>

>                                                             iii.

> For

instance, the A9L boxcode  belongs to the GUFB strategy.  The A3M boxcode also belongs to the GUFB strategy.  If you compare A9L.bin and A3M.bin the files will be almost identical because they use the same strategy but are configured for different vehicles by Ford.  If you get a definition (also called def) for the GUFB strategy, you will be able to edit both A9L and A3M binaries because they use the same strategy.

……….

>                                                             iii.

> J3 port MUST be thoroughly cleaned, both sides, before installation!

***IMPORTANT***

……………….

> Chapter 5:

>

> Suggested Techniques for Effective Calibration of EEC Systems

>

>

>

>

>

> Vehicle Inspection and Preparation

>

> CRITICAL part of the tuning process. Start here, really.

> Several areas of the vehicle should always be analyzed before you

> begin the effort.

>

>                                                                i.

> Check base timing, adjust as needed.  On older Fords, pull “spout” timing connector either by distributor (86-93) or on passenger fender side (94-95).  Adjust distributor to achieve 10 degrees base timing with spout removed.  Reinstall spout before tuning.

>

>                                                               ii.

> Evaluate TPS voltage, make sure it is in range through motion.

Vehicles are very sensitive to improper TPS voltage.  TPS being too low or too high can cause the ECM to not enter the correct idle mode.

TPS should be between 0.95 and 1volt with throttle plate closed.  This can be checked using QH quite nicely.

>

>                                                             iii.

> Look at MAF intake routing, make sure there are no gross vacuum / intake leaks.

http://support.moates.net/tuning-maf-systems-and-air-leaks/

See how much or little of that you want to put here.

>

>                                                             iv.

> O2 sensors should be operational, exhaust should be leak-tight at

> least that far back.

OEM Ford O2 sensors work a million times better than cheap aftermarket ones.

Ideally, a wideband sensor is to be installed in addition to the factory O2s rather than instead of one.

If this is not possible, it is greatly preferable to remove a secondary (Post-catalytic converter) O2 sensor.

If a primary O2 sensor has the be removed in order to install a wideband, make sure closed loop operation is disabled.

>

>                                                              v.

> Basic maintenance should not be overlooked.

>

> 1.       Plugs and wires

1a. PLUG GAP IS REALLY IMPORTANT

1b. Appropriate plug type is really important (Copper, Silver (Brisk for 3v)).  Iridium plugs are ok for applications with extremely strong spark boxes or CDI systems.  Avoid platinum plugs like the plague.

>

> 2.       Oil and coolant

>

> 3.       Fuel filter and fuel age/quality/octane

>

> 4.       Clean air filter and MAF

>

>                                                             vi.

> Ensure that fuel pressure is as expected through operating range.

>

> Remember, you can’t fix mechanical or electrical issues with reprogramming.

> Tuning is about more than just flipping chips, so make sure your

> vehicle is in good shape!

This really can’t be stressed enough.  Tuning a car that isn’t running right is like putting a bandaid over a gangrenous wound!  The first step to tuning a car properly is to make sure it is mechanically sound!

>

>

>

************I’m not sure I would get into datalogging just yet because we haven’t talked about recalibration yet.****************

> Datalogging: What’s important and what does it mean? What should we be

> interested in? What to select?

>

> RPM

> MAFV

> Kg/Hr

> Spark

> HEGO1/2

> TPS

> ECT,IAT

> Load

> WBO2

>

***********************************Snip*********************************************************************************************************

>

>

> Recalibration: Modifying Parameters and Values

>

The purpose of recalibrating an ECM is to produce the behavior you desire, and by doing so hopefully improve performance, emissions or other operating characteristics.  Normally, there are two stages to this process.

First, parameters within the strategy are altered to match physical parameters of the engine.  Engine displacement, injector size are the primary values here.  Also, the MAF transfer function should be altered to match the MAF that is installed on the vehicle.  You can often “rob” a MAF transfer function from another vehicle’s strategy when using the MAF from another vehicle.

Next, operating parameters are changed in order to achieve the actual running conditions desired for the particular engine.  In many cases, simply adjusting the “configuration” items for the strategy in the first step will make then engine run great but there are almost always small changes that can be made to optimize performance.

>

> What are the most common values we will need to modify?

>

i.     Displacement – how large the engine is

ii.      Injector slopes – define how much fuel flows through

injectors, aka injector size

iii.      MAF calibration – defines how much air enters the engine as

a function of MAF voltage.  aka MAF transfer function iv.      Rev limiters – protect the engine from being damaged by over-revving

v.      Speed limiters – protect the driver from his/her own stupidity

vi.      EGR delete, PATS delete, secondary O2 delete – turn off items that are not present or not desired.

>

> How do we know which values to change, and by how much?

>

(repeat / correlate with above)

First step: calibration data should match actual equipment specification

example: If you have a 347 stroker with 30# injectors your strategy should be configured to match these physical parameters

Next step: start your engines, identify problems and goals.  There are hundreds (if not thousands in some cases) of parameters you can change.  Before starting on tuning, it’s good to have an idea of what’s not right, what you’d like to improve and what you can leave alone.  This may sound basic, but maintaining some kind of focus is really important to working effectively.  Examples of things you might want to work on are improving idle, improving wide open throttle performance, decreasing fuel consumption.

After figuring out what aspects of running the engine you want to work on, it is time to get the data you need to achieve your goals.  By selecting appropriate items for datalogging, the QuarterHorse allows you to view, log and replay the same data that your ECM uses to run your engine.  Instead of blindly guessing which values you need to change in order to get the engine behavior you seek, you can use this process of logging, analyzing logged data and a little math to make appropriate changes.

Now specific tasks in the tuning process will be examined in detail.

This will be presented as a mixture of theory and practice.  The next chapter will serve as a guide for how to adapt the programming of your ECM to suit specific modifications (cold air kits, injectors, motor transplants, etc) and will be attempt to be primarily hands-on.

Routine tuning processes: (these are going to need more explanation, I’m just running out of steam tonight)

Basic setup – Slopes, injectors, MAFs, sane spark tables

WOT / Open loop fueling – MAF transfer, inj slopes, stabilized fuel table

Closed loop fueling – O2 trims, MAF transfer

Power tuning – Dyno, spark tables

Idle tuning – idle RPM drive, neutral, Drive idle air, neutral idle air, integrator, gains, etc

Dashpot – role, tuning, scalars, preposition

>

>

>

> Chapter 6:

>

CASE STUDIES AND HANDS ON PRIMARILY.  Theory / processes in previous chapter

>

>

>

>

>

> Key Issues and Vehicle-Specific Examples

*MAKE MORE SPECIFIC*  General procedures covered above

>

> How do many of the popular modifications on these vehicles affect the

> tuning approach?

>

>                                                                i.

> Bigger MAF

>

>                                                               ii.

> Bigger injectors

>

>                                                             iii.

> Cold plugs

>

>                                                             iv.

> Nitrous

>

>                                                              v.

> Gears and converter

>

>                                                             vi.

> Auto vs Manual

>

>                                                           vii.

> Emissions delete / racing modifications

>

>                                                          viii.

> Cam, heads

>

>                                                             ix.

> Headers/exhaust

>

>                                                              x.

> Cold air intake

>

> We look at a walk-through of important considerations and the thought

> process of tuning several different example combinations, with

> real-world dyno results.

>

>                                                                i.

> A9L/GUFB Fox Body, 1993 N/A 331 stroker, 24# injectors, cam, headers, 5spd.

>

>                                                               ii.

> CBAZA, same as above.

>

>                                                             iii.

> 03/04 Mustang

>

>                                                             iv.

> SC A9L

>

>                                                              v.

> SC

> 03/04 Cobra

>

>                                                             vi.

> F150 Truck

>

> Achieving an Optimized Result: When is it good enough?

>

>                                                                i.

> What are your goals?

>

>                                                               ii.

> Do you plan for future modifications?

>

>                                                             iii.

> Rules of thumb for AFR and timing, NA vs boost.

>

>                                                             iv.

> What is safe vs aggressive?

>

>

There are two products that we sell that can read the program in a factory ECM:

BURN1/BURN2 with a F2A and F2E – This setup can be used to read ECMs on the bench.  ECM does not need to be powered.

QuarterHorse – This setup requires the ECM to be powered either by a vehicle’s battery or a 12V bench power supply.

Reading with BURN2+F2A+F2E

1. Start with all cables disconnected (F2A,F2E,USB,etc.)
2. Connect the F2E to the F2A
3. Put the F2A in the BURN1/BURN2
4. Connect the Burn1-2/F2A/F2E Assembly to your ECM.  Make sure your ECM is powered off if it is in the vehicle
5. Connect the USB from the BURN2 to the PC
6. Start Flash n  Burn Software on the PC
7. Choose appropriate settings for the Supported chip type based on the ECM type:  J3 Ford EEC-IV Reader or J3 Ford EEC-V Reader
8. Choose appropriate settings based on the number of banks used:
   • 56k EEC-IV = 032000 start 03FFFF end
   • 64k EEC-IV = 030000 start 03FFFF end
   • 2-bank EEC-V = 010000 start 02FFFF end
   • 4 bank EEC-V = 000000 start 03FFFF end
9. Click “Save buffer to file” and choose a filename.

Reading with QuarterHorse

At the time of writing (Aug5-2010) Binary Editor is the only software that supports this feature of the QH reliably.  Select “Read PCM” from within the software.

Before you read this, make sure you have read Theory: Alpha-N, Theory: Mass Air Flow and the FordOverview.  Although not essential, it wouldn’t hurt to have at least read about Speed-Density operation as well.  This page will assume you have read and understood these pages.  This is a somewhat complicated topic and will require you to put several pieces together so don’t feel bad if you have to read this a couple times.

About the table and why it is critical

The “Load with failed MAF” (“LWFM” from here forward) table(s) are found in almost all MAF Ford Strategies.  Most strategies that make use of IMRCs (Intake Manifold Runner Control – valves that restrict air entering the engine in order to increase tumble and velocity) have two LWFM tables instead of one and  switch from one LWFM table to the other as the IMRCs open and close.  The main purpose of the LWFM table is to estimate the amount of air going into the engine without using the MAF sensor or a MAP sensor (if present) to provide the ECM with an “emergency” fallback method of running the engine in the event the MAF sensor fails.

The LWFM table is also important for normal operation of the motor because Load from the MAF (this is “Load” – the Ford-specific calculated cylinder filling value calculated from the MAF sensor, RPM and engine displacement) is “sanity checked” against the LWFM table to determine if the MAF is providing reliable information.  If there is too large of a difference between calculated Load and the LWFM table, the ECM may ignore the MAF even if it is providing valid information! This happens most commonly in forced induction situations (where load is greatly increased compared to a naturally aspirated car) but can also occur in cars with aggressive camshafts.  If you are making changes to a MAF transfer function and you are not seeing any changes in engine operation, double check your LWFM table!  Further, most strategies use “Anticipation logic” to predict airflow.  This prediction logic is based off…  Surprise… The LWFM table!  Having a sane LWFM table is neccesary for the aircharge anticipation logic to work.  You can disable this but it’s generally not necessary if you tune the LWFM table properly.

LWFM table is a classic example of an Alpha-N control strategy – it’s purpose is to provide a very crude estimation of airflow entering the engine when the MAF signal is absent or the ECM thinks it is unreliable.   The LWFM table uses only two inputs – throttle position (aka “TP”) and RPM to determine Load.  Here is a picture of a typical LWFM table: (screenshot from Binary Editor / GUFB strategy)

Here you can see the X axis is RPM and the Y axis is RELATIVE Throttle Position volts.  Each cell represents the Load that will be used to calculate fueling and timing when the ECM thinks the MAF is bad.  For example, idling with the throttle closed (0 volts relative)  around 700 RPM the ECM will assume a Load of .1602 and make appropriate fueling and timing changes.

The importance of the LWFM table varies considerably from strategy to strategy.  A rule of thumb is that the newer of an ECM you are using the more picky it will be able the LWFM table.  Fox Body and most early EECV (pre-99) are fairly tolerant of inappropriate LWFM tables where 99+ ECMs are generally much, much, much more picky.

Tuning the LWFM Table

Tuning the LWFM table is pretty simple:

First, set the Aircharge WOT multiplier, Anticipation logic scalars, etc. to make the ECM as tolerant of a bad failed MAF table as possible

Second, GUESS!   Yes, guess.  Enter values that you think are sane for the setup, starting with the stock LWFM table as a guideline.  A few examples:

• If you put in aggressive cams, decrease the LWFM table at low RPMs and throttle angles while increasing it at higher RPMs and throttle angles.
• If adding a positive displacement supercharger (roots, twin screw) multiply the whole LWFM table by approximately the highest pressure ratio you will see.
• If you add a centrifugal blower, multiply a column of the LWFM table by the pressure ratio you achieve at a given RPM

Third, drive around and log throttle position (TP Relative), RPM, Load.  Compare the Load values you log with the LWFM table.  Start changing entries in the table so they get closer to the load you really see at given TP and RPM conditions.

Note: Turbo cars present a very big challenge to this strategy due to the amount load can vary with throttle position due to spool time.  This is a very tricky case and often the only solution is to try and maximize allowed error before the LWFM table becomes active and also disable Aircharge Anticipation and other functions dependent on the LWFM table.

As stated in our overview of MAF systems, one of their main weaknesses are air leaks.  Whenever air can enter the engine without going through the MAF, weird things happen.

There are two principal kinds of leaks that wreak havoc on MAF systems – constant leaks (like a unplugged vacuum port) and mechanically induced leaks (such as a Blow Off Valve or Bypass Valve that vents to atmosphere.)  Each leak has a tendency to affect the system differently.  In this article, we will try to take a look at what “should” be happening, what changes with a leak and what kind of odd things you can look for while tuning to identify a leak.

Reversion presents an additional problem for MAF systems.  Reversion is the technical name for when air changes direction and reverses flow.  MAFs are not one way systems – they will measure air flowing into the engine and then meter the same air flowing out of the engine when there is severe reversion, causing unreliable MAF readings.

Constant leaks

This kind of constant leak in a MAF system is the classic “vacuum leak” where a gasket, coupler or piece of tubing in between the MAF and the engine does not seal properly.  In this case, air can enter the engine without passing through the MAF.  Because air has entered the engine without passing through the MAF sensor, the MAF sensor reads artificially low.  An engine operating in open-loop mode will tend to run very lean.  A motor operating in closed loop will see very large positive trims as the computer uses the O2 sensors to add fuel to compensate for the lean condition.

The air leak provides more air for the engine at idle which will make the idle rise or sometimes “hunt” or bounce around unstably.  Generally, the idle system will also try to compensate.  On Fords you will see the ISC Integrator (“Integrator”) swing negative, indicating the ECM is allowing less flow through the idle valve than is commanded in the tune.  It is very common for the Integrator to get stuck at the minimum allowed value and have the car still idle higher than commanded.

Most MAF systems use the MAF for calculating appropriate timing values as well as fueling.  With a vacuum leak throwing off the system, the ECU thinks there is less air entering the engine than their really is.  This will mean that “load” values will be artificially low, which generally leads to timing being artificially high.  In severe situations, this combination of issues (less fuel, more timing) is a recipe for melting engine components if it goes unchecked.

Mechanically induced leaks

Bypass valves are the most common source of mechanically induced leaks although idle, purge and other vacuum operated solenoids can all be a problem.  MAF systems require these valves to be re-circulated so that air leaving the valve re-enters the intake AFTER the MAF so it does not get measured twice.

Blow off valves on turbocharged vehicles are often vented to atmosphere.  This unfortunately will severely confuse a MAF system.  When the valve opens, air that has already passed through the MAF and been “counted” is released into the atmosphere instead of entering the engine.  The ECU will supply enough fuel for all the air that has passed through the MAF while only a small portion of this air actually entered the engine.   This causes the engine to run very rich and can cause stalling or other problems when letting off the gas and the BOV opens.  Once the valve closes again and the car burns off the excess fuel delivered, things slowly return to normal operation.

Supercharger bypass valves can present the same kind of issues when they are allowed to vent to atmosphere. (or when there is a leak in the piping allowing air to recirculate.)  Failing to catch an air leak with a supercharger bypass will result in the MAF curve having a sudden change when the valve closes.  This will require complete re-tuning of the MAF transfer function once fixed so it is best to catch it early.

Reversion

Reversion is most common in engines with very large camshafts operating at low speeds such as close to idle.  Situations where MAFs read unreliably due to reversion can generally be greatly improved by moving the MAF further from the throttle body.  Increasing the volume of the intake between the MAF and the throttle body is also effective at smoothing out the pulses of air coming from an engine with a radical camshaft.  It is normally possible to get a reliable enough MAF signal in most circumstances.  Even extremely wild cams that draw 3-4″ of vacuum at idle can be tamed with an appropriately designed intake system.

Another form of reversion that is troublesome to MAF systems happens with poorly designed supercharger bypass valve systems.  In most of these systems, the pipe connecting the outlet of the bypass valve connects with the inlet of the supercharger at an angle where recirculated air flows backwards through the intake.  This causes any reverse-flowing air to be metered multiple times by the MAF, leading to unreliable operation.  This can almost always be remedied by adjusting the angle of the pipe from the bypass so it points at the inlet of the supercharger directing the flow of recirculated air away from the MAF.

Reversion is very obvious if you are logging the MAF signal. Looking at a graph of a “normal” MAF signal versus time, it will look like a line that could have been drawn without reversing the direction of travel.  The same graph of a MAF impacted by reversion will look very “shaky” and jagged, changing direction many times in a short period of time.

Each ECM has a 3 or 4 digit processor code that uniquely identifies it.  You can tell what strategy a ECM uses from its box code or from looking at a dump of a stock program from that ECM.  “Strategy” is Ford’s lingo for a program to run a vehicle. (or operating system)  Each strategy can have multiple calibrations for different engines.  Sometimes even V6 and V8 engines will use the same strategy!

If you are wondering if your strategy is supported, take a look at the Supported Strategies guide.

This list will grow over time.  If you don’t see your vehicle listed here, email [email protected]

A9L = GUFB (88-93 “Fox body” V8 mustang 5-speed)

A9P = GUF1 (88-93 “Fox body” V8 mustang auto)

T4M0 = CBAZA (94-95 SN95mustang  5.0 V8)

LLX4 = CDAN4 (96-97 Cobra 4.6L 32v)

PTP2 = FBFG2 (04 Mustang GT)

RCX5 = CDAN4 (97 Tbird 3.8L v6)

SLL4 = CTBAE (96 5.0 explorer ??? )

LKT3 = ODAJ0 (02 F150 4×4 auto)

SCI1 = ODAG0 (02 F150 4×4 manual)

NMI1= ODAG0 (02 F150 4×4 manual)

MIJ1 = ODAG0 (02 F150 4×4 manual)

KVF1 = ODAL1 (02 F150 4×4 manual)

CXN1 = MNAE1 (01 Lightning)

CUX1 = MRAD2 (01/02 Lightning)

CUX2 = MRAD3 (01/02 Lightning)

URB1 = TAUF0 (02/03 Lightning)

There is a handy Excel spreadsheet you may want to look at ( link ) that has a decent cross-reference.

External Resources

Core Tuning have an excellent list of strategies they support which can be used to cross reference ECMs and strategies.

OBDTester.com has a nice list of Ford ECM info organized by hardware ID and updates for Ford ECMs.

ECU Connections forum – mostly Bosch Motronic stuff.

DS-MAP – MAP sensor conversion for DSM ECUs, supports Ostrich

TunerPro RT – general purpose ROM editor that supports APU1, Ostrich, ALDU1 and most of our gear.  Useful for Nissan, Ford, GM, DSM, some Bosch Motronic (BMW, Porsche, VW, etc.) among others. (we sell this)

ThirdGen.org – forum dedicated to the 3rd gen camaro/firebird with a great Tuning section!

EFI Live – Supports our RoadRunner Emulator for OBD2 GM vehicles (we sell this)

Binary Editor – Supports our QuarterHorse emulator for 86-04 Ford vehicles (we sell this)

EEC Editor – Supports our QuarterHorse emulator for 86-04 Ford vehicles (we sell this)

TunerCat – supports APU1, ALDU1, Ostrich, etc. for OBD1 GM vehicles

Neptune – supports Demon, Ostrich, BURN2,  etc.  The premiere solution for tuning 92-01 distributor Hondas (we sell this)

eCtune – supports Demon, Ostrich, BURN2, Hondalog, etc.  Another great 92-01 distributor Honda solution

Crome – supports Demon, Ostrich, BURN2, Hondalog, etc.  an older and poorly maintained 92-01 distributor Honda solution

TurboEdit – supports Ostrich, Hondalog.  an old and finicky software package for 88-91 distributed Hondas

BRE – supports Ostrich, Hondalog.  an old and finicky software package primarily aimed at 89-91 Vtec hondas

Pgmfi.ORG – Home of the DIY Honda community.  Birthplace of CROME, TurboEdit, BRE and loosely affiliated with other softwares.  Still a great resource for Honda ECU tuning.

Nistune – supports Ostrich, dual Ostrich.  Nissan ROM tuning software, dealer version works with our hardware.  Programs made with Nistune work with our Nissan 2Chip adapter.

Tuning Porsche 944 turbo vehicles using TunerPro, Ostrich, SocketBooster (thanks Joshua)

Turbo Mopars using Ostrich2

RhinoTuning using Ostrich2 / BURN2/ etc. for tuning Suzuki Swift pre-OBD2 vehicles

Nissan Data Voice uses the Ostrich2 for realtime tuning for OBD1 Nissan vehicles

Ever wish your favorite Moates emulator would work with your favorite ROM editor software that doesn’t have native support for our products?  EmUtility (from the author of TunerPro) allows you to use Moates emulators with any software that can spit out a binary (bin) or hexadecimal (hex) format file.  It supports the Ostrich1, Ostrich2, APU1 *and* RoadRunner!  It can even support more than one emulator connected to the same computer simultaneously. (this requires more than one instance of the program, one for each emu)

Installation

You can get EmUtility from the Utilities section of TunerPro.net

EmUtility may require additional files to be installed for it to work, specifically the Microsoft Visual C redistributable libraries, which  are also linked off the Utilities section of TunerPro.net

EmUtility does not come with an installer – it is shipped as a zip file with a single program file inside.  Unzip it to place where you will be able to easily find it, such as your desktop.  You can run it directly from the desktop and it will not make a “mess” because it is only one file.

Usage

EmUtility is pretty straightforward to use.

First, start the program.  You should see “Detecting Hardware… Ostrich 2.0 blah blah blah” for instance.  If you see “No Hardware Detected” check your cables and connections.  If you cannot get your hardware to detect, try looking at our USB Troubleshooting Guide.

After you have verified that your hardware has been detected properly, click the “…” next to “Input / Output File” to select a file to use.  (If you are going to read the contents of the emulator to a file, this can be a new file)

Next select an operation from the drop down box next to “Operation”  Valid operations include:

• Read from emulator to file = creates a new file on your computer with the contents of emulator RAM.  Must specify a filename, how much memory you want read (size), if you want to use a non-standard start address (File Start Address)  and if you want to use large RAM support (required for files > 512kbit / 64k byte)
• Write from file to emulator = updates the RAM on your emulator with the contents of a file on your computer.  Must specify a filename  and if you want to use large RAM support (required for files > 512kbit / 64k byte).  File size and start address will be automatically selected for you and will be correct in most cases where your file is the same size as the chip you are trying to emulate.  (i.e. 32k byte file for 27C256 chip)
• Verify emulator RAM with file = compares the contents of the Emulator’s RAM with a file on your computer to see if they match.  Must specify a filename  and if you want to use large RAM support (required for files > 512kbit / 64k byte).  File size and start address will be automatically selected for you and will be correct in most cases where your file is the same size as the chip you are trying to emulate.  (i.e. 32k byte file for 27C256 chip)
• Monitor File for changes and upload = this operation monitors a file for changes and uploads the changes to your emulator as they happen. ust specify a filename  and if you want to use large RAM support (required for files > 512kbit / 64k byte).  File size and start address will be automatically selected for you and will be correct in most cases where your file is the same size as the chip you are trying to emulate.  (i.e. 32k byte file for 27C256 chip)

After you have selected and configued the operation you desire, click “Execute” to perform it.  To cancel a monitoring+upload session or other op, click “Cancel Op”

That’s it!

Suggested Uses

If you have a program that can spit out bin files but it does not support Moates hardware:

1. Start EmUtility
2. Pick “Write from file to Emulator”
3. Point EmUtility at the file you are working with
4. Click “Execute” to load the initial file
5. Change the operation to “Monitor file for changes and upload”
6. Click “Execute” to begin monitoring the file for changes
7. Leave EmUtility running in the background.  Go back to your editing application.  Make changes and save the file (with the same filename).  As you save changes to the file, EmUtility will copy them to your emulator almost instantly!

Nissan 16 bit applications with TunerPro 4.x: (using a daughterboard like our Nissan 20×2 that takes two identical chips and two Ostrich 2.0 emulators)

1. Plug in ONE Ostrich and follow the directions immediately above to set up monitoring for an application that does not support Moates hardware.
2. Leave EmUtility running and connect the second Ostrich.
3. Start TunerPro.  It should detect your second Ostrich.
4. Start your emulation session in TunerPro.
5. Tune away.  TunerPro will update one Ostrich, EmUtility will update the other

(Note: TunerPro 5.x supports dual Ostrich mode which is easier to set up than this)

16 bit Nissan applications such as 925style.com’s ROM  EDITOR (using a daughterboard like our Nissan 20×2 that takes two identical chips and two Ostrich 2.0 emulators)

1. Plug in ONE Ostrich and follow the first set of directions above to set up monitoring for an application that does not support Moates hardware.
2. Leave EmUtility running and connect the second Ostrich.
3. Start a SECOND COPY of EmUtility.  It should detect your second Ostrich.
4. Repeat the instructions for loading a binary and starting monitoring in the second EmUtility session
5. Tune away!  As you save changes to the file, each instance of EmUtility will update one emulator.

