In adequate, Unsafe, and destructive ECU tuning
Cheater tuners, horrifying tuning practices, and destructive tunes all cost you big money and can produce lower power than a good tune!
Think that any “tune” will do because of the low cost, or worse, you select a tuner just because they always seem to make so much more power than others. Not all tuners are created equal nor do they use proper tuning techniques to give you the most power and still remain safe. Some tuners even cheat and use dangerous techniques costing you much more money than you could have ever saved from the cheap tuning. These types of tunes are reckless and irresponsible not only do they make less power but they can also lead to catastrophic engine failure. This happens more often than you would think and chances are that you have an unsafe tune.
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Some not so experienced low cost tuners will only make a few changes to the maps usually only adjusting the load and boost limit. However make no changes to the fuel tables, timing, torque limit, boost limit, or load. They are not only leaving a huge amount of midrange power/torque on the table, the maps are not adjusted properly so the engine can go lean or rich at critical points. Resulting in improper fueling, timing, and load tables/limits leaving you vulnerable to knock, detonation, pre-ignition. Especially if the car has multiple upgrades that supply extra fuel, air, like a big turbocharger or intake system. All of this will result in lower power output, high EGTs, pre-ignition or knock and puts a lot of stress on the engine causing premature wear, and over time lead to catastrophic engine failure.
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Even worse are the cheater tuners, that play the "I have the best tune because I make the most power gains". They do make a lot of power but it is short term, risky, and at your expense. This is because the timing advancement is in areas that we know are dangerous. Some even incorrectly advance the timing straight across all maps, increasing the chance of pre-ignition, detonation, and stressing the engine. This reckless shortcut strategy only leaves you holding the bag as every acceleration shortens the life of your engine and sometimes ending it instantaneously.
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As if incorrectly advancing the timing was not enough, the only way that this risky timing advancement can be maintained is to also turn off the knock sensor entirely. Otherwise, the ECU will detect the devastating unsafe condition and retard the timing to prevent engine damage that was caused by their unsafe advancement. Unfortunately for you the knock sensor is one of the most important sensors’ used by the ECU. The ECU uses this sensor to monitor the engine’s performance, fine tuning the maps as you drive and is critical for preventing damage. This sensor should never be disabled on ANY car for ANY reason, even cars without turbos.
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In addition to that disabling the nock sensor also turns off the one critical last ditch effort the ECU has to save your engine from extreme catastrophic events, the emergency fuel cut off. This last resort/fail safe device is designed to save your engine in super extreme conditions from destruction. However with these horrifying insane tuning practices it will be disabled and on the one occasion that it is needed, it will not be there to protect your engine and your engine can fail catastrophically. This type of destructive tuning leaves your ECU controlling your engine in blind mode, while running in an extremely unsafe condition, and no way to protect or prevent engine damage.
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With this kind of tuning ECU will have no way to monitor knock, the ECU won't re-write the map to a safe condition, and it won't cut the fuel when the ECU detects an engine killing condition. This blatant disregard to engine safety is just reckless and ruthless and causes more engine failures than any other performance enhancing upgrade out there. Unsafe tuning has done more to confuse the capabilities of these engines and damage reputations because the blame is always placed on other things like badly designed upgrades, large turbos, