Do Tunes work without changing factory fixes?

[6500rpm]

A little background, I've been a new car/fleet tech for 30 years, but away from the race game since the days of carbs and distributors so I haven't kept pace with the car world not related to repairing factory problems.

My question is, a ton of repairs I perform on new vehicles involves re-flashing to fix specific issues found by the manufacturer. If I were to get a tune package from Livernois, etc, does it over write the factory program or just change specific parts of it? As an example, next week Ford's going to be releasing a service action (not necessarily related to our SHO) dealing with a p2111/2112 throttle body dtc. Some models will get a throttle body and others a reflash from preliminary information. So say I had a car that required the reflash and it was performed, then I contacted one of the reputable tuners and installed their tune, would it negate the repair software from Ford, or just change specific operating characteristics?

 

[Livernois Motorsports]

We do not negate any of the base calibration modifications with our tuning. It is far more likely that whenever we build you a custom tune that you will be forward-dated to the latest factory base cal that will include fixes for things that you are not even aware are wrong. When we build a tune we do not delete ANY of the safety, update or non-performance related logic/data. We focus on enhancing the platform, not replace it.

 

[6500rpm]

Thanks for confirming that, it's a good deal. So to start off the education of an old dog, typically what sensors/information do you look at when tweeking the tune? The Ford IDS data log screens provide almost an endless amount of information.

 

[Livernois Motorsports]

There are between 18 and 22 THOUSAND tables in an EcoBoost's ECM. That is why you get years of data from IDS. A typical tuner will adjust a few hundred. We address thousands of these tables. This is what lends to us having the fastest, safest and most reliable/dependable tuning available. That is about the most distilled response that I can provide to your question. There is about 5000 words worth of explanation that I could dribble through, but NOBODY wants to read all of that for the 10 billionth time.

 

[2013blacksho]

So do you guys install the latest updates thank ford has at the time or do I need to have that done before buying a tune package. Also my sho has 97k on it and runs great but is there a milage that you hesitate to add power to a drive tran. The maintenance has been kept up on as well.

 

[limited02]

So do you guys install the latest updates thank ford has at the time or do I need to have that done before buying a tune package. Also my sho has 97k on it and runs great but is there a milage that you hesitate to add power to a drive tran. The maintenance has been kept up on as well.

I would imagine LMS takes Fords programming and makes the adjustments they feel is required to perform to their level of expectations. So when you load the tune, the factory tune gets stored away and the absolute best possible version gets uploaded that would already address the short comings Ford has. Their tunes touch all points and are damn near perfect. Tuned my '12 MKS last week and my only regret was not doing it sooner!

If your car has been maintained and is mechanically sound, order the LMS MyCal as soon as you're done reading this!!! The car is so much nicer to drive and the shifting/power is awesome.

 

[2013blacksho]

Nice! Thanks for the reply. One thing thought want about the general updates they talked about, should the computer be at the latest software version available from ford before a tune?
And yes I really want a tune asap. I drive my car 100 miles a day and would be fun to see what it can do

 

[Livernois Motorsports]

We have access to the same factory updates that your dealer does. This is why we do not just tune your car with logging and blah blah blah...how would a log know your software version? It doesn't. Who has the most accurate data on your specific car? Ford! That is why we extract the factory calibration with a loader, update the base cal for your strategy (if there is one), build YOUR tunes and then queue up your device for loading. If all we did was log and tune you would never have access to the base calibration modifications that Ford releases.

 

[2013blacksho]

Very nice I will be calling to order sooner than later!