Using the RoadRunner as a general purpose 16 bit emulator with software that does not have native support (i.e. Bosch Motronic 28Fxxx):

1. Start EmUtility
2. Pick “Write from file to Emulator”
3. Point EmUtility at the file you are working with
4. Click “Execute” to load the initial file
5. Change the operation to “Monitor file for changes and upload”
6. Click “Execute” to begin monitoring the file for changes
7. Leave EmUtility running in the background.  Go back to your editing application.  Make changes and save the file (with the same filename).  As you save changes to the file, EmUtility will copy them to your emulator almost instantly!

1) Get on the website here in the ‘software and drivers’ section and download and unzip the ‘USB Drivers’ file. Remember where you put it.

2) Plug the Ostrich into the USB port of your PC, and point the operating system to the previously located USB Driver directory and install the drivers. See the USB Driver Installation Guides here on www.moates.net for further guidance in this regard.

3) Go into the drivers and set the COM port of the USB to Serial Converter (under Ports in the Device Manager of the Windows Control Panel). Set it to COM3 or COM4. Override any warnings against ‘port in use’ or any of that nonsense. Again, refer to the USB install guides for more info.

4) While in the port settings, set the latency to ‘1’ (default=16). This will speed it up dramatically.

5) Use TunerPro RT or a similar program to upload a binary to the Ostrich, and verify that it is uploaded correctly.

6) Hook it up to the vehicle, and go to town. When installing the ribbon cable where the chip normally goes, orient the red stripe so that it faces where the chip notch or arrow (pin #1) would normally face.

Note: If you have the car off, and the Ostrich is hooked up to the car’s ECU, then sometimes an upload/verify won’t work right. Just turn the car on, or disconnect the Ostrich during the initial upload, and everything should be fine.

There are jumpers inside the Ostrich, depending on how many pins / memory size you are emulating to.
The following pictures illustrate three different ones: 24, 28, and 32-pin. The 32-pin is only used for Ford EEC-V applications right now.

24-pin (with associated pictures for an installation where the original chip was a 2732A in a 1227747-style GM ECM):
Here’s the jumper settings, set for 24-pin emulation:

Here’s the socket that is soldered in the ECM. Note the direction of the notch (to the right) indicating where the original chip pin #1 would go:

Here’s one way to do it, first right before insertion and then after it is snapped down in. Really it is preferable to use a ZIF socket here. Notice the 24-pin socket that is stacked onto the bottom of the regular 28-pin emulation cable. You can just use the 28-pin with the extra 4 pins hanging over as well. Note the red stripe toward where the notch would normally go:

28-pin Installation using the G1 chip adapter, similar to that used in a 1986-92 TPI GM ECM:
Check out the jumper settings. Note that this is the configuration that the Ostrich is shipped with, and works for the majority of the applications.

Note the direction of the notch on the chip, despite the direction of the ZIF handle. This is counter-intuitive for many, and is relatively unique to the G1 / TPI-style adapter due to spatial constraints in the ECM housing:

Now we take the chip out, and put the emulation cable in. Note the red stripe and how it is oriented compared to the notch on the chip that was there before:

32-pin Jumper Settings, presently only used for EEC-V applications:
]]> https://support.moates.net/ostrich-operation/feed/ 0 https://support.moates.net/bluetooth-install-on-ostrich/ https://support.moates.net/bluetooth-install-on-ostrich/#respond Mon, 10 May 2010 05:34:54 +0000 http://support.moates.net/?p=854

Bluetooth

There are two tools available for datalogging on Honda ECUs from www.moates.net and they include the HULOG and the HondaLog.

HULOG: The HULOG comes in a plastic enclosure and ONLY requires a pin swap if it is an older unit. All the new units come with 1:1 connector pinning, so will differ from the pictures shown in that no pin swap is required or will be present on the extension cable. It can be mounted externally or internally, depending on whether you want to pass the 4-pin header cable or a USB cable out of your ECU.

HondaLog: The HondaLog can be mounted directly to the ECU with no interconnecting cable It can also be mounted at the end of a 4-pin tether cable. Either way, no pin swap is required (note color of wires and their order in the pictures). The unit is shipped with two pinning options in terms of the attachment header. It also comes with a piece of shrink-wrap tubing in case you want to ‘wrap that rascal’ when you’re done. Either way, it goes to your USB cable and PC on the other end.

Pictures are shown below for the two units. The installation header is a 4-pin latching unit, and comes with the moates.net Honda Chipping Kits. You can alternatively use a 4-pin 0.025″ square-post breakaway header. Please take note of the directionality of the latch on the interconnecting cable though, since that is critical.

HULOG Pictures

HondaLog Pictures



]]> https://support.moates.net/huloghondalog-installation/feed/ 0 https://support.moates.net/honda-tuning-with-crome/ https://support.moates.net/honda-tuning-with-crome/#respond Mon, 10 May 2010 05:31:23 +0000 http://support.moates.net/?p=848 Although quite outdated, this is a very nice PDF tutorial written up by Darren Kattan. Check it out by clicking HERE

(also: Using the ‘EX’ with the G3)

Note: This product was updated in 2015.  The original documentation (which still applies) follows with a discussion of differences between the original and current hardware.

For placing several different binaries on a single chip for GM applications, the G3 adapter is the hot ticket. By ‘stacking’ the binaries on a large-sized memory, and using the included switching ability, you can swap between different programs on-the-fly while the car is running. You could have ‘Valet’, ‘Economy’, ‘Nitrous’, or whatever else you want to put together.

First a little background. A memory chip is accessed by changing the state of various connections or pins. Some of the pins are called address lines. They tell the chip which data to present. There are low address lines (A0 through A14) and high address lines (A15 through A18). The larger chips like the AM29F040 have A0-A18, or 19 address lines. What the G3 adapter does is take ‘manual’ control of the address lines A15-A18. If you study binary stuff, you’ll know that this will give you 16 different memory ‘banks’ which can be selected.

On the G3 are several components, including one thermofuse (looks like a capacitor) to protect against shorts when using the ‘EX’ module, four capacitors which help dampen RFI pickup from the EX cable, two jumpers to set the operating modes (see below), and a rotary DIP switch to select which bank of memory is to be accessed.

Installation instructions for the G3 adapter are very similar to those for the ‘G1’ adapter, so see the section under ‘G1’ instructions for guidance in this regard.

Think of the G3 as an old-style channel selector on a TV. You just turn the knob, and the car’s ECM will see a different channel or ‘bank’ of memory. Put the switch to position zero, and all the ‘high’ address lines will be set to 5v. Thus, the actual memory location that will be accessed on a 29F040 will be 78000-7FFFF. If the switch is set to position ‘F’, then all the high address lines will be set to GND, or ‘low’. In this case, the reference memory will be 00000-07FFF. You can see how this lets you put up to 16 programs on a single chip and select between them. The switch positions are numbered 0-F, which is just hexadecimal for zero through 16.

There are several different hardware configurations which are possible with the G3. This increases flexibility along with the confusion factor. Let’s look at these combinations individually:

1) Putting a 29F040 chip in the G3, and operating with an ECM that originally takes a 27C128 (16k bin) or 27C256 (32k bin). This gives you 16 bins.
2) Putting a single 29C256 or 27SF512 chip in the G3, operating in ‘passthrough’ mode with no switching.
3) Putting a 29F040 chip in the G3, and operating with an ECM that originally takes a 27C512 (64k bin). This gives you 8 bins.
4) Putting a 27SF512 chip in the G3, and operating with an ECM that originally takes a 27C256 or 27C128. This gives you 2 bins.

The most typical cases are (1) and (2), so we’ll talk about them first.

For operating instructions on the ‘EX’ module, see the bottom of this page.

Case 1: Originally a 27C128 or 27C256, use a 29F040 chip to switch between 16 programs.

First thing you will want to do is ‘assemble’ your big 512k binary from a group of smaller ‘stock-size’ binaries that you create or collect. The screenshot shows the configuration screen in ‘TunerPro’ under the BIN stacker function whereby the proper settings have been selected.

Notice how the bin size here is 16k (originay a 27C128) and the chip size is 512k (for a 29F040). The switch size for the Case-1 hardware configuration is 32k. This is going to create a 512k fie that you can then burn directly to a 29F040 chip without any offsets. Also note that TunerPro does the BIN order reversing for you, so all you need to worry about is which switch position is associated with which BIN.

The jumper positions for this Case-1 are such that both jumpers should be placed in the ‘down’ position as shown in the picture. This will allow full access to a 29F040 chip’s memory banks via the switching with bank sizes up to 32k. Make sure the notch on the chip is facing to the left as shown.

Case 2: Originally a 27C128, 27C256, or 27C512 chip, use a 29C256 or 27SF512 chip as a single-program pass-through application.

If you want to use the G3 as just a straight adapter and not a switcher, this can be done very easily. Just program the chip as you normally would for a single-program application and put it in the adapter.

Only trick is to make sure that you set the jumpers to the ‘up’ or 29C256 position. This will allow the G3 to act just like a ‘G1’ adapter, passing the signal directly through and bypassing the switching functionality. Make sure the chip is moved over to the right, with the notch facing left.

Case 3: Originally a 27C512 chip, use a 29F040 chip to switch between 8 programs.

Now we’re getting to some more ‘flexible’ appication of the G3. For this case, the jumpers should be set as shown, with J1 in the ‘down’ or 29F040 position and J2 (right) in the ‘up’ position. You still stack your BINs using the TunerPro Bin Stacker, but the settings should be such that your Bin Size=64k, Chip Size=512k, and Switch Size=64k.

When switching in this mode, there will be a little difference. In this mode, position 0-1 are the same and 2-3 are the same and so on. So, in terms of which BIN you will be accessing, you’ll be seeing BIN0 in positions 0-1, BIN1=2-3, etc through BIN7=E-F. This gives you 8 binaries you can put on the chip and select from, with a switch occurring every ‘other’ switch position.

Case 4: Originally a 27C128 or 27C256 chip, use a 27SF512 chip to switch between 2 programs.

OK, so you don’t want to run 16 different binaries? Just two? Here’s an option for you. Set up your BIN in TunerPro again, with the Bin Size=16 or 32k, chip size=64k, and switch size=32k. Set the jumpers with J1 in the ‘up’ position and the J2 in the ‘down’ position. This will allow the A15 line to get switched every other switch position.

When operating in this mode, the first bin will be accessed at switch positions 0,2,4,6,8,A,C,E and the second BIN will be accessed in the other positions. This gives some switching flexibility without the confusion of millions of binary files.

That’s about it in terms of G3 operation. Again, the installation is pretty much the same as for the G1 so see that section for instructions in that regard.

Using the ‘EX’ module:
The function of the ‘EX’ module is that of a remote BIN switching device and display indicator. When used with the G3, the ‘local’ G3 rotary switch should be placed in the ‘0’ zero position!

If you want to have a ‘AntiTheft’ or ‘Valet’ mode, you should put that binary in position zero, so you can disconnect the EX and carry it with you. It can be unplugged from the ribbon cable at any time. Don’t worry about plugging it in backwards. It won’t short out, it just won’t work right and won’t light up. If it lights up with the car on, you’ve got it right.

Revisions of the ‘G3’ Switching Adapter

As of 2015, there are two different versions of the G3 Adapter.

The first version has a rotary switch on board and a single 10 pin connector.  This is the version that this article has discussed so far.  It was manufactured up to 2015:

The second version does NOT have a rotary switch.  Instead, it has two connectors – one 10 pin (like before) and a provisoin for a 4 pin (new, open not installed in this picture).  It was manufactured starting in 2015:

Fortunately, they function nearly identically.  The new version is simplified with fewer configuration steps required due to having fewer jumpers.  Both versions can be used on the same platforms for the same thing – allowing multiple programs to be used on OBD1 GM vehicles.

• The early version can be used for switching without any external hardware via the knob.  The current version requires either the EX remote (which connects to the 10 pin connector) or a rotary switch with 4 pin cable.
• The current model only switches three address lines allowing a maximum of 8 programs, regardless of the program size.  Earlier models supported switching more address lines in some configurations
• The current model will only function in pass-through mode for a single program when using a 28 pin chip.  The previous model could support switching between two 32k or 16k programs with a 28 pin 512k chip.
• The current model has only one jumper which selects whether a 28 pin 27SF512 chip or 32 pin 29F040 chip is installed.  The earlier model had a second jumper which selected the program size.  The only jumper that needs to be adjusted on the new model is to select which chip (27SF512 vs 29F040) is installed – the current version will always function as if J1 was set for 64k operation.
• The current model always presents 64k chunks of memory, i.e. if J1 on the earlier model was set for a 64k block size.  The earlier model could present smaller chunks, the current model only presents 64k chunks.  When using 16k or 32k bins with the current G3, ensure they are arranged in the top section of a 64k block.

The HDR1 memory adapter is primarily designed to download the existing code from a stock Memcal.
It can be used for other things as well. For instance, if you want to use a UV eraser on your stock Memcal and then reprogram it without tearing stuff up, the HDR1 allows this to be done very easily.

Step 1: Take the stock Memcal (or whatever) and identify where the pins come out for the existing EPROM.

Step 2: Insert the HDR1 into the Memcal and note the orientation of the existing chip.

Step 3: Place the assembly into your favorite chip reader / programmer (AutoProm shown, chip notch facing ZIF handle, empty spaces nearest to handle).

Step 4: Go ahead and read or re-program the chip.

That’s it! No mess, no fuss. Pretty straightforward. ]]> https://support.moates.net/hdr1/feed/ 0 https://support.moates.net/g2-adapter-installation/ https://support.moates.net/g2-adapter-installation/#respond Mon, 10 May 2010 05:27:16 +0000 http://support.moates.net/?p=841

G2

G2 TBI-Style 2732-to-29C256 Adapter Installation Instructions:Here is a pictorial depiction of a G2 installation in a TBI-style ECM.
It shows the following:

1) Disassembly and removal of stock socket body.
– Take note of the ‘stock’ 2732A chip orientation. Your 2732A chip will probably be in a little plastic holder.
– Try and overcome the challenge presented by the disparity between that fact and this pictorial guide.
– Take apart the ECM case, loosen screws that hold ‘daughterboard’, and get everything free so you can get to the underside.
– Be careful with ribbon cables which are often glued to the ECM housing areas.
– Measure spacing between row of chip socket pins, and make sure you order the correct adapter part (0.6 or 0.45″).
– Using small screwdriver, gently pry plastic off of pins. It should come free, leaving pins to be desoldered individually pretty easily. This may not work as well with 0.45″ spacing sockets, and you might have to desolder the whole socket at the same time or mutilate it a little bit to get it out.

2) Desoldering of stock socket pins, removal of solder from holes using solder sucker.
– Apply heat and remove each individual pin (assuming you were successful with step (1).
– Use solder sucker to open up each hole for acceptance of the ‘new’ socket.

3) Soldering in place of a 24-pin collet-pin DIP socket. (For 0.45″ spacing, 12-pin SIPs are used instead).
– Just like it says. If you want a very low profile install, skip this step and go to step (4), except solder it in place instead of pressing it in.

4) Placement of G2 adapter along with optional ZIF and associated chip.
– Just like it says.

5) View of relative clearance and reassembly.
– Check and make sure it’s not going to hit anything when installed back in the car. If you have clearance issues, you might want to consider the solder-in option mentioned in (3-4).

Note that the height can be reduced by not using the ZIF socket, and can be further reduced by soldering the adapter directly in as mentioned (bypassing the DIP or SIP socket install).

These pictures should give you the information you need with respect to procedures, relative socket / adapter / chip orientation, etc.
However, if after viewing this you still have questions, just let me know at my email address on the main page and I’ll do my best to field them.

Have fun!

]]> https://support.moates.net/g2-adapter-installation/feed/ 0 https://support.moates.net/file-uploads-and-downloads/ https://support.moates.net/file-uploads-and-downloads/#respond Mon, 10 May 2010 05:25:17 +0000 http://support.moates.net/?p=837 Our file manager is no longer available for access due to a website crash.  Almost all of the content is available at the excellent forums http://www.gearhead-efi.com

You can also click this for a direct link to the files section: link

1. Check both axis of the VE table in the tuning tool to make sure the MAP and RPM headings (the ones colored sky-blue) have link PIDs associated with them. The link PIDs are usually displayed as {Link: SAE.MAP} and {Link: SAE.RPM}.
   
   
2. Check that the units displayed for the MAP link pid are exactly the same as the units specified in the Scan Tool for that PID.
   

   You can change the units of the VE table’s MAP axis using the menu option: Edit->Configure display units…
   
   You can change the units of the MAP PID in the Scan Tool by displaying the [PIDS F8] tab page, right clicking on the SAE.MAP PID and selecting Imperial or Metric so that it matches the units in the VE table.
   
   

3. Make sure you start logging (red button) or monitoring (yellow button) in the Scan Tool. Otherwise real-time data will not be sent to the tuning tool’s VE table and RTACS will not work.
   
   
4. Make sure the cells you want RTACS to update are not “protected”. Protected cells are displayed with a white background.
   
   
5. Set the accuracy in the [RTACS] tab page of the VE table to 0. That will turn off EFILive’s auto protect feature when EFILive “thinks” the cells are accurate enough.
   
   
6. Make sure the Col, Row and BEN factor PID values are displayed and updating with the expected values in the [RTACS] tab page of the VE table.
   
   
7. Make sure the min and max RTACS limits in the [RTACS] tab page of the VE table are set far enough apart so that values can be modified.
   
   
8. Make sure the “RTACS is NOT active” changes to “RTACS is active” when you expect RTACS to be working.
   
   

Here’s more text from a recent email:

The most important part of the RR auto tune is to make sure the calculated BEN factor PID you are using is correctly calculating the error between the commanded v’s actual (i.e. wideband measured) AFR. The error is displayed as a numerical value that represents the percentage error between the two values.

———————————————————————————–

The BEN factor is calculated as (actual AFR) divided by (commanded AFR).

A value of 1.00 indicates that the commanded AFR matches the actual AFR

A value less than 1 indicates that the actual AFR is less than the commanded AFR by the fractional part of the value. i.e. if the value was 0.95, then the difference is 5%, if the value was 0.90 then the difference is 10%, if the value was 0.87 then the difference is 13% etc.

A value greater than 1 indicates that the actual AFR is greater than the commanded AFR by the fractional part of the value. i.e. if the value was 1.05, then the difference is 5%, if the value was 1.10 then the difference is 10%, if the value was 1.13 then the difference is 13% etc.

The RTACS software multiplies the existing VE value by a percentage of the BEN factor, the percentage is based on coarse/fine settings.

———————————————————————————–

When the border turns red that indicates that the logged data is currently being discarded because it did not pass the filter(s) that you have in place.

———————————————————————————–
You should also make sure the PCM is operating is open loop to prevent the PCM from fighting against you and adjusting the long/short term fuel trims while you are trying to tune. You can force open loop by increasing all values in B4205 (Closed Loop Temp Enable) to greater than the coolant temp will ever get. That will prevent the PCM from entering closed loop.

Hope this helps!

For using EFI Live, perform the following:

1. Open up the software, and get the EFI Live Roadrunner Control Panel. Make sure the Roadrunner serial number is being displayed.
2. Upload the whole new Operating System and Calibration from the PC *.tun file to the Roadrunner device.
3. Select the “Execute from PCM Flash Memory (if equipped)” option (two chips with arrows in between). This will turn the Roadrunner emulation ‘off’ in order to blank out the PCM RAM when the memory read faults. The software should display ‘Flash’ as the mode of operation.
4. Re-select the button, this time selecting the ‘Emulation’ mode of operation.
5. Turn the key or power to the PCM off, wait 10 seconds, and turn it back on.
6. If you like, at this point you can open the EFI Live ScanTool software (make sure cable is connected and vehicle is on). You will probably want to scan for codes and DTCs, and clear them all as appropriate.
7. Start the vehicle briefly (1-2 seconds) and then shut power back off. This is primarily to reset the idle relearn, so it typically not an issue with the drive-by-wire configurations.
8. You should now be able to restart the PCM and vehicle, and things should work as expected if you are using a valid *.tun file.

This procedure will also help if you have suffered tune corruption.

If you have any questions, contact EFI Live or Moates technical support and they’ll be glad to help further.

If you’re completely new to burning chips, you may want to take a look at the Beginners’ Guide before reading the rest of this article.  You will probably still need to read this guide in order to choose the correct programming parameters unless you’re in the situation where you’re programming a chip that is the exact same size as the chip you are replacing.  Programming chips with offsets comes into play in two situations:

1. If the chip you are programming is of a larger capacity than the binary file you are putting on it, you need to use an offset to ensure the tune ends up in the right spot on the chip.
2. Switching adapters which hold multiple programs require the use of offsets to fit multiple programs on a single chip for a switching adapter.

Both of these cases will be covered in this article.

Chip Offsets With a Single Tune:

We’re going to assume you have either TunerPro or Flash n Burn open at this point and the chip physically oriented correctly.  If you need help with this, look at the Beginners’ Guide before continuing.  We will be selecting the correct buffer and chip addressing to ensure the chip is burned properly and can be used.

When in the software:

1. Select the type of chip you’ll be programming from the drop-down menu. This will likely be either the AT29C256, 27SF512, AT90F040 or Moates J3 adapter (F3/F3v2).
2. Pick the ‘Load file to buffer’ option, and navigate to the file you want programmed on the chip. Select it, and it will be loaded to memory on the PC. Take note of the file size indicated in the message window. (You can typically “hover” over the filename before opening it and Windows will pop up an information box iwth the file size)  It will likely be one of five sizes: 4k, 16k, 32k, 56k or 64k bytes.
   • The file you have loaded will determine your buffer addressing (start/end)
   • 4k byte = 0000/0FFF
   • 16k byte = 0000/3FFF
   • 32k byte = 0000/7FFF
   • 56k byte = 0000/DFFF
   • 64k byte = 0000/FFFF
3. In the top right part of the window you will see the Chip Addressing offset values that need to be changed. The buffer addressing along with the chip size will determine what offsets you need to use. (Flash n Burn usually automatically selects sane offsets based on your chip type and file size in order to place your buffer at the end of the chip, where it usually belongs.)
   The following table summarizes what offsets you need to use depending on chip used and file size:

   File Size	Chip	Buffer Start -> End	Chip Start -> End
   4k (4096)	AT29C256	000000 -> 000FFF	007000 -> 007FFF
   16k (16384)	AT29C256	000000 -> 003FFF	004000 -> 007FFF
   32k (32768)	AT29C256	000000 -> 007FFF	000000 -> 007FFF
   4k (4096)	27SF512	000000 -> 000FFF	00F000 -> 00FFFF
   16k (16384)	27SF512	000000 -> 003FFF	00C000 -> 00FFFF
   32k (32768)	27SF512	000000 -> 007FFF	008000 -> 00FFFF
   56k (57344)	27SF512	000000 -> 00DFFF	002000 -> 00FFFF
   64k (65536)	27SF512	000000 -> 00FFFF	000000 -> 00FFFF
   32k (32768 EECIV)	F3/F3v2	000000 -> 007FFF	032000 -> 039FFF
   56k (57344 EECIV)	F3/F3v2	000000 -> 00DFFF	032000 -> 03FFFF
   64k (65536 EECIV)	F3/F3v2	000000 -> 00FFFF	032000 -> 03FFFF
   216k or 224k (EECV)	F3/F3v2	“bank” format: non-linear!	convert to 256k!
   256k (EECV)	F3/F3v2	000000 -> 03FFFF	000000 -> 03FFFF

   While the correct values are often selected, you can manually enter them.  For a single-tune single-chip scenario, you generally want the buffer (or file content) to be placed at the ‘end’ of the chip. The notable exceptions to this rule are 32k EECIV Ford tunes (which need to start at 0x32000 and end before the end of the chip) and 216k/224k Ford EECV bins (which are not in linear memory format and need converted to 256k before programming).

   
   To do this manually:

   • Ensure Buffer Addresses are correct for the file size you have loaded.
   • Adjust the Chip Addressing start value and end value until the end value is the maximum value for the chip AND buffer address values are correct.
   • A short list of common chip addressing settings:
     • 64k bin: 000000 start 00FFFF end ( SST27SF512 chip )
     • 32k bin: 008000 start 00FFFF end ( SST27SF512 chip )
     • 16k bin: 00C000 start 00FFFF end ( SST27SF512 chip )
     • 4k bin: 00F000 start 00FFFF end ( SST27SF512 chip )
     • 56k Ford EECIV bin: 032000 start 03FFFF end ( Ford F3 chip )
     • 256k Ford EECV bin: 000000 start 03FFFF end ( Ford F3 chip )
     • 112k Ford EECV bin: SPECIAL need other software ( Ford F3 chip )
     • 216k Ford EECV bin: SPECIAL need other software ( Ford F3 chip )
     • BEB files CANNOT be programmed with FnB / TP.  Must program using Binary Editor
     • eBIN file CANNOT be programmed
4. Once you are satisfied with the offsets, perform a normal Erase/Blank/Program/Verify cycle!  Consult the Beginners’ Guide for more information.

