Stephen,

I’m glad you’re confident after talking with Tony. We don’t exaggerate our capabilities, and we’re only interested in making our products work correctly for our customers.

I’ve spoken with Mike from Altered Atmosphere and he’ll do the tune for $xxx of which I’ll pick up $xxx; not as a policy but rather to find out what’s going on. If you’d prefer, you can have us reprogram the computer for free and bring the A/F ratio down to 13-1 where it should be. However, since you’d probably go back to the dyno to have it checked, you might as well get the custom tune. One of our standard options is selling a kit for $100 under retail with a “zero map” to get custom tuned, which is essentially what I propose. Unfortunately, Altered Atmosphere is an independent shop and I can’t have them retune the car for free; but I did work to get the price for a custom tune down to $xxx. Another option is for us to send a re-programmed unit to Altered Atmosphere with an updated map in it, then you can have them dyno it. If it works, you’re in there and if it doesn’t you can still have them custom tune it.

Please don’t misunderstand what I tried to say in my last e-mail; I wasn’t saying “be happy, you’re getting more power up to 5500 - rpm” what I was trying to say is even with the lean condition, you’re still making more power because of the timing corrections. What I was getting at is that when the fuel map is richened up to where it should be, which is completely obtainable by the tuner, you’ll be making more power across the entire rpm band just like you should.

Why your car is so lean is really a bit of a mystery since we can’t see the car. I seriously doubt it’s a “west coast/east coast” issue and the different gas is irrelevant. The Unichip is clearly working in that resultant A/F ratio is very flat which is what we want; the question is why it’s 14.0 instead of closer to 13.0 where we want it. My guess is that your car is somehow physically different from the two cars we saw here; either your car is too lean or the cars here were too rich. Although I can’t be positive at this point, since the two cars here were very close to each other, my guess is that for some reason your car is a bit lean. It really doesn’t matter as far as your car is concerned since we can correct it which ever retune way you’d prefer to proceed, but it is an item of interest for other CL’s. Right now, we only have data for three cars, and yours is the one that’s different. I’ll be happy to see any other data which other people might have that can serve as a “tie breaker.” Data is good, and the more we have the better.

One possibility which the forum may be able to answer is having the car’s been reflashed by Acura… I know there’s a transmission issue, but have any reflashes affected the ECU’s timing and fuel tables? If so, that could explain the difference between your car and the ones we’ve seen here.

Which brings me to an important point; there’s a big difference between data supported “knowledge” and “feelings” about what may or may not be happening. If we discover the cars we worked on here were too rich for some reason and, therefore, other folks have lean tunes because of those maps, we’ll be happy to correct the maps and get them where we want them to be. However, there isn’t necessarily a big difference in the way a car “feels” if you’re making a 30-foot difference in a ¼-mile run… but the car is still running stronger none the less. Some guys “feel” changes more than other guys, but that doesn’t effect what the car’s really doing.

Your dyno sheet is another great example. We’ll get your car to where it’s making more power, and to where you’ll be able to feel the change, but right now the changes reflected on the dyno sheet aren’t anything you can feel. The 1% loss at high rpm and 1-2% gains at midrange aren’t detectable anywhere but on the dyno. Essentially, right now your car feels exactly the same with the Unichip or without it; that will change when the A/F ratio comes back down where it belongs, which is easy.

One of your comments makes my point. You said “Members are concerned about power at wide open throttle. They seem to see an increase at partial throttle, but the car seems to lose power when at WOT.” There are essentially no power changes happening at part load; the only power changes are at full throttle. Fuel can’t be changed in closed loop without big time problems and you don’t need the car to make more power at part throttle… you just push the pedal down when you want to go faster.

Don’t confuse full load/part load with rpm… anytime the car is at less than about full throttle, it’s in closed loop and it’s tuned for efficiency, mileage, and emissions. That’s true at all rpm; if you’re at redline and lift the throttle, the car is tuned for efficiency. Any time you’re at full throttle, regardless of rpm, the car is in open loop and is tuned for power. The entire dyno sheet you’re looking at after the run is done at full throttle/open loop but covers all rpm. Here’s where it gets tough to figure out what’s really going on when we talk with customers… the car doesn’t make any more power at 40% (for example) throttle regardless of what it feels like. It’s probably a bit smoother because of the extra data we’re adding, but it’s not making more power. The only valid “power feelings” occur with the pedal on the floor or very close to on the floor… regardless of rpm. When someone tells me the car makes more power at part throttle but not at full throttle, that simply isn’t the case

Guys have to understand what’s going on with your car doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with what’s happening with their cars, and that what the “feel” can be very deceptive. I’m happy to work with you to get your car where it should be, but guys need to realize they can’t get their money back because of a “feeling” or because somebody else’s car did something on a dyno somewhere. What I know of right now is a specific problem to one vehicle, which is not an epidemic. The product works, we just have to figure out why your particular car didn’t respond like the other car’s we’ve seen to the particular map we loaded into it. Your car needs more fuel, and we can get it the fuel either through the custom tune route or with a reprogram as you would prefer; your car’s fuel issue however, isn’t necessarily transferable to “feelings” other guys are getting.

Rather than jumping to conclusions which won’t get us anywhere, let’s get some data and we’ll correct any problems we find. Please let me know if I can answer any additonal questions and which of the three options you’d like to follow to get the A/F ratio corrected.


Cheers,

Jack



Jack Friedman, General Manager

Unichip of North America

www.unichip.us

Toll free 1.866.643.7400

Local 1.503.6407465

Fax 1.503.214.6444

Stephen,
The other thing I wanted to tell you with why I think what I do about your car
is
that not only did your car differ from the other two CL's we worked on, it is
also
different from what we we've seen from Honda/Acura vehicles in general.
Typically,
Honda/Acura vehicles tend to be about 10.0-1 A/F in stock trim and about 11.0-1
A/F with
the hardware modifications you have on it. Your car is about 1.0 higher than
that without
the Unichip which also is reflected with the Unichip on the car. It should be
13.0 while
yours is 14.0; as I said earlier, we can certainly correct that problem but
again I think
there's something different about your car.

Cheers,
Jack