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Quote:

Originally Posted by WesleyG (Post 1921067)

im really not a fan of the unicrap to be honest, most of the people i know end up having problems with it and eventually end up tossing it.

The unichip was for a time when car ecus where not clever and you couldnt flash them.

With software tuning its just a matter of a flash and you are good to go, no wiring needs to be cut or tapped into at all.

but thats my opinion.

Unichip is great.
That's my personal experience, not my opinion.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Eagle (Post 1921135)

Unichip is great.
That's my personal experience, not my opinion.

Depends on what you're trying to get out of it I guess. It seems a bit limited compared to flash tuning.

I'm not a huge fan but it may also have something to do with me blowing a previous car's ECU trying to remove the stupid unichip. :D

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Eagle (Post 1921135)

Unichip is great.
That's my personal experience, not my opinion.

Agree 110%... :thumbup:

a Product is also only as good as the person installing and tuning it...!

Much the same with flashing - put it in the wrong hands and it WILL be a mess...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Eagle (Post 1921135)

Unichip is great.
That's my personal experience, not my opinion.

Of course, and the people that fit it and tune it make a massive difference, but to date, this year alone, I have removed 3 unichips for people, simply because the unichip malfunctioned

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheGooseman (Post 1921140)

Agree 110%... :thumbup:

a Product is also only as good as the person installing and tuning it...!

Much the same with flashing - put it in the wrong hands and it WILL be a mess...

Absolutely.

But, put both in the right hands and flash tuning > unichip, it's probably just a case of more old school guys who know unichip and have been using it since noah's ark. People are often scared of things they don't know how to use.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Eagle (Post 1921135)

Unichip is great.
That's my personal experience, not my opinion.

Great in comparison to what?

Quote:

Originally Posted by WesleyG (Post 1921142)

Of course, and the people that fit it and tune it make a massive difference, but to date, this year alone, I have removed 3 unichips for people, simply because the unichip malfunctioned

Interesting. I've heard nothing bad about Unichip, and my experience is all positive, but who knows - YMMV :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by sav (Post 1921143)

Are you insinuating that I'm an old fart and that I resist change? :paddle:

OK, you're right...:D

What im trying to get across is, if the option of doing a software change is available, why not just do that? tuning is tuning, whether its the chip or the actual software in the car? no cutting and splicing of wires etc.

Chuckle... this debate is as old as the hills. I still contend it's down to the economics - why just sell a tune, when you can sell a tune and hardware (on which you make a margin). But technically, flash tune will always be superior to piggyback - I only need to point to a post in this thread to prove the point:

Quote:

Originally Posted by African (Post 1860897)

On exhaust. ECU goes crazy if cats are removed. TNT did the rear box with twin pipes for me and fitted a hi-flow cat.

It's trivial to deal with this problem using opensource (or other flashing solutions) - disable the P0420 (and other rear O2 related) DTC, and zero out the AF3 and rear O2 compensation. Click click, reflash, and you're done in 5 minutes without a hardware solution. I could run vuvuzela as an exhaust for all the ecu cared, and it wouldn't complain :D

Just a compliment to everyone - this discussion is always so vitriolic wherever I've seen it online - everybody's been very civil here. Maybe we're all old bullets...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Td-d (Post 1921177)

Maybe we're all old bullets...

nope i can be classified as what people call a 'lighty'

I agree. Why add/remove hardware if you can just flash the existing ECU?

Unichip has its place. On cars where the ecu flashes itself back to stock after a while. Like my Tuna where you have to use actual hardware. (The Unichip has since given up and i removed it...)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dammod (Post 1917133)

I dont mean to hijack your thread either, but I too was just pointing out that there is "life before FI" lol.

Not once did anyone claim those gains by simply "fiddling with the ECU" and nothing else:
(By the way, to "fiddle" with the ECU you need to "flash" it regardless. Just mentioning this because in you first paragraph you referring to "tweaking" then in the second you use the word "flash" as if it adds more power. Any "tweaks" you do needs to be "flashed to the ECU.)
Not sure what you are trying to "compare" either??

You mean +-170 kw....not 185. 170kw - 175kw is VERY believable considering I got 165 with less mods and base tune on a dyno that just a few weeks earlier had an 86 dyno day with 86's doing between 135 - 155 kw ranging from stock to stage 1. None of them with a tune though as far as I know.
http://i58.tinypic.com/rcrn2g.jpg

Your ECU stores your data on an EPROM or EEPROM. Tweaking any data is modifying it. Flashing the ECU is the term used to load this modification to your ECU. So I do undertand the difference and it was used in correct context :D

As for these gains, be so kind and supply a SABS calibration certificate on dyno in questions, less than 6 months old. That is engineering standard for measuring anything. You are measuring something ...... but you are not measuring actual kW output. For a start, you are adjusting reading for loss in transmission train ......The reason why the dyno ask for model and make of vehicle ...they have a base of what the output should be and they use that. The gain is relative to you original input.

As for volumetric efficiency ...... you cannot change that by anything but getting more air and fuel into the cylinder. FI is one option, gas flowing, better air filtration flow and xhaust with better scavenging and even cams ...can and will change volumetric efficiency at a specific rpm.

Volumetric efficiency is a physics term and is constrained by physic laws ...not some ECU code unless it affects air volume intake on each cycle with additional fuel ....... like turbo boost

Thump your chest all you want, get indignant ...bottom line no evidence of any claims apart from uncalibrated dyno graphs are given as fact :D Just engineering background ... I do believe you all ..... now just give me verifiable data.

Thanx for pointing out I should use dyno ....fat fingers and a slow mind:D

Ermmm.. it's 'dyno' not 'dyna' :thumbsup: