2018+ pro tune (updates)

[Cardude99]

Edit... See pages 6 and 7 for updates on the progress.


Okay so I have been debating this recently. Really want a tune but yes I'm nervous about the dredded ecoboom. These days, how safe is a tune for an 18+ ? If there a lot of inherit risk with a protune? Can I request a vendor to be conservative and not go for max power? Will that make a difference?

I do live in Phoenix so the heat and bad gas is a concern.

Mods I would plan to do at the same time are cvf charge pipes, boomba diverter valve, colder plugs, catch can, wastegate, and low speed fuel pressure sensor. Question, is all of that necessary? I'm considering PD tuning.

Is a tune worth it? Is the failure rate low? Are there other measures that can be taken to reduce the risk? Or should I simply stick with the stock tune?

I have no desire to get the Ford racing tune, I'm only interested in pro tunes. Any help and advice is much appreciated

Sponsored

 

[dgc333]

Before any of those mods you have listed an aftermarket intercooler should number 1.

Plus if you are really concerned about ecoboom then you really should consider the Ford Performance tune, it comes with a warranty and you aren't going to give up much in the way of power compared to a pro tune with the mods you are talking about.

 

[FreePenguin]

I have the FP tune, and really enjoy the extra power, while still being a regular car to daily and not worry and never have to do adjustments and stuff. Pro tunes, they make you do those catalogs and such. Doesn't sound fun and just not into it. I want to believe ford performance is on the very very verrrry safer side of the power tune vs others, they may not have the inside info on the engines checks and balances.

If you are asking to be conservative to be safe, just get the ford performance tune. its already optimized as safe as can be without the risk and have a warranty.

 

[Deleted member]

Okay so I have been debating this recently. Really want a tune but yes I'm nervous about the dredded ecoboom. These days, how safe is a tune for an 18+ ? If there a lot of inherit risk with a protune? Can I request a vendor to be conservative and not go for max power? Will that make a difference?

I do live in Phoenix so the heat and bad gas is a concern.

Mods I would plan to do at the same time are cvf charge pipes, boomba diverter valve, colder plugs, catch can, wastegate, and low speed fuel pressure sensor. Question, is all of that necessary? I'm considering PD tuning.

Is a tune worth it? Is the failure rate low? Are there other measures that can be taken to reduce the risk? Or should I simply stick with the stock tune?

I have no desire to get the Ford racing tune, I'm only interested in pro tunes. Any help and advice is much appreciated

PD Tuning all the way, youll absolutely love what Ryan can do for your car. His customer service is fantastic and he will walk you through what is safe for your car with what mods you have and very quick to answer questions and never makes you feel dumb for asking unlike another tuner i used to be tuned+ by...... but lets not open that can of worms.

The most important thing you can do is make sure you have your supporting mods first and stay up on proper oil changes and your plugs every 15-20k.

Intercooler, catch can, pcv baffle plate, a quality drop in filter and properly gapped ngk plugs are IMO the most important to help mitigate the effects of LSPI in our motors. No matter how good your tune is and even if you have all these mods done, you will still have LSPI its just a fact of life for a DI turbo 4 pot. The important thing is to do everything you can to help prevent it.

Along with these mods and maintainence, making sure you properly warm up your car before pushing it is VITAL, make sure that oil temp hits the normal range on the center stack before getting into much boost, and even then wait another 10 minutes of driving or so before you go WOT full boost. Need that oil to be 200+ degrees to get the most protection.

I have been full bolt and pro tuned for 70k of my now 90k miles, ive tried to treat my car religiously as ive laid out above and she has been solid. This coming from a guy who has had ecoboom happen to him at 20k, back then me not knowing shit about these cars thought it would be smart to floor it in 6th on the freeway on a cobb canned tune, shortly there after there was a nice pretty crack in my block between cylinders 2 and 3.

 

[Deleted member]

I have the FP tune, and really enjoy the extra power, while still being a regular car to daily and not worry and never have to do adjustments and stuff. Pro tunes, they make you do those catalogs and such. Doesn't sound fun and just not into it. I want to believe ford performance is on the very very verrrry safer side of the power tune vs others, they may not have the inside info on the engines checks and balances.

If you are asking to be conservative to be safe, just get the ford performance tune. its already optimized as safe as can be without the risk and have a warranty.

