Cobb's street tuner release notes
 

Cobb's forum

Hmmm, maybe I should have stuck with the accessport

Looks pretty cool...And Cobb says it should be out Feb 11th....Sooooooo.....We should see it sometime in early 2006! :lol:

Actually Feb 11th is when they announce when it will be out ....

That looks cool, but wow is it expensive. :shock: $1045 is twice what the equivalent product for my car is. If I ever buy a Subaru it's staying bone-stock.

Wasn't it due out Feb 11, 2004 also? :lol:

There might still be hope for me :D

I really want somthing that I can adjust off the dyno on my own for little things :lol:

For StreetTUNER users, a special StreetTUNER map file format has been created to allow any StreetTUNER user to share their map files with fellow StreetTUNER users.


Danger, danger.
Some guy sent me a map that makes my car really fa......b0000M!

Be careful with that possibility, not everyone who claims to be a tuner has experience :)

It'll be interesting to play with the Cobb stuff when it comes out, and see how it compares.

I would never trust any map other then a tuners map :wink:

I hope it does however tune as easy if not easier the the EcuTech being that is has a lot of stuff built into it just makes it more user friendly and offers more in its package then the EcuTech as far as a reflash or a reflash that you can tweak and data log with map switching abilities live tuning......


Wow it has a lot when you think about it................I just hope Nate will offer his skills when it comes to us n00bs tuning cars, I still like the idea of a pro doing the maps :D

Nate will tune anything you pull on the dyno. We ain't hatin', just haven't played with the StreetTuner yet so we're withholding judgement until we do..

thats good enough for me :mrgreen:

Street tuner + G-tech Pro RR + Wide band O2 sensor is probably the direction I am headed long term.

Keep a spare motor in your garage if you think a G-Tech will allow you to tune a car to equivalent performance as a car tuned on a dyno. :p

Also, keep a lot of money saved up for the tickets. I doubt you'll be able to do more than 2 or 3 3rd gear pulls on the street w/o attracting attention. :lol:

that sounds like a grand idea :D I need to get my side job done and I might get one of those G-tech Pro RR :D

G-tech vs. Dyno has little to do with blowing the motor IMHO. It is about knock sensors, air/fuel, and O2! Also, G-Tech@Altitude(current), Dyno@Altitude(Sac).

I'm not saying I won't have professional assistance or Dyno tuning, just that having the additional tools listed would allow for fine tuning based on conditions, etc. A couple pulls on a Dyno <> weeks of monitoring and tweeking... You don't think Subaru built the stock maps in 3 pulls, do you?

I don't :lol:

No, I bet Subaru used more like 10,000 pulls on a dyno to get the stock maps. Then they drove it for months. Then they put it back on the dyno to tweak it.

And unless G-Tech has a product newer than the RR, I don't think it can monitor and display a boost curve, timing corrections, EGT, A/F ratio, RPM, Speed, knock events, etc. It's not like it hooks to the ECU.

G-Techs (esp. the new RR) are good for handling tweaks, IMO. I'd use it in conjuntion w/ in car video to figure out what sections of the track I'm wasting traction on, and where I'm not being smooth enough. Not for engine tuning.

I think all this put together has what you are looking for Scott

:lol: I'll leave the tuning to the experts. As soon as I have my own dyno and as much experience as Nate, I'll start tuning my own maps.

Um, unless I misread the specs, the Street tuner has the ability to see the data you are refering to, if it is not already on the gauges I have. Wide band 02 is probably the key addition. Dynos do not offer the items you are listing, they just show torque, and HP, just like the G-Tech... It's all about gauges, and what's plugged into the OBD2 port.

key word would be to "tweak" the maps. I still want Nate or equal dyno tune to start with, but there could be little things that I might want to change (tweak) to see better results once up here

I wouldn't trust an accelerometer attached to the car by a suction cup to report hp and torque accurately enough to tune with. Also, an autometer boost gauge isn't going to give the accuracy, and more importantly the curve vs. rpm, to tune boost. A wideband O2 will be useful, but again, it's not going to show the data over rpm... it's just going to show you the A/F right now.