Using Switching Adapters:

Using our switching adapters (G2X, G3, GX, TwoTimer, F3, F3v2,F8) requires programming chips using offsets of making “stacked” bin files.  Switching adapters use chips that are larger than an ECU requires, allowing the extra space to be used for multiple programs.  The “extra” space gets divided up into chunks, each of which can store an individual tune.  There are two approaches to creating proper chips for use with switching adapters, both equally valid:

1. Lump all tune files together on your PC into one bin file “stacked” which is the same size as the chip, program chip at once.
   • The “Bin Stacker/splitter” function in TunerPro can be used to prepare a single file from a group of tunes.  (You can also use a hex editor or other tool)
   • This “stacked” file contains all the tunes and can then be programmed like a “normal” file using TunerPro, Flash n Burn, etc.
   • “Normal” programming cycle: Erase, Blank check, Load tune/buffer, Program chip, Verify.
   • Entire chip gets programmed at once, all tunes for the ECU get programmed on the chip in one operation as part of the “stacked” file.
   • Requires preparation of new “stacked” file and reprogramming of entire chip if any individual tune changes.
2. Program the chip multiple times, once for each tune, different small selected area of chip Program/Verify cycle instead of whole chip.
   • Instead of relying on a program to create a “stacked” file, knowledge of chip addressing is used to place tunes at correct places within a chip.
   • Programming cycle changes slightly: Erase, Blank check happens at very beginning of cycle ONLY ONCE.  Does NOT happen before every Program/Verify operation, like normal.
   • Erase/Blank is followed by multiple Program, Verify operations.  Each operation is for one tune.  Each operation will have different start/end addresses which are a portion of the chip.
   • Does NOT require preparing any special files in advance – uses the same bin files which would be used for single-tune programming.
   • If you want to chance a tune which is already programmed, the entire chip must be erased and all tunes individually reprogrammed.

As a rule of thumb, tunes start at the end of the chip and count down.  i.e. “Tune 0” is in the highest addresses on the chip, or the top slot in a stacked bin.  “Tune 1” will be the next lower slot.  Some adapters have chips which can hold more tunes than there are address lines for switching.

Each switching adapter we sell has different numbers of available slots, slot sizes and corresponding chip addresses start/end:

• G2X: 27SF512 chip (00000/0FFFF), 16x 32kbit/4kbyte slots on chip:
  1. F000/FFFF
  2. E000/EFFF
  3. D000/DFFF
  4. C000/CFFF
  5. B000/BFFF
  6. A000/AFFF
  7. 9000/9FFF
  8. 8000/8FFF
• G3: 29F040 chip (000000 / 07FFFFF), 16x variable size slots, Ex remote required, addressing varies according to settings on adapter
• GX: 29F040 chip (000000 / 07FFFFF), 16x 64k slots, Ex remote required, addressing varies according to size of base file.
  • There are 16 slots on the chip.  Each slot is 64k ( 0x0FFFF) in size.
  • Tunes smaller than 64k typically need to be top-justified so that they END at the end of each window
  • When using the Ex remote (or no switcher – floating switch inputs) slot “0” will be at the end of the chip and bigger numbers on the Ex remote will mean slots closer to the beginning (0x000000) of the chip.
• TwoTimer: 27SF512 (00000/0FFFF), 2x 256kbit/32kbyte slots, idles in “high position”
  1. 8000/FFFF
  2. 0000/7FFF
• F3 (version one – switch pin and 2 tunes): special case.  Cannot program entire device at once, stacking NOT possible.  Program chip twice, manually change state of switching pin during programming. Note: “Erase chip” function does NOT erase whole chip, only erases the “bank” selected by the jumper
• F3v2 (version two – 4 pin connector and dial switch, 8 tunes): special case.  Cannot program entire device at once, stacking NOT possible.  Program chip multiple times, manually change state of switch during programming to select different slots. Note: “Erase chip” function does NOT erase whole chip, only erases the “bank” selected by the switch
• F8: special case.  Use F8 device utility to prepare and program tunes.

It is unlikely that your chip or burner has failed, such events are actually quite rare. All devices are fully tested for all functionality prior to shipment.

We have many folks that send their units back to us, but very few that actually exhibit failure during bench testing once they arrive.

However, it is possible that something is wrong with your procedures.

Please utilize the following test matrix. This should take about 5 minutes:

1) Disconnect all USB devices, close all software, and re-install USB drivers.  See here.  If you suspect that your drivers may be confused, use the FTCLEAN procedure outlined here.

2) Re-connect the Moates device, and allow the drivers to associate with it. Wait about 30 seconds.

3a) Go into the Windows Device Manager, and look under ‘Ports(COM/LPT)’. If there is a ‘USB Serial Port’ listed, right-click on it and select ‘Properties’. If not, carry out step ‘3b’ on this list first.

3b) If you saw the ‘USB Serial Port’ from step (3a) then go directly to Step 4. If not, then expand your ‘Universal Serial Bus controllers’ section, and right-click on the ‘USB Serial Converter’. Go to the ‘Advanced’ tab, and check the box indicated as ‘Load VCP’. Then hit ‘OK’, unplug the device, and plug it back in. You should then be able to carry out (3a) successfully.

4) Go to the ‘Port Settings’ tab and then click the ‘Advanced’ button. Change the COM port setting on the pull-down to COM4, COM5, or COM6, regardless of ‘in use’ warnings. Accept any warnings. If you are running multiple devices (for instance an Ostrich and BURN2), make sure you assign different COM port numbers to each of them. But, make sure your COM port assignments are in the range of COM4-COM8. Also, while you’re on this page, change your ‘Latency timer’ to 1mS via pulldown. Click OK to apply all settings and close all Windows Control Panel sub-windows. If you like, you can unplug and replug the USB cable to the device to verify that it appears in the list with the new settings.

5) Download and install the latest version of Flash-n-Burn from here:
http://tunerpro.net/download/SetupFlashBurn.exe
Note: If you’re working with an APU1, check the back and make sure the horizontal switches are placed in the ‘outboard’ position, away from the USB connection.

6) Download a 64k ‘test’ bin from here:
http://static.moates.net/zips/00-512-TEST.zip
Unzip it, and open the FlashBurn software.

7) Within the FlashBurn software, make sure the chip burner is recognized in the white dialog window. Select 27SF512 on the top left, and load the 64k ‘test’ file to the buffer. Make sure that the file size displayed in the dialog window is 65,536 bytes. If you’re loading a 32k file (like for Hondas etc), make sure the file size is 32,768 exactly.

8) The addressing should auto-select on the top right, but make sure it is correct. Chip addressing should be 000000-00FFFF. Buffer addressing should also be 000000-00FFFF. If you are loading a 32k file rather than the test file, make sure chip addressing is 008000-00FFFF and buffer addressing is 000000-007FFF.

9) Insert the chip into the socket, with the notch (pin 1) facing up toward the ZIF handle and USB cable. Make sure the chip is positioned furthest away from the handle and USB, such that the 4 empty slots are closest to the handle.

10) Select ‘erase chip’ and ‘blank check’. Verify that these steps were successful. Look up again at you addressing, and make sure it matches what is specified in step (8).

11) Select ‘program chip’ and then ‘verify chip’. Make sure you have success in the dialog box.

At this point, if everything checks out, you have illustrated that your chip and programmer are working correctly. If any of these steps fail, please send us a screen capture of the part of the process which failed, and we’ll do what we can to help you troubleshoot further.

Other problems can come from corrupt, incorrectly sized, or mismatched binaries for target application, incorrect chip and buffer addressing for a given file size, or incorrect COM port settings within the client software (such as Crome, etc).

For the burner itself, typical ‘next step’ troubleshooting would include taking apart the enclosure, blowing it out with compressed air to remove any metallic dust that might have accumulated, gently prying loose the ZIF socket to make sure there are no bent pins underneath where it snaps in, trying a different USB cable, trying a different chip, or trying a different PC or USB port.

Certainly if there is a true hardware failure, we’ll be glad to take care of it at no cost, but we doubt you want to spend time shipping back and forth if there isn’t a real hardware fault.

What makes engine management tricky is that even the best theoretical models fail to accurately represent physical behavior in certain situations.  All engine controllers would use the same logic and procedures for running the engine 100% of the time if there was a perfect engine control strategy.  Instead, most engine management schemes incorporate several different modes of operation in which different sensors dictate fuel and timing requirements.  Also, engine controllers have specific logic dictating when to switch between different modes of operation based on different demands from the driver and different engine conditions.  Some of the most common mistakes made by people starting out (hell, even experienced tuners too) are changing some of the “main” functions in order to try to fix a problem that is being caused by a secondary table or the computer operating outside its normal mode(s).  Better understanding of the various modes of operation will help pinpoint what needs to be changed in a tune.

It would probably be a good idea for you to have read the other articles about Injectors, Speed-Density, Mass Air Flow, and Alpha-N before reading the rest of this.

Some basic vocabulary:

• ECM, ECU, Engine computer : used interchangeably to mean the computer operating the fuel injectors and running the engine
• RPM : Revolutions Per Minute – how fast the motor is spinning
• MAP : Manifold Absolute Pressure – (usually) the pressure of air entering the motor
• ECT : Engine Coolant Temperature sensor – sensor used to measure the temperature of coolant circulating through a motor.  Sometimes called different things by different manufacturers.  I will use ECT here
• IAT : Intake Air Temperature sensor – sensor used to measure the temperature of air entering the motor.  Sometimes called different things by different manufacturers – I will use IAT here.
• MAF : Usually used as a shorthand for Mass Air Flow Sensor / Meter
• MAP : Manifold Absolute Pressure Sensor – a sensor that measures the pressure of air in the intake manifold
• Idle Valve : A electromechanical valve controlled by the ECM that allows air into the engine in order to control engine speed.
• Displacement : the volume swept by a piston descending from the top to the bottom of the cylinder bore.  More here.
• AFR : Air Fuel Ratio – the ratio of air to fuel present in a combustible mixture.  Usually stated as a ratio, i.e. 14.7:1 for the stoichiometric AFR for gasoline.  Stoichiometric AFR varies from fuel to fuel.
• Lambda : similar to AFR, except usually expressed as a number where 1.0 represents a stoichiometric mixture for all fuels.  Lambda and AFR are the same concept expressed in different units.
• Stoichiometric : a mixture containing the precise amount of oxidants required for complete combustion of all fuel present.  See here or here for more information on chemistry involved.
• Injector : a special type of solenoid that allows fuel to flow through it when energized (more)
• Pulsewidth : the length of time the engine computer applies electricity to the injector, or how long the injector is commanded to be open
• Flow Rate : The amount of fuel an injector flows once open.  These values are typically given in units of cc/min or lbs/hr at a specified fuel pressure. (injector flow rate varies with the square root of fuel pressure.)
• Latency : the length of time after the injector is turned on before it achieves its linear flow rate.

Goals of Engine Management

Although the answer is somewhat obvious (“make the engine run as well as it can”) it is worth a closer look at what engine management systems try to achieve and why.  Operating optimally normally means one of several things:

1. Making the most power possible without engine damage happening
2. Consuming as little fuel as possible in order to make a specific power output (maximizing efficiency)
3. Minimizing emissions

Most of the time engine management systems aim for more than one of these at once, i.e. Fuel efficiency while minimizing emissions or power and efficiency.  Generally, you cannot have your cake and eat it too when it comes to engine management because the physical conditions required to achieve optimal fuel economy are vastly different than those required to achieve optimal power production.  Minimizing emissions frequently conflicts with BOTH power and economy!

So how do engine management systems deal with the conflicting requirements of economy, emissions and power?  The answer is the title of this section – engine management systems switch between different modes of operation based on input from the driver, measurements from sensors and how they are programmed from the factory.  Sometimes in the course of tuning it is necessary to change not only configuration parameters of an ECM but also how it switches from one mode of operation to another.

Common Modes of Operation

Different ECMs will have different modes of operation and different rules for switching among them.  Many modes of operation exist to service requirements common to all engines, leading to many modes of operation being shared between different engine management implementations:

• Cranking: This is the first task for an ECM – help an engine transition from being spun by the starter to spinning on its own propelled by combustion.  This might not sound like a very difficult task, but there is a LOT involved!  While cranking, cam and crank sensors need to be monitored so the ECM can determine how fast the motor is spinning and what angle the crankshaft is at in order to provide accurate ignition timing, injectors have to be fired in order to deliver enough fuel to get the engine moving, the ignition system has to deliver sparks at an opportune time to ignite the mixture, (in some cases) the idle valve needs to be opened to allow enough air into the motor to get it running on its own…  And more sometimes!  Combine this with (typically) the lowest operating voltages because the alternator is not providing electrical energy and you have a potentially tricky situation.
• Startup: Once the engine is spinning under its own power, the fun can start.  There are often special rules that change the behavior of the ECU immediately after the engine starts.  Idling higher to prevent stalling is a common task in startup mode.  Many engines add additional fuel and change timing in order to try to help the engine warm up to desired operating temperature faster.
• Open Loop: This is a critical mode for the overall operation of the engine.  Open-loop mode is the mode used most often for performance, but it is important all the time.  Open loop operation uses a control strategy like MAF, Speed-Density or Alpha-N to determine fueling and ignition parameters to use to run the engine.  If tuning parameters related to open loop are incorrect, the motor will never run optimally.
• Closed Loop: This is an important mode for fuel economy and emissions.  In Closed Loop mode, the fueling and ignition values from Open loop are adjusted using feedback from additional sensors (usually Oxygen sensors).  Small imperfections in a tune can be corrected in closed loop, letting the ECU maintain much closer control over operating conditions than is possible with open loop alone.  There are usually limits to how large changes can be made by closed loop, which can lead to diagnostic error codes.  (Too Lean / Too Rich / O2 sensor)
• Power Enrichment: (aka “PE” mode) This is a subset of Open Loop operation where engine conditions such as AFR and ignition timing are adjusted with the goal of maximizing power.  Frequently, TPS readings close to wide open throttle serve as a trigger for PE mode.
• Tip-in: Sudden changes are a problem for all control strategies.  When the TPS sensor indicates the throttle has changed quickly enough, the ECU can enter Tip-in mode where
• Decel Fuel Cut Off (DFCO): When you take your foot off the gas, many ECMs will shut off fuel injectors in order to decrease fuel consumption and help promote engine braking.
• Dashpot: Many ECUs implement some form of digital dashpot using the Idle Valve.  The idea here is to prevent stalling when the throttle plate closes suddenly by opening the idle valve enough to gradually bring the engine to idle.
• Idle: At idle, the ECU tries to maintain engine speed while little or no load is placed on the engine.  Idle is often one of the trickiest states to control well.  Usually a mixture of airflow control (via Idle Valve or Drive-by-Wire), spark control and fuel control is used.  Strategies for controlling idle vary immensely among manufacturers.
• Limiting/Protection: Engines have limits – how fast they can safely spin, how much boost they can handle, how fast the car can safely travel.  Part of the ECM’s job is to monitor engine conditions and take measures before damage occurs.  Frequently, spark or fuel will be cut off until engine conditions return below a pre-set limit.

More to come later on this topic…

Before you read this, you should already have read the articles on Injector Theory and Speed-Density.  This article will not make much sense without the background information in those articles.

First, vocabulary:

• ECM, ECU, Engine computer : used interchangeably to mean the computer operating the fuel injectors and running the engine
• RPM : Revolutions Per Minute – how fast the motor is spinning
• MAP : Manifold Absolute Pressure – (usually) the pressure of air entering the motor
• ECT : Engine Coolant Temperature sensor – sensor used to measure the temperature of coolant circulating through a motor.  Sometimes called different things by different manufacturers.  I will use ECT here
• IAT : Intake Air Temperature sensor – sensor used to measure the temperature of air entering the motor.  Sometimes called different things by different manufacturers.  I will use IAT here.
• Displacement : the volume swept by a piston descending from the top to the bottom of the cylinder bore.  More here.
• AFR : Air Fuel Ratio – the ratio of air to fuel present in a combustible mixture.  Usually stated as a ratio, i.e. 14.7:1 for the stoichiometric AFR for gasoline.  Stoichiometric AFR varies from fuel to fuel.
• Lambda : similar to AFR, except usually expressed as a number where 1.0 represents a stoichiometric mixture for all fuels.  Lambda and AFR are the same concept expressed in different units.
• Stoichiometric : a mixture containing the precise amount of oxidants required for complete combustion of all fuel present.  See here or here for more information on chemistry involved.
• Ideal Gas Law : PV= nRT (Pressure times Volume equals moles of gas times ideal gas constant times temperature)  More to be read about this here.
• Moles : a measure of how many atoms are present.  See here.
• Induction stoke :  the part of a 4-stroke engine’s cycle in which air is drawn into the cylinder by the piston.  See here for more information if you are not familiar with a 4 stroke engine’s operation.

Many ECMs (particularly older ones) use extremely slow processors to run an engine, especially by today’s standards.  In addition to doing all the math required by Speed-Density to calculate airflow, the processor often has many other extremely timing or IO-intensive tasks, such as processing crank and cam sensor inputs, firing spark plugs and firing injectors.  Additionally, most of these processors lacked floating-point units (short explanation: pieces of a chip that understand what fractions and decimals are) limiting their ability to accurately represent a model that involved lots of numbers with a fractional component.   Bottom line: engineers had to come up with ways to simplify and speed up the math involved in speed density in order to get older, slower, cheap microcontrollers to be able to run an engine.

Obviously, different manufacturers implement things differently.  In the remainder of this article, we are going to explore briefly how Honda and GM simplified the ideal speed density system to make it more practical to implement on cheap hardware.

GM: Base Pulse Width (BPW)

Ideally, n = PV /RT and then injector pulse = n / injector flow constant

GM introduce the concept of “Base Pulse Width” or BPW to reduce the “V” and “R” terms.  Basically, the BPW is how long the injectors need to be open in order to fill cylinders at 100% volumetric efficiency at a standardized temperature.  The BPW is then multiplied by the Volumetric Efficiency table (which is no longer a VE table in the ideal sense of the word) to determine fueling at different load and RPM conditions.  This is then modified further by coolant and intake air correction tables to account for temperature.  This cuts the number of math operations more or less in half.  The idea behind Speed-Density is being applied in a way that is less math-intensive.

Honda: Required Fuel Value (ReqFuel)

Ideally, n = PV /RT and then injector pulse = n / injector flow constant

Honda took a different approach to the problem of simplifying Speed-Density.  Basically, the MAP sensor and RPM values measured by the ECU are used to index a LUT that contains (more or less) a desired fueling value.  Looking at the math above, Honda essentially pulls the final desired injector pulse (n / injector flow constant) out of a table.  This required fueling value is then scaled by various tables indexed by ECT and IAT which attempt to correct for variations in air temperature.  Honda reduces about half a dozen math operations to one table lookup and a couple of additional easy math operations.  Again, the principles of Speed-Density are being applied in a non-ideal way that attempts to capture what is going on in a way that is fast to implement on slow chips.

Old Bad news: As of this time (2-25-10) there are NO PUBLIC DEFINITION FILES for software that supports our hardware. (TunerPro RT, EEC Editor, Binary Editor)

New Better news: (2-13-13)  The Minotaur software available from Power Hungry Performance will spit out bin files you can program to our chips.  Supposedly, there will be QuarterHorse support soon.  Note: we are not affiliated with PHP in any way and you will have to contact them for any and all specific information regarding their products.

Be prepared to do a lot of reading in the numerous side links on this page.  More information that is beyond the scope of this overview will be available.

“Mass Air Flow” (MAF, for short) is a method of measuring airflow into an engine in order to supply an appropriate amount of fuel and adequate spark timing. First, vocabulary:

• ECM, ECU, Engine computer : used interchangeably to mean the computer operating the fuel injectors and running the engine
• MAF : Usually used as a shorthand for Mass Air Flow Sensor / Meter
• Vane Air Flow Meter (VAFM, “Flapper” type meter) : An early type of air meter rarely used today that relies on air pressing against a metering plate (“flapper”) to provide an airflow signal
• Karman Vortex air meter : A type of air meter that not used very much anymore that creates and counts vortexes (air disturbances) in order to measure airflow.
• Hot-Wire MAF : A type of MAF Meter that uses a thin wire heated by an electric current to directly measure air mass.  The most common type of MAF today
• Hot Film MAF : A type of MAF Meter that uses a metal film heated by an electric current to directly measure air mass.  Another type of MAF that is found today.
• TPS : Throttle Position Sensor
• MAP : Manifold Absolute Pressure Sensor – a sensor that measures the pressure of air in the intake manifold
• Displacement : the volume swept by a piston descending from the top to the bottom of the cylinder bore. More here.
• AFR : Air Fuel Ratio – the ratio of air to fuel present in a combustible mixture. Usually stated as a ratio, i.e. 14.7:1 for the stoichiometric AFR for gasoline. Stoichiometric AFR varies from fuel to fuel.
• Lambda : similar to AFR, except usually expressed as a number where 1.0 represents a stoichiometric mixture for all fuels.  Lambda and AFR are the same concept expressed in different units.

Types of MAF Meters and General Operating Principles

Hot Wire MAFs and Hot Film MAFs are the dominant technology in use today.  Earlier style meters (Vane/Flapper, Karman) required an external temperature sensor in order to provide a meaningful airflow reading.  Hot Wire and Hot Film sensors are often found coupled with a dedicated air temperature sensor but they do not strictly require one because the method in which they generate a signal accounts for the temperature of the air they meter.  If you want to learn more about meters, read up here.

ECMs generally have a routine (usually called the “MAF transfer function” or something similar) that converts the raw sensor readings into an airflow value. Sometimes this is a real-world unit (such as g/s or lb/hr) and sometimes it is a purely arbitrary synthetic unit that merely defines the shape of the curve. MAF transfer functions for hotwire MAFs are usually an exponential curve. The shape of the curve is usually determined by the physical characteristics of the sensor. The metering range of the sensor is usually determined by the cross-sectional area of the housing it is in. This means that an easy way to increase the amount of air a given MAF can meter is to put it in a pipe with a larger cross-sectional area. The new MAF transfer function can be approximated (usually fairly closely) by multiplying the old transfer function by the difference in cross sectional area.

Example Question: a meter in a 2″ diameter round housing can meter 1000g/s. The same meter in a 4″ diameter round housing will measure how much air?

Answer: First, find cross-sectional area of 2″ diameter pipe.  Area of circle = pi * r^2.  Diameter = 2 * radius. Radius = 1″, area = 1 * pi.  Second, find cross-sectional area of 4″ diameter pipe.  Area = 4 * pi.  New area / Old area = 4 / 1 = 4.  Multiply original airflow (1000g/s) by ratio of area (4) to get maximum value of 4000g/s.  Note that each individual point in a MAF transfer function can be multiplied in this manner to rescale.

MAF Systems

From here on in this guide, “MAF” and “MAF Systems” will refer exclusively to systems using Hot Wire MAFs and Hot Film MAFs. The reason for this is pretty simple: these type of sensors (at least theoretically) are capable of measuring air mass without the need for significant compensation for air density (i.e. altitude changes, forced induction, changes in air temperature).  In practice, many control strategies use other sensors to try to increase the accuracy of the MAF by additional adjustments but it is not strictly necessary.  MAF sensors do not know what “boost” or “vacuum” are – they deal exclusively with airflow.  If you are trying to make the transition from tuning mostly Speed-Density systems to MAF Systems, be very cautious with timing values as the same trends and rules do not apply to both systems.

Fueling with a MAF system is about as simple as it can get.  It goes something like this:

1. The raw sensor output is converted to an airlow value
2. The next step after determining airflow is to figure out how much fuel is needed to achieve a “target” AFR (more on AFR targets later) which is usually achieved by multiplying by AFR expressed cleverly (see footnote)
3. Finally, the desired fuel value is achieved by multiplying/dividing by a value (injector constant, injector slope, async BPW, …) to account for injector size.  Also any battery compensation is added.  (See Theory: An Injector Model for more information)
4. Done!  At this point, we have an injector pulsewidth!  PulseOut = (MAF_Transfer(RawMAFSensor) * TargetLambda * injector size) + injector latency

There is no “standard” way of doing timing with a MAF system, but all variants basically calculate a value that represents how much air is entering the cylinder each time the motor turns over.  It goes something like this:

1. Start with the same airflow value from step one of fueling. (MAF signal -> MAF Transfer)  This tells us the amount of airflow per unit time.
2. Measure how fast the motor is spinning (RPM) and from this calculate how many revolutions happened during the same time frame as our MAF sample.
3. Multiply/divide airflow by engine revolutions to get airflow / rev.  Most engine management stops here (GM, Subaru, Mitsufeces, …) and spark tables are indexed in grams/rev.  This is a measure of engine load (with a lowercase “l” to denote that we are talking about something different than “Load”, explained next)
4. Ford (and others?) instead use a “Load” (with an uppercase “L” to denote that we are talking about something different than “load”) value that is calculated by multiply/dividing airflow/rev by engine displacement to get a measure of how full the cylinders are relative to their maximum capacity naturally aspirated at sea level with certain air conditions.  If you’re at all familiar with Speed-Density, this should sound somewhat familiar because it is a concept VERY similar to Volumetric Efficiency.
5. Timing tables are usually in the form RPM x calculated load.  MAF timing tables will display a very different characteristic shape than RPM x MAP tables common in Speed-density systems.

Now that we have some concept of cylinder filling (“Load” or “load”), we should return to a piece of how fueling happens in a MAF system: target lambda/AFR.  Usually the same measure used to determine appropriate ignition timing is used to determine an appropriate target AFR/lambda.  In these cases, there is a table that dictates target lambda/AFR indexed by RPM and load.  Sometimes, RPM and TPS is used to determing target AFR instead of calculated load.

Strengths of Mass Air Flow

1. Extremely accurate fueling and spark delivery across a diverse range of engine conditions (at least while in steady-states): the holy grail for engine management. A properly set-up MAF system can adapt to changes in weather and altitude with ease.
2. Minor changes to engine equipment (i.e. headers, minor camshaft changes, intakes that do not significantly alter the placement of the MAF) do not require recalibration of the ECM.