Just because the FP tune is from ford and covered under warranty doesn't make it safer. You are correct when you say it is more conservative, but it is also a canned tune meaning ford has to make sure this tune is compatible and driveable across all cars in all markets, different climates and elevations. There is much more room for the car not to like something about the way youre driving it or any other mods you may have on a car.

Where a pro tune is custom tailored to how you drive, your mileage, mods, average elevation, and is backed up and refined by data logging allowing a pro tuner to much more safely see where things like timing, boost, fuel etc can either be advanced or retarded depending on how the car responds to the tune.

Not all cars will respond equally to the same tune, especially and canned one with out logging and revisions.

 

[Cardude99]

Before any of those mods you have listed an aftermarket intercooler should number 1.

Plus if you are really concerned about ecoboom then you really should consider the Ford Performance tune, it comes with a warranty and you aren't going to give up much in the way of power compared to a pro tune with the mods you are talking about.

Already have an ic.

 

[Cardude99]

PD Tuning all the way, youll absolutely love what Ryan can do for your car. His customer service is fantastic and he will walk you through what is safe for your car with what mods you have and very quick to answer questions and never makes you feel dumb for asking unlike another tuner i used to be tuned+ by...... but lets not open that can of worms.

The most important thing you can do is make sure you have your supporting mods first and stay up on proper oil changes and your plugs every 15-20k.

Intercooler, catch can, pcv baffle plate, a quality drop in filter and properly gapped ngk plugs are IMO the most important to help mitigate the effects of LSPI in our motors. No matter how good your tune is and even if you have all these mods done, you will still have LSPI its just a fact of life for a DI turbo 4 pot. The important thing is to do everything you can to help prevent it.

Along with these mods and maintainence, making sure you properly warm up your car before pushing it is VITAL, make sure that oil temp hits the normal range on the center stack before getting into much boost, and even then wait another 10 minutes of driving or so before you go WOT full boost. Need that oil to be 200+ degrees to get the most protection.

I have been full bolt and pro tuned for 70k of my now 90k miles, ive tried to treat my car religiously as ive laid out above and she has been solid. This coming from a guy who has had ecoboom happen to him at 20k, back then me not knowing shit about these cars thought it would be smart to floor it in 6th on the freeway on a cobb canned tune, shortly there after there was a nice pretty crack in my block between cylinders 2 and 3.

How necessary is the baffle? Didn't really want to install that. Looks like a pain in the ass

 

[Deleted member]

How necessary is the baffle? Didn't really want to install that. Looks like a pain in the ass

I Wouldnt say totally necessary i just did it in conjunction with my UPR DVCC to prevent as much oil vapor as possible getting through the intake. Honestly its not hard, the intake manifold is very easy to remove, took me about 2 hours to do the whole thing.

 

[whatdoyoufeedit?]

PD Tuning all the way, youll absolutely love what Ryan can do for your car. His customer service is fantastic and he will walk you through what is safe for your car with what mods you have and very quick to answer questions and never makes you feel dumb for asking unlike another tuner i used to be tuned+ by...... but lets not open that can of worms.

The most important thing you can do is make sure you have your supporting mods first and stay up on proper oil changes and your plugs every 15-20k.

Intercooler, catch can, pcv baffle plate, a quality drop in filter and properly gapped ngk plugs are IMO the most important to help mitigate the effects of LSPI in our motors. No matter how good your tune is and even if you have all these mods done, you will still have LSPI its just a fact of life for a DI turbo 4 pot. The important thing is to do everything you can to help prevent it.

Along with these mods and maintainence, making sure you properly warm up your car before pushing it is VITAL, make sure that oil temp hits the normal range on the center stack before getting into much boost, and even then wait another 10 minutes of driving or so before you go WOT full boost. Need that oil to be 200+ degrees to get the most protection.

I have been full bolt and pro tuned for 70k of my now 90k miles, ive tried to treat my car religiously as ive laid out above and she has been solid. This coming from a guy who has had ecoboom happen to him at 20k, back then me not knowing shit about these cars thought it would be smart to floor it in 6th on the freeway on a cobb canned tune, shortly there after there was a nice pretty crack in my block between cylinders 2 and 3.

On top of all that small stuff isn't one of the main reasons it happens is due to our undersized turbos and paper thin non Siamese bore blocks (supposedly designed that way for better cooling for 87 octane) limiting us to push over ~400whp for a DD? If so I think it's time to start talking about using the 2.5 Duratec block out of a n/a Fusion. Yes I know the ST 2.0 is an upgrade using the 2.3 crank but the 2.5 naturally aspirated blocks are everywhere cheaply and offer a significant displacement bump. I've seen this setup already being utilized on a Mk3 Focus (using it's 2.0 GDI head and 2.5 block with minimal modifications). Supposedly this may work with our 2.3 GDI heads as well. The 2.5 blocks even in stock form are more meaty and can take more abuse as almost like they are meant for boost. Maybe that should be the next logical research we should be doing to further push this platform versus our 2.3 blocks.