As far as the features of the Street Tuner... it looks like the best you can do is datalog to a CSV file on disk that can "be imported into popular spreadsheet programs for display or graphing". You might be able to get the data you need to tune, but at the very least, it's going to be pretty tedious.

Like Mike said, you might be able to do some minor tweaks, but I'd be extremely wary about actually attempting to tune a car with the tools you listed. The biggest reason is that your data aquisition tools are not integrated, which means they may not be calibrated to each other, and there is a higher chance of human error when overlaying all your data points. For example: what happens if the G-Tech thinks 5500 rpm is what the Street Tuner considers 5300 rpm? And how are you going to record A/F ratios in order to compare them to the curve you're importing into Excel?

You're either gonna blow up the car pushing it too far, or get a result that's not as good as the result an experienced tuner with the proper tools would get. If you were to significantly improve your tune, I'd call it luck.

I could be wrong, but Scott, I beleive you are attributing to much to Nate's Dyno. The Dyno, and the ECUTEK SW run on seperate machines/applications and are not linked.

The Dyno is only a tool to simulate real world conditions in a shop, and measure wheel torque, and HP. That is all. And as we know, comparing numbers even between identical dynos at different locations can be a crap shoot. The G-Tech provides the same data, and as long as it is not moved, should provide data, probably as consistant as a Dyno, and as air is actually flowing over the car, and through the openings, I would argue it would be more of a real world number because it is really happening, not being simulated.

Go read the Street tuner specs again. All the data you are talking about is available for real time display.

ECUTEK does not have a monopoly on reverse engineering the Subaru Select Monitor communication protocol...

Live Tracing even allows you to see the exact entry the ECU is currently reading... Wonder if ECUTEK can even do that?

You may choose to rely on others to tune your car, but I would like to be able to do that and in addition, learn more about the process, and in the end, be able to do it myself where possible/reasonable.

I think the dyno reads a/f ratio as well

How? SYBIR, NATE?

There is some O2 sensor that goes into the end of the exhaust.

And you are correct, sybir or nate puts it in there :P

:P I wonder if that is yet a third machine/application, or just an add-on sensor for the ECUTEK? Probably the later. I don't know why it would be an input to the dyno.

Somebody who knows what the heck is what on Nate's setup speak up...

Its an extra sensor for the Ecutek software.

That's what I do with my Tweecer, it's not bad once you get used to it. I just import the CSV file into Excel and make my own graphs of the data.

The dyno should do hp. torque, a/f, and boost at a minimum. And lays all 4 on the same graph vs. rpm.

The street tuner software shows you real-time data. Whoopty do. Are you gonna just remember all those data points in your head, after reading them as they flash across the screen while you're driving? It only logs to a text file on disc. You have to open that file in another application to graph it. And that graph won't include the data coming from the G-Tech.

The EcuTek software (assuming it's similar to DeltaDash) will show realtime data, as well as graph all the data coming off the ECU. But that still doesn't show hp and torque, which is where the dyno comes in. And I don't consider the G-Tech a replacement for a dyno... there's no way the accelerometers are going to be all that accurate down a bumpy road, while attached to the windshield by a suction cup.

I'm going with Dean in this argument. What you're describing is exactly what we work with on the mustangs, and it works just fine. Would it be nice if the software did absolutely everything for you? Sure, but it's not necessary. An Excel graph works just as well as a graph in the tuning program (or better).

Dyno tuning is great and all, but lots of pulls add up to be expensive and you can't be on a dyno 24/7 whenever you want to make some changes to your car. There's all KINDS of stuff you can tune by yourself on the street if you have this level of control over the ECU, from idle control, part throttle tip-in response, deceleration injector cuts, throttle breakpoints, etc. etc. etc. All of the little things can add up to a big difference in the way the car responds to you, and it's nice to be able to customize it so it feels ideal for you.