Weaknesses of Mass Air Flow

MAF systems are known for having these issues:

1. MAF systems are extremely intolerant of vacuum leaks.  Any leaks between MAF sensor and engine generally cause all manner of odd problems, running lean in most cases due to un-metered air making it into the engine.
2. MAF sensors can be extremely sensitive to how they are “clocked” – merely rotating the sensor at a given spot in the intake tract can be sufficient to significantly change its output.
3. MAF sensors require laminar flow to read 100% accurately.  True laminar fluids do not exist so this introduces some degree of inaccuracy to MAF sensor readings.  Placing MAF sensors near bends, size transitions or obstructions where flow is less laminar greatly magnifies this issue.
4. A MAF sensor can be a flow restriction in cases where the MAF housing is the smallest portion of the intake system.
5. Hot-wire MAF elements are very fragile.  Debris can destroy delicate wires easily.  Dirt and oil deposits can build up on the sensor element, adversely affecting readings.
6. MAF systems have a relatively poor response to transient conditions, such as sudden throttle changes.  This is explained by the time it takes air to move from the MAF sensor where it is measured to the cylinder where it can be involved in combustion.
7. MAF sensors are not “one-way” sensors – reversion from a camshaft with large amounts of overlap can cause air to be metered on its way in to the engine and then again on its way out resulting in an artificially high MAF reading.  This can almost always be fixed by placing the MAF sensor sufficiently far from the throttle body, however doing so comes at the expense of making transient response even worse.

It may seem like there are a lot of weaknesses of MAF systems, but it is truly hard to emphasize just how amazing and important the strengths are.  It is no secret that the majority of OEMs today are implementing MAF systems as the primary control strategy.  There is a good reason for this, namely that engines can be controlled much more precisely (with the goal of meeting stricter and stricter emissions standards) with a MAF system than any other type of control strategy.

Note: I say “Multiply/divide” multiple times because multiplication and division are very similar operations but division is generally much slower on microcontrollers and other “small” processors often found in ECUs.  For this reason, most division is implemented as multiplication by carefully changing the scale of one of the operands.

If you do not have a strong background in physics and chemistry, be prepared to do a lot of reading in the numerous side links on this page.  This isn’t intended to be a brutal presentation of the topic, but theoretical concepts are necessary in order to be able to understand what is going on behind the scenes.

Speed-Density is a method of estimating airflow into an engine in order to supply an appropriate amount of fuel and adequate spark timing.  First, vocabulary:

• ECM, ECU, Engine computer : used interchangeably to mean the computer operating the fuel injectors and running the engine
• RPM : Revolutions Per Minute – how fast the motor is spinning
• MAP : Manifold Absolute Pressure – (usually) the pressure of air entering the motor
• ECT : Engine Coolant Temperature sensor – sensor used to measure the temperature of coolant circulating through a motor.  Sometimes called different things by different manufacturers.  I will use ECT here
• IAT : Intake Air Temperature sensor – sensor used to measure the temperature of air entering the motor.  Sometimes called different things by different manufacturers.  I will use IAT here.
• Displacement : the volume swept by a piston descending from the top to the bottom of the cylinder bore.  More here.
• AFR : Air Fuel Ratio – the ratio of air to fuel present in a combustible mixture.  Usually stated as a ratio, i.e. 14.7:1 for the stoichiometric AFR for gasoline.  Stoichiometric AFR varies from fuel to fuel.
• Lambda : similar to AFR, except usually expressed as a number where 1.0 represents a stoichiometric mixture for all fuels.  Lambda and AFR are the same concept expressed in different units.
• Stoichiometric : a mixture containing the precise amount of oxidants required for complete combustion of all fuel present.  See here or here for more information on chemistry involved.
• Ideal Gas Law : PV= nRT (Pressure times Volume equals moles of gas times ideal gas constant times temperature)  More to be read about this here.
• Moles : a measure of how many atoms are present.  See here.
• Induction stoke :  the part of a 4-stroke engine’s cycle in which air is drawn into the cylinder by the piston.  See here for more information if you are not familiar with a 4 stroke engine’s operation.

Basic Goals and Method

The goal of Speed-Density is to accurately predict the amount of air ingested by an engine during the induction stroke. This information is then used to calculate how much fuel needs to be provided and may also be used for determining an appropriate amount of ignition advance.

The theoretical basis for this is the Ideal Gaw Law (more here.) rearranged to solve for “n” (the number of moles of gas present :

• n = PV / RT

In order to use n = PV / RT to calculate the amount of air a motor ingests during the induction stroke we would need:

• P is pressure in the cylinder immediately after the intake valves close.
• V is volume, which we know from engine displacement.
• R we know (it’s the Ideal Gas Constant see here for more)
• T is the temperature of the gas in the cylinder immediately after the intake valves close.

Many of the things required to calculate the amount of air the engine ingests using the ideal gas law are missing, unavailable or at least incomplete.  Some notable points where reality is less than ideal:

1. Our MAP sensor measures the pressure differential caused by the downward stroke of the piston in the intake manifold, not pressure in the cylinder as the intake valves initially close.
2. We are assuming that there is no residual exhaust left in the chamber to contribute to “poisoning” of the intake charge.
3. Camshaft overlap (i.e. when both intake an exhaust valve are open simultaneously – see here) makes fluid flow modeling considerably more complicated.
4. T that we need is the temperature of the gas in the cylinder.  This is not usually MEASURED – instead it is ESTIMATED from the temperature of air in the manifold (IAT), the temperature of the cylinder heads (ECT) and other factors.  “RT” is often referred to as the “density correction term” as it tries to account for how air density varies with temperature.  Density correction is arguably one of the biggest problems with speed-density. (more on this later)

Speed-Density introduces the concept of Volumetric Efficiency (VE) to account for the differences between what it can observe and what is really going on.  (mostly problems 1-3 above)  Roughly speaking, VE is the ratio between the amount of air actually present in the cylinder and the amount of air we predict would be in the cylinder using MANIFOLD pressure (MAP) instead of cylinder pressure for our “P” Pressure term, REVOLUTIONS Per Minute (RPM) times Displacement (Volume / REVOLUTION) for our “V” term and an air temperature value estimated from some combination of ECT and IAT for our “T” term.

A motor said to be operating with 100% VE has the same amount of air actually in the cylinder as predicted by n = PV / RT.  Most engines operate at considerably less than 100% VE in most operating conditions.  The difference between actual airflow and theoretical maximum airflow is termed “pumping loss.”  Some engines (most notably Honda engines ) can achieve slightly greater than 100% VE in certain conditions.  Most engines operating under forced induction can be thought of to have a VE greater than 100% in some conditions.

Speed Density ECMs generally have one or more VOLUMETRIC EFFICIENCY (VE) tables that are a critical item to be adjusted.  These tables allow predicted airflow values to be more closely adjusted to observed reality.

Strengths of Speed-Density

Speed-Density has many things going for it:

1. Pressure sensors do not pose any restriction to the flow of air into the engine, unlike a MAF sensor.
2. MAP sensors respond to changing conditions very quickly, enabling it to have fairly good transient response especially compared to Mass-Air-Flow
3. Compared to a carburetor, it allows much more control over the mixture at different engine loads
4. Simplicity: all the sensors required are extremely reliable.

Weaknesses of Speed-Density

Speed-Density is known for having several notable issues:

1. Density correction, density correction, density correction.  You might not think that temperature is that big of a deal, but trust me it is!  Seasonal changes can wreak havoc on speed-density systems.  Superchargers or turbochargers that compress air and raise its temperature from adiabatic heating cause significant changes in density that must be accounted for.  Altitude can also be really problematic.  Many systems incorporate Barometric Pressure sensors to try to address this, but it’s an imperfect correction.
2. Large camshafts with extremely low vacuum due to high overlap close to idle.  Camshafts that have low or pulsing vacuum close to idle present a challenge for Speed-Density.  MAP sensor averaging can help.  Alpha-N blending can help.  It is still very tricky to use speed density to predict airflow with a pressure sensor with camshafts that do not build an appreciable amount of vacuum.
3. Volumetric Efficiency tables can be very time consuming to tune.
4. Engine modifications generally produce volumetric efficiency changes requiring re-tuning.
5. Quite a lot of math is required to do Speed-Density “by the book.”  Because of this, most manufacturers implement something kind of like theoretical speed-density and cut corners or combine math operations in order to allow faster execution on puny computing hardware.  (Remember, most ECUs made prior to 2000 have a slower processor than the average inexpensive cellphone circa 2010)

Sanity Checking a Speed-Density Tune

There are a few rules that transcend particular manufacturer implementations:

1. Volumetric efficiency rarely changes suddenly.  VE tables should almost always have very gradual changes.
2. VE usually DECREASES as pressure DECREASES (i.e. more vacuum = less VE)
3. VE usually maxes out at an RPM close to peak engine torque at maximum observed load, which is usually where peak cylinder filling occurs.
4. Remember that VE tables are not the only thing that controls fueling.  Temperature correction tables (ECT, IAT) are often implemented as multiplier/divider tables.  Don’t forget about injector battery tables either! (see the separate article on Injector Tuning for more on this)

Alpha-N is also sometimes called “TPS maps” because the only sensor that is used for determination of fueling is the Throttle Position Sensor.  (And measured RPM, or how fast the motor is spinning)  Fuel and timing requirements for the engine are expressed as a function of RPM and TPS.

Alpha-N is used most of the time in tricky situations:

1. When the MAP sensor or MAF sensor has failed and the primary control strategy is deemed to be invalid.  Something-is-better-than-nothing is the idea.  (“Load with Failed MAF” is an example from Ford-land)
2. In conjunction with ITBs (Individual Throttle Bodies) due to the extremely low vacuum created by them (making Speed-Density tricky) and the desire to avoid needing to fit a potentially restrictive Mass Air Flow sensor (making MAF impossible).  Again, something-is-better-than-nothing is the idea.
3. In conjunction with ITBs and MAP as a load multiplier. (PowerFC D-Jetro for GTR Skyline, most notable example)  ITBs + Boost – Alpha-N output is multiplied by a MAP sensor to come up with a composite load index.
4. In conjuction with Speed-Density and some kind of blending algorithm.  This approach is often used with very large camshafts that pull little vacuum at idle.  Basically, TPS and MAP are allowed to contribute varying amounts to the overall load calculation.   Net result: more stable and meaningful load index close to idle when MAP sensor readings are unstable.  Found on the Electromotive TEC3 among others.

Alpha-N is very poor at dealing with hills (think about engine load going up and down hills at a constant throttle position), temperature variations and just about anything else that you’d care about except close to wide open throttle where it does fine.

Understanding your fuel injectors is one of the most important things you can do to ensure that fueling is appropriate for your engine.  First, some vocabulary:

• ECM, ECU, Engine computer : used interchangeably to mean the computer operating the fuel injectors and running the engine
• AFR, Air – Fuel Ratio : the ratio between how much air and how much fuel an engine is receiving or how “lean” or “rich” it is running
• Solenoid : a solenoid is an electromagnetic electromechanical device.  It operates by using electricity moving through a coil to generate a magnetic field which moves a plunger. (more)
• Injector : a special type of solenoid that allows fuel to flow through it when energized (more)
• Pulsewidth : the length of time the engine computer applies electricity to the injector, or how long the injector is commanded to be open
• Flow Rate : The amount of fuel an injector flows once open.  These values are typically given in units of cc/min or lbs/hr at a specified fuel pressure. (injector flow rate varies with the square root of fuel pressure.)
• Latency : the length of time after the injector is turned on before it achieves its linear flow rate.

Everything you ever wanted to know about injectors but never knew to ask

Injectors are pretty simple devices: turn on the electricity, wait till the fuel starts flowing.  Right?

Not quite…

Injectors are mechanical devices – once electricity is applied, the injector needs to move from its resting position in which no fuel flows to its open position where fuel is flowing at its published flow rate.  The problem is that this transition from “closed” to “open” is far from instant – some larger injectors can take several milliseconds to open fully.  During this time, injectors do not flow at their linear flow rate.  How long injectors take to open varies from injector to injector largely due to mechanical reasons.  Fuel pressure can also affect injector latency because of the force applied by fuel on injector internals.  And most importantly, the amount of electricity you supply to the injector controls how much magnetic force coils inside the injector can create.  Bottom line: when your battery voltage decreases (such as when cranking) your injectors take longer to open and fuel injector latency increases.

Tuning for Injector latency

Most engine computers have some kind of table to compensate for injector latency.  They can be called many things – “Injector Battery tables” or “Injector battery offset” or “battery tables” but they frequently look very similar: a table of how long to open the injector before it achieves linear flow (“latency”) versus measured battery voltage.  The idea here is that the ECM opens the injectors for a period of time (from the battery tables) to compensate for variations in injector opening time versus battery voltage.  If you change injectors, you probably need to update your battery tables, too.  If you vary fuel pressure, you may want to try changing the battery tables as well as other tables to account for changes in latency.

A basic method for tuning injector latency requires a wideband and a multimeter (or better yet, datalogging battery voltage from the ECU).  Follow this procedure:

1. Start by hooking up you multimeter or starting datalogging battery voltage.  If you are using a multimeter, use a voltage source close to the ECM if possible.
2. Fire up the car and hold it at a few thousand RPM.  Observe battery voltage – it should be fairly high. (13.8 – 14.5 volts, depending on the vehicle)
3. Gradually, let the car return to idle while keeping an eye on battery voltage.  Many vehicles will run anywhere from 0.75 to 0.1 volts lower at idle compared to cruising RPMs.
4. Problems with battery tables can contribute to hunting or unstable idle.  Once the car is idling, do everything you can to put an electrical load on the car – turn on headlights, turn on the stereo, turn on the fan for the climate control inside the car.  As you do so, keep and eye on battery voltage and observed air fuel ratio.
5. If you see the car run progressively leaner when you turn on electrical accessories and voltage drops, start increasing injector latency at the battery voltage you observe until you minimize changes in air fuel ratio when changing electrical load.  This will result in a curve with a steeper slope.
6. If you see the car run progressively richer when you turn on electrical accessories and voltage drops, start decreasing injector latency at the battery voltage you observe until you minimize changes in air fuel ratio when changing electrical load.  This will result in a curve with a flatter slope.
7. If you feel really adventurous, you can disconnect the large cable between the alternator and the + side of the battery (or sometimes a wiring distribution block) while the car is running.  When you do this, the battery will stop charging.  Voltage you observe at the ECU will decrease as the car consumes the battery’s charge.  You can generally tune a much wider range of the battery table by doing this but it is much more of a pain to do and will eventually drain your battery to the point the car will not run.
8. Note: these injector battery tuning methods assume the car is reasonably well tuned close to idle and will idle at a reasonably steady AFR.  Doesn’t need to be perfect, but you may do more harm than good messing with injector battery tables when the tune is jacked.

Another sign that your battery tables may be off is when the car runs poorly at small throttle angles compared to large throttle angles.  Sometimes changing latency is a quick way to fix a car running too rich / too lean that runs well close to wide open throttle.  Latency changes will have a large effect at low pulsewidths (i.e. closed throttle) but will have comparatively little effect at high pulsewidths (i.e. open throttle.)

You shouldn’t be afraid to adjust injector latency as part of tuning but always remember that it is a BROAD SWEEPING CHANGE THAT WILL AFFECT HOW THE ENGINE RUNS EVERYWHERE.  If you have a problem in a specific load condition, chances are your problem is elsewhere.  When you start seeing PATTERNS of problems (i.e. closed throttle too lean, close to idle where battery voltage too lean, hard starts/cranking when battery voltage lowest, etc.) then it is worth looking into whether a latency adjustment can solve your tuning issue.

You can always sanity check your injector battery tables visually.  Injector latency always increases as battery voltage drops.  If you look at a 2D graph of battery voltage versus latency, it should always be relatively smooth.  As voltage increases, injector latency should level out and change much more slowly than at lower voltages.  This is not a Ford thing or a Honda thing – this is a universal thing that all cars that use fuel injectors will follow.

Tuning for Injector Flow

We haven’t said that much about injector flow up to this point, but it is equally important to having your engine run correctly.  Injector flow is the “obvious” thing that most people change when installing different injectors.  Most older systems account for injector flow with a “fuel constant” (it is called many different things in different systems such as… ) – when you change the size of injectors, you multiply the fuel constant by the difference in flow between your old injectors and your new injectors.  For example:

1. Fuel constant = 16.4
2. You have 24lb/hr stock injectors
3. You install 32lb/hr stock injectors
4. 24 (old) / 32 (new) = .75
5. New fuel constant = old fuel constant * change in injector size = 16.4 * .75 = 12.3

Keep in mind, this is just a guideline to get you close.  You can use the injector size / injector constant to make sweeping, global changes to fueling if your tune is off everywhere.  You *should* be able to get a tune very close to where it was before an injector change by changing nothing more than battery tables and an injector size / injector constant.

Some systems (Ford, GM LSx, newer Dodge / DCX Hemi, others) use a dynamic flow model of injector behavior rather than a single “injector constant.” These systems try to more precisely account for the flow of injectors by modeling how injector flow changes as a function of how long they are open.  Most ~87-2009(ish) Ford uses the concept of injector slopes.  There is a “low slope” and an “high slope”, along with a threshold to change from one to the other and often a minimum pulsewidth.  The injector slopes can be thought of as TWO injector flow constants and the ECM changes from one to the other as the injector opens.  When changing injectors on Fords or other manufacturers that use dynamic flow models, a good starting point is to scale both slopes (or all members of a dynamic flow table) uniformly by the predicted difference in injector flow rate.  An even better approach is to copy values from another OEM calibration that uses the injectors you have installed.  Some injector suppliers (but not many – Injector Dynamics is the one that comes to mind) do dynamic flow testing and can supply you with data precise enough to plug in.

You have three choices for tuning forced induction on a TPI ECM (i.e. 7730).

1. Not REALLY a good option, but a simple one: use stock code, hack it around to be ok at WOT by power enrichment tables.  This is ugly and only has a possibility of working for low boost setups.   Do not do this unless you really don’t care how the car runs except at WOT and you are too lazy to choose another option.
2. Use Code59 on your ‘7730  (see www.code59.org – a modified version of the $58 code that came in the Syclone/Typhoon turbocharged trucks) For this to work, some wiring mods are needed.  (See here for more wiring info, here for more general info) This is not for the faint of heart, but represents a much better solution overall because you are using code that understands what forced induction is.  Code59 isn’t perfect, but it’s arguably the best option readily available that works with OEM hardware.
3. Code59 on a ‘749 ECM.  This is pretty similar to #2 above, except you get some additional stuff in the ‘749 that will make it easier to say run P+H injectors.  Rewiring will be needed.  The ‘749 is also setup to control boost via PWM and an external solenoid which can be handy for turbocharged applications.

You should plan on buying a Wideband O2 (such as the Innovate LC1), something to datalog with (APU1, ALDU1) and something for realtime emulation (APU1, Ostrich2) along with a G1 chip adapter in order to tackle a project like this and have any degree of success.  You could do it without some of these tools, but you probably wouldn’t be reading this webpage for advice if you didn’t need them.

You will genererally need to install colder spark plugs, (maybe) a spark box, larger injectors (32, 36 or 42lbs would probably be good place to start.  Use an injector calculator to figure out how big you should go based on power goals), a 2bar or 3bar MAP sensor to replace your 1bar factory sensor, sometimes an upgraded fuel pump(s).

Good Choices (Complicated)

The other worthwhile option to mention is using a LS1/LS2 ECM with EFI live.  This requires extensive hardware and wiring changes but has great rewards in terms of an upgraded ignition system, more reliable triggering (i.e. no Optispark) and much more powerful and capable ECMs with advanced features.  See EFI Connection 24x / 58x pages for more information on this upgrade.  You can get EFI Live from us after you’re done.

Bad Choices

While I’m at it, a lot of people ask about FMUs.  This is a quick explanation of how they work and why they’re a band-aid (at best) not an effective tuning solution:

• FMU is a rising rate regulator
• It causes fuel pressure to increase at a fixed ratio with boost pressure (usually 8:1 to 12:1)
• Fuel delivery (approximately) increases by the difference in sqrt of fuel pressure.  I.e. 40 -> 60 psi = sqrt(60) / sqrt(40)
• An FMU can generally get fueling approximately ok SOMETIMES but more often than not it results in an overly rich mixture and inconsistent fueling across different RPMs.
• With 35 psi base pressure and 8psi of boost, a 8:1FMU will be delivering close to 100psi of fuel pressure!  Because it raises fuel pressure so much, there is a significant strain placed on the fuel pump and injectors.  Fuel atomization (and therefore power) suffers a lot at extreme pressures with most injectors.
• Most importantly, FMUs do nothing to adjust spark to compensate for boost.
• Bottom line: FMUs are a cheap, hackish bandaid supplied to minimally make things work by running the car artificially rich instead of properly adjusting the mixture and timing for boost.

The “Good Choices” above are ways of doing things the “right” way.  It’s a lot more work, but you can get the car to run a *lot* better than with an FMU.  Making appropriate adjustments for ignition timing will also let you run a LOT higher boost than with just a FMU.

This is the documentation for the Nissan Boards.  At this point, there are only one version of the boards, 1.1nm  As future revisions to the board are produced, this page will be updated.

Applications

These boards are designed for S13 and B13 applications.  They will NOT work with S14a ECUs that have a 20×2 pin header.  They will not work with late S14/N14/etc. ECUs that have a 40×1 header. Known good applications:

S13 Silvia RWD “Red top” SR20DET (i.e. 62, E5, etc.) 240 swaps, etc.

S13 Silvia RWD “Black top” SR20DET NON VVTI (VVTI motors not supported) 240SX, etc.

S13 240SX KA24DE twin cam engine US Engine

B13 Sentra FWD SR20DE Sentra, etc.

U13 Bluebird SR20DET

About the Board Hardware

The 20×2 Nissan ROM board has two 28 pin sockets for an EPROM such as a 27SF512 or 27C256.  These are not “even-odd” style boards – chips installed in this board should always have identical programs unless you REALLY know what you are doing.  You will need to buy a ROM burner separately if you do not already have one – this board cannot program chips.

You can use two Ostriches with this board.  Insert each Ostrich like it was an EPROM.  Make sure JROM is not installed (see below for more) or you may have issues with addressing and Ostriches.  You will need a 5.x version of TunerPro RT to have native dual Ostrich support.  You can accomplish the same thing using TunerPro 4.x by also using EmUtility (available from tunerpro.net in the utilities section) to run one Ostrich in emulation mode while TunerPro natively runs the other Ostrich.

Switching and JROM

As previously mentioned, the 20×2 board allows the use of two programs with near instantaneous realtime switching.  The JROM is used to change between two programs when using 512k chips (i.e. 27SF512 or 27C512).  By default, the adapter uses a 32k program from 08000h to 0FFFFh.  When JROM is present, the adapter uses the 32k program from 00000h to 07FFFh.  You can mount an external switch for the jumper if you like.  This link has more information about programming multiple programs and offsets.

Software support

This board has no copy protection that would prevent you using it with a particular software package.  The technical answer to “software support” is to say that it will work with any software capable or providing a Nissan binary ROM file.  Software I have tested these boards with:

• Tuner Pro RT ( www.tunerpro.net )
• 925style.com ROM Editor ( ask google “925style ROM editor” – original site is down)
• Nistune

Just to reiterate – any software that can output a binary file will probably work fine with these boards.

Installation

Installation of the Nissan 20×2 boards can be quite tricky.  A proper de-soldering iron is required for good results.

1. Remove both the top and bottom case from the ECU
2. De-solder all 40 pins of the 20×2 connector.  remember, a clean de-soldering job is critical to this working correctly.  Be careful not to overheat and burn any traces as this can be easy to do.  When you are done, it should look something like this:
3. Place the installed pin header in the 20×2 header so that the “notch” in the header faces towards the blue ECU connector:
4. Solder the 20×2 header in place carefully.  Again, remember clean, accurate soldering is critical for this product to work correctly:
5. Find the jumper marked “CJ1”  – you will need to remove it and move it to position “CJ2”  as this enables the use of the ROM board.  (Putting the jumper back to CJ1 will enable the use of the stock program.)  Be careful when doing this.  The use of two soldering irons, a soldering iron and de-soldering iron or best yet – a set of SMD tweezers will make things much easier.  If you damage the jumper removing it, do not worry – you can use a small piece of wire or a paperclip instead.  (Trim any excess wire / paperclip if you use this method)
6. Finally, slide the 20×2 board onto the installed header:

In order to issue you a license for Binary Editor, you must first download and install the software. ( http://www.eecanalyzer.net )  Once you have downloaded and installed the software, go to the “Register” menu at the top of the screen and select “Register Binary Editor”

Next, you will be presented with a screen where you need to provide some information.  First, check the boxes to indicate which hardware you will be using.  Under “Tuners,” check “Moates” for the QuarterHorse.  If you have an Innovate or PLX wideband, make sure you check the appropriate box under “Loggers.”  You will also need to do this for the DataQ standalone datalogger, if you own one.  Finally, put your name in the “Licensed To:” box.  Finally, copy and paste the Machine Code displayed and email it to [email protected] so he can issue you your license.

Note: you will see the machine code  change as you check and uncheck boxes along with changing the name in the “Licensed To:” box.  You must have the same boxes checked and your name typed identically as when you requested your license before you type in the registration key or your “Machine Code” will be different and the registration process will fail!

After you have received an email with your registration key, you will need to open the software registration box again, make sure the same boxes are checked, re-input your name in the “Licensed To:” box so everything matches.  Enter the registration key in the boxes below and then click “Register” – and you’re done!

EEC Analyzer

Download and install the software from http://www.eecanalyzer.net

Go to the “About” tab and click “Register”

Copy and paste the “Machine Code” into an email to [email protected]

When you receive your registration code, navigate back to this screen and enter it in the bottom box then click “Ok.”  Your software will now be registered.

There are several groups of ECMs.

94-95 LT1,LT4,LTx: These can be tuned via TunerCATS ( link ) with the $EE definition and an ALDU1+CABL1 (94 – square ALDL style connector) or ALDU1+CABL2 (95 “D” shape OBD2 connector).  These are typically the 16188051 ECM.  APU1 also works for reflash on these vehicles.  No chip adapter needed.

