I am looking for the same. It looks like to me that a laptop is mandatory for all. Can anyone correct me on this?
Even getting a cheap android tablet is a good solution if it avoids needing a laptop.

Can some who knows chime in please?

 

Seems like this would be a question to fire back at KTuner, and not at an enthusiast forum.

 

From what Hondata said, you only need to reload their tunes once in a while to take advantage of any ECU changes in between the time period. (Not necessarily the newer the better, but at least that is an option.)

I don't know how frequently they update the tunes to take in factory ECU changes, though. Also don't know how to identify the baseline version for their tunes (for example the latest factory one I know of is A89 for non-Advance SH-AWD models). Maybe I will follow up with Hondata to learn more....

 

understood.
My conversation with Ktuner was that the updates are 'built in to the software'.

ktune: We include any fix updates into our tunes once they’re available.
me: ok, great, then would I be able to obtain those new tunes?
ktune: They’re built into the software.

So I guess they did not really answer the question, or he meant we would get these updates when we connect to the Net with the laptop? I don't know enough about how they update.

I can only assume they work just like Hondata.

 

Folks:

Well, Stage 2 is installed! I wrote to KTuner a series of emails about installing the tunes on my V.2 handheld. I have this right brain thing with sequences. KTuner referred me back to the videos, which I did. I made it much more difficult than it is in actuality. So, I now have Stage 1 and Stage 2 on my Tuner. I flashed my ECU with Stage 1, and then immediately flashed Stage 2. Stage 2, I discovered, is a self-contained program which is also stand alone. Anyway, I made it much more difficult than it is...right brain dominant folks like me: get a kid who gets computers to install it. I burned up a lot of neurons on this Flash, but got it! I plan on putting the KTuner back in the cabinet and not get it out again until I sell the car and someone else wants it.

OH, reading upstream on my computer, I have no intention of returning it to stock, even if I have to go to the Acura dealer. This is a separate part of the ECU. I have left tunes on other cars I have taken to the dealer with no problems. I suppose if Acura was coming out with new engine mapping on turbo lag and other issues addressed by KTunes (highly unlikely) I suppose I could return it to factory stock. That won’t happen. For you who are paranoid about some dealer rejection of your car because it is tuned, don’t worry about it. It is not illegal to the warranty to mod, as long as your vehicle passes the Emissions tests, you’re fine. One potential concern is that our state (Arizona) looks at the ECU to see if it has been altered. I will find out in 5 years or so when that comes up. If it is a problem, I can flash it back to stock and retest it.

 

just wondering, why did you get the V2 and not the V1.2 if you are going to just put in on a shelf?

 

And how are things running since the update to Stage 2? Since you have been driving around with Stage 1 for a while, is Stage 2 a very noticeable difference?

Thanks

 

Excellent question! I messed up. After I got the v.2 I realized that it was not what I needed, so I have recommended others like me to purchase the v.1. So, I spent too much money to buy something I didn’t need, and haven’t thought about how proceed since this unit is married to my ECU already. I guess I could sell the v.2 and then use the money to buy a v.1, but that seems like a lot of unnecessary complications.

 

I haven’t driven a lot since this morning, but SOP dyno is that the accelerator is a lot more responsive, NO lag for the turbo. I will post more after I get some more seat time next in my day. This is an advantage of retirement!

 

thanks for reply, and your honesty....lol

 

Will be great to know what you think PD.

I wish I had found this before I bought my RDX. Here are the numbers from Motor Trends COTY (car of the year) testing last year on the 2019 RDX.

Accel, 0-60 mph 7.1 sec
Quarter-mile 15.5 sec @ 90.7 mph

Holy smokes that is slow. Theirs was SH-AWD like mine but couldn't tell if it was the Advance model or not. Didn't spend much time looking either. The weight they had listed was less than the Advance's. But the price listed likely would have been the advance. According to their testing the CRV is only about .4 seconds slower to 60 and the 1/4.

Either way stock, on a hot day, my car is running better times than these. The modded one I drove is almost a second quicker in the 1/4. Again on a hot day. In all honestly if I had seen that 7.1 stock I likely would have moved on to another ride. I was anticipating being in the low 6's to high 5's stock and if I ever got tired of it, consider a tune. Now it seems like I need a tune just to get where it should 'start' from. It is way to close to the CRV in performance given the price premium I paid. A tuned CRV would likely smoke a stock RDX.