I understand you guys have to be more careful with what you do since your engines are boosted and on the verge of blowing up at anytime (:lol:), but trust me.. if you're comfortable with your level of knowledge on what you're doing it's very nice to have the control to change anything anytime.

hahahaha! Thanks for the reminder. :lol: :shock:

I'm not saying that tweeking the car is impossible... although I'm not totally convinced that it's a good idea w/o some previous tuning experience. I'm saying that tuning the car with the tools that Dean listed is tuning in the dark... you're not going to get the necessary into to see what's really going on.

For example, the wide-band O2 sensor has zero logging ability. You will have to somehow drive the car to the top of 3rd gear, and watch and remember the readings from the gauge. Then later, after you've got excel open to show the datalog, add in the A/F ratios to the chart. There's no way you're going to get that right...

Next, the data for hp and torque that he's going to be tuning against are coming from a notoriously innaccurate tool. G-Tech's are fun, and can sometimes tell you useful info in back to back runs, but they're not accurate enough to be used to actually tune hp and torque! If they were really that good, why would tuners spend $30,000 on a dyno when they could spend $300?

The current EcuTeck software (DeltaDash) already lets you bump base timing, idle speed, base boost, etc. The only reason to use something like the Street Tuner software is if you want to make specific adjustments to the maps at a specific RPM. I contend that without adequate data, making adjustments like that are a crap shoot: chances are you'll either make less power or risk the motor instead of improving on the dyno tuned map that's in the car to begin with.

Really, if you want to adjust for altitude, bump the base timing a degree, or add a pound of boost across the board (assuming you're not already pushing the efficiency of the turbo). Poking around in the maps isn't going to give you an advantage over the existing tools. Not to mention, there are a finite number of times you can reflash the ECU before the chips wear out... while the base offset feature of DeltaDash are stored in volitle memory that doesn't require buring the ECU.

I think until we have the Street Tuner software in hand, this discussion is probably moot.

We can choose to disagree on Dynos, and G-techs... I think we agree Accelerometers and the real road <> Dynos in a garage. Which is more realistic/accureate, to tune to is probably as good as the springs vs. sway bar holy war. There are a number of things a Dyno cannot emulate, but there are also a number of things an accelerometer cannot reproduce as reliably as a dyno.

I am not claiming to be an instant expert, but unless I am mistaken, Nate didn't have a Dyno and ECUTEK SW until when, April 04? Perhaps he had previous experience with the Subaru maps, but he learned somehow, and hopefully didn't blow something up in the process.

If you make small tweeks you will probably never get out of the range for the knock sensor, and timing retarding systems to save you, especially if you are watching real time guages, and evaluating real time and/or recorded data.

I'm not sure Nate or any other tuner has any more tools than the ones I described. They may have slightly more data that is more closely linked, but I'm not sure how much. EGT is not really instantaneous, so it probably isn't much help on a dyno. Wide band 02 might be nice to be linked, but recognizing a spike and corelating it to the narrow band data from the ECU may be enough. What I'm describing may not be perfect, but people have certianley been tuning NA, and FI cars with fewer tools for years.

And as I said, Dynos, and experince are a great starting place, and I plan to take full advantage of them, but want to be able to take the next step as well monitor what has been done.

P.S. Unless I am mistaken, the Street tuner, just like the normal AccessPort does not write to the ECU EEPROM unless you force it to, so it does not use up any of your "flashes".

With the AP, there are real time maps and base maps. Base maps consume your limited number of flashes, but the Real Time ones don't.

I don't know what the exact parameters are, but there is a short list of things that the base map can do that the real time maps cannot.

Street tuner is the same was I believe.

You guys crack me up sometimes.

