I just heard of a dyno that is setup in a 180mph wind tunnel. That sounds appealing if the software to set the load is also very clever, but the expense is going to more than most of us will earn in a lifetime.

All a compromise at the end of the day, both methods have problems and when everyone acknowledges that there is no issue and room for differences of opinion.

I don't envy road mappers for the safety risks I have to admit, although Andy paints a good picture of his experience. My partner in medical practice runs the medical centre at a nearby circuit and the offer has been there for testing. Since I don't do any mapping of customer cars these days I've not taken him up on it. Even if paying, since you can have a 1 hour driving experience for about £80 or £100 including an instructor with just one other car on the circuit, I suspect if you chose your hours at a small circuit it could be feasible. Bob uses Bruntingthorpe with success I believe.

just don't mention the legality of it,,,,,,,,


just a thought ;)

A smart ECU that begins with 'S' perhaps? ;)

For other readers, Paul has mapped my car extensively on the road and on the dyno. I believe I've got the best of both worlds :)

I'm sure Andy is very careful, although Skydivers will also tell you they've been ok so far!

I certainly envy the space at Bruntingthorpe, I'd be in clover with that right next door.

I recommend Llandow if you get the chance, lovely little circuit, and not expensive, other than that we'd go off to Castle Combe.

Cam maps was an area where I would have liked a dyno on both the Evo and GTR. Both had only intake cam timing on the models I am interested in. What I did was to measure the airflow, boost pressure, intake cam advance, knock, ignition timing and RPM at high speed during WOT runs on the same stretch of tarmac in the same gear. Both setups ended up with maximum possible intake cam advance for spool up and midrange with gains in rate of change of RPM, gains in boost vs RPM, and gains is airflow/RPM vs boost. Then I tried various rates of decay to red line. The main hassle was other traffic.

I've not attempted variable cam timing mapping on a dyno. It might be quite a revelation especially with realtime mapping, but would it be valid if the boost and knock thresholds didn't behave like they did on the road? I would think it is best done at the boost level I'm going to use on the road and there is an obvious interaction between ignition and cam timing too. Would you retard the ignition a bit and drop the boost to do the cam timing mapping and then put it back on the road afterwards? Genuinely interested in your thoughts on this one Paul/Alan.

John, our dyno is open to you, please come on down and try it for yourself.

Paul, Your TA cars are to all intents and purposes full on race cars, stripped, caged, full safety features, race tyres, as per rules and regs etc...etc...

Before you got the rollers and perhaps even since you've had the rollers were any of your TA cars road legal in race trim, and did you ever map any of your TA cars on the road, or was it purely rented roller time and on circuit mapping??

Even on an autronic where you haven't got fine closed loop fuel control, and closed loop knock control, it's very easy. I find the best way is to get the car on load, hold it for a second or so with the new cam value ready, hit enter and watch the power. For lower load zones it's okay to just hold it indefinitely (say at 0.4 bar) but really you can play endlessly. The main thing is you can alter the spool point, so you don't necessarily tune the 1 bar region, as you may find that without a certain cam advance you just can't get to the 1 bar load zone. So then you're looking at changing the boost charactristics themselves which is where the biggest gains are. Once you can get the turbo spooling where it wasn't before, the gains of say 5 degrees on the cam can be subtle.

Both the blue zen car and the green one were both road legal and 'finished' on the road - if they are ever finished.

I thought so :)

The green car was never really finished on the road, instead some data logging was done on track to fine tune it, but mainly because we always ran out of time to map it on the dyno, and there was little point thrashing it on the dyno when we could be testing on track and sorting other areas of the car.

I had no issue at all with mapping our green car 100% on the dyno, as the rear radiator meant the heat loading on the engine bay was almost the same on the dyno as on track. But the knock and lambda control of the Solaris/Syvec ECU meant that we had the chance to optimise it on track with confidence. The thing with 600hp is that even a relatively long straight on track is quite quickly over with.

A good read :)

From my quick flick through this thread. A combination of road and dyno mapping is the way ahead. Just wether you map on the road first then fine tune on the rollers followed by another tarmac ripping run or do you set it up on the dyno followed by a tweak on the road? My bugeye running a GEMS ECU has only been mapped on the dyno and works well putting out 441bhp on scoobyclinics rollers earlier this year. Not sure if driveability would improve slightly by road mapping may ask Steve Simpson ,who maps mine, about it.

Oh well , thread resurrection.... It's been a while and a lot of things progressed ,improved since then... So at this stage how did OS improved compared to EcuTek? What people more likely to use these days at the certain stage of tune where no aftermarket ecu is required?

Would be really interesting to know, as at the end of this thread it all went out of topic...