 

It appears MT is contradicting themselves, in this article (Jan19) they list 6.4 sec for the 0-60 (2019 RDX a-spec, AWD)
https://www.motortrend.com/cars/acur...update-review/

If this is your reference in MT, this article is listed as Nov18. Can't imagine the RDX sped up in two months.
https://www.motortrend.com/cars/acur...year-finalist/

 

True but a tuned CRV wouldn't have looked as good as this...
but as far as performance, give it some time...i never had a car that i didn't want to modify to see what it can do. seeing how this shares the similar engine to the type R and accord, once performance manufactures move on from R&D to actually production, i think this car will be a really good multi-purpose vehicle. track and fun!

i can only imagine the gains upgrading intercooler, turbo, downpipe, exhaust, injectors, and fuel pump and tuned to E85

 

All us 2019 RDX owners know that it is how you get the RDX off the line matters a lot, probably more than other vehicles.

 

One additional follow up, I recall you had issues installing stage 1 the first time and wound up going to a garage to get it installed. Were you able to do the Stage 2 update yourself? I inquire as I am leaning towards getting the KTuner, and don't want the hassles of locating the a garage to handle the install.

Thanks!

 

PadreDave,
im curious how your gas mileage tracks over the next 1000 miles or so.

 

My pleasure. I had “issues” but with the online videos and other step by step I managed to load the Stage 1 & 2 tunes to my tuner unit, and then took it outside and it loaded like I was a pro! One thing I was surprised about is that each Stage is a stand alone program. Installing Stage 2 erased my install of Stage 1. So, knowing that there is no reason to install Stage 1 unless that is the tune you want. Stage 2 installed with no issues. Kinda freaky when you get warning lights for all of the safety systems...they go away after putting a few miles on the car.

The mileage thing has me perplexed in that my indicated MPG is slowly climbing, but it is only 18 mpg right now. What I want to do is fill the tank and reset everything and then get a better idea of what it looks like in the longer run. I resist (OK, confession time: I do enjoy mashing the go pedal) but am trying to get you all some more information.

 

Oh, I almost forgot. If you are going to tune it and swap it back to stock when you become afraid of taking it back to the dealer (not a valid fear) definitely PURCHASE v.1!!! Version 2 is for folks who want to adjust all kinds of stuff that is magic to me. In fact, I will sell my v2 unit and use the proceeds to buy a V.1 because it is so easy to use!

 

Just k-tuned my rdx with stage 2. what a difference!
nice and smooth power. That throttle delay is 90% gone. There are a couple situations where I can detect a delay, but I had to really try. Loving it so far..

 

I would like to know how it affects your gas mileage after a few hundred miles.

 

Fuel economy all comes down to how much you keep your foot out of the throttle. More HP = more fuel. But having said that I often get better mileage from a tuned motor than stock IF I can keep my foot out of it. A lot of the things done to make the car faster, but when implemented at part throttle, can help with fuel economy such as increasing the timing.

 

I filled up today with Costco 91 and on my drive home (all city streets with 40-45mph Speed Limit) and my derived mileage is up to 24. That was with great restraint, BUT.....just for fun I put it into Sport + and hit the D/S button again for the S gearing and the whole vehicle transforms. I still got the good mileage but have a bigger smile on my face driving responsibly. I need to look it up here, because I recall reading somewhere what the “S” on the D/S button does. I have owned mostly manual transmissions, but remember back in the 50’s and 60’s that there was the PRNDL with an S on my grandpa’s Oldsmobile.....anyone verify that or am I hallucinating again?

 

I wonder if someone with KTuner can post the category of settings that are changed from stock to stage 1/2. I have FlashPro for my other car, so out of curiosity I loaded up RDX tunes to see where the differences are.

I am very surprised to see no changes in ignition at all. The differences are in boost/knock limits/torque limit. Stage 2 further relaxes these settings.

 

Thank you Funz51 and PadreDave. Your updates has really got me more comfortable with the upgrade. This will be my Christmas present to myself! So December I will be making the leap.

 

I will report on the stage 2 burn soon, including MPG, butt-kick measurement, rpm hanging and general 'normal' driving experience (traffic and otherwise). So far, with only some tooling around and a few WOT's, I find it awesome. Not only the power increase, but the way it handles itself with normal launches from 0, 10, and 30 mph. Very well done so far.

...also, which was mentioned by someone before, the brakes appear to be harder, and the sport steering is a bit tighter. i assume it is because they used the latest factory ECU settings as a base. My original ECU was A88.
... and I used Parallels running Win10 on my Mac laptop to burn the V1.2/ECU.

 

In my right-brained way of thinking, I wonder if some of the ‘throttle lag” is due to the transmission finding the right gear for the job. Most manufacturers will de-tune FWD so as not to produce torque steer, and with 10 speeds to pick from the TCU might be trying to adapt to the changes we program into the ECU. Does that make sense, or should I stick to providing folks with innovative approaches to pastoral care?

It is so strange to have this many forward gears. Does an ECU flash tike KTuner also change transmission shift pointe, etc? Is our transmission adaptive to engine and right foot planting?