 

[dgc333]

Just because the FP tune is from ford and covered under warranty doesn't make it safer. You are correct when you say it is more conservative, but it is also a canned tune meaning ford has to make sure this tune is compatible and driveable across all cars in all markets, different climates and elevations. There is much more room for the car not to like something about the way youre driving it or any other mods you may have on a car.

Where a pro tune is custom tailored to how you drive, your mileage, mods, average elevation, and is backed up and refined by data logging allowing a pro tuner to much more safely see where things like timing, boost, fuel etc can either be advanced or retarded depending on how the car responds to the tune.

Not all cars will respond equally to the same tune, especially and canned one with out logging and revisions.

I would strongly disagree that the FP tune is not safer. FP, Roush and Montune have direct access to all the factory tuning data and know exactly how far they can safely push the tune. It is because they have access to this data that they are able offer a warranty. A Pro-tuner can only wish to have this level of data at their disposal.

Pro-tuners require the data logging because they are pushing the tune much closer to the edge.

 

[FreePenguin]

I have to think the above comment is fairly accurate, I read somewhere that ford performance mentioned having ability to change some things that aftermarket tuners simply cannot touch or know about.

like the golden key to the core programming of the tuneperations itself.

 

[Deleted member]

I have to think the above comment is fairly accurate, I read somewhere that ford performance mentioned having ability to change some things that aftermarket tuners simply cannot touch or know about.

like the golden key to the core programming of the tuneperations itself.

I can promise you that is not true, the computer has been cracked in our cars, nothing that protuners cant access.

 

[Deleted member]

I would strongly disagree that the FP tune is not safer. FP, Roush and Montune have direct access to all the factory tuning data and know exactly how far they can safely push the tune. It is because they have access to this data that they are able offer a warranty. A Pro-tuner can only wish to have this level of data at their disposal.

Pro-tuners require the data logging because they are pushing the tune much closer to the edge.

Data logging on your specific car will always be more accurate than the general factory tuning data, like i said above the FP tune has to be extremely general and be able to run across a wide variety of cars. Also not all custom tunes or tuners are always pushing "to the edge" i can promise you my pro tune is no where near the edge.

Also there is no "secret data" that ford has access too that protuners do not. These cars have been out since 2014, the computers have been cracked and pro tuners can access all the same data that ford can.

There is no way a canned tune without logging and revisions will ever be better for your car than a protune that has been logged and revised until it is optimal for your specifi car. You and joe shmoe across the country running the FP tune will never be 100% opitimal for your driving style, mods, climate without logging and revisions...

I know alot of people here think, oh it comes with a warranty it must be safer and that is just NOT the case....

And i would like to re iterate that i dont think the FP tune is dangerous by any means, but it will not have the potential to be optimal for your car without logs/revisions.

 

[dgc333]

We will have to agree to disagree.

IMHO, there is no way in hell that a Pro-tuner that has maybe a couple of hundred hours of dyno time can know as much about how the engine reacts to tune changes as the factory with its 10s of thousands of hours of instrumented test time.

 

[Deleted member]

We will have to agree to disagree.

IMHO, there is no way in hell that a Pro-tuner that has maybe a couple of hundred hours of dyno time can know as much about how the engine reacts to tune changes as the factory with its 10s of thousands of hours of instrumented test time.

Thats just the problem though, yes they have mountains of factory data, but its not YOUR car, with your own mods and driving habits. It doesn't take a degree in mechanical engineering to tune these cars, and im sure that the most reputable pro tuners have just as much knowledge on the platform as ford does, and if the Pro-tuner specializes in the platform ie(tune+, pd tuning, stratified) i think after 4 going on 5 years of custom tuning these vehicles they are gonne know how the engine reacts to tuning changes... otherwise i dont think theyd be in business very long.

When you get the FP tune there are no data logs or revisions done, so please tell me how thats safer for your car?

Again not all cars respond to the same tune in the same way. If you believe they do then you probably believe every single eco leaves the factory with 310 crank HP. Their are variations even in all stock vehicles.

Sponsored