94-95 TBI: Unlike all other TBI ECMs (which use a G2 chip adapter) these ECMs are memcal like their TPI cousins and work with the G1 memcal adapter.  Take the cover off the ECM and if you see a memcal, you probably have one of these.  The 16168625 is an example.

94-95 W-body LQ1: uses the regular MEMCAL found in 1227165/7727/7730 ECMs, you can use the G1 adapter in these units also.

94-95 3800: Primarily use the 16183247 and subsequently a different style memcal is used than earlier ECMs.   The 94-95 3800 powered regals use a similar ECM that is weatherproofed, the 16183428, but that ECM is specific to the 94-95 3800 Regals only. This family of PCMs have the little blue ‘box’ memcal that has the integrated knock sensing board.   A G4 chip adapter is required for these, it’s shorter than the G1.

93-95 3100 vehicles (except for the A-bodies, which use a non-weatherproof version of the 94-95 LQ1 PCM) are all flash units. Unfortunately we don’t currently have a solution for these.

(Thanks to Robert Saar for his help!)

There are a few solutions for people with 96-97 computers:

-Convert to a 94-95 ECM that is well-supported by TunerCATS OBD1.  This will require an ALDU1+CABL2 combo, TunerCATS OBD1 tuner ($69.95) with a single definition file ($EE – $19.95) OR TunerCats WinFLash and TunerPro RT with the $EE definition, along with a new 94-95 ECM.  This may involve minor wiring changes.  Arguably the most simple and straightforward option.  Preserves all engine sensors, distributor, etc.  This option will work for LTx engines ONLY.  96-97 Vortecs must use another option.

-Convert to a 98+ ECM that is well-supported by EFI Live.  This will involve more substantial wiring changes and a supported 98+ ECM.  This will involve a 24x reluctor conversion kit. (See here for more information.)  This is *NOT EASY OR SIMPLE* but arguably provides the best solution because quality, trusted LSx electronics replace many problematic parts on the earlier engines such as replacing  the Optispark system with coil-near-plug as found on the LSx.

-Use TunerCATS OBD2 Tuner.  Even though there are no hardware changes needed for this, I put it towards the bottom of the list.  TunerCATS OBD2 Tuner is only available with Roadrunner ECM hardware because of licensing restrictions BUT Roadrunner hardware isn’t compatible with 96-97 ECMs.  You will end up having to spend $489 on a RoadRunner guts kit (that you can’t use on a 96-97 ECM!), $280 on the  TunerCat RTOBD2 package, and $80 on a definition for your ECM.  Grand total: $850.  Now go back and compare costs to the two conversion options above if you wonder why I didn’t list this option first…

This guide gives you an idea of how to “stack” your ROMs to make things work.

Step 1: determine how big ONE program is. ( look how big your ROM is – 27C256 = 32kbyte = 8000h, 27C32 = 4kb = 1000h )

Step 2: Determine how big of a program your switcher uses.  This hopefully will be the same as the size of your ROM, but your ROM may be smaller than this value.  G2X = 4kb = 1000h, Two Timer = G3 = 32k = 8000h)

Step 3: Fire up Emutility

Step 4: Uncheck the “End justify” box

Step 5: Input the size of your program in the SIZE box.

Step 6: Do some math.  Programs in the Ostrich are END JUSTIFIED.  The Ostrich’s memory goes from 00000h to 3FFFFh.  Fire up the windows calculator in scientific mode.  Change the format to hex.  Put it 3FFFF to start.

Step 7: Subtract the size of your PROGRAM.  This can be different from the size of the switching adapter.

Step 8: Put this value in the start address box.

Step 9: Program the ostrich (Write from file to emulator)

Step 10: Go back to Windows calculator.  Subtract the size of the SWITCHING ADAPTER.  (3FFFF – size of program – size of switching adapter)

Step 11: Go back to step 8.  Repeat steps 8 through 11 until you have programmed all desired settings.

Basics

When we talk about “OBD1” GM vehicles, we mean vehicles made from (approximately) 1986 to 1995.  These cars used several different types of engine controller – some have one injector for each cylinder (Tuned Port Injection, or TPI along with the LTx motors) while some have fewer injectors that are placed near the throttle body (Throttle Body Injection, or TBI) instead.  All the vehicles of this generation speak the ALDL protocol for logging/vehicle communication.

For purposes of this guide, “ECM” means Engine Control Module, Powertrain Control Module (PCM), Engine Computer Module (ECM) – terms will be used interchangeably to mean the same thing.

Hardware for OBD1 GM

Overview

94-95 model years are oddballs.  Many of these ECMs support being reflashed over the ALDL interface (e.g. LT1) using TunerCATS.  Some (like the 94-95 TBIs) use a G1 adapter.  Many Grand Prix from these years use the G4 adapter.  Diesels generally use the G5 adapter.

The process for tuning OBD1 GM products is pretty much the same for all 86-93 model years.  First, a “chip adapter” is used to convert whatever the ECM in question needs into a form that accepts a 28 pin EPROM.  Some chip adapters require soldering for installation (G2, G2X) but most do not (G1, G3, G4, G5).  The same EPROMs can be used for all of our OBD1 GM products (except the switching adapters…) which is usually the 27SF512 – C2.

After a chip adapter has been installed in an ECM, tuning can begin.  You can burn chips using a ROM burner such as the BURN1/2.  Alternatively, you can either use the Ostrich 2.0 emulator or the emulation facilities of the APU1 to make changes while the vehicle is running.

Logging from the computer is accomplished using either an ALDU1 or the logging facilities of an APU1.  For 86-94 vehicles, CABL1 is required to connect the logger and the vehicle.  For the 1995 model year, CABL2 is required due to the physically different connector.

Instead of buying the BURN2, Ostrich2 and ALDU1 separately, you can buy the APU1 unit that does the functions of all three pieces in one unit.

Hardware

G1 – “Memcal” style chip adapter (TPI, Syclone/Typhoon, 94-95 TBI, 92-93 LT1, etc.)

G2 – “TBI” 24 pin style chip adapter

G2 GN Style – Grand National Only.

G2X – Multiple program switching version of G2

G3 – Multiple program switching version of G1

G4 – Blue Memcal style chip adapter for some 94-95 vehicles

G5 – Diesel memcal style chip adapter

HDR1 – Header that allows reading memcals in a BURN1/2.  Used to read stock program on memcal ECMs.

BURN2 – Programs chips

Ostrich – USB Chip emulator, allows realtime changes while engine running

Socket Booster – required for use of Ostrich 2.0 in TBI applications.  Can be used instead of G2 adapter.

ALDU1– USB ALDL interface

CABL1– Used to connect an ALDU1 or APU1 and a pre-1995

CABL2 – Used to connect an ALDU1 or APU1 and a 1995 car

APU1 – Combines the functions of the BURN2 (programming chips), Ostrich 2.0 (real time chip emulation) and the ALDU1 in one unit

Applications

This table is abbreviated. If you don’t see your application here, please email us.

* Socket Booster (S_BOOSTER) required for Ostrich 2 emulation and TBI ECMs

If you have excel, you can also take a look at this spreadsheet for a list of what hardware you’ll need with various combinations.

Software

TunerPro RT ( link ) and TunerCATS ( link ) are the two most commonly used software packages for OBD1 GM.

FreeScan is a free datalogger that works with some GM vehicles. ( link )

There is an excellent cross-reference I found with google that lists common ECMs, which mask (software revision) they use and various other useful information.  ( link )

Holden Vehicles

TunerCat OBD1 tuner seems to have the best support for Holden vehicles at this time ( link ) although TunerPro has support for some ( link )

Hardware-wise, the majority of these vehicles use the G1 chip adapter.  Some of the newer vehicles use our newest G6 chip adapter.  We don’t know the Australian vehicles as well as those stateside so we recommend you check out http://www.delcohacking.net for more info on these vehicles.

The main product that we make for 98+ GM vehicles is the RoadRunner emulator that allows realtime changes to be made to a LS1 ECM.

The RoadRunner is designed to be used with either EFI Live or TunerCATS software.

EFI Live is a comprehensive tuning software package that includes both an editor and logging application.  The software has the most comprehensive vehicle support out of any package we sell for OBD2 GM, working with both Gen3 and Gen4 ECMs and TCMs.  It is licensed on a per-vehicle or per ECM type basis.

Tuner CATS OBD2 tuner is used primarily with the RoadRunner hardware.  It only supports Gen3 LS1 ECMs/TCMs.  Tuner CATS OBD2 tuner can ONLY BE SOLD WITH ROADRUNNER HARDWARE.  WE CANNOT SELL IT TO YOU UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES UNLESS YOU BUY ROADRUNNER HARDWARE.  It is licensed on a per ECM type basis.

We also often get asked, “Can I use your product to let me put _______ on my engine?” The answer to this is very simple: our products let you tune factory Ford computers.  If the factory Ford computer can do it, our products can help you tune it.  If there is another factory Ford computer that you can swap to run your engine that does what you want, great.  Some examples of what I’m talking about here include putting a MAF sensor on a car, running a car without a MAF speed-density, switching to coilpacks, etc.  If you can’t do it with a factory Ford ECM, our products aren’t going to help you achieve your goals.

We offer products that work with almost all ~1986-2004 Ford ECUs that have a J3 port (i.e. EECIV and EECV).  International users report success using our products with non-US computers that have a J3 port.  A J3 port looks like an edge of a circuit board that kind of sticks out.  J3 ports must be cleaned with a wire brush and solvents in order to remove the protective coating on the circuit board before they can be used.  They are almost always behind a rubber protective panel.  We do not offer any products for Ford computers that lack a J3 port, such as pre-1986 and 2005+ computers.  Also, cars branded by Ford but manufactured by others (i.e. Ford Probe, made by Mazda) often use computers that lack J3 ports.

It is critical that the vehicle is fully off before installing or removing anything on the J3 port.  Failure to power-off the ECM correctly can result in frying our hardware, your ECM or both!!!  If you have any doubts at all, remove the keys from the ignition 100% or disconnect the battery.  WARNING WARNING WARNING!

On this page “application” simply means the car/ECU/engine you are working with.

“ECU” means ECM, PCM – the computer running your car’s engine.

“Strategy” is Ford lingo for a set of procedures (i.e. code) that an ECU runs.  (Closest GM term: Operating system)  Most of the time, a strategy is particular to an ECU, i.e. the GUFB strategy runs onA9L ECUs.  Sometimes more than one strategy can run on the same ECU (i.e. GUFB/A9L + GUFC/A9P) .  Most of the time the “tuner” cars (i.e. Roush, Saleen) use unusual strategies that are often simply renamed factory strategies.

“Definition” means a file that describes the location of parameters that can be changed in a strategy.  All of the Ford tuning software uses definition files to process raw files.

“Patch code” refers to special routines that change the way a strategy operates in order to allow Quarterhorse to log all vehicle parameters.

Hardware used with Ford:

F3 Chip adapter – This stores a new program for a Ford ECU and clips on the J3 port.  This is a simple Ford “chip” that can optionally store two programs.  It works with both EECIV and EECV.

Jaybird – This is a Ford-specific device that writes F3 chip adapters ONLY.  It uses the same Flash n Burn software as a BURN1/BURN2

F2A – The F2A is a Ford interface for the BURN1/BURN2 programmers.  It lets you write a F3 chip adapter using a BURN1/2 programmer and the Flash n Burn software.

F2E – the F2E is used with a F2A and a BURN1/2 to read the stock program from a ECU.

BURN1/BURN2 – These general purpose ROM burners can be used with a F2A to program F3 chips

FORDEMU – This adapter allows the use of a Ostrich emulator to make real-time changes with a Ford ECU.  This product has been replaced with the Quarterhorse.  It does not work very well with EECV ECUs.

Quarterhorse – The Quarterhorse (or “QH” for short) is our flagship Ford tuning product.  It allows changes to be made while the vehicle is running.  It also allows datalogging by spying directly on RAM locations.  In order to log all vehicle parameters, patch code that is specific to each strategy is required.  Many of the features of QH require special definition files and/or software support that may not be available for all applications.

Software for Tuning Fords:

You can read the binary from any J3 Ford computer with our gear (BURN2+F2A+F2E), but that does NOT mean that any J3 ford computer is fair game.  In order to be able to display a raw binary from a Ford ECM in a real-world units that might make sense to you, a definition is required.  The def is kind of like a roadmap that allows software (Binary Editor or EEC Editor) to translate what runs the car’s computer into something meaningful to you.  Defs have to be developed by a human being for each application.  PLEASE ASK US FOR HELP IF YOU ARE NOT SURE YOUR APPLICATION IS SUPPORTED!!!

TunerPro / TunerPro RT (www.tunerpro.net) : Great for basic editing.  Free.  Somewhat limited definitions compared with other software.  At time of writing (11/28/09) lacks full support for QH, but beta versions have support.

EEC Editor http://www.moates.net/eec-editor-software-from-paul-booth.html : Cheap ( <$50 ) software with fairly extensive editing support for editing Ford tunes.  EEC Editor requires you to purchase definitions on a per-strategy basis.  One strategy will cover more than one box code.  Definitions for datalogging can be purchased separately.  As of time of writing (11/28/09) has QH support for MANY applications including Fox body mustang (GUFB/GUFC/etc. A9L/A9P/C3W/etc.) 94-95 Mustang (T4M0, CBAZA) along with many 96-03 applications.  Custom definitions available for a fee.

Binary Editor (http://www.eecanalyzer.net) : Relatively cheap ( $80 BE / $130 BE + EEC Analyzer) software with comprehensive editing support and comprehensive support for QH.  See here for a list of strategies supported.  Binary Editor comes with a bunch of definitions that are free and there are others you need to pay for.  You can see most of them at http://www.eecanalyzer.net in the downloads section.

Moates.net F.A.Q

You can use the ALDU1 and CABL2 together for both datalogging and reprogramming. Just get you a free trial version of TTS DataMaster and then get you a copy of TunerCat with the proper definition.

Do I need an adapter to get the chip to fit in my TBI ECM?

For chip swaps on your TBI computer, you’ll probably want to use the G2 adapter. Most folks use an S2 socket snapped into it along with the C1 chip. They’re pretty easy to install, or I can do it for you. The chip you’re looking at comes out of that little plastic holder. Squeeze it gently from the sides, and then use like a jeweler’s screwdriver to lift the legs away from the sides of the holder a little bit. It should snap out of the bottom. Worst case, you can cut the plastic support piece along the back of the chip, and it will come apart much easier. Then you can read the ‘stock’ chip using the Burn1. Key thing though is that to reprogram a chip, you’ll need to use a Flash chip like the C1, and you’ll want to use a G2 adapter to make fitment easy. They are 28 pin rather than 24 pin.

I am using ALDU1 and CABL1 and I cannot get my PC or Laptop to connect to my ecm.

When using it to connect to the 165, make sure the vertical switch (as you look at it to the right) is in the ‘up’ position. When working with the 730, have it in the middle position.

– Under Windows Control Panel, make sure you have the USB/Serial device set up to COM3 or COM4.

– Under TunerPro Tools/Preferences, make sure you have it set up as a ‘Max232/etc’ on the corresponding COM port.

– Under TunerPro ALDL/Datalogging section, make sure you have the correct *.ads file selected. This will either be the 1227165_6E.ads or 1227730.ads file.

What does the switch on the ALDU1 do?

The switch on the back of the ALDU1 changes the resistance between pins A and B on the ALDL interface cable. The topmost position places 10k ohms between the pins. Some ECMs require this 10k resistance in order to connect to the ALDL datastream (some 1227165 are an example). The middle position opens the connection between A and B (infinite resistance). This is the “default” position. Most cars can be datalogged in this position. Cars that require 10k to connect can be switched to this position after connection. The bottom most position shorts the connection (0 ohms). Most GM ECMs dump trouble codes when pins A and B are shorted. This switch position makes doing so simple and convenient when a PC is not available.

What do I need to do to use the winALDL program with ALDU1?

• Set the baud rate to 4800 within the WinALDL program.
• While looking at the ALDU1 box, set the vertical switch to your right, and switch it ‘up’ (10k mode).
• Set the COM port selection in WinALDL to match what it set up to on the USB driver under the control panel.
• Select the ECM type in WinALDL which matches your ECM.
• Make sure the ALDU1 is connected to the laptop prior to starting the software.
• Turn your key off, connect the ALDU1 to the car, and start the software.
• Turn the car on, it should connect.

Does the USB AutoProm require a driver, and if so, where do I get it and how do I install it?

The USB AutoProm does require a driver. You can download it from http://www.moates.net/. Instructions on installation can also be found there. Without the driver, the AutoProm will not function.

Note that the serial version does not require any special drivers.

Is there a users manual for the Autoprom?

Yes, Its on the Moates.net website here.

What does the vertical switch on the back of the Autoprom do?

The vertical switch on the backplane of the AutoProm changes the resistance between pins A and B on the ALDL interface cable. The topmost position places 10k ohms between the pins. Some ECMs require this 10k resistance in order to connect to the ALDL datastream (1227165 is an example). The middle position opens the connection between A and B (infinite resistance). This is the “default” position. Most cars can be datalogged in this position. Cars that require 10k to connect can be switched to this position after connection. The bottom most position shorts the connection (0 ohms). Most GM ECMs dump trouble codes when pins A and B are shorted. This switch position makes doing so simple and convenient when a PC is not available.

What does the horizontal switch on the back of the Autoprom do?

The horizontal switch, called the bypass switch, switches whether the PC communicates with the AutoProm CPU or directly to the ALDL interface hardware. When the switch is towards the serial or USB port, the PC communicates with the AutoProm CPU. This mode is used for changing data in the emulation buffer, for acquiring A/D data, and for ALDL datalogging in “AutoProm” mode (TunerPro only). When the switch is switched away from the serial or USB port, the AutoProm is in bypass mode. This mode allows the PC to communicate directly with the car through the ALDL cable. This allows the AutoProm to function as a simple ALDL cable. Use this mode to communicate with your OBDI vehicle using most ALDL data acquisition software such as WinALDL, CarBytes, Datamaster, etc.

What is the firewire connection on the rear of the AutoProm for?

The firewire connection on the backplane of newer AutoProm units is used for connecting (via a special connector available from moates.net) the 3 channel A/D module.

What chips can I burn and read with the AutoProm?

The Serial and USB AutoProm can read the following:

2732A, 27C128, 27C256, 27C512, 27SF512, 29C256, 29F040, Moates F2A Ford Adapter, Moates F2E EEC reader

The Serial AutoProm can write to the following chips:

29C256, 29F040, 27SF512*, Moates F2A Ford Adapter

* USB AutoProm only

Why does the USB version support writing 27SF512 chips, but the serial version does not?

Because of the simplicity and size of the USB connector, there is more room on the hardware layout for the electronics necessary to write to 27SF512 chips. The serial version does not have enough room for the required components.

What chips can I emulate using the AutoProm?

The AutoProm can emulate virtually any chip up to 64MBit in size (64KB) with 28 pins or less.

What are the 3 additional channels of analog to digital (A/D) conversion for and how can I make use of them?

With the AutoProm, you can monitor and datalog up to 3 channels of analog data. This can be used to monitor external temperature sensors, voltage levels, etc. To make use of the this feature, you need the appropriate interface connector available from www.moates.net. Once connected, you can use TunerPro to monitor the data or datalog the data in the normal ALDL stream (see the TunerPro help documentation).

I’ve hooked up the USB AutoProm to the computer, but the software cannot find or detect it.

The USB AutoProm requires a driver to be installed. See the appropriate question in this FAQ for more information on finding and installing this driver.

Emulation does not seem to work. The SES light flickers and/or the cooling fans come on when I turn the key on.

There are a few things to try or check.

1. Make sure you do not have a chip in the ZIF adapter. At no time other than reading or writing a PROM should you have a chip in the AutoProm ZIF.
2. Make sure your checksum is correct or disabled if your ECM requires it. Checksums can be disabled on GM ECMs by uploading 0xAA to the Mask ID byte.
3. Make sure the chip header is installed in your ECM correctly. Make sure pin 1 is oriented correctly and that all pins are making contact. This may require making adjustments to your ECM chip adapter.
4. If you’re using a C3 ECM (7747, etc), make sure you’ve soldered in your chip adapter correctly. Make sure your car runs as expected from your stock (or known-good) chip.
5. Make sure your emulation header cable is not too long or in a place where electrical interference could be an issue.

After uploading my bin to the AutoProm successfully, verification fails.

There are generally two causes for this: 1) You have a chip in the AutoProm ZIF, 2) Your USB cable is bad or inadequate. Try a different brand or type of USB cable.

I can’t seem to read or write a chip. What am I doing wrong?

Make sure the chip is properly oriented in the AutoProm ZIF. Pin 1 should be towards the back (connection) side of the AutoProm, and the chip should be all the way towards the front of the ZIF, such that any unused pins are between the chip and the ZIF handle.

I can’t seem to connect to my ECM with the AutoProm.

If your AutoProm is in bypass mode and you’re using TunerPro, make sure TunerPro is configured to use “Max232” as the adapter interface. If you’re using a USB AutoProm in bypass mode with WinALDL, make sure WinALDL is configured to use 4800 baud. There are a few ECMs that cannot be connected to un non-bypass mode. Please contact Craig or Mark for more information if you continue having difficulties connecting.

Could tell me how to connect with the APU1/ALDU1 step by step?

• Turn vehicle off.
• Close all programs including TunerPro.
• Connect the APU1 or ALDU1 to the USB port and the vehicle ALDL.
• If using the APU1, set the horizontal switch to the ‘inside’ setting for use with TunerPro. Set it to the outside for use with WinALDL or DataMaster.
• For 8192, if using 1227165 ECM, set vertical switch to ‘up’ position (looking at it with the vertical switch to your right).
• For all other 8192, set it to the ‘middle’ position.
• If you want to ‘flash your codes’ set it to the bottom position and turn the key on.
• For 160 baud (older TBI, etc), set it to the ‘top’ position.
• Open up your Windows Control Panel, under ‘System’ and ‘Hardware’ and ‘Device Manager’ under ‘Ports’. Find the USB Serial Port, and go to the Port Settings tab. Go to the Advanced button, and make sure the COM port setting is either COM3 or COM4. Set the latency to 1. If having connection issues, you might try a latency of 5. Once settings are applied, hit OK and close out all Control panel stuff. Keep in mind that this will be valid and ‘keep’ for the particular USB port you are plugged into for next time. If you plug into a different USB port you’ll need to do this again for that one.
• Open un TunerPro, and go under the Tools/Preferences section. Go to the ALDL/Emulation tab. If using APU1 with the switch to the ‘inside’, select ‘AutoProm’ for datalogging device type. If using the ALDU1 or the APU1 with the switch ‘out’ then select ‘MAX232/etc’ as device type and specify the correct COM port assignment (remember this from the Windows Control Panel exercise, probably COM3 or COM4). Once set, hit apply or OK and close that window.
• Go to the Tools/ALDL-Datalogging/Setup section of TunerPro, and ‘browse’ for the correct datalogging definition file (ADS file). You may need to download it from the TunerPro website. The name of the file should tell you if it’s the right one. Once selected, you’re ready to go almost.
• Close TunerPro and open it back up. That’ll make sure all your options ‘stick’.
• If using APU1 with the switch ‘in’, you should see a message at the bottom of the TunerPro window indicating “Connected: AutoProm blahblah” whereas if you have the switch ‘out’ or you’re using an ALDU1, you will see ‘Hardware Not Connected’ and that is OK.
• Go back to the Tools/ALDL Datalogging/Setup option, and now turn your key on. Click on the ‘Connect to ECM’ button. It should connect. If not, then something isn’t correct or something is wrong. Could be corrupt binary, bad connection, hardware problem, or something else. Some of the older 165 (pre-89) have difficulty, and you may need to upgrade to the 89 (6E) code. Some of the SyTy/late-model TBI trucks/LT1 stuff has problems because of a ‘silence mode’ command requirement. This is being worked, and should be fixed soon.
• Once connected (you’ll see the ‘connected’ indicator), you can monitor variables. Go to the Tools/ALDL/Datalogging menu, and you’ll see where you can show ‘Flags’, ‘Values’, ‘Dashboard’, ‘Traces’, all sorts of user-definable stuff. To choose values for your dashboard display, you can right-click and select something you want to show from a pulldown menu.
• Now you’re up and running. Don’t forget: NEVER disconnect the APU1 or ALDU1 from the PC while the software is open! No damage will occur, but the PC side will hang up and get confused. So, always connect and disconnect your hardware when there is NO software open and running (safe rule of thumb

Once you do all the stuff above, next time all you should need to do is:

• Connect USB stuff
• Connect ALDL stuff
• Set switches
• Start TunerPro
• Turn key on
• Connect and datalog
• When finished, turn key off and close TunerPro session
• Disconnect ALDL
• Disconnect USB

How do I make an ALDL data recording with Tuner Pro?

For ALDL data acquisition the AutoProm has two modes: Passthrough and AutoProm. Passthrough mode is set by placing the horizontal switch on the backplane away from the USB connetor. In this mode, TunerPro must be set to MAX232, since the AutoProm, when set to this mode, is just like any other ALDL cable. To set it to AutoProm mode, place the horizontal switch towards the USB port. In this mode, TunerPro must be set to AutoProm mode. The purpose of passthrough mode is to allow the AutoProm to be used for gathering ALDL data using applications other than TunerPro. In this mode you cannot make changes to the emulation buffer in the AutoProm mode. In AutoProm mode (again, set on the AutoProm itself and in TunerPro’s settings), you can emulate and datalog at the same time.

To record an ALDL data log, see the TunerPro help file, but here’s a summary:

• Connect the AutoProm ALDL cable to your Vehicle
• Set the AutoProm and TunerPro to the appropriate mode (see above explanation)
• Connect to your ECM
• Hit F4 to open the ALDL setup window
• Click “Select Log File for Record/Play” and browse to a file to record to (or enter the name of a new file)
• With TunerPro actively getting data from your ECM, hit the Record button
• When done logging, hit the stop button
• Hit the play button to play back the log you just recorded

How do I emulate with the Autoprom and Tuner Pro?