Just a raving of a Physician of the Soul as I await a total left knee replacement surgery. Once my clutch leg heals I can drive my Mazdaspeed 3 more. Down here nearer to the equator, our best driving season is Fall through Spring.

 

The Ktuner does nothing for the transmission programming. That apparently is handled somewhere else.

My biggest issue is from a stop. Of course having to drop from 10 -> 6th gear will take some time but it isn't terrible but the lag is still there. Unfortunately I often need more than a 10 to 6 drop. That is where it seems even slower. Overall I think they got the programming for the gears better than on the Passport/MDX platform. There seems to be some load on the motor when downshifting so normally it has some boost by the time it finds the right gear and then gets going pretty well once its found a gear.

 

Neither KTuner nor Hondata touch the transmission map.

I asked Hondata about how to tune throttle response on RDX, and the impression I got is today's engine management tuning is different from a decade ago. The ECU simply sends torque request to TCU, and TCU interacts with ECU to determine the final throttle opening and gear selection, maybe more settings. Lots of variables to figure out if you ask me.

BTW, apparently Hondata did not touch ignition so the tune is actually CARB-compliant.

 

Is KTuners plug & play? Looks like you plug it into the OBDII, upload their tune and that's it. Far better than Hondata's that requires a laptop. Am I correct in this assumption or am I mistaken?

 

Depends on which version. The V2 should support that but more expensive. With the Ktuner V1.2, you'll need to have a laptop but you have about $150-200. Both will load the tune through the OBD2 port. The V2 is much bigger and wouldn't be easy to leave attached for logging. The V1.2 is much smaller and you can use it to log as well.

 

Thanks. So, the V2 has a pre-loaded tune depending on whether you order the Stage 1 or 2 though? So you can just upload it for the power gains? I'm not so inclined to do a lot of data logging.

 

If you are running a tune, and Acura puts out an over-the-air update, do you lose the tune when you update? Maybe it's not an over-the-air update, but rather an ECU update that the dealer installs. Do you have to choose between the Tune or the factory update?

 

Great question.
I will inquire

 

Factory ECU update erases any tune. You will need to reload to restore the tune.

 

Thanks, that makes sense. What I don't understand is if you restore the tune, do you lose the updates that were in the Factory ECU. I'm "guessing" that the Hondata or KTuner Tunes contain the latest version of the ECU programming that was available when you bought your kit. Does that mean your Tune is "stuck" with that version of ECU update if you want to run it?

I'm sure this is more just me not having a clue as to how these tunes work, but I am interested in them and want to learn more as I plan to acquire a new RDX in the next day or two.

 

I have been speaking to Ktuner since I just bought and burned last week. I have this question into them right now.
When you burn, you burn their compilation of changes on the latest base at that time. I hear your question "what happens if Acura does something special to the base?". I am concerned with the same, as is why I have an email into them. They answer quickly.

It appears that you download the staged tunes once. I tried this today as I pulled up stage two while not connected to the internet. So the ? still stands. How do we get updated Stage 1 and 2 burns?

 

Just finished an email exchange with Ktuner and here is the answer to the question: " do you lose the tune when you update?"
The tunes are included in the Ktuner software itself. When you download and install the ktuner software into the laptop, you get the tunes based on the latest base code of Acura. Suppose Acura changes the factory base tune, and you want those changes. If you open the Ktuner software while hooked up to the internet, the software will tell you whether they have built new stage tunes based on that new Acura factory base tune. It is up to you to open the ktuner software once in a while to see if they have any new updated tunes. At that time it is suppose to prompt you with an update to the software at that time. Then you burn using that updated tune.
note; The software version does not come out specifically for the RDX (or model of vehicle), they put out a new software release the includes all the vehicles they tune for, so it may not be very prompt for any specific vehicle.

Now knowing this, geeks (like me) will be opening that ktuner software every week to see if there are any new updates and reporting back on this site....

 

Thanks. So, is that ability to update going to be free for life? It sort of sounds like the makings of a support contract that you would pay for annually. Luckily, KTuner isn't taking any lessons from Acura on that front.

 

lol right. how many more tweaks can one make to an ECU unless the software or hardware changes around it. Ask the Civic Si boys and girls and see how many updates they have seen the past years...

 

No restriction whatsoever on Hondata, I assume KTuner would be the same. Hondata maintain the release note in the link below. RDX ECU version is identified by *5YF*. So just check this link once in a while to see if a newer version is available. Just keep in mind newer is not always better for ECU firmware

https://www.hondata.com/help/flashpr...tsnewtopic.htm


BTW, apparently 2020 RDX switched to a different ECU, A2x instead of A[5/6/7/8]x on 2019.