Dean, the advantage of the dyno is repeatability. You put he exact same lod on the car every run, so you get exact quantified data of what the last set of changes you made did. With a dyno and a couple hours, you can do every sort of load testing there s- steady-state cruise, tuning thottle tip-in, WOT runs, everything you and Austin has mentioned, for far less than the cost of one speeding ticket (or reckless driving, even). I plan to run a Hydra from Element in the car once it has a turbo, and it's going to get road tuned to make it drivable, then it's going to Nate. Then, everytime I go someplace with a change in altitude (Thunder Hill, Reno-Fernley, Stead, Infineon, wherever I'm racing) I'll do as much datalogging as possible to see if it actually NEEDS adjustment. I'm betting the tweaks will be minor with my car, because it's a speed/density setup. Tweaking all it will need to scrape that last 5-10 hp up. It's not as if the car will suddenly run poorly at high altitude on a good valley-tuned map. There may or may not be a few extra horepower left is all. Point is, you're spending a lot more on your equipment and assuming a lot more risk by attempting to tune your car yourself than you'd spend by letting Nate apply his experience (and training, and factory information sources) on his dyno, for the sake of small gains. Then there's the consideration of the hardware- there's a guy in Sac whose AP can't even report a CEL code properly (reported as "06B7" and believed to be "P0607"- Performance Control Module failure. :lol:) and plenty of issues reported with adding and divorcing APs to cars.

G'morning Kevin! :lol:

What I'm saying is that your planned method is going to be inferior to the method already used on your car. Aren't cars today faster than before? Isn't a lot of that due to the higher level of technology used in new vehicles, especially the use of computerized tuning?

I'm just getting a real "dude, I made my '92 Eclipse have like 400 horsepower, y0!" feeling from your plan. :lol:

Yes, I slept until 2:45, woke up, leaned over, started my laptop and pointed my browser to SECCS Tech forum, just in case dean was posting something I can argue with. :P



You're just a hater because you don't get all 24 hours of your day to yourself. :P

Next you will be telling me a computerized alignment is better than a hand done one just because a computer is involved.

Dynos are not magic! Reproducable for a given environement, yes, but accurately reproduce real world conditions, NO! Put one in a wind tunnel on a motion control platform, and we can talk, otherwise, they are just a tool!

Next time I run over a Dyno on the straightaway at Thunderhill, or on my way to work, I will think otherwise.

A useful tool, but as with most tools, they have their limits. And I have heard a number of recent visitors to Nate's Dyno mention 3-4 pulls tops to tune a car. While I am sure this is good, it cannot compare to the data you can accumiulate in an hour, week, month or perhaps most important, LAP of real world driving.

Again, I am not saying Dyno time or the expertise of a trained tuner like Nate is not of value, in fact, I am saying it has great value, but I believe I can learn from him and augment his abilities with my own with the right tools and time.

You sound like the average Utec user. Good luck Dean.

By the way, I like it when Austin and I agree. He does this stuff for a living, just like Nate...

Except that Nate, with all of his professional experience, uses a dyno. And, I'd bet you that Austin's company either owns or has arrangements for access to a dynomometer as well. Further, while I don't mean to knock Austin's knowledge in any way, since he's far superior to me when it comes to automotive engineering, he's not familiar with Subaru engine tuning, as he's made clear more than once with comments about how we all do things so differently than what he knows about Ford V8s. It's just like when the DSM or turbo Honda guys hsow up on subaru boards and start spouting off about MBCs and AFCs. They know plenty about the cars they know best, but that doesn't make them subaru experts.

EcuTech says the ECU can take way more then 100 reflashes and that its just a rumor as far as the number of base flashes an ECU can take

EcuTech also says that thier ECU has been flashed more then 300 times with no failure :D I'm sure this would be the same for Cobb reflashes

Damn you Mike K for starting this mess and not staying with it!

I predict at least 4 pages out of this one...at least it's a good topic..

No, I sound like an informed technical person who will do the dilligence to ensure he doesn't hurt anything, and who understands the value of professionals, but also understands the limitations placed on those professionals by outside forces such as economics, and time.

I would appreciate both you and Scott not associating my comments with those of the bleeder valve boost controller and no gauges portion of the automoile enthusiast spectrum.

