pcmforless vs. madz28

[IROCZBeast]

I want to send my pcm out for a tune. I was wondering if anyone has ever used either one of them and what they thought about either one. Price wise, performance wise etc...

Thanks.

[bad64chevelle]

Neither. PM Jon Prevost (Fasterthanyou) and you will not be disappointed.

[badzracing]

FOFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Best tuning and prices EVER! Bill's da man.

[badzracing]

My fault........I don't think Bill tunes lt-1's. Fasterthanyou is the man for that.

[IROCZBeast]

I think fasterthanyou only does OBDI.

[bad64chevelle]

hmmm...thats right youre obd II....i dunno PM either Foff or Fasterthanyou and one of them i think can get you squared away...

[Frosty]

I have Bryan's tune(pcmforless) and it worked WONDERS! He's also a wiz with the LT1's as well. He's HUGE within the Impala/Caprice world.

He nailed my car dead on(granted I only have minor boltons). It really woke the car up after the headers.

[IROCZBeast]

I've spoken to foff already, he was a big help.

But he only has LS1 software.

[Squirrel]

you cant go wrong with either, ion is cheaper....thats about the only diff.

[foff667]

I'd love to tune on LT1's but the fact is I can't offer pricing for less then madZ28's...$125 for a full mail tune is hard to beat. I can pound it into peoples head that it wont be near as good as a true tune but in the end its up to the owner to make that determination. I couldnt take a $400 hit for all new software unless I know I'll be able to make my money back :(

[foff667]

you cant go wrong with either, ion is cheaper....thats about the only diff.


if you meant jon is cheaper, jon doesnt have the software for any obd2 cars that i know of so he'd be in the same boat as myself.

[foff667]

FOFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Best tuning and prices EVER! Bill's da man.

sometimes its hard to beat the price of a mail tune...but if you've ever actually looked one over you'd shake your head :shrug:

[Squirrel]

if you meant jon is cheaper, jon doesnt have the software for any obd2 cars that i know of so he'd be in the same boat as myself.
ion = mad z, thats his name...ion and brian/alvin's mail tunes are spot on and you cant beat the price, unless you have heavy bolt ons or a power adder they will get you damn near to what you can get with a personal tune

[foff667]

ion = mad z, thats his name...ion and brian/alvin's mail tunes are spot on and you cant beat the price, unless you have heavy bolt ons or a power adder they will get you damn near to what you can get with a personal tune

Depends who you ask E, but I'll tell you what take a look at some of the "pro" files i have and tell me if you'd want one in your car. Most are complete hacks...for instance a guy on another board had me look at his mail tune from a well known ls1 vender, high & low octane wot cells were the same meaning little to no protection against knock, front o2 sensor codes deleted, fuel tables untouched and thats just the start. Im not gonna say they've never guessed very well, but thats all a mail tune is, a guess.

[Squirrel]

first time ive heard that bill...the cz28 guys swear by ion and the speed density boys live for the pcm4less guys...i dont think ive ever heard someone be disappointed by either one of their tuneus

[foff667]

i dont think ive ever heard someone be disappointed by either one of their tuneus

Disappointed & safe are two different things. & Keep in mind 99% of THOSE people have never had the opportunity to go through & view their tune either. Out of site out of mind, but ive seen so many shady things in both dyno tunes & mail tunes I wouldnt trust em. I personally don't do mail tunes because of the fact that its just a guess, an educated guess yes, but still & all a guess. I could easily make the harnesses needed & charge $30 for a tune since I could just make up some generic starter tunes that would get it close, but every car is different & reacts different. Just by adding 1-2* of timing in most cases will net enough hp on a dyno to make people happy & deleting TM or changing part & wot shift points will give you that seat of the pants feel, thats only a tiny part of tuning, but its where people get the most smiles from. Getting a large cam to idle & startup under all conditions, making sure the car is shifting where you want it to shift, dialing in your a/f to a safe but good #, eliminate or ease bucking from larger cams...this is all stuff that is VERY hard to do without seeing the car.

[JL8Jeff]

Bill, you should see how many 96-97 OBDII LT1's are looking for a tune and you might be able to work the cost of the license into the tune for a group of guys. I'll probably be looking for something after my car is back up and running with the headers and IROCZBeast has a 96 as well.