The TunerPro help file has a step-by-step outline of how to emulate. Here’s a an abridged overview:

• Attach the AutoProm to your PC and to your Vehicle
• Make sure the horizontal switch is towards the USB port on the AutoProm
• Start TunerPro (note that TunerPro automatically detects the hardware)
• Load your bin and bin definition into TunerPro
• Upload the bin to the emulator (see the related menu or toolbar buttons)
• Enable emulation (again, in the tools menu or on the toolbar)
• Start your vehicle
• Make changes to the bin
• Hit “update” in the respective item editor after every change to update the emulator RAM with the new data.

Note that you may need to disable the checksum in your bin. This is done by changing the mask ID byte to 0xAA. More information on that can be found in the various tuning forums, including the forum at www.thirdgen.org/techbb2 (DIY PROM forum).

What do I need to start tuning a Ford?

It really depends on what you want to do and how you want to do it. The F1 and F3 adapters are plugged into the J3 port. You cannot change anything with these while they are plugged into the J3 port, you have to unplug them and use the burn1 to write the modified bin file to the adapter. These adapters “override” the stock programming and allow you to change anything you want ,and get your “tune” exactly where you want it. To do this though you really need a way to datalog, and a Wideband O2 sensor is a great help as well.

The F1 adapter is designed for use with most EEC-IV processors, it doesn’t work with the 4 cyl turbos, and it does not come with a chip. The new F3 works with both EEC-IV and EEC-V processors up to 2003, it is switchable between 2 memory locations , giving you multi-chip capability. It also comes with chip installed and with the optional F2A adapter, can be programmed without removing chip.

You also need some software to be able to edit your bin files, the bin file is the binary code within your PCM. Both Tuner Pro and EEC Editor support Ford stuff and work well with Moates hardware. You will need to make sure there is software support for your particular application.

Another way to tune is with a emulator, basically with this device you can make changes while the car is running, this greatly simplifies the tuning process. Currently Moates offers the Ostrich, which will interface with EEC IV and EEC V PCMs using the FORDEMU. Also the Autoprom will work with only EEC IV PCMs using the F1.

I have a 2.3 Turbo (PC1, PE, PF2, PF3, PK, PK1,etc) what do you have for me?

Typically folks have used the F2 adapter to override their stock EEC program via the J3 port. However, the F2 adapter is no longer available. The F1 adapter does something similar, but it doesn’t work with turbo type applications, only N/A EEC-IV (pre-96) stuff. So, I have the F3 and F4 adapters (single program and switchable). They will be made available soon. They will work with EEC-IV and EEC-V as well as the Turbo EEC-IV.

The Burn1 is a chip programmer, and is used to program the J-3 adapters via the F2A. The F2A is merely an adapter to go from the BURN1 to a chip adapter such as the old F2 or F3/F4. The BURN1 can also be used in conjunction with the F2A adapter. This is being redesigned so that it can be used with the APU1, and will be renamed probably to just the FA. It is used for a couple of different purposes. First, it can be used in conjunction with the F2E to read the ‘stock’ content from the EEC-IV and EEC-V computers. Second, it can be used to read chip modules such as the F1, F2, F3, F4, and others such as the TwEECer. The binary from these exercises can be saved and edited offline. The BURN1/FA combo can also be used (as well as the APU1/FA combo) to program chip modules such as the F2, F3 and F4. This way, you go directly through the BURN1/APU1 interface via the accompanying software and USB interface. No need to remove the chip from the module.

In all these cases, there is no desoldering involved. Just clean the contacts on the J3 port and stick the programmed adapter module (F3 or F4 in your case) in there.

How do I know what bin file I need?

You start by getting the catch code off of the processor (see image), this will be the .bin file name. This one would be a Z2D1.bin

What is a J3 port?

It’s the port on the back of your processor that the adapter plugs into (see pic).

Which way does the chip go into the socket on the adapter?

The top of the socket on the F1 adapter has a notch in it, line it up with the notch on the chip facing the same way, the chip installed all the way at the bottom of the socket(see picture).

What chip addressing do I use when programming a F2 or F3 for EEC-IV ?

When programming for EEC-IV, you want to put a 56k binary from 032000-03FFFF.

What chip addressing do I use when programming a F2 or F3 for EEC-V ?

When programming for EEC-V, use the following addressing:

BANK0: 002000-00FFFF

BANK1: 012000-01FFFF

BANK8: 022000-02FFFF

BANK9: 032000-03FFFF

Does the F2E (EEC computer reading interface) use an external power supply ?

No, its uses the USB port to power the PCM.

Do I have to remove the PCM from the car to use the F2E ?

No, it works either way, either on the bench or in the car.

Is the F2E a stand-alone unit, will I need anything else to read the chip ?

No, it is not a stand-alone unit, it is designed to work with the burn1 and F2A Ford programming adapter.

How do I use the F2E ?

Attach the F2A to the Burn1, then plug the cable that came with the F2E into the F2A, then the F2E to the cable, then plug it into a CLEAN J3 port (see pics below).

What addressing do I use to pull out a bin from my EEC-V ?

When pulling a bin from a EEC-V, use the following addressing:

000000-03FFFF will pull out an entire 256k file with the banks at the following addressing:

BANK0: 002000-00FFFF

BANK1: 012000-01FFFF

BANK8: 022000-02FFFF

BANK9: 032000-03FFFF

Which way does the chip go in to the socket?

The top of the socket on the burn1 is the handle, line it up with the notch on the chip facing the same way, the chip installed all the way at the bottom of the socket(see picture).

My software doesn’t see the burn1

Follow the documentation on setting up a com port and installing the USB drivers in the documentation section on the Moates.net web site here.

Can I use a Wideband O2 sensor in my factory harness?

The wideband O2 sensor itself looks much like a standard O2 sensor. It does in fact install similarly, with the same threads. However, it requires a separate control box. It is a heated sensor which requires special heating rates and such, and can’t be controlled straight off of a factory harness. Instead, what you do is ‘add’ it to your exhaust, keeping the stock O2 sensor in place and adding the wideband sensor at another point in the exhaust system by cutting a hole and welding in a bung. Then for the control box, you use either the LC1 or the LM1. For the LC1, you can monitor it via the laptop and what-not, and for the LM1, it has a local readout which you can view. Both the LM1 and LC1 have a ‘serial’ output which can be used to either hook up to a PC for logging or to a gauge like the XD1.

As a more advanced topic, if you’d like to ‘replace’ your factory O2 sensor with a wideband unit, you can use what is called the ‘simulated narrowband output’ of a unit like the LC1. To do this, you need to splice into your existing harness slightly and program the LC1 to match. The LC1 has two programmable analog outputs, one of which can be used to ‘feed’ the factory ECU.

In any case, the wideband controller (LM1 or LC1) is a critical part which is needed.

Where do I find support for TunerPro software?

At the TunerPro website http://tunerpro.markmansur.com/, Mark has a nice F.A.Q posted there.

Where do I find support for EEC Editor software?

On the EEC editor mailing list http://groups.yahoo.com/group/eeceditor/.

Or check this web page to D/L the software and def files: EEC Editor

Where can I find information on using the Flash & Burn Software for the Burn1?

This information can be found in the Burn1 Use document in the Documentation section of the Moates.net web site.

Where can I find information on Chip addressing?

This information can be found in the Using offsets when programming chips document in the Documentation section of the Moates.net web site.

What chip addressing do I use when using the F2 in a EEC-IV ?

When programming for EEC-IV, you want to put a 56k binary from 032000-03FFFF.

Can the firmware of my Moates.net device be updated?

There are 3 devices which can be reflashed in terms of firmware: APU1, BURN1, and Ostrich.

Whatever you do, do NOT reflash your unit with an update that is designed for another! For instance, don’t reflash your AutoProm with a Flash&Burn firmware. Otherwise, you’ll be sending it back to me. I don’t know how to state this more explicitly. Be careful and deliberate, and DON’T reflash with the wrong firmware! Step by step instructions are below:

1. Download the Firmware updater program and the correct firmware for your application from Moates.net, i.e AP_2_8_A.zip is for the autoprom, notice the “AP” at the beginning of the file.
2. Open up the Firmware updater program, you should see a window like below:
3. Click on the open file button, browse to the directory you downloaded the firmware and select it.
4. Make sure you have the correct firmware loaded before this step! Now click update, you should see this screen when update is done:

The first thing you should do if you are having trouble with the Ostrich is to follow the instructions in the “USB Troubleshooting Guide” which you can find here – for the rest of this guide, it is assumed that your Ostrich has been assigned a COM port and you have selected the appropriate settings for it in device manager.

The ostrich is a ROM emulator – this means that it is designed to look like an EPROM to a target system, like your ECU. If you have a working ROM Burner (such as the BURN1 or BURN2) you can quickly and easily test your hardware. We will be using the BURN1 programmer and an Ostrich 2.0 in the following example, but any ROM burner that can read 27C512 EPROMs will work. The Ostrich 1.0 works identically to the Ostrich 2.0. Follow the “Hardware Test Instructions” to verify that your Ostrich hardware is working correctly.

If you’re reasonably certain that your hardware is working right but you still can’t get the Ostrich working with your ECU / ECM of choice, take a look at the “Software Setup” section for hints and writeups on using the Ostrich with particular applications.

Hardware Test Instructions

1. For this test, download a 64k ‘test’ bin from here:
   http://static.moates.net/zips/00-512-TEST.zip
   Unzip it and save the file somewhere you can find it.
2. For this test, you will need your ROM burner software installed and working. (in this case, Flash and Burn). We will also be using TunerPro RT for uploading files to the Ostrich. Even if you do not usually use TunerPro RT, please use it for this test as it is known to communicate with the Ostrich flawlessly.
3. First check: TunerPro RT should say something in the lower window about finding an Ostrich. If your Ostrich shows up in device manager as a COM port but TunerPro RT does not detect it, you probably have a defective unit and need to RMA it.
4. Next check: The Ostrich2 has different modes of operation for 28 and 32 pin operation, both electronically and with switches. Ensure that both switches are set to the 28 pin position. Make sure the “Emulation Banks” toolbar is visible in TunerPro.
5. The Ostrich should be set for Bank 0 for 28 pin operation. Try setting the Ostrich to Full 4Mbit (or Bank 8 for 32 pin operation) and back to Bank 0 (for 28 pin operation) to be sure your Ostrich is not stuck on an incorrect bank.  It is important to CHANGE this setting, even if it looks correct initially.
   
6. Quit TunerPro.  Download the DORESET program and run it.  (It’s pretty simple and self explanatory.)  Even if you haven’t used one of these programs, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to run this just-in-case an incorrect vendor ID got set somehow.  After you are done, quit the DORESET utility.
7. Re-open TunerPro RT.  Now it is time to load a file.  In order to verify with Tunerpro, you need to first load a XDF  and a binary that *should* work together.  Doing a verify with Tuner Pro without loading a XDF can result in unpredictable behavior.  You can find an assortment of bins and XDFs on TunerPro’s website in the definitions section.  Try to choose a bin/XDF pair where the bin files are the same size as the files you are trying to use.  i.e. 4k, 16k, 32k, 64k
8.  Open a binary file that is the same size as you use in your ECU. Click the button with an up arrow on it to upload the file to your Ostrich. You should see the status bar in Tuner Pro flash as the file uploads. (Note: this will be very fast – under a second usually)
9. Now do a verify in Tuner Pro.
10. TunerPro will automatically update the checksum on a file loaded according to the current XDF before doing a full upload to the emulator.  This can cause a false-failure when you are trying to use a ROM burner to check the Ostrich.  For the next test, we want to disable this behavior.  The easiest way to do this is to go to the ‘XDF’ menu and select “New XDF” which will create a new, blank XDF without a checksum to update.
11. Go to the “File” menu and open your test bin AGAIN.  Ignore any warnings from TunerPro – No you do NOT want to save.
12. Click the “Upload” arrow like you did previously to upload the bin to the emulator, this time with your new blank XDF.
    
13. Disconnect your ostrich’s USB cable from the PC. Connect your ROM burner and fire up its software. Connect the socket at the end of the Ostrich’s ribbon cable in your ROM burner like it was an EPROM.
14. Make sure the switch on your Ostrich 2.0 is set to the appropriate setting for the cable you are using.  if you are using a 28 pin cable, both switches should be towards where the USB cable plugs into the Ostrich.   (the Ostrich1 didn’t have external switches)
15. In your ROM burner’s software, load the same file that you uploaded to your Ostrich using TunerPro RT. Make sure you choose an EPROM that is the same size as the file you are uploading (i.e.  27SF512 for 64k)
16. Perform the “Verify” function. If your Ostrich is working correctly, the Ostrich should “verify” successfully. If it failed to verify on the first try, try again.  Sometimes the Ostrich needs an opportunity to power up before it becomes available.  If your Ostrich passes this test, it is 100% working and you should do a happy dance!
17. If your Ostrich failed the “Verify” in the ROM burner software, try plugging the USB cord from your Ostrich back in to your PC and repeating the Verify test in your ROM burner software. If the Ostrich passes the test when the USB cord is plugged in but it fails when it is unplugged, one of the ground or power pins on the socket is damaged. Carefully inspect the socket for broken pins. Carefully inspect the ribbon cable for frayed or damaged wires. Emulation cables (see here) can be ordered at a fraction of the cost of a new unit.  Also – double check your switches!  Switches can cause the Ostrich to verify with USB plugged in and fail to verify with it unpluged.
18. If your Ostrich does not verify with the USB cable connected to the computer but you did pass the earlier verify in TunerPro RT, there is a problem with the Ostrich communicating down the ribbon cable with the target system. Look at the ribbon cable with the socket VERY carefully. Are there any broken pins? (this is very common) If you are sure that your cable is good but your Ostrich still fails this test, it will have to be RMAed.

Software Setup

How to setup Ostrich in CROME

(more will be added here later)

With that out of the way, you’re looking at this page because your USB drivers are very broken.  You have devices in Device Manager with yellow exclamation marks that cannot load, cannot start or just plain don’t work.  This procedure will forcibly remove everything FTDI related and allow you to start over with a clean slate.

1. Step one: download FTCLEAN from FTDI’s website – link
2. Step two: unzip the file into a directory on your computer.
3. Step three: run FTCLEAN.EXE
4. Step four: click “Clean system” then click Yes to confirm
5. Step five: REINSTALL FTDI DRIVERS!!!  You should be starting from scratch.

Almost all Moates.net products have a USB interface to connect to a computer. (ALDU1, HULOG, Hondalog, BURN1/2, Ostrich 1/2, Roadrunner, Quarterhorse, Jaybird) Fortunately, all Moates.net products with a USB interface use the same USB support chip so they can all use the same drivers. This makes it easy for you – one driver install will take care of ALL Moates products! Check out USB Driver Installation for more on how to reinstall drivers.

The chip in our devices is made by a company called FTDI. This chip is VERY common and is used in everything from USB-serial and USB-parallel adapters sold in computer stores to other automotive electronics products. This is important because of the possibility of a driver conflict between drivers for your Moates.net devices and other devices that also use the FTDI chips. AEM FIC, Hondata S300 and K-Pro and the USB Instruments Stingray and Swordfish (among others) have a tendency to obliterate our drivers and cause driver conflicts. Be warned: the troubleshooting instructions later on this page may cause other devices that use the FTDI chips to stop working. Tip: If you start having driver conflicts, installing the latest drivers from FTDI will often be enough to resolve conflicts and make everything work again.

Making Sure Everything is Working and Configured

First step to making sure you don’t have a connection issue is to unplug all USB devices that are not absolutely necessary from your computer.

First, Right click on My Computer. (You might find this on the desktop, you might find this in your start menu. Desktop pictured)

Next, go to the Hardware tab and select “Device Manager.” (note: Windows XP is pictured, but the exact placement of device manager may vary slightly in Win98 and Vista)

Next, go to the “Ports” section of device manager and click the + sign next to it to open it, if it is not already open. You should see something like this:

Now plug in ONE of your Moates.net devices. We are going to plug them in one at a time to figure out which ports Windows is assigning to them. Assuming everything is working, you should see something like this in device manager:

The “USB Serial Port” device pictured is using COM10. Some software has issues with COM ports greater than 8, so the first thing we are going to do is change the port it uses to a port less than 8. Looking at device manager, you can see that Bluetooth Communications Port has used COM5 and a Communications Port has used COM1. We should not use either of these ports. We are going to change to COM3, which is unused. First step: right click on the “USB Serial Port” device and click “Properties.”

Next, click on the “Port Settings” tab at the top of the Window.

Next click the “Advanced” button.

On this screen, there are several things to change. First change the COM Port Number to COM3, the port we decided was open. If all of your ports say “in use” you can still select them, but it is recommended you find an unused port under 8. Second, set the Latency Timer to 1 msec. When you are done, click OK on this screen and the driver screen that follows until you are back at Device Manager.

These are the optimal settings for our devices (COM1 – COM8 and Latency = 1ms). If you had trouble, try again with these settings. Remember which port your device was using in device manager when it comes time to configure your tuning software.

Common Issues with USB Drivers and Connections

It is possible to disable devices in Windows. Sometimes this can happen accidentally. If a device is disabled, it has a red X across its icon, like the Bluetooth Communications Port in this picture.

To enable it, right click on the device and select “Enable.” Afterwards, the device should not have a red X across its icon.

Devices can also have issues loading or have device driver problems. When this happens, a yellow exclamation mark appears. Almost 100% of the time, this is a sign that you need to reinstall device drivers. If a simple reinstall does not fix the issue, there is a more heavyhanded method to reinstall drivers using FTCLEAN.

As a rule of thumb, the WHQL drivers which will be downloaded automatically will work fine.  However, it is recommended that you use the drivers from our site with Win98, WinXP and Vista.  Automatic drivers will generally work fine for Win7 but there are certain known good drivers.  We specifically recommend the latest drivers available from FTDI for machines running Windows 8, 8.1, Win10 or newer.

Specifically recommended driver versions:

• Windows 98/ME drivers can be downloaded by clicking here.
• Windows 2000/XP/Vista drivers can be downloaded by clicking here.
• There is a Vista Specific Guide that may be helpful to those running Vista.  Vista is also known to work well with the 2.08.x.x series of drivers in addition to the drivers listed above.
• Windows 7 is known to be stable with the 2.08.24 driver (available under “no longer supported drivers”) as well as the 2.12.x.x series (latest at time of writing) which are both available here.  In some cases, the 2.08 series works better than 2.12 series, your mileage may vary.  Use of drivers older than the 2.08 series is not recommended!
• 8 and 8.1 are known to be stable with the 2.08.24 driver (available under “no longer supported drivers”) as well as the 2.12.x.x series (latest at time of writing) which are both available here.  In some cases, the 2.08 series works better than 2.12 series, your mileage may vary.  Use of drivers older than the 2.08 series is not recommended!
• Windows 10 and newer machines are highly recommended to use the latest and greatest VCP drivers available directly from the USB chip’s manufacturer here. (at time of writing: 2.12.28.0)  In rare cases, the 2.08.24 driver (available under “no longer supported drivers”) can work better but this is NOT recommended.  Use of drivers older than the 2.08 series is known to cause issues!

If you have trouble, start with this troubleshooting guide.

If you have trouble, you may also want to look at FTDI’s Installation Guides for your OS.

This article was accurate as of the time it was written (2009) but things may have changed.  At Moates.net, we rely on information from our users about what works and what doesn’t work.  Please investigate on PGMFI.org and elsewhere to confirm the information you find here!  Things may have changed and we may not be in the loop.

Unsupported Vehicles

• V6 Hondas have very limited hardware and software support
• K-series Hondas have no support from hardware we make at this time
• 2001+ non-K series Hondas (D17, R18, etc.) have no support from hardware we make at this time
• Automatic Hondas have very limited support. Very little has been done with automatic transmission controls and many tuning packages eliminate the code used to control auto transmissions.

Unsupported ECUs

• Anything pre-1988 probably lacks spark control. There isn’t much if anything available software-wise for these ECUs. You might find 24 or 28 pin EPROMs inside, you might not. Your mileage may vary.
• 1988-1991 DPFI (Dual Point Fuel Injection – Throttle Body Injection) ECUs have zero software support. 90-91 models can be chipped like an OBD1 ECU hardware-wise, but that doesn’t solve the software issue.
• 1988-1989 Civic Si (PM6) and 1988-1991 CRX HF ECU (PM8) require a daughterboard we do not sell in order to be chipped. Use a 90-91 ECU on these model years.
• 1992-1995 JDM GSR Automatic ECUs (hardware design makes chipping them impossible. Auto JDM P30s are ok)
• 1996-2001 ECUs (OBD II – hardware design makes chipping very difficult to impossible, requires surface mount soldering tools and chips no longer available on the market.)
• Prelude ECUs (trivially chippable, but unless you are going to develop the software support, it doesn’t currently exist)
• V6 ECUs from Legend (early models can be trivially chipped, but unless you are going to develop the software support, it doesn’t currently exist)
• NSX ECUs (early models can be trivially chipped, but unless you are going to develop the software support, it doesn’t currently exist)
• Basically any ECU other than an Integra or Civic ECU is not well-supported

This information was last updated 2/4/09 by Dave Blundell.

G1 Chip adapter picture

Overview

The G1 is an adapter that allows a chip or emulator to be plugged into OBD1 memcal based GM PCMs.

The GP1 kit is a G1 chip adapter and two 27SF512 flash chips packaged together at a lower price.

Compatibility

The G1 is compatible with the following vehicles:

• 1986-1993 TPI & LT1
• 94-95 TBI trucks

The G1 is compatible with the following chips:

• SST 27SF512
• 27C128/256/512 based eeproms

Details

Our revolutionary G1 adapter allows you to customize your ecu or pcm by bypassing your factory tuning, allowing you to insert your own custom programmed chip without the hassle of tearing apart your stock memcal. This can be useful if you plan on returning your car back to stock, or need to use your stock memcal as a template for a newly modified ecu.

(much of the content on the rest of this page is edited from Allan Reinke’s review on www.iroczone.com – thankyou very much)

So what exactly does this adapter do?  In case you don’t know, GM ECMs (1986 to 1993 TPI and some 94-95 TBI stuff) utilize a memory calibration “memcal” unit. This unit consists of the PROM (calibration code) and resistor packs (for limp mode, cold starts, etc.). The resistor packs consist of two chips. One a 16-pin and the other a 14-pin. These are custom laser etched type resistor packs making them extremely difficult to duplicate. In other words, you need these resistor packs, you cannot copy them (as of right now anyway) and your car will have a hard time starting without them. Some Memcals have a more compex ‘non-EPROM’ half which contains knock circuitry, and the original (or one very similar) Memcal needs to be used in conjunction with the adapter.

What the adapter does is allow you to plug in your resistor packs so your ECM will still use them, and at the same time, “bypass” your existing PROM chip so you can install your own.  By doing so, you can reprogram your ECM with no modifications to your factory memcal AND no soldering is required! The process of reprogramming your ECM is greatly simplified.  You no longer need to worry about destroying increasingly hard to find memcals with a bad soldering job when you use a G1 adapter!

Install Instructions

First things first. You need to access your ECM. This is easily done as it is located behind the dashboard, on the passenger’s side of the car. (In some other applications, it is located under the passenger’s seat area, in behind the dash, by the kickpanel, or under the hood usually up by the firewall.) If you look underneath the dash on the passenger’s side, you will see a wiring harness plugged into a silver box. This box is held in by two hex screws. First, carefully unplug the two connectors to the ECM (otherwise, you won’t be able to gain full access to the ECM as the wires will keep you from pulling the ECM all of the way out.) Each connector has a “latch” where you just push in the latch and wiggle out each connector. Take your time, they don’t just fall out.

Next, get a hex screwdriver or other means of removing the two screws holding the ECM in place. Once these are removed, the ECM falls right out (be certain to catch it!).

GM TPI ECM

Now, with the ECM removed, you will need to use the screwdriver to remove the two screws holding the access plate on. Most of the time, the access plate will be stuck on the ECM. Use a small screwdriver and carefully pry around the access panel until it pops off.

TPI ECM – Cover removed

Once the access panel is off, there sits your memcal. If your Memcal looks like this, then the G1 adapter should work for you. If not, then look at some of the other adapters such as the G2 and see if that matches up. Using your fingers, press the latches on both sides, away from the memcal. Doing this will “pop” the memcal up.

TPI ECM – latches on memcal

Once the latches are fully out, the memcal should come right out.

TPI memcal – removed

The memcal will not usualy fit in the ECM (with the adapter) with it’s cover on. On some applications it will, such as some of the 1227730 and 1227749 units. So we will most likely need to remove the blue cover on the memcal so that it will fit back in there. Very CAREFULLY, remove the cover with a small screwdriver, prying the clips. Again, be careful, clips will break off.

pry GENTLY to remove memcal cover

You only need to do the one side just enough to pop the side up and the other side will come right off.

naked memcal :)

In this example, we are using a EPROM chip installed directly into the G1 chip adapter. This is a good “final” install after you have a program that you know works the way you want but it is not very easy to change the program in the chip. The advantage of this is that you are much more likely to be able to put the cover back on the ECM with just a chip installed. (i.e. no ZIF socket or emulator cable)  Install the chip with the U indention out. (Pin 1 faces left as in the picture) . If you are using a Flash chip such as the 29C256, then the chip will also have an arrow by Pin-1. This should also go out toward the edge of the adapter. Be sure to line up all of the pins on the chip and gently press it into the socket. Once you are comfortable with the feel, you will need to exert a little force to fully insert the chip. This can be tricky. Bent and broken pins can result if you are not 100% certain that all of the pins of the chip are lined up correctly.

