dodge guy wrote:
Desert Captain wrote:
dodge guy wrote:
As usual the people that have never used a tuner know more than the people that have used it and can tell you the real before and after differences.
On the other hand the folks that plop down serious bucks for a chip or tuner think the chip tuner folks know more about their vehicle than the manufacturer... Just sayin.
:R
Even I can tell from driving my Excursion and now my MH that they don’t have the customers best interest at hand. They make a one size fits all tune, they go into everything from pickups, box trucks, dump trucks and bread trucks as well as delivery trucks. They are all loaded to different weights. Mostly empty. Where a MH is built and is mostly loaded all the time. So the performance in an empty box truck is far different than that of a loaded MH.
Oh, the I can tell from driving my Excursion and now my MH that they don’t have the customers best interest at hand argument...seriously??? :h
Since you obviously missed it I will reprint Gdetrailer's previous post. You might want to read it, you could learn a lot...
Then there is the ones who don't believe that the OEM has their "best interest" at heart and believe their "rights" to "roll smoke" have be trampled on..
OEMs like Ford, take a lot more than HP/TQ and mileage into account when they design, build and execute the design. That means a fine balancing act between HP/TQ/EMISSIONS and longevity.
Once you decide that you know all and more than the OEM knows and hack and rewrite the code you have now tossed all caution to the side and one or more items will end up being thrown into the waste can..
For what it is worth, Ford did a good job with the design of the V10, it can be capable of more HP/TQ, but consider a few things.
Once you move to the Super Duty platforms Ford does intentionally "derate" the engines and drive train. It is done for a purpose and not to be a fun buzz kill.
The idea to derate is to save and protect the engine and drive train under industrial continuous heavy duty use. In other words the duty cycle increases as you derate.
If I remember correctly Ford did an additional derate to F and E450 and heavier platforms and that is due to the commercial customer use aspects of those platforms in order to get the highest longevity with the least breakdowns. The engineers are not stupid..
Tuners remove the derating which in turn does indeed reduce the duty cycles, reducing it's over all life if you continually flog it..
If you tune it, it isn't like your gonna drive it like a little old lady who only drove it to church on Sundays.. No, your gonna stomp on it, a lot.
Ford did a lot of homework on the modular series and other than a few tarnishes like skimping on the sparkplug threads and a few yrs of a weak oil pump they are decent engines with very long service lives.. I had a 2003 5.4 for 16 yrs, when I sold it, there was just under 250,000 miles on the engine. That engine purred like a kitten all of it's life. Oil changes, one plug change and one set of COPs was all it needed while I owned it. Never used a drop of oil, never had cooling issues..
I just leave things bone stock and things tend to be very reliable for me.
Contrast that to my Dad who was constantly trying every little moonshiners tricks under the sun to make more power and get better mileage while towing.. Very often the hop up mods left him stranded somewhere along the road.. Higher compression (shaved heads, decked the block, different pistons), more aggressive cams, over advancing the stock timing settings.. Multiple times took the ends right off of sparkplugs, multiple under hood fires, burned up wiring harnesses and plug wires, boil overs and the worst was shattered holes right through 6 out of 8 pistons 10 hrs from home with a 5th wheel in tow..
Leave the tuners to the teeny boppers trying to prove they are better on main street and the midlife crisis guys trying to relive their lost youth again.
I could apologize for agreeing with him wholeheartedly but since he is right I'll pass. If the money you spent makes you happy, hooray. When your improvements overcome the basic laws of physics, even better. Run what you like and I'll do the same and as noted keeping things stock actually does work pretty well for me. YMMV.
:C