[foff667]

Bill, you should see how many 96-97 OBDII LT1's are looking for a tune and you might be able to work the cost of the license into the tune for a group of guys. I'll probably be looking for something after my car is back up and running with the headers and IROCZBeast has a 96 as well.


I tried that a couple of months back but people were asking me if I can do it for less then $175 or what have you...the fact is I cant compete with a mail tunes cost, but you'll always have better results when the person is there with the car. All I asked at the time was the commitment of (2) lt1 people & I would tune them for $200/ea which would cover the cost of the software/hardware needed to tune meaning I wouldnt make a dime on either of those cars but I would gladly put in 2 days of tuning for them since it is a Hobby & I love to tune cars. But it would take a commitment since I just cant plop down $400 or 500 for some software in hopes that 2 people will eventually want tunes(been there done that). The only good thing about obd2 lt1's is that its very similar to ls1's in how they operate so dialing in a good tune isnt difficult.

[foff667]

& to clarify for you Eric I personally have nothing against pcm for less...I've never seen one of their tunes, but i have seen a 1/2 dozen of pro tunes & know how most of them tune and its pretty typical across the board.

[slasherbarb]

Would pay $200 for a tune, just not right now...after my headers, gears, etc i will be looking for a tune...maybe come next spring...

[coldkilla]

Would pay $200 for a tune, just not right now...after my headers, gears, etc i will be looking for a tune...maybe come next spring...

goes for me too, ive got pcmforless tune now but id pay 200 for a live tune but i want to complete a few more things first. i have a 93 obd1 lt1 tho.

[slasherbarb]

goes for me too, ive got pcmforless tune now but id pay 200 for a live tune but i want to complete a few more things first. i have a 93 obd1 lt1 tho.jon prevost can do it for you right now...he's equipped for obd1 cars...

[foff667]

jon prevost can do it for you right now...he's equipped for obd1 cars...

:werd: if you can get ahold of him :lol: I havent seen him in over a month now :(

[NJSPEEDER]

pamperedz got alvin to do the tune in his LT1 car and it is an animal now.

[ar0ck]

This is one thing I always tell myself about mail order tunes. They do the basic tunes on Test Mule cars and make the tune generic to specific mods (ie 3" cat back... do this). Not every car is the same...

[Frosty]

pamperedz got alvin to do the tune in his LT1 car and it is an animal now.


I don't think Alvin is doing the LT1's anymore. I think that's all Bryan now but don't quote me. I know Bryan is the only one that does the LS1's.

I personally would never do a mail order tune. I'm lucky enough to live 15 minutes from the shop Bryan works out of a few days out of the month. Then again he lives near Reading,PA so it's not THAT far from me.

[Squirrel]

alvin does 99% of the tunes for the speed density cars, so he still works on lt1s last i checked

[Frosty]

Oh Ok. I heard he was only doing the TPI cars.

[Savage_Messiah]

I I just cant plop down $400 or 500 for some software in hopes that 2 people will eventually want tunes(been there done that).

sorry :cry:


And I agree with everything that's been said on benefits of a custom tune vs. mail order tune...but I guess that's a given since that's what I got :shrug: lol

[foff667]

sorry :cry:


And I agree with everything that's been said on benefits of a custom tune vs. mail order tune...but I guess that's a given since that's what I got :shrug: lol

I was more referring to the gtp licenses I bought & still really havent used other then on my car & 2 others :(

[Savage_Messiah]

ahhh i gotcha. Don't a couple people on here have GTPs?

[JL8Jeff]

I agree with ya Bill. If you were gonna do that, I would get a deposit from the people wanting the tune to at least try to cover the cost of the license. That way, if any of them back out you still have that covered.

[foff667]

I agree with ya Bill. If you were gonna do that, I would get a deposit from the people wanting the tune to at least try to cover the cost of the license. That way, if any of them back out you still have that covered.

well the thing is its not even JUST a new license...it would be a whole new tuning pkg(tunercat obd2) which doesnt come with a scanner. So I'd be using hptuners for scanning & tunercat for the editing which from the demo version I have it doesnt look very user friendly.

