Tuning at 5,200ft

[SpAz]

Hi guys,

I'm obviously beating a dead horse since I've posed this question elsewhere but I thought I'd get your input on it again.

I live in Colorado and there are very few SCT tuners, let alone tuners with experience equivalent to some of the companies that have built tunes for members here. And of the SCT Tuners here, none of them have experience in dealing with the SHO. I'd rather have someone that has already done some research to build a tune rather than be an experiment for someone.

I've spoken to Rick w/ Livernois (maybe he can chime in) about getting a tune for my SHO and I asked if altitude would be an issue. According to him it wouldnt be an issue but he recommended I put the car on the dyno to double check the a/f.

My question is: Is it possible to have someone back east at a lower elevation build a tune that would work here at 5,200+ft?

I'm thinking that the route I might take would be to have Livernois build a tune for me, then take my car to scrperformance.com here in Co and have them check timing, temps, a/f, etc.

I want to unleash some of this cars potential yet I also dont have 10k (guessing) sitting around to buy a new engine. (Plz refrain from posts stating 'have to pay to play'. I get that. I'm simply trying to inform myself as much as possible before pulling the trigger.)

So, what say you?

 

[SunDaze]

Shoot Torrie of Unleashed Tuning a email to see what his opinion is......... [email protected]

 

[EcoBrick Bob]

You live in high country, so obviously already know this, but my experience with my different turbo'd cars (Saabs & Volvos) when I went to Colorado, is that they are not affected by altitude like non-boosted vehicles.

Thus it seems the turbos will build to the boost pressure the blow off valve is set at (assuming they are capable of doing so), no matter what the altitude. Also, wouldn't the turbo'd car naturally run rich given the lower oxygen content of the air?

Or... am I way off base????

 

[yamahaSHO]

Turbo cars are effected by altitude, just not to the same dergree as NA and mechanically driven boost. The turbo will work harder to achieve the boost and will run out of steam quicker. When I lived in Colorado, I was always able to run a bit more timing to help with the loss of oxygen. You can play with timing and AFR to increase boost response/lag and more than likely add a bit more timing on top, taking into account any extra boost you add

 

[SpAz]

But is it safe to use a tune built at sea level at 5200ft?

 

[yamahaSHO]

It's generally better than the other way around if the tuner isn't on their game. You could stand to see better gains with a custom tune though.