What should be my first mod?

[FrsDuke]

Ecutek gives you more options and configurable stuff to play with. It's a very powerful tool. It is probably overkill for most applications, but an excellent option now that they allow retail customers to play with it. The OFT is a tablet that let's you flash off the shelf freely distributed tunes or custom tunes onto the car. It can also do some datalogging and read and clear trouble codes. It is a much simpler system but does not give the flexibility of full ecu manipulation.

By all means do a track day and some autoX on the stock tires. The car is very manageable at and slightly beyond the limit. Excellent accelerated learning tool those crap Prius tires.
Even with improved power the car will remain most rewarding as a momentum car like a spec miata essentially. Play with it a bit as it is. That will help you decide what you want to do.

[wheelhaus]

Originally Posted by Suko

My goal is to build a solid track car that can also be my daily driver, so I want lots of power but not so much that the car tries to kill me every time I put my foot on the gas

Lots of power and track car is a tricky combo. The track is where reliability, durability and sustainability are paramount and high power setups that work fantastic on the street don't often leave much room for the kind of heat that gets generated while running hard at 100% for extended periods. Higher power means higher speeds, so brakes will need attention as well.

For track days, definitely read up in the tracking/autocross/HPDE subforum. If you haven't before, HPDE days are a GREAT way to get into it. Tires and some minor brake work ashould be your first mod steps. Focus on grip, brake performance, and engine heat sustainability and overall reliability as your next steps; this includes oil coolers, catch cans/aos, etc. As you plan for more power, remember that any given kit tuned to produce as much power as it possibly can may not work so well after being brutally heatsoaked during a 30 minute session on a 97° day. Reliability and durability will be very important so your tune should also be focused in such a manner. Especially if you're driving the car to and from the track.

[Suko]

Originally Posted by FrsDuke

Ecutek gives you more options and configurable stuff to play with. It's a very powerful tool. It is probably overkill for most applications, but an excellent option now that they allow retail customers to play with it. The OFT is a tablet that let's you flash off the shelf freely distributed tunes or custom tunes onto the car. It can also do some datalogging and read and clear trouble codes. It is a much simpler system but does not give the flexibility of full ecu manipulation.

By all means do a track day and some autoX on the stock tires. The car is very manageable at and slightly beyond the limit. Excellent accelerated learning tool those crap Prius tires.
Even with improved power the car will remain most rewarding as a momentum car like a spec miata essentially. Play with it a bit as it is. That will help you decide what you want to do.

Do you have any experience with the OFT system?

[s2d4]

Originally Posted by FrsDuke

It is a much simpler system but does not give the flexibility of full ecu manipulation

Can you clarify what you mean by "does not" ?

[Boofneenee]

Stickers

[FrsDuke]

Originally Posted by s2d4

Can you clarify what you mean by "does not" ?

I run OFT and love it. I don't know how to better define "does not", but I can try to give examples if that will help.

I think you can load more than one flash at a time with ecutek and switch using the cruise control stalk to switch without taking the time to load another rom. I don't know how long this takes but I assume the car must be turned off just like the oft. Advantage would be not having anything hooked up to do it and time perhaps.
Ecutek also allows you to make custom tables which I think let's you actually play with logic and behaviors. I don't really know enough about how everything works to use the stuff and therefor can't tell you what good it does, but for more advanced users like @jamesm it certainly seems to have appeal.

OFT has everything I need at this point and they are adding functionality all the time.

[jamesm]

Most of the difference comes into play when you go FI. Some things are hard limitations and others are more for convenience and ease of tuning. In any case, you can tune an FI car with OpenFlash, it just isn't going to be as easy to get right and you'll have to stop when you run out of maf or hit the load limit.

one example of something other software packages 'can't do' is overboost fuel cut. this is very easily set up with racerom custom maps.

another example might be trying to eliminate tip-in knock on an innovate kit. with brzedit or oft, you'd just have to go pulling timing all over the place, where with racerom you can create a custom map timing compensation based on map delta to solve the problem. much better, really.

so you can use anything up to a point, but i've done it both ways and i can tell you the racerom is worth double what they're asking. once you get past that point, there really isn't an option anyway.

[FrsDuke]

What you need to do is decide how far you want to push the car. If you want reliable trackable daily driver for less than $5k in engine mods I'd suggest staying NA and going OFT. You'll be able to break 200 whp which will be great for what you say you'll use the car for. If you want more power than that be prepared to spend more and do a lot more research.

[LBC Por Siempre]

I am a tall feller, 6'5", and have tipped the scales during my high school football years at 285 pounds! Because of that folks can call me a big dumb dude. But the one thing I don't know is,"what is a(n) OFT"?

What does it do, does it allow you to change your Tune On-The-Fly using a Tablet and some software?

Thank you for your time.

[Ray_32]

Throw in a new exhaust (catback/axleback) for some sound - and drive away! The stock setup is honestly awesome for fun and quick drives

[jamesm]

Originally Posted by LBC Por Siempre

I am a tall feller, 6'5", and have tipped the scales during my high school football years at 285 pounds! Because of that folks can call me a big dumb dude. But the one thing I don't know is,"what is a(n) OFT"?

What does it do, does it allow you to change your Tune On-The-Fly using a Tablet and some software?

Thank you for your time.

OFT is a map flashing device. It allows you to pull and flash roms to the ecu (for the purpose of tuning). You can use it to pull your map, edit it with other software, and reflash it, or to simply load one of the maps that shiv (a well-respected tuner for many years on many platforms) has created for public consumption.

it's the equivalent of a tactrix cable or ecutek cable, only that it's a physical device with a screen you can output realtime data on and carry in your car to flash maps.

it's the 'apple approach' to tuning, compared to the others lol.

[FrsDuke]

Enjoy the rabbit hole
http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showp...05&postcount=1

[ramiram1984]

Your antenna

[Suko]

Originally Posted by FrsDuke

What you need to do is decide how far you want to push the car. If you want reliable trackable daily driver for less than $5k in engine mods I'd suggest staying NA and going OFT. You'll be able to break 200 whp which will be great for what you say you'll use the car for. If you want more power than that be prepared to spend more and do a lot more research.

What aftermarket do you have on your car, And how much power are you making with tunes and all?