However if you are just getting started tuning your car, you may want to use a ZIF socket (available from Moates.net for a small fee) or install the emulation cable from an Ostrich 2.0 or APU1 instead. You probably won’t be able to close the lid on your ECM, but it will be a lot easier for you to make changes to the program in the ECM.

After you have either a chip or emulation cable insterted in the G1 adapter, install your memcal onto the adapter. Simply line up the right side of the memcal to the right side of the pins on the adapter.

G1 adapter meets memcal

Press firmly and it should easily slide into place! In terms of original Memcal orientation on the adapter, make sure that the original ‘EPROM’ half is hanging off and that the ‘limp-home’ half is in contact with the angle header on the edge of the adapter.  It should look something like this:

G1 adapter with chip and memcal attached

Next, the G1 and memcal combination needs to be re-inserted into the ECM.  Place the adapter, memcal first, face down in the access panel. Then curve the adapter, memcal first toward the empty space in the ECM (bottom, but in the picture it’s up as the ECM is facing upside-down).


Once the adapter is in place, line up each side to each latch. See the pictures. Make sure it’s lined up before pushing down! You don’t want any bent pins in your ECM!

check one side

check other side

You have to ensure that the adapter is placed correctly in the ECM socket so that when you unlatch it, it’ll pop right up. It needs to be perfectly centered or you can bend pins in the ECM – not good. Once you are comfortable with the placement, press down on the adapter in the center of the two latches until the outer latches “click” and are in the “installed” position (up.)  Give yourself a pat on the back – you’ve completed the physical installation of the G1 chip adapter!

Reinstall the access panel (only if you are NOT installing the ZIF socket or if you are using a low-profile ZIF like the S4!!!) and reinstall the ECM in the car by following the steps you took to remove it in reverse. If you are using the ZIF socket for testing purposes, you’ll be happy to know that the access panel faces towards the front of the car, away from the dashboard. It may be a little neck tiring, but you will be able to replace chips while the ECM is installed.

The Jaybird

Overview

The Jaybird is a USB based device used ONLY for loading tunes onto F3 adapters.  It is designed to be the simplest and cheapest solution for programming J3 style Ford chips.  It cannot program other chips.

The Jaybird CANNOT READ STOCK ECMs!!! If you require this functionality, you need to get BURN2+F2A+F2E instead.

Software

This device can be used directly from TunerPro RT, EEC Editor, Binary Editor software packages as well as the Flash-n-Burn dedicated programmer software.

The F3 is a simple chip for EEC-based Ford ECUs allowing the stock program to be replaced with a tune of your choice.

To install, simply clean contacts of the EEC connector with carb cleaner and a mild abrasive such as scotchbrite or 220+ grit sandpaper, and slide the module on.

It is critical that the vehicle is fully off before installing or removing anything on the J3 port.  Failure to power-off the ECM correctly can result in frying our hardware, your ECM or both!!!  If you have any doubts at all, remove the keys from the ignition 100% or disconnect the battery.  WARNING WARNING WARNING!

Tunes can be loaded through the via the Jaybird or Burn1 /2 and FA (F2A) adapter.  Flash n Burn, TunerPro RT, Binary Editor, EEC Editor (and others?) software can be used to program these chips.

Switching Setup

The F3 can optionally store two programs and switch between them.  You can even switch between them while the vehicle is running.  The F3 adapter has a switch pin.  If you connect this switch pin to chassis ground, the program will switch too.  In order to program the second program you must ground the switcher line while programming!!! There is a ground pad provided next to the switcher pad for your convenience – a paperclip works wonders for programming.  (FYI – Dave often uses this for nitrous – regular NA program in one half of F3, program with a couple degrees of timing and/or more fuel in the other slot, wire the program switch wire to the nitrous solenoid – see diagram)

Take a look at this picture to get an idea of what you need to do:

One thing to be careful of when you are wiring your F3 for switching: NEVER NEVER NEVER connect your switch wire to 12V!!!  You will instantly fry the F3 if it sees more than about ~5volts.

The safe way to “flip” your F3 on an external signal (like nitrous) is to switch the GROUND side of your solenoid (i.e. wire to constant 12v, give the system a ground to trigger) and wire the F3’s switcher to your switched ground.

If this is not an option and you want to have a 12volt signal trigger your F3 to “flip,” you need to add a simple relay or reed switch as in the following diagram:

The Honda chip kit contains all the components necessary to put a chip in your OBD I Honda ECU.

There are two varieties of this kit, the USDM and JDM versions. JDM ECUs are smaller square ECUs that require surface mount components. The USDM ECUs are rectangular and use standard thru-hole components.

This kit also comes with a replacement capacitor for the 200uF cap that is known to go bad in these older ECUs.

Compatibility

This kit is compatible with the following ECUs:

• P28
• P30
• P72
• P75
• P05
• P06
• P08

Overview

The HuLog, HondaLog, and Xtreme HuLog are USB datalogging adapters that are used to datalog Honda ECUs.

Functionally the devices are identical, however the HuLog/Xtreme HuLog come in ABS plastic enclosures for protection.

Also, the Xtreme HuLog will retain its COM port assignment regardless of what USB port is used.

Tips and Tricks

To achieve maximum performance out of this device (and all Moates devices) we recommend setting the latency timer to 1 ms. This can be changed in Windows XP by using the following procedure:

1. Control Panel
2. System
3. Hardware
4. Device Manager
5. Ports (COM and LPT)
6. USB Serial Port (COMx)
7. Port Settings
8. Advanced
9. Latency Timer

Compatibility

The HondaLog/HuLog is compatible with:

• CROME Pro
• eCtune
• Neptune

How to Buy

Please visit the Xtreme HuLog’s page in our website here

3 Basic rules for using HULOG/Hondalog

1. ECU Must be chipped.  Properly.  Software must be installed in the chip WHICH MATCHES THE SOFTWARE ON YOUR PC.  Different versions of software on the PC can require different modifications to bin/chip.  Yes, upgrading your PC software can break logging until you “upgrade” the software in your chip, too.
2. There is no plug n play for this stuff.  Even if the drivers are installed automatically by Windows, software on your PC MUST BE CONFIGURED MANUALLY to match the hardware you are using and the modifications done to the bin/chip.  There are several incompatible options and you must have the SAME on both the chip and your PC.
3. J12 (US/EU/big case) or J4 (JDM/small case) is required to be removed for all known aftermarket software

OVERVIEW

The ALDU1 is a datalogger designed to work with OBD I GM vehicles.

The ALDU1 is compatible with the CABL1 and the CABL2, which are interface cables that connect to GM OBD I and OBD II vehicle respectively.

The ALDU1 can be purchased by itself, or as a combo with either the CABL1 or CABL2.

CABL1 is used for ~88-94 GM OBD1 vehicles with a rectangular ALDL connector like this:

CABL2 is used only on 95 (and some late-year 94) vehicles that still speak ALDL but have the D shaped “OBD2-style” connector like this:

It can be interfaced with many pieces of software, including TunerPro.

Pinouts and Wiring

In the event you need to build a custom cable, use the following pin outs for the RJ45 connector:

1=A(gnd)

2=B(diag)

3=E/M(data)

This is the 86-94 original ALDL connector:

On CABL1:

• pin A is connected to RJ45 pin 1
• pin B is connected to RJ45 pin 2
• pin E and pin M are connected to RJ45 pin 3
• pin G is connected to RJ45 pin 4
• other pins are not connected

This is the late model ALDL connector used in 1995:

On CABL2:

• Pins 4 and 5 are connected to RJ45 pin 1
• Pin 13 is connected to RJ45 pin 2
• Pin 9 is connected to RJ45 pin 3
• Pin 16 is connected to RJ45 pin 4
• Pin 2 is connected to RJ45 pin 5
• Pin 10 is connected to RJ45 pin 6
• Pin 14 is connected to RJ45 pin 7
• Pin 6 is connected to RJ45 pin 8

How to Buy

Take a look at the OBD1 GM section of our online store here

Test Procedure

The first step towards determining if your ALDU1 is working correctly is to look at the USB side.  Before you continue, you should have verified USB connectivity and you will need to know which COM port your cable is using.  Take a look at the USB troubleshooting guide if you have any questions or concerns here.

You will need to have TunerPro RT version 5.0 or later installed.

Test procedure:

1. Start TunerPro RT with your cable plugged into your computer but unplugged from the vehicle.
2. Load a valid XDF / ADS-ADX combination for your vehicle
3. Go to Tools … Preferences and select “Use Plug-in” for Interface type.  Then make sure “TunerPro Data Acquisition I/O Interface” is selected.  Next, select “Configure Plug-in Component”  Then make sure “Standard Serial” is selected and the COM port shown matches the COM port of your cable. 
4. Finally, click the “Test For Valid Interface Using Settings” to perform a test on the cable.

If your cable fails the above test, it will almost certainly need to come back to us for repair.  If it passes the above test, the hardware has passed a basic minimal test.

Types of Nissan Computer

Trivially chippable Nissans fall into several categories:

28 Pin EPROM (VG30DETT 300ZX Twin turbo, KA24E 240SX, RB26DETT R32 Skyline GTR, …) – If you see a 28 pin EPROM inside the ECU, this is your application.  Ostrich 2.0 works in almost all cases, but many of these applications will require a SocketBooster.

20×2 ROM Board “S13” (SR20DET Silvia/240, SR20DE Sentra, SR20DET GTiR, etc.) If you see a spot on the edge of the circuit board with two rows of 20 pins, this is probably the application.  (also see below S14a)  The Nissan 20×2 Adapter board is intended for this generation.  Two Ostrich emulators can be used for realtime emulation.

20×2 ROM Board “S14a” (SR20DET “black top” VVTI, 95-97 “B14” Sentra, etc.) If you see a spot on the edge of the circuit board with two rows of 20 pins, this is probably the application.  (also see above S13) These are not supported at this time.  Future hardware may add support.

40×1 ROM Board (Late model sentra, 240?) If you see a single, extremely long row of pins that are very closely spaced together, this is your application.  These are not supported at this time.  Future hardware may add support.

Many Nissan ECUs are not trivially chippable (RB25 Neo, R33 Skyline, R34 Skyline, 350Z, …)

Software

TunerPro RT has definitions for most S13/B13 platforms.

925style ROM editor supports most JDM ECUs.  I’ve used sucessfully with S13 SR20DET and R32 GTR Skyline.  It isn’t officially available anymore but you can find it easily with google.

CROME is compatible with certain Nissan ROMs, particularly those used in S13 based vehicles.

The RoadRunner is the only available full blown emulator for LS1 PCMs – unlike other “emulation” software, the entire contents of the flash is emulated Real-Time, not just certain maps.  It can also be used as a general purpose emulator in custom applications (Bosch Motronic, BMW, Miata, Nissan, …)  It is designed for PSOP44 chips like 28F200 28F400 28F800 29F400 29F800

Hardware Available

At this point, there are two (and a half) versions of RoadRunner you can buy:

1. A RoadRunner pre-installed in a rebuilt 12200411 GM LS1 ECM.  This is intended for all supported GM applications.

2. A RoadRunner “guts kit” containing just the raw circuit board, cables and hardware to mount the device in place of a 28Fx00 EPROM.  This is intended for all custom applications.  If you purchase the guts kit, you should specify whether you want a 512k (28F400) or 1024k (28F800) version. (we’re counting these two variants of the guts kit to get two and a half)

GM Compatibility

At this point (August 2009), there is only ONE officially supported target for the Roadrunner: the 12200411 (or just “411”) ECM.  The 12200411 is plug-and-play with ’99 and up Corvette LS-1’s (throttle-by-wire), ’99 and up Camaro/Firebird LS-1’s (cable-throttle), ’99-02ish Gen III Vortec trucks (cable throttle), ’00-02ish Gen III Vortec trucks (throttle-by-wire).  The 12200411 can also control 4L60E and 4L80E transmissions.   In case it wasn’t clear from the application list, the ‘0411 can control both drive-by-wire and drive by cable engines – pretty much any GM vehicle with a 24 tooth reluctor wheel(“24x”) is fair game for full sequential fuel and spark operation.  The ‘0411 can also be used to run 97-98 LS1s with minor rewiring or “green plug” 1024k PCM vehicles with slightly more extensive wiring changes.  It can also be used with a Van OS to run distributor applications with only a 4X reluctor.  The ‘0411 can also be used to run LTx/Gen2 retrofits with a custom conversion kit from EFI Connection.

Please note that the RR does *not* function identically to a “normal” PCM in terms of long term keep-alive memory.  When you turn the key off with a RR PCM, the PCM will reset every time.  If you need to pass emissions or do other functions that depend on this memory, you may have to use a normal PCM.

Later (LS2/LS3+) engines switched to a different style ECM (E40, E38, E67, E37, etc.) that is electrically incompatible with Roadrunner.  There will never be a RoadRunner for any late-model ECM.  Period.

Late model engines also switched to a different style crank trigger setup (58X / 60-2) that makes it impossible to use a LS1 ECM to run the engine.  People have succeeded in using a RoadRunner in a 411 ECM to run a late model engine by a combination of creative wiring changes and swapping the crankshaft reluctor to a 24 tooth unit.  This is not for the faint of heart.  We do not officially support this application so we can’t really assist you with this conversion, but again we’d recommend Mike at EFI Connection as a capable source for wiring and conversion needs.

Unsupported GM Applications

Previously, a Bluetooth option for Roadrunner was available.  This has been discontinued – it is no longer available.  There are no plans to offer this in the future.

Previously, there were Roadrunner versions available for LB7, 1024k PCMs and 98 PCMs.  All of these applications had issues which is why we no longer offer “ready to run” Roadrunner PCMs from these families.  These have been discontinued – we cannot guarantee that these applications will work fully.

Why did this happen?

• 97-98 LS1 Core PCMs are hard to find.  The 99-02 PCMs are superior and can be made to work in 98 applications with little effort.  If you’re bound and determined to use a RR in a 97-98 PCM, you could try this at your own risk but we strongly recommend conversion to an ‘0411 PCM.
• LB7 PCMs come in several flavors.  Early PCMs lacked a driver that later PCMs had, making them incompatible.  Also, RR equipped PCMs had a tendency to present an invalid VIN.  This did not appear to affect operation, but…  VATS was also sometimes a concern and may need to be disabled.  Combine these issues with the extremely limited supply of Core PCMs and we decided to no longer offer a “ready to go” LB7 Roadrunner.  For a TUNER, none of the issues on this platform should be a show stopper but we would recommend caution in a daily driver application.
• 03-08 1024K LS1 PCMs may all have 1024k of memory but they do NOT appear to be universally compatible.  During testing on an 05 Avalanche, there was a significant number of no-start conditions while using a stack of “random” 1024k PCMs fitted with a RoadRunner.  It was not determined whether this was due to differences in PCM hardware, The RoadRunner or another factor.  The decision was made not to offer a ready-to-go RoadRunner for vehicles requiring a 1024k PCM.

Getting an Unsupported RoadRunner

If after reading why we no longer offer a RoadRunner for a PCM you have and you still want to try it, there are options.  If you want to try one of these applications, you will need to either:

• Send us a Core ECM.  Order a RR Guts kit.  Order the RR Install service.  Receive the PCM you sent us back with a RoadRunner installed
• Order a RoadRunner Guts kit.  Install it yourself.

Please note that these applications are UNSUPPORTED meaning that if you have strange problems, we aren’t going to be rushing to revise the product in order to solve your issues.  These are intended for advanced users capable of troubleshooting and working independently.  Use at your own risk!

GM Software Compatibility

EFILive natively supports the RoadRunner.  In order to use it with EFI Live, you must purchase the Roadrunner license.  After purchasing the license, you can use the Roadrunner in any vehicle supported by the ECM.  You can tune as many RoadRunner equipped ECMs as you like – you do not need to buy additional licenses for additional RoadRunners.  If you want to flash a copy of the program in the Roadrunner into the vehicle’s original ECM, you can do this but standard EFI VIN or Stream licensing fees will apply.

TunerCAT OBD2 Tuner natively supports the RoadRunner.  Existing OBD2 Tuner customers can simply buy the RoadRunner upgrade.  There is a package that includes one definition file which is intended for people who want to use RoadRunner and TunerCAT to tune only one vehicle.  There is an add-on ***ONLY AVAILABLE FOR ROADRUNNER USERS*** that includes the WinFlash cable allowing you to reflash vehicles with TunerCAT.  There are also all-LS1 and all-supported-vehicles packages.  ***AGAIN, YOU MUST BUY ROADRUNNER HARDWARE TO BE ABLE TO BUY TUNERCAT OBD2 TUNER.  NO EXCEPTIONS.*** Updates for TunerCat Roadrunner users are available on the “Additional Links” section of the product page for RRTuner and WinFlash on our web store.  These links are updated to always point to the most recent version available.

Other Applications / Technical Specifications

The RoadRunner has been used successfully as a general purpose 16 bit data bus emulator for applications other than GM LS1.  (Bosch Motronic ME7.1 comes to mind.)   The RoadRunner uses the same FTDI USB-serial bridge as our other products, appearing as a COM port to the operating system.  It is designed to emulate a 28F800 (0r 28F400, 28F200, even 28F100) chip operating in 16 bit data bus mode.  The 28F800 is capable of presenting data in both 8 and 16 bit selectable modes, but the RoadRunner does not support this – 16 bit mode only.  The pinout of the RoadRunner is designed to match the pinout of these ICs – other 16 bit data bus chips could theoretically be emulated with creative cabling.  We have NOT performed extensive testing to determine the fastest access time for the Roadrunner, but we estimate that it is in the 65-80ns range.  90s is 100% safe.

The above picture illustrates the locations of pins 1 and 44 relative to the USB connector on the RoadRunner.

Full documentation for the protocols for talking to a Roadrunner for emulation and limited data trace are available on request. (They are very similar to the protocols used with the Ostrich 2.0 and our other devices but some minor differences exist.)  If you are interested in using the RoadRunner in a custom application, please contact us.  The hardware platform is a tried-and-tested 16 bit wide data bus EPROM emulation system available at a competitive price.

Specific Non-GM Application Usage Notes

The RR_on_BP5R write-up details fitting the RoadRunner emulator to the Miata BP5R (2000 1.8) ECU (Thanks James Holland!)  This ECU uses a 29F200 instead of the 28F400/800 the RR was designed for.

We have a byteswap board that allows the RR to fit inside the case of a ME7 Audi 2.7t ECM and performs an endian-swap for use with TunerPro RT on this platform.

Hardware Supported

Currently, the Demon 2 is the only supported hardware for Neptune.  We sell the Demon2+Neptune RTP setup.

Discontinued Hardware

If you have discontinued hardware, you can get current production hardware (Demon2) for half off with our trade-in program.  More details here.

The Demon (or “Demon 1”) is no longer in production and has been replaced by the Demon2.

Demon1 hardware

The original Neptune RTP board was designed by Moates.  It is no longer in production and has been replaced by the Demon2.

Original Neptune RTP Hardware

eCtune is a ROM Editor available for Hondas. It is written by Calvin Baank and has an exhaustive list of features.

eCtune has very structured licensing. It is important to note that most eCtune tunes will only work when run off the Ostrich or Demon. This means a separate Ostrich must be present in each car you tune with eCtune. (For all you CROME guys, there is no more burning chips and walking away)

At the end of the day, if you want to drive 5 cars at the same time, you will need 5 Ostrii.

There is also a dealer version available, contact eCtune for more information.

For more information on eCtune, visit the eCtune website here

NOTE: We do NOT sell or directly support eCtune.  You must purchase your software licenses and receive support directly from eCtune!  This page is provided for information only.

The Autoprom

The Autoprom was the first Moates device. It is a combination Emulator, Chip Burner and Datalogger.

Today you can buy these devices separately, however this package eliminates the need for 3 separate units.

Compatibility

As of writing this article, the only software known to be fully compatible with the Autoprom is TunerPro RT.  TunerCat OBD1 Tuner and TTS Datamaster support almost all of the AutoProm’s features.

If you plan on tuning Honda vehicles, purchase the Ostrich, Burn1, and HuLog separately or a Demon as there is no software for Hondas that supports the Autoprom and all of its features.

The Autoprom CANNOT be used to program F3 Ford chips using the FA nor can it be used to read Ford ECMs using the FE.  You will need to look at the Jaybird or BURN2/FA/FE combo for Ford vehicles.

The Autoprom does not work smoothly with 29F040 chips.  If you need to work with these chips, it is recommended that you purchase a BURN2.

The Autoprom should be compatible with almost all USB ports.  Its power consumption should be in the 100-150mA range.

Environmental Compatibility

The APU1 is NOT designed to be left in an engine bay!!!  It will fail prematurely if exposed to the heat of a bay.   It is designed for a maximum operating temperature of about 80C (175F).

The APU1 is NOT designed to be exposed to moisture!!!  It will fail prematurely if exposed to liquids.  It will fail prematurely from condensation inside its case.

If you are going to use the device in harsh environments, try to do so for short periods of time and then program a chip for long term use.  We recommend this in general but it is especially important in harsh environments.

Due to its internal battery constantly powering portions of the device, the APU1 can easily be ruined by condensation caused by sudden drops of temperature in humid environments.  Returning the device to a cool (~50-77F / 10-25C) , dry environment after exposure to high humidity before attempting to use again  is a very good idea.  Placing it in a sealed bag with dry rice or another desiccant can help if condensation is suspected.

Switch Positions

Real-Time Tuning / Emulation

1. Make sure car is in key-off position with no power to the ECM. Remove the ‘stock’ chip and install socket adapter (G1 or G2) if not already present. Remove any chip from the AutoProm ZIF socket!
2. Hook the 28-pin ribbon cable header to the ECM chip adapter socket. Make sure the ‘red’ wire points toward where the notch, or Pin1, would be on a chip normally going in the socket. The AutoProm will auto-select its power source from either the USB port or the ECM header.
3. Get your PC powered on with TunerPro or TunerCat loaded up. Hook USB cable up to the AutoProm and PC. Check the AutoProm switch positions along the backpanel. The innermost horizontal switch can be positioned either inboard (10k – used to select data initiation on older-model vehicles.  Try the other ‘open’ setting first!) or outboard (open A-B – almost everything else) depending on ECM requirements. The outer horizontal switch should be in the ‘towards the USB port’ position. (APU1 mode. Other position is passthrough mode, identical to ALDU1).
4. If you haven’t already loaded a file onto the AutoProm, you will get an SES light condition indicating bad PROM content. Now is the time to go ahead and initialize the AutoProm from the PC software (should be under ‘Emulation, Initialize’ option). Once initialized, load the desired binary file into the PC software and upload it to the AutoProm (option should be right next to the ‘Initialize’ button). You may want to select the ‘Verify’ option (in TunerPro) to ensure that the binary upload was successful. If you keyed the vehicle on without a valid binary loaded, you may need to cycle the key off for about 20 seconds to let the ECM reset.
5. At this point, you should have the AutoProm loaded with the desired binary file. The car should now respond as though a chip with the uploaded binary content is installed. If not, then there is an issue. Either the binary is corrupt or some other condition exists.
6. From the PC software, you can make on-the-fly changes in the BIN content and have those changes immediately transferred to the AutoProm and the car should respond accordingly. There are several options within the supporting PC software, such as ‘Checksum Disable’, ‘Upload Entire Tables’, ‘Update Checksum’, and ‘Keep Item Open’, etc., so read through the documentation and practice a little bit so you understand what is going on and what to select. Typically, checksum disable or update checksum should be selected. Use a setting of “AA at 08” for 28 pin applications, and “AA at 04” for 24 pin ECMs.
7. Have fun, and try not to burn anything up other than rubber and fuel!

Stand-Alone Datalogging

1. Hook the APU1 up to the PC USB port and place the outer horizontal switch in the standalone, ‘away from USB port’ position (toward outside). It doesn’t matter whether the AutoProm is connected to the ECM chip socket because it gets power for standalone data logging from the USB port.
2. Connect the ALDL cable to the car’s ALDL connection. Place the inner horizontal switch on the AutoProm backpanel in the proper position for your vehicle and mode desired: inboard=”10k across A-B”, outboard=”open between A-B”.
3. Load up your favorite datalogging program on the PC, such as “TunerPro”, “WinALDL”, or “TTS DataMaster”. You may need to select an ADS file to define your datastream if using TunerPro. Turn on the key and start logging data! To stop, just turn car off and disconnect hardware. Keep in mind that in this mode, the hardware will not be ‘detected’ like the AutoProm mode, and that you’ll need to specify which USB Serial Port number (hopefully COM3 or COM4) has been allocated to the port in the datalogging software preferences.

Simultaneous Emulation and Datalogging

1. Carry out the same steps described above in the sections on Emulation and Datalogging, except keep the outer horizontal switch in the ‘inboard / toward USB port’ position.
2. Use a simultaneous-supporting program such as TunerPro RT to perform simultaneous datalogging and real-time emulation/tuning. You should see results from changes to the binary on-the-fly right when you make them.

Chip Reading and Programming

1. Connect the AutoProm to the USB cable. The USB will supply the power.
2. Make sure the 28 pin ribbon cable used for emulation is UNPLUGGED from the unit. Unpredictable behavior can result from the APU1 being directly connected to a ECM using the emulation cable while burning chips.
3. Make sure that the switches on the AutoProm are set for AUTOPROM MODE (outer switch inwards, see above picture)
4. Place the target or source chip in the ZIF socket. Orientation is critical, and the chip should be placed with its notch or arrow facing toward the ZIF handle and toward the back panel of the AutoProm. The chip should be at the ‘bottom’ of the socket, such that any unused socket pin slots are closest to the handle or backplane.
5. Use a supporting software program, such as TunerPro or FlashBurn to pick read/write operation, file location and name, starting and ending addresses, any hex offsets, bank selection, or other characteristic of the read/write operation. Carry out desired program/read/verify steps as desired, and remove chip from socket.