Just so you know dean, you don't tune with gauges, you tune with datalogging. Gauges are a failsafe for when you aren't tuning.

Please either go back to sleep, or read the whole damn thread. We spent much of page 1 discussing data logging, so please bite me!

Dean, I don't understand your fascination with wanting to avoid new technology. I said you sound like a Utec user, not a DSM tuner (I was implying Austin was, tongue-in-cheek). Utec user love to espouse the virtues of road tuning for one reason- they don't own dynos. You keep attempting to discredit a dyno for being a "tool" when that's all ANYTHING is, including one's experience. Neither Scott nor myself is saying that road tuning is useless or pointless. But to say that you can accomplish everything you can with a dyno by roadtuning is a mistaken assumption. Dynos are superior tuning tool to road testing, although road testing can be useful as well in its own ways. I'll give you a shining example of why that is. Let's say you've got your shiny new streetTuner, your G-Tech, and your laptop out on whatever desolate, flat, long, straight strecth of road you think is your personal test track. On your 19th pull, you think you've got yuur map pretty set, just one or two more tweaks. So you make those tweaks, and do the next pull. Only on htis one, you get a slightly stronger headwind, and your G-Tech says you lost 4 peak horsepower, even though your changes were the "right" ones. So you go back to the old way, or even worse, change something different, and poof, the G-Tech says you're back to +1 above the previous pull. Nice repeatability, considering the dyno will NOT lie to you about the effect of a given change IF it's properly set up.

Sorry, but this thread is about 50 times longer than my attention span :P

I am in no way attempting to discredit it, in fact I have repeatedly mentioned it's value.

I never said that...
This is where the holy war begins. My claim is that they are different, and each has value. Period! Please do not attempt to put other words in my mouth.

Unless a Dyno is in a wind tunnel that is emulating the wheel speed, it is providing a skewed view of how the car will work on the road. And as we both mentioned, the road has issues with reproducibility.

Everything the Dyno tells you is in some small respect, a lie. A repeatable lie which has quite a bit of value, but none the less a lie about how the car will perform in an on road environment.

Air flow causes drag, and down force and any number of other things that affect the car in a number of ways, these are not emulated by the dyno. The Dyno contact patch is not the same as the road contact patch, thus, any rolling resistance calculations are at best, a crap shoot, etc.

Dynos are not magic! Subarus are not Magic. Road tuning is not Magic. There is physics, knowledge, experience, learning, experimenting, success, and failure. No Magic, bullet, or otherwise.

I choose to value the knowledge and experience of others, build the same within myself by learning which involves acknowledging the above, experimenting, success, and failure. If done properly, my failures will be small, and outnumbered or overwhelmed by my successes.

You choose your own path.

Dean, I guess the argument I'm trying to make is not that tuning w/o the dyno isn't a viable tuning method, it's just that it's lower tech than the way your car was already tuned...

Think of it this way: you bring a length or steel to a professional to get its length measured. They used an expensive set of calipers to measure it accurately to the nano-meter. Then you bring it home and notice that it's 10 degrees hotter at your house. So you bust out your wooden ruler and decide to measure it yourself because you know the steel must have expanded due to temperature.

I'm not saying that the 1st measurment is totally exact after the temp change, and I'm not saying that the wooden ruler is necessarily going to give you an incorrect measurement. I'm just saying that it's going to be very hard to improve on the original measurement w/o the high-end tools.

People use the tools available to them. For years, people have been measuring their steel rods w/ wooden rulers, and it worked. But now that we've got the more accurate calipers, you're going to find it hard to improve on those results with the old tools.

Now, you could certainly take the caliper measured length, and do the math to figure out how much the length should change from a +10 deg temp difference, and estimate the new length, and I would bet that's a pretty accurate value. Similarily, you should be able to bump base timing or boost to help compensate for altitude, but I wouldn't try re-tuning the car, or re-measuring the steel rod.

Am I making sense? That analogy feels tortured.