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Can anyone tell me about Byrons Tunes
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Byron: [QB] Dyno tuning, blown up engines, mail order chips, and other things of interest.... Dyno tuning an engine does not guarantee it will not fail, nor does it bulletproof the EFI system in any way. Failures can, and will happen. Dyno tuning simply provides a means by which the air/fuel ratio and timing advance functions of the processor can be dialed in and/or verified. Usually, when dyno tuning, discoveries are made pertaining to the health of the fuel system or special timing advance needs of the engine in order to achieve peak power without detonation and without excessively lean mixtures. And, it gives you an environment by which you can verify these things to avoid future problems. Most supercharged engines benefit greatly by dyno tuning...both in power production and longevity. However, I constantly see cars come to the dyno that I frankly am worried about...and hesitant to tune. Here's a few examples: A typical supercharged 99GT with a box-stock Vortech kit will arrive. Every single one of these cars run lean above 5000RPM because they use a factory mass-air meter that pegs at 300rwhp. And, almost every one detonates badly in the mid-band on our fuel. They almost always are still running platinum plugs (a big no-no for supercharged cars). So, the car arrives with a few thousand detonation miles on it, and the pistons have seen extreme exhaust temperatures due to the lean mixtures as well. The car is making 330-350rwhp and the owner wants it tuned for power with pistons that look like the craters of the moon. So, now I have the job of taking a likely damaged engine, and tune it for more power? My choices are to deny the job and guarantee engine failure, or take the job and fix/tune the car. So, I do my best to educate the owner as to the likely condition of his engine, and if I get agreement/understanding, we proceed. If the engine fails, the owner knows why. Usually, once the mixture is fixed and the detonation stops, the engine lives a long happy life. But, sometimes the damage is already done and there is no saving it. In fact, about once every month or so I see one of these cars arrive for tuning that is chugging smoke out of the breather...too late. Another scenerio is when a customer is pushing the mechanical limits of the engine. I get a lot of 200K mile boneyard 5.0L engines with 15+PSI of boost making 470+rwhp after tuning. Or, supercharged stock mod motors making over 470rwhp. You simply can't do this for long and expect to get away with it. Again, I do my best to advise the owner, and if they wish to proceed I will help them. I can give probably a dozen such examples. The bottom line is that there is no way for a tuner to prevent what can happen to an engine before it it tuned, nor is there any way to prevent a failure when the mechanical design limits of the engine are approached. And, of course, there is always the "unknown" or "freak" failure. A T-Rex in-line pump can stop running and grenade a supercharged engine in the matter of a few seconds. (I've seen that). A throttle body screw can fall off and cause a valve seat to dislodge and fall into the engine (I've seen that). Injectors can stick shut. MAF's can fail. Any sensor wire can come loose. Let's face it, there is any number of things that can happen to a perfectly tuned, perfectly built engine to cause it to spontaneously disassemble. Unfortunately, as a tuner, I'm a target for blame whenever something like this happens...whether I deserve it or not. I'm not saying it's impossible to mis-tune an engine. It is possible. We had a situation a year ago where a wideband sensor was reading 1AFR too rich and I tuned 3 cars at 13:1 AFR. Luckily, there was no damage, but I promptly called the owners and informed them...and got the vehicles back. We also discovered why the sensor went bad. Someone was running leaded fuel. And, there's always the possiblity of making a keyboarding error or simply making a human mistake. I'm not beyond that, but I can honestly say that I've made damn few mistakes like this over the years...I am quite careful. Lastly, mail order chips... There is *no way* to predict what a mail order chip will do for a particular engine. All a tuner can do is *assume* some baseline fueling values for an engine and make a best guess for timing. That guess could be off an inch or a mile; every car is different. If I do a mail-order chip, it is merely an educated guess. And, because of this, I offer a 30-day no-questions money-back. If anyone isn't happy with one of my mail-order chips, simply return it for a full refund. And, over the years, I have refunded at least 5. Mail order chips are not nearly as good as dyno tuning. The reason is that every car has different needs. So guys, all I can say is that I'll take what you bring me and do the very best I can with it. I am not a "lean&mean" or "glory" tuner. I don't put the hardware at risk to hit a magic dyno number, and I don't do things that I wouldn't do to my own car. I've tuned over 500 cars to date, and if you add up ALL of the engine failures that occurred from those vehicles and compare that percentage to the number of engine failures that occurred on un-tuned vehicles, I think you'd find that the tuning process is quite beneficial. There's a reason the supercharger companies and local engine builders send us cars for dyno tuning. They have reduced the number of failures dramatically, while offering the customer an engine that hits power numbers they were not able to previously achieve. I did not lobby them, and I have never advertised. They discovered this on thier own. If anyone has any questions about my practices and wants to hear from me, feel free to email me. I respond within 24 hours. Thanks for the air time, I hope this helps. Byron Reynolds RACE Systems [/QB][/QUOTE]
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