[JL8Jeff]

Does the tunercat look better or worse than LT1Edit? I thought it was another license for Hptuners. I figure I won't need any tuning until Spring since that's probably when I'll finally get the header install done!:rolleyes:

[foff667]

hptuners doesnt offer tuning for lt1's & tunercats license sceme is far cheaper once you actually buy the pkg...thing is I have about all the licenses I need IE all ls1 fbodies, all GTP's & a 97 v6 fbody license. I've never used lt1edit but I will say it(tunercat) doesnt look like a very sophisticated system. I just know read/write times are just as fast as hptuners & licensing is cheaper. It has 99% of the parameters I'd need to tune what I'd need to tune & at least they offer tuning for obd2 lt1 cars & not vin locked like edit. Again downside is the initial investment for something that i may not use very often in the future. Remember even the last lt1 that rolled off the showroom floor is now nearly 10 years old. And the only other licenses I might want with tunercats is the 04 gto & maybe vettes, but vette guys scare me.

[JL8Jeff]

but vette guys scare me.

:rofl:

They have more money than brains, why would they scare you!

[foff667]

:rofl:

They have more money than brains, why would they scare you!

exactly that reason

[IROCZBeast]

I may send out just for a basic tune to delete codes then eventually maybe take a ride to philly to have him tune my car in person.

thanks for all the input guys.

[Frosty]

Like I said I highly recommend them. :)

[NJSPEEDER]

when the time come sto get a custom tune, DO NOT JUST TUNE ON A DYNO!!!!
dyno's are great for getting the idea of what you need at WOT. but your car spends very little of it's driving time with your foot on teh floor unless it is a dedicated race car.
foff667 and most other really good tuners can use dyno data, but will want street driving data so that the whole table can be filled in properly.

[Koll]

I need to get a hold of prevost after the winter as I will have some upgrades

[Pampered-Z]

Mail order tuning is only going to be close, you will most likely still need to get fine tuning done. No tuner is going to be 100% dead on without having the car. If yuor car runs now, check if the tuner wants a scan log to help tune the car.

What do you need tuning for? Bolt-ons or major programming? I know allot of people that are very happy with MadZ, PCM4less and foff67. The thing with mail order is how similar your mods are to others. All of the tuners will probably have files for something like a hotcam, but if you have an odd set-up or want something specail then you will need more then mail order, or at least understand it may take a few times to get things right.

SO IT'S VERY important that the tuner you work with is willing to keep trying if there is any issues and is willing to try multiple times.

When I had just heads+Cam I* used Ed Wright ( Fastchip ) for tuning and it was OK, and was done mail order in that I had to keep sending the chip back and pay the shipping, so there was extra cost to me.

For my stroker supercharger tune I needed allot more special tuning One tuner couldn't figure it out, but PCMforless said it was no problem! I'm running the PCMforless tune done by Alvin ( 93LT1 have chips/ Speed Density, 94+ don't so Brian would tune then). . But I consider it more then just a mailorder. Alvin sent me the chip with a basic tune, I then drove / scanned the car, sent him the scan files and told how how the car felt, and he sent me back new files to update the chip. ( I purchased the software and hardware to burn chips). Took Alvin two tries to get everything dead on. Car runs perfect and scans show the fuel/timing are dead on, but I still want more WOT tuning, and will send Alvin a file when I get the car on the dyno. I also want to have Alvin do dyno tuning real time, next time he's in PA to make sure the tune is 100% before I remove the FMU.

John

[foff667]

Mail order tuning is only going to be close, you will most likely still need to get fine tuning done. No tuner is going to be 100% dead on without having the car. If yuor car runs now, check if the tuner wants a scan log to help tune the car.

What do you need tuning for? Bolt-ons or major programming? I know allot of people that are very happy with MadZ, PCM4less and foff67. The thing with mail order is how similar your mods are to others. All of the tuners will probably have files for something like a hotcam, but if you have an odd set-up or want something specail then you will need more then mail order, or at least understand it may take a few times to get things right.

SO IT'S VERY important that the tuner you work with is willing to keep trying if there is any issues and is willing to try multiple times.

When I had just heads+Cam I* used Ed Wright ( Fastchip ) for tuning and it was OK, and was done mail order in that I had to keep sending the chip back and pay the shipping, so there was extra cost to me.

For my stroker supercharger tune I needed allot more special tuning One tuner couldn't figure it out, but PCMforless said it was no problem! I'm running the PCMforless tune done by Alvin ( 93LT1 have chips/ Speed Density, 94+ don't so Brian would tune then). . But I consider it more then just a mailorder. Alvin sent me the chip with a basic tune, I then drove / scanned the car, sent him the scan files and told how how the car felt, and he sent me back new files to update the chip. ( I purchased the software and hardware to burn chips). Took Alvin two tries to get everything dead on. Car runs perfect and scans show the fuel/timing are dead on, but I still want more WOT tuning, and will send Alvin a file when I get the car on the dyno. I also want to have Alvin do dyno tuning real time, next time he's in PA to make sure the tune is 100% before I remove the FMU.