APU1 Video introduction

There is a series of videos on our YouTube channel that also explain some of the basics. You can also consult the APU1 Troubleshooting guide if you’re having trouble.

APU1+Wideband+Datalog

On the back of the APU1 you will find a terminal block with 4x screw terminals. The one closest to the USB port is GND/Common, and the other 3 are for channels 1,2,3 respectively. If you have a wideband O2 with 0-5v outputs, it can be wired up to GND/CH1 and TunerPro can then present the ADC data along with the rest of the datastream when operating in AutoProm mode (this feature unavailable in pass-through mode). Configuring this is a little bit complicated and requires comfort with TunerPro RT, basic algebra and some patience.

This is a nice article written by Charles Woock on how to configure TunerPro RT to digest 0-5v inputs such as the LM1 and LC1. The values can be brought in through the APU1 via the APADC interface.  (Note: newer APU1s have the APADC interface built in as standard equipment) The tutorial explains how to set up the ADS file and render values such as AFR Air Fuel Ratio as part of your GM ALDL data stream.

Here’s the PDF file:

http://static.moates.net/zips/wideband_datalog_tunerpro_lm1.pdf

“First Edition” AutoPROMs

Very early editions of this unit feature a different switch configuration.

These units have a horizontal switch and a vertical switch.

For the horizontal switch, outbound is passthrough mode and inbound is APU1 mode.

The vertical switch has three positions.  It controls the behavior of the datalogging interface, much like the inner switch on newer models. 10k is the up position, open is the middle position, and short (check codes) is the down position.

These units also use a different style cable to connect the APU1 to the vehicle.  We no longer sell this style of cable.

The reason we are able to do this, is because when Honda designed their ECUs, the boards for the P05, P06, P28, etc were basically all identical. For the ECUs like the P05 and P06 that did not require VTEC, the components that are used for VTEC functionality were simply not installed.

Thanks to the guidance of the forums on PGMFI.org, we were able to collect these missing components, organize them into kits and sell them to you.

You can convert the following ECUs to VTEC:

• P05
• P06
• P75

The first step in the process is to identify the board in your ECU. In these ECUs, the only factors that affect board revision is the time that the ECU was produce. Meaning that just because you have a P06 doesn’t mean you’ll necessarily have a particular board.

First, identify your ECU to find out what board you have.

It will be one of the following. Clicking these will bring you to their respective page on our online store.

• 11F0
• 1720
• 1980

Your kit will come with a handful of components as well as a card with pictures that indicates the place to install the components. Sometimes this isn’t enough. Here is a better picture:

1720 Conversion

1720: VTEC Conversion

Download TunerPro here

Originally written to modify GM and Ford binaries, the uniqueness of TunerPro is its ability to have Definitions. While this adds a slight layer of complexity to the end user, the definition files (XDF) instruct TunerPro as to where tables and variables reside within the binary it is opening, allowing TunerPro to be compatible with virtually any binary.

Currently definitions are available for the following Vehicles at least as of 9/30/08, more being added regular (see http://www.tunerpro.net website for all the latest)::

General Motors

Ford (requires v4.13 or higher)

Subaru (Requires v4.13 or higher)

Nissan

Porsche (Motronic)

DSM (Eagle/Mitsubishi)

Renault

Registration

You will be emailed a key file to register to the address provided with your order.  In order to do this, we need your name, address, phone number and CORRECT EMAIL.  Make sure you can check the email address you provide with your order as this is where we will send your key.  Be sure to check any spam filters.  We do not need a key or any other information from you for TunerPro RT – we simply need a valid email address.

1. Verify that you have an Automatic. You will know if there are resistors in RP17 and RP18 (next to the EEPROM)
2. Remove RP17 and RP18
3. Replace RP18 with a jumper. (The one you removed from J12 usually works well, or just a paperclip)

When you are done, the resistors should look like this:

Manual ECU Resistor Arrangement

Honda ECUs have a Diagnostic Generation, Model and a Board Revision.

The diagnostic generations are OBD 0, OBD I, and OBD II.

Examples of the model are  P28, P72, etc.

The board revisions are 1980, 11F0, and 1720.

Diagnostic Generation (OBD 0, OBD I, OBD IIa/b)

Every generation

From top to bottom:

Knowing the generation of your ECU is extremely important. For a P28 it is easy because the P28 was only made for OBD I vehicles, however Integra ECUs like the P72 and P75 have both OBD I and OBD II variants. Be weary of this when you are purchasing an ECU online, an OBD II ECU is basically worthless.

Model (P28/P72/etc)

Side view of P28

Just because you have an OBD 0 or OBD I ECU doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll be able to just up and tune. Take a look at the side of your ECU, you’ll see 37820-PXX-XXX. The numbers following the P, like P28 or P30 are very important. Here are some things to note about the most common variants:

• P05 – Civic CX – Most basic supported ECU. Doesn’t have O2 Heater circuit, disable this to prevent CEL
• P06 – Civic DX – Same as P05 but has heater circuit
• P08 – JDM Civic – Same as P06, but has VTEC
• P28 –  Civic Ex/Si – The standard issue tuning ECU.
• P30 – Del Sol VTEC – Same as P28 but has a Knock Board
• P72 – Same as P30 but with IAB control
• P75 – Same as P72 but with no Knock Board or VTEC control

Board Revision

The only reason that the board revision is typically of interest is when you are attempting to add components like a VTEC conversion kit.

The board revision can be found silkscreened onto your ECU:

This is a 11F0 board

USDM/JDM

The only time you need to worry about whether your ECU is UDSM or JDM is when selecting which chip kit to purchase. JDM ECUs require slightly different chips than their USDM counterparts, so make sure you select the right one when you order.

USDM (Rectangular)

Periodically we release new firmware for our products. We generally recommend AGAINST updating firmware unless you have a very specific reason for doing so, as there is always the chance something will go wrong during an update leaving the device bricked in a state where it has to be sent in for repair.

If you are attempting to update your firmware because you think your current firmware is corrupt, be advised that you will not be able to update your firmware unless the old firmware actually works (a little) and is able to accept new firmware. You will have to return your device to us in these cases.  Some newer r

Again, most of the time problems can be resolved without a firmware upgrade. Consult this site and/or contact us at [email protected] if you think you need a firmware update.

Firmware Update Procedure

The information on this page pertains to the following devices:

• APU1 AutoProm
• Ostrich 1.0
• Ostrich 2.0
• Flash & Burn (BURN1 / BURN2 / Jaybird)
• Roadrunner LS1 16-Bit Emulator
• QuarterHorse J3 Ford Emulator
• Demon integrated tuning device
• NEMU integrated tuning device

Directions for updating firmware:

1. Download the following utility (new version as of 2017):
   Firmware Update Utility
   and unzip it to the location of your choice.
2. Download the appropriate firmware package for your hardware from the table below and unzip it to the location of your choice (preferably to the same location as the update utility).
3. Connect your hardware to your PC and close all software applications.
4. Start the firmware update utility. Your hardware should be automatically detected. If it isn’t, click the “Detect” button
5. Click the “Browse” button in the update utility and browse to the firmware package you downloaded and unzipped in step 2 above.
6. If the package and hardware match, the “Update” button should be available. Press it now.
7. Once complete, the updater should notify you of success and display the new version information.

Firmware downloads for individual units:

Only certain Hondas can be tuned using our hardware. In short, these are any vehicles that run a B, D, H, or F (Accord) series engine with a distributor and can run an OBD I ECU. Whether they accept these ECUs natively or via an OBD II to OBD I or OBD0 to OBD I conversion harness makes no difference.

Some of the OBD0 (pre-92) vehicles can be chipped and tuned natively, but the OBD I software tools are so much more advanced and user friendly that it is worth considering converting these vehicles to OBD1 with a conversion harness when possible.

If you have a 1996-2001 Honda, you will need to remove your stock OBD2 ECU and plug-in a supported OBD I ECU via a conversion harness. Please make sure you order the appropriate harness for your car as different model years used different connectors.

Supported Vehicles

• 1992-2000 Civic (1996-2000 Civics require OBD2-OBD1 conversion harness, use 92-95 OBD1 ECU)
• 1992-2001 Integra (1996-2001 Integras require OBD2-OBD1 conversion harness, use OBD1 ECU)
• 1992-2001 Prelude/Accord (1996-2001 Preludes require OBD2-OBD1 conversion harness, requires Integra or Civic OBD1 ECU swap, )
• 1988-1991 Civic/CRX Si-HF or swapped cars (can use OBD1 ECU and OBD1 tools with OBD1/OBD2 distributor swap and conversion harness)
• 1988-1991 Integra/CR-X/Civic with B16A swap (requires PR3/PW0 ECUs to use as OBD0 Vtec)
• 1990-1991 Civic/CRX Si D16A6 (will have PM6 ECU, ready to use as OBD0 non-vtec)
• 1988-1989 Civic/CRX Si, 1988-1991 CRX HF (requires use of a 90-91 ECU to use as OBD0 non-vtec)

Supported ECUs

• 1992-1995 Civic (P05 | P06 | P08 | P28)
• 1994-1995 Del Sol VTEC (P30)
• 1992-1995 Integra GS-R (P61, P72)
• 1992-1995 Integra RS/LS/GS/SE (PR4 | P74 | P75)
• 1992-1995 JDM Civic, Integra, Del Sol, etc. (P30, P72, P54, P08, etc. small square case. Place note in order!!! JDM ECUs require different parts than USDM)
• Chippable OBD-0 ECUs (PW0 | PR3 | PM6)
• see also pgmfi wiki on the subject

Note: If you do not see your car or ECU specifically listed here, please check to make sure you do not have an unsupported setup before purchasing anything!

Supported Tuning Software

• Neptune (targets primarily 92-95 OBD1 ECU hardware, very actively developed, advanced feature set, per-vehicle licensing)
• eCtune (targets primarily 92-95 OBD1 ECU hardware, starting to be poorly maintained, advanced feature set, per-vehicle licensing)
• CROME Pro (targets OBD1 ECUs, supports datalogging, getting to be poorly maintained, great for “simple” tunes, flexible licensing)  There is a very nice PDF tutorial written up by Darren Kattan. Check it out by clicking HERE.
• CROME (as above, free but without datalogging support)
• BRE (Primarily targets OB0 Vtec computers: PR3, PW0. Also has limited support for PM6. Only recommended for “simple” setups. Not very actively supported)
• TurboEdit (Primarily targets OBD0 non-vtec computers, i.e. PM6. Only recommended for non-vtec engines and very simple setups. Not very actively supported)
• Uberdata (Older application. Targets OBD1 platform. Once thought to be dead but seems to be some recent development activity)
• FreeLog (Free, datalogging package, works with Crome, not heavily supported/updated.)

Rest in Peace

The Ostrich 1.0, which has now been discontinued, was the first in the Ostrich line. Upon the creation of the first Moates product, the Autoprom (APU1) the team at Moates quickly realized the demand for separation of the Burner/Emulator/Datalogger combo.

As a result, the Ostrich 1.0 was born.

Early versions of the Ostrich 1.0 were very basic featuring only a black case.

Later versions of the Ostrich 1.0 featured a sticker with a very mean looking Ostrich.

Early revisions of the firmware used 115,200 baud rate. Later revisions (leading up to the Ostrich 2.0) were released featuring the 921,600 baud rate.

The meanest emulator known to man.

The release of the Ostrich 2.0 was the marking point for the next generation of Moates products. Along with a 75% size reduction, the Ostrich 2.0 also boasts many firmware advances. The Ostrich 2.0 connects to the host computer with a baud rate of 921,600bps, which is the fastest bit rate supported by standard RS-232.

In English, this means uploads, download and verifies happen in less than 2 seconds for most ROMs.

There are also some new features for developers available on the Ostrich. Features like ROM tracing, and window tracing allow developers to keep track of what addresses are being access within specific regions of the ROM. This is helpful for reverse engineering roms, and can also aid in datalogging ECUs with limited datalogging capability.

The following software packages are known to be compatible with the Ostrich 2.0:

• CROME

• Hondata (Note: Old “Stage” software before S300 only.  No S300 support)

• Neptune (Note: DEALER VERSION ONLY!!!  We do NOT sell Neptune software that works with the Ostrich.)

• eCtune

• BRE

• TurboEdit

• TunerPro

And many more…

To purchase the Ostrich 2.0, please see this item in our Online Store here

Environmental Compatibility

The Ostrich is NOT designed to be left in an engine bay!!!  It will fail prematurely if exposed to the heat of a bay.   It is designed for a maximum operating temperature of about 80C (175F).

The Ostrich is NOT designed to be exposed to moisture!!!  It will fail prematurely if exposed to liquids.  It will fail prematurely from condensation inside its case.

If you are going to use the Ostrich in harsh environments, try to do so for short periods of time and then program a chip for long term use.  We recommend this in general but it is especially important in harsh environments.

Due to its internal battery constantly powering portions of the device, the Ostrich can easily be ruined by condensation caused by sudden drops of temperature in humid environments.  Returning the Ostrich to a cool (~50-77F / 10-25C) , dry environment after exposure to high humidity before attempting to use again  is a very good idea.  Placing it in a sealed bag with dry rice or another desiccant can help if condensation is suspected.

Supported Targets – 24, 28, 32 pin 8 bit ROMs

The Ostrich is a general purpose emulator.  It can be used to emulate up to a 4 megabit ***8 bit*** EPROM.  It cannot be used to emulate 16 bit ROMs like the 28Fxxx.  The Ostrich 2.0  is available with DIP28, DIP32 cables.  The SocketBooster 1.0 is used with 24 pin applications.

• 27C32 (TBI GMs, Old Bosch Motronic) = 28 pin emulation cable, Socket Booster
• 27C64 (misc ECMs) = 28 pin emulation cable, Socket Booster
• 27C128 (misc ECUs) = 28 pin emulation cable
• 27C256 (misc ECUs) = 28 pin emulation cable
• 27C512 (misc ECUs = 28 pin emulation cable
• 27C010 (?) = 32 pin emulation cable
• 29F040 (?) = 32 pin emulation cable

We have NOT performed extensive testing to determine the fastest access time for the Ostrich2, but we estimate that it is in the 65-80ns range.  90s is 100% safe.

In cases where you have a PLCC package chip, you CAN use the Ostrich 2.0 but you need a DIP->PLCC adapter.  We do NOT sell these.  Logical systems seem to sell suitable adapters.

The SocketBooster and the Ostrich 2.0

The SocketBooster is never required when using the Ostrich 1.0 but it is required for most 27C32-based applications when using an Ostrich 2.0.  You can think of it as a signal amplifier for the Ostrich 2.0.  In most applications, the Ostrich 2.0 can produce a strong enough signal on its own.  If your ECU acts like it has a bad chip or no chip installed when using the Ostrich but the same program works as a chip, this could be a sign that your application needs a SocketBooster.  (It could also mean that your Ostrich is failing…)  You might ask, “well why don’t you use a SocketBooster all the time?”  Unfortunately, the SocketBooster interferes with the operation of the “trace” feature of the Ostrich.

This is a list of applications where we have found a SocketBooster to be ABSOLUTELY necessary:

• 86-93 GM TBI ECMs using a 24 pin 27C32 EPROM

This is a list of application where we have found a SocketBooster to be necessary in SOME cases:

• 90-93 Nissan Z32 8 bit ECUs, 90-93 Nissan R32 Skyline 8 bit ECUs.  (By extension, most 8 bit Nissan computers around this age)
• 90-94 Mitsubishi DSM ECUs

This is a list of applications where the SocketBooster is 100% NOT needed:

• 88-95 Honda ECUs
• 86-95 GM TPI “Memcal” style ECMs
• Nintendo NES and Gameboy
• All 32 pin applications

If you don’t see your ECM listed, email [email protected] with the particulars of your application.

About Emulation Bank Setting

Power Consumption

Ostrich Use with PLCC32 Targets

The Ostrich can be used with PLC32 targets, but we do not sell the necessary adapters.  In most cases, you will need to get the EMU3206 cable we sell so you are starting with a 32 pin DIP.  We have fund these vendors sell adapters that will work for emulation of PLCC32 targets:

• http://www.adapt-plus.com/products/adapters/prod_dipplcc.html
• http://www.logicalsys.com/
• http://www.adapters.com/

Making Your Own Cables

We recommend you buy a suitable cable from us.  You should not bother reading this section unless you understand how EPROM addressing works and you have a specific need that cannot be met with a cable we already sell.  This is not for beginners.  You are warned.

Parts can be found here (Page 106: PCI-24, PCI-28. PCI32, IDS-34)

The pinout of the Ostrich is more or less the same as the chips that it is designed to emulate, viewed from above.  The two switches define the possibilities – 24 pin(2732), 28pin (27C512) and 32pin (AM29F040).

A very important thing to note is that all pins are live in each mode, i.e. if you are using the Ostrich to emulate a 27C256 in 28 pin mode, you must make sure that the highest address pin (A15, pin 28) present on the 27C512 but missing on the 27C256 is in a defined state by using a pull up/down resistor.  Although the Ostrich has very weak internal pull-ups, allowing pins to float in an undefined state is likely to cause problems.  TunerPro RT and most software typically top-justifies bin files when uploading them to the Ostrich so generally pull UP resistors are going to be what you need.  If your target system has hard pull downs (ground) on “unused” address lines, you will have to either disconnect these lines from the target system and manually pull them high *OR* adjust where in the Ostrich’s memory bins are uploaded to.

In 32 pin mode, the Ostrich uses 32/34 pins with the same pin numbering scheme as a 29F040:

In 28 pin mode, the Ostrich uses 28/34 pin with the same pin numbering scheme as a 27C512:

In 24 pin mode, the Ostrich uses 24/34 pins with the same pin numbering scheme as a 2732:

Data Trace

The Data Trace feature of the Ostrich 2.0 allows you to observe which data in its memory is being accessed by the target system.  It’s a little more complicated than it sounds so there is a dedicated support page for the Trace Feature.

Creating a BIN for the 2Timer

We get this question a lot, so we have decided to do a write-up to help people out. Let’s assume you have an easy situation and you are simply trying to create a Race Gas tune for your vehicle. We are also going to assume that you have both of your original BIN files in an easily accessible folder on your computer. For the sake of simplicity, lets say that both of these tunes were produced with CROME. So you should have 2 files, each of size 32,768 bytes, or 32KB for short. You need to combine these files into one 64KB file.

Unfortunately, CROME does not have this capability. However TunerPro does.

Download it here.

There is a standalone module within TunerPro called the Bin Stacker.

Tools->Bin Stacker/Splitter

Within the Bin Stacker there are some rather Cryptic options:

Bin Size: This is the size of the tune. Typically 32KB (for Hondas)

Chip Size: This is the capacity of the chip. 64KB (assuming your using a SST 27SF512)

Block Size: This is useful if you are putting two 16KB tunes on a 64K chip, but you need the second 16KB tune to start at the halfway point of the chip. Set the block size to 32KB and it will start writing the second tune at the 32KB mark. If you’re doing this on a Honda, select 32KB.

For the 2Timer, Pos 1 is the default, and Pos 0 is the map that gets selected when you ground the wire coming out of the 2Timer unit.

Using the Browse button you will be able to put your two tunes in their appropriate positions, and by clicking Stack you will be able to create 1 file that you can burn to a chip.

Using the Flash N Burn software you will be able to burn this file to your SST 27SF512 chip.

Alternate Procedure

When using the 2Timer to switch between two 32k programs, you will want to program the chip directly (not through the 2Timer). Assuming you are using the 27SF512 chip, you can program two positions.

1. First, insert the 27SF512 chip into the BURN1 programmer and erase it followed by a blank check.
2. Load the first program from file to the buffer of the FlashBurn program.
3. For the first program (switch open to select), program the chip using chip addressing of 8000-FFFF, buffer addressing of 0000-7FFF. After the programming cycle, perform a verify step.
4. Load the second program from file to the buffer.
5. For the second program (switch wire grounded), use chip addressing 0000-7FFF and the same buffer addressing as before. Again, verify after this step.  DO NOT ERASE THE CHIP BEFORE PROGRAMMING A SECOND TIME
6. That’s it! You can switch the wire to ground to select the ‘lower’ chip addressing location.

You may also want to consult the article on programming chips with offsets found here.

How to Buy

To purchase the 2Timer, please visit this item in our Online Store here

John Cui

CROME is a ROM-Editor written primarily for OBD I Honda ECUs. A Pro version is available for $149 which unlocks a hidden data-logging feature.

CROME works natively with the following Moates hardware:

• Ostrich (both 1.0 and 2.0)
• Burn1
• Burn2
• HuLog (both Xtreme HuLog and Original HuLog)
• HondaLog

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKpLKHEwWXY[/youtube]

Firmware Updates

• The new version of Binary Editor 2010 requires QH firmware 1.6 or higher.Most firmware upgrades are bugfixes of one variety or another.  If you aren’t having trouble, chances are the bugs do not affect you.
• Most bugs affected the QH when operating in modes 3 and 4 (EECV)
• The latest firmware revision as of 2/11/10 (version 1.6) allows you to read the stock program from an ECM using the QuarterHorse.

Program Switching with QuarterHorse

Here are pictures which detail how the rotary switch is installed on the QuarterHorse. The kit comes with a length of no-clean solder, and it is very easy. Follow the pictures for guidance, and remember, this is ONLY for EEC-IV and not post-1995 EEC-V.

First, look at the connector part you received. It may or may not have had one of the 4 pins removed. If not, pull it out so that it is as shown.

Go ahead and use the no-clean solder that was supplied. Get one spot on the QH connector tinned up like it shows in the picture.
Now, hold the modified 4 (now 3) pin connector in place as shown, re-heating the solder so that the two pieces can be bonded together in the correct position.

Now, come in with the solder on the other 2 joints. Use a little extra for strength, but don’t go overboard. Re-heat and add solder to the first joint you started with here to ensure good connection.

Soldering work is now complete, so check fitment of the cable and look for straightness and orientation. Use the photo below for reference.

Here’s another angle showing solder joint details.

These are most of the parts (pin header shown unmodified) that come with the switch kit. Knob is also included (shown in 2nd picture below).

Here is what the completed switch / QH / knob assembly should look like:

This is a pretty simple installation. It basically overrides the BS0/BS3 lines (if you’re familiar with this terminology) at the EEC connector. Therefore, to repeat, this is NOT to be used on EEC-V applications.

NOTE: The QuarterHorse must be configured to use MODE 1 or the switch will NOT WORK.  As of the time of writing (Apr 2011) Binary Editor is the only software that supports Mode switching which means it is also the ONLY software that will currently work with the switcher module.

Switching Low Level Details

While in Mode1, there are 4 tunes available.  The following table explains the state of each pin while each tune in BE is active.  It matches the pin orientation of the header that is pictured above.

 

If you don’t want to use our switching kit but you do want to do switching, you need to understand how this state table works. The first thing to keep in mind is that all pins default to “1” or 5V unless you intervene – this is called “pulled up.” When you are figuring out what state the QH is going to be in, you must always assume any pins you haven’t specifically changed the state of will be “1.” A simple way of doing switching without our kit would be to solder a wire to the GND pin (by itself, above) and to the one next to it (BS0). If you were to put a toggle switch on this, you would be changing between Tune 0 (switch open) and Tune 3 (BS0 = GND)

The Burn2

The Burn2 has the same features as the Burn1, only smaller and more compact.

The Burn2 is a revolutionary device that was designed with the automotive enthusiast in mind. it supports chips used in our products aimed at ECUs/ECMs from the late 80s and early 90s.

The BURN2 can:

• WRITE SST 27SF512, ATMEL AT29C256 and 29F040 chips.
• READ but NOT WRITE 2732A, 27C128, 27C256 chips (and most other 24/28 pin EPROMs/EEPROMs that can replace one of these chips).
• With a F2A adapter, it can WRITE our F3 EECIV/EECV chip modules.
• With a F2E adapter, READ factory Ford ECMs.
• with a HDR1 adapter, READ factory GM TPI ECMs that would use a G1 chip adapter .

As you can see, it is designed to comprehensively work with our products but it is NOT a general purpose EPROM programmer.  If you require programming chips outside these specifications, you probably should look at another product.

How to Buy

Visit this item’s page in our online store here

Software

This device can be used directly from TunerPro RT, EEC Editor, Binary Editor software packages as well as the Flash-n-Burn dedicated programmer software.

Chris Handwerker was kind enough to write a utility for using the BURN2 under Linux.  Thanks for sharing with us!

The Burn1 is a revolutionary device that was designed with the automotive enthusiast in mind. it supports chips used in our products aimed at ECUs/ECMs from the late 80s and early 90s.

The BURN1 can:

• WRITE SST 27SF512, ATMEL AT29C256 and 29F040 chips.
• READ but NOT WRITE 2732A, 27C128, 27C256 chips (and most other 24/28 pin EPROMs/EEPROMs that can replace one of these chips).
• With a F2A adapter, it can WRITE our F3 EECIV/EECV chip modules.
• With a F2E adapter, READ factory Ford ECMs.
• with a HDR1 adapter, READ factory GM TPI ECMs that would use a G1 chip adapter .

As you can see, it is designed to comprehensively work with our products but it is NOT a general purpose EPROM programmer.  If you require programming chips outside these specifications, you probably should look at another product.

Before the Burn1 was developed, there were only a handful of chip burners known to be compatible with these chips. These burners were usually not cost-effective, used outdated PC interfaces like a parallel Printer port. They also required external power supplies, so forget burning on the fly. Examples include the $160 Pocket Programmer II.

The Burn1 was revolutionary with its simple USB interface that provided all power to the unit. An internal DC voltage step-up circuit is used to provide the high erase voltage required on certain chips.

The latest generation of the Burn1 is the Burn2. It has the same same command set and features as the Burn1 but has a smaller size.

How to Buy

This product has been replace with the Burn2. Please visit the Burn2’s page on our webstore here