tuners anyone???

I was looking at programmers the other day...anyone ever use one? ( I was looking at the diablosport predator) my main question is, if you have, did you notice any power difference or change in 0-60,1/4 etc....or are they just a waste of money...

talk to buzz, i think he uses the predator, but he's also twinned and mostly pinned...

stay away from hand held programmers. biggest waste of money in my book. get a mail ordered tune. about the same money or less and way better. those hand held's are junk. IMO

if you are not going for any internal mods the hand helds work just fine. if you go for a hand held make sure to get a SLP predatior. it will get you the same amount of power and reliablity as a mail order tune if you do just minor bolt ons.

If you spend $300 on a hand held you can get hptuners std for $500 and pro for $600. A great investment. i have hp tuners pro and am glad i chose it.

the only way i would roll is log/email tune. Mail orders will ruff it in really close. it does not matter how great the tuner is, you will always have a better tune if you pull atleast 1 log.

[quote="shawnss"]stay away from hand held programmers. biggest waste of money in my book. get a mail ordered tune. about the same money or less and way better. those hand held's are junk. IMO[/quote]
hey shawn, do you order your chicken nuggets through the mail too??? haha

turbotudor wrote:

shawnss wrote:

stay away from hand held programmers. biggest waste of money in my book. get a mail ordered tune. about the same money or less and way better. those hand held's are junk. IMO

hey shawn, do you order your chicken nuggets through the mail too??? haha

sure as hell do. i have had both and would never get a hand held again. biggest waste of money. they are a basic download. what you get out on them isnt worth the money. IMO.

I thought that with the predator you can custom tune your programs and download extras...so what would be the difference between that and the hp tuners pro?

hp tuners pro is a full on tuning system. it re-writes the pcm and tcm. you can do all of the things a hand held will do and more. it is not hard at all to tune a car in for better milage and preformance.


you are correct with the hand helds, you can have a special tune made for your car. nice thing about the SLP predator is you dont have just canned tunes. you can adjust manythings such as torque management (if you have an auto) add fuel, up to 6 degrees of timeing and many others. also if you decide to do a small cam, most will support taht also. they also have 6 preset tunes to work off of.

A book I was reading says the diablosport tuner is good for arond 20 to 25 hp...that sound about right?? I don't want to spend money if its not gonna do much....

awwwww, this is why i run carbs, no debating on tuners haha
if i want more timing, i give it more. if i want more fuel, i give it more,
hell, and it's shittons cheaper too

yea about that, but honestly if your gonna mod your car shawn is right dont waste your money on a hand held.

thanks for all the input!

Yeah most of the time if you get a tune through the mail the tuner will give you free updates when you need to re-tune or at least at a discount.

turbotudor wrote:

awwwww, this is why i run carbs, no debating on tuners haha
if i want more timing, i give it more. if i want more fuel, i give it more,
hell, and it's shittons cheaper too

same here im building a 514 to put in my 71 mustang right now give me a couple years and well have to line up

well, I after a ton of research and reviews...I went with the diablosport predator...very nice...noticeable power increase...and you can custom tune your car...I also bought the pc link so when I get some more upgrades, I can get custom tunes from diablosport!

I had a Predator when I first got my car. It worked alright. I didn't keep it long though because I got a cam. It leaves a lot on the table if you have any mods or plan on any other mods.

rocket_z350 wrote:

well, I after a ton of research and reviews...I went with the diablosport predator...very nice...noticeable power increase...and you can custom tune your car...I also bought the pc link so when I get some more upgrades, I can get custom tunes from diablosport!

For $100 i can do all that predator will do and more . ask jason, and halo.

shawnss wrote:

stay away from hand held programmers. biggest waste of money in my book. get a mail ordered tune. about the same money or less and way better. those hand held's are junk. IMO

Most major Mustang (Horsepower by Herman, Amazon, etc) use handheld tuners when they dyno tune, and dyno tunes are a lot better than mail order tunes. I'm not saying mail order tunes are bad though, and that's really all you can get in Montana. A friend of mine in Billings named Ryan has the sonic blue 03 Cobra that's Whippled with 60 lb injectors, dual fuel pumps and all the other mods has a mail order tune from Amazon that works wonders. It kinda sucks that there aren't a whole lot of shops able to do dyno tuning, but I guess that comes with living in Montana.

OP, there will ALWAYS be a performance gain with a custom tune vs a stock tune, mods or not. Gas mileage, horsepower, power under the curve, throttle response, etc will always benefit from a custom tune.

Edit: Shawn, I think I misread your post. I think you might be talking about out of the box tunes, in which case I agree.

Novaflash2002 wrote:

rocket_z350 wrote:

well, I after a ton of research and reviews...I went with the diablosport predator...very nice...noticeable power increase...and you can custom tune your car...I also bought the pc link so when I get some more upgrades, I can get custom tunes from diablosport!

For $100 i can do all that predator will do and more . ask jason, and halo.

well, thing is, its also a scan tool so I can read trouble codes, and it will work fine for nitrous (timing control) and/or a turbo setup

i highly doubt it would run a turbo set up. the main reason is you can not change the main ve and pe tables with the hand held. the software that i use is http://www.hptuners.com/index.php . it can do just about everything from changing vin #s to delteing any dtc that the car had. also has a scan feature, where it can clear codes. i think it might butter toast lol.

But if you are happy with the hand held that is all that matters.

Congrats on the purchase Matt. I really hope it works out for you.

Novaflash2002 wrote:

i highly doubt it would run a turbo set up. the main reason is you can not change the main ve and pe tables with the hand held. the software that i use is http://www.hptuners.com/index.php . it can do just about everything from changing vin #s to delteing any dtc that the car had. also has a scan feature, where it can clear codes. i think it might butter toast lol.

But if you are happy with the hand held that is all that matters.

um...buzz uses the diablosport predator...with twin turbos...you can contact diablosport and they will write you a tune, which you can download from your pc...

yea a base tune to get you to a tuner. lol. we were trying to talk to you at the reno. we were the guys in the chanpange camaro.

Novaflash2002 wrote:

yea a base tune to get you to a tuner. lol. we were trying to talk to you at the reno. we were the guys in the chanpange camaro.

was never at the reno...you might be mistaking me for someone else...

hmm thought that was you pulling throught their parking lot looking at a purple vette........ saw a maec sticker atleast............maybe not.......

Novaflash2002 wrote:

hmm thought that was you pulling throught their parking lot looking at a purple vette........ saw a maec sticker atleast............maybe not.......

OH!!!! lol, I thought you meant along time ago...plus I was just dazing off, lol and that purple vette was my old one! Just had to confirm!

yea thought that was you.