:thumb:

The lack of support form open source is still an issue. I've got an ongoing issue thats had to be reffered to eucteck to be looked at, if it was open source i'd have been on my own.

Surely its down to who is actually mapping it,
you can have a Muppet working for a Company but a really good mapper on OS,
Its down to knowledge and experience imo not the name above the door.

What support will give you EcuTek?

EcuTek give only support mappers/dealers

EcuTek is overpriced and mainly lack of features,this is main issue,why people choose go with aftermarket ECU or Open Source

As you know its down to tools used and mapper used,its never will be down to the SW which he using


Jura

I'm sure I've asked this before but I can't remember the answer. At the moment I'm running ecutek map, IF I wanted to have an OS map would I loose my ecutek licence? Not that I'm too worried but come resale time (should I ever sell :D) some people prefer the ecutek route to the OS route.

What about twin maps etc on the jdm blob ecu, are all the features available through OS that are available through ecutek? I'm assuming so :wonder:

OS seems to be making more of an appearance these days and I'm guessing it boils down to cost tbth, has anyone had any major issues going the OS route that couldn't be rectified but would have been if it had been ecutek? You can see the support infrastructure with the ecutek which in one sense is a big piece of mind for some people.

Question for the mappers:- disregard the support network of the ecutek a min, is mapping a car the same through OS as it is ecutek? I.E can / could the ecutek mappers map with OS if they wanted? Obviously the OS can't map the ecutek down to the distribution rights I'm guessing? But again is that the only thing that stops you from mapping ecutek? Is it purely the support you receive from Ecutek that sways your reason to leave the OS route alone?

Not tryin to pick any wars :lol1: just a general question :thumb:

sorry just to clarify, supporting the mapper, not me direct.

you can be the most experianced mapper in the world, but there can be odd funny codes that are very infrequently kicked up, if every at all.

Lets say for example ECu kicks up a 722 code (random number plucked from the air) and its very rare, if you go open source who can the mapper go back to to ask? no one knows everything, if they claim they do there lying.

Jura,
I strongly disagree with a number of things you have said.

Stating something to be "overpriced" is subjective to say the least. ;)

"Lack of features"..... very subjective, especially when you're comparing Opensource and EcuTEK. If you look at RaceROM vs Opensource, RaceROM is a lot better and more of a stable platform. Sure, prior to RaceROM it was much of a muchness. :)

It certainly can be down to the software, as much as the mapper at times. ;)

I belive carberry has support, not sure about racerom,

Hi there

If you will go with OS you will no loose EcuTek licence.I've run before wagon mapped via OS and we are never have any problems,car has run spotless

All those features which are available on EcuTek(twin maps etc.) are available too on OS(CarBerry ROM).JDM ECU(STi or WRX) can have two maps without the problem

EcuTek mappers can map via OS,but not sure how will look on this EcuTek itself

And about the mapping over EcuTek via OS is possible


Jura

Hi Shaun

Lack of features,have look on older pre 06 models,which can't have RaceRom and on those cars/ECU you can't have Dual fuel maps etc(Yes via MegaROM you can have those functions,but MegaROM is only available only on JDM cars)

Agreed on some cars this can be down to the SW(on 06 cars onwards),where CarBerry is not available,but will ask you if Bob Rawle will start map via OS,would you consider have car mapped via OS(on few minutes forget on the you are supported by EcuTek ;) )

Second point many WRX owners with pre 06 can't have those functions via EcuTek

Overpricing point,its down to personal preference and mainly down to the budget



Jura

Hi Jura,
My comments were to address some form of balance. Ergo to state that there are areas where the EcuTEK route is better than OS. It's swings and roundabouts though as you suggest, depending on model of OEM ECU you have. :)

I haven't got a problem with OS mapping software par se. :)

Of course I'm not naïve to suggest that price is not a factor when it comes to this kind of thing, and for some that is THE most important factor.

From working with non-car related computer systems for a few years, I've learned that many opensource communities offer far better levels of support than branded licensed products do, the only issue with opensource software is that nobody is obliged to provide that support.

OS products are often the pride and joy of a number of hobbyists, so the enthusiasm to iron out bugs is driven far more aggressively than that of a faceless brand who are just meeting SLAs.

Some generalisations above, but my observations of software developers away from the remapping scene.

Just a thought , when EcuTek users/mappers state that EcuTek has more source for a back up if smtn goes wrong , how do they know that as the Ecutek mappers can't use OS by the agreement ???

:wonder:

eh?

ecutek is a mapping software, if the software is used for mapping the company that develops the software will get invovled.

opesource is just that, any tom dick or harry can download it and claim to be a mapper, also find some of the OS progs are in fact hacked/modified vesions of earlier ecutek software