John

I wonder what exactly the problem was with the tuning that prevost couldnt get your car running right? Did you change anything other then the tune in the meantime? But yeah Iroc Z & I had talked mainly about just minor stuff which can be done mail order very cheap. But also you have to keep in mind any downtime & shipping charges to and from your tuner. But for mail tunes its really pretty simple even with cammed cars...theres just some generic setting you can throw in and get the car running pretty well for the most part. But its much better if you have the car in front of you to make slight tweaks to the idle set screw & get data logging from a cold start so your startup idle is good year round. Thats why I got into the whole tuning thing is because I had a dynotune done up at cartek & it turned out to be a waste of nearly $600...driveability was horrible, they cut my front o2 sensor wires without telling me(to keep it in open loop) & just made excuse after excuse as it why it was running like crap. Within about 45 mins I had the car more driveable by myself then cartek had in 4 visits up there. Anywayz that reminds me have you talked to sean lately? He swung by a couple of months ago to have me adjust for the 9in he installed but havent heard from him. I know he's probably gone quicker since he had that done.

[Pampered-Z]

I wonder what exactly the problem was with the tuning that prevost couldnt get your car running right? Did you change anything other then the tune in the meantime? But yeah Iroc Z & I had talked mainly about just minor stuff which can be done mail order very cheap. But also you have to keep in mind any downtime & shipping charges to and from your tuner. But for mail tunes its really pretty simple even with cammed cars...theres just some generic setting you can throw in and get the car running pretty well for the most part. But its much better if you have the car in front of you to make slight tweaks to the idle set screw & get data logging from a cold start so your startup idle is good year round. Thats why I got into the whole tuning thing is because I had a dynotune done up at cartek & it turned out to be a waste of nearly $600...driveability was horrible, they cut my front o2 sensor wires without telling me(to keep it in open loop) & just made excuse after excuse as it why it was running like crap. Within about 45 mins I had the car more driveable by myself then cartek had in 4 visits up there. Anywayz that reminds me have you talked to sean lately? He swung by a couple of months ago to have me adjust for the 9in he installed but havent heard from him. I know he's probably gone quicker since he had that done.

Well the first time in May when Jon tried it turned it my new MAP sensor was bad, but then in August the problems Jon was having was A) The calculations of airflow because I run a 2-Bar map sensor and the pulse settings for the 42lb injectors. B) Transission when the throttle opens, couldn't get the dead spot out of it. C) Coasting. Car had serious back-firing when coasting. Even when I switched back to 24 lb injectors and 1-bar map the car backfired. Didn't do it with the fastchip, so there was something in the timing settings when coasting ( Which is why Jon took those chips to try to figiure how to program for coasting).

Haven't been able to get Jon to return any E-mails, PMs or Phone calls since August. I don't know if he even looked at the chips he took from me, or ever plans to? I Assume he does intend to return my stuff either?

PCMforless has a 1993 with a 355/blower, 2 bar map, big injectors, so he had something close already. His first tune was close, nice idle, slight flat spot off idle and was a bit flsat above 5,000RPMs, his second seemed to drive fine, but when Alvin review the scan log he sugggested a few changes. ( I think he pulled some timing out and added more fuel up top ).

[foff667]

glad to at least hear you got most of your stuff sorted out...I havent seen or talked to jon in over a month. Unfortunatly I feel for both sides in that I know Jon made at least a couple of trips out your way to try and get the stuff settled. I have no clue what he charged you or exactly how much the stuff is worth that he still has of yours. But i've been in positions similar in that I was about 10 hrs into a tune for one guy & only making $150 on the deal...considering 5 hours was driving to & from the track and him being nearly 2 hours late $15/hr hardly seems worth it in the end considering each license for obd2 stuff can run anywhere from $90-$400 lol. Again it comes back to mail tuning though since alot of people dont mind a tune thats close enough, but myself as well as most self tuners are perfectionists when it comes to tuning so will try and put as much time/effort into getting it spot on. Hopefully jon will at least return your stuff to you at some point, thats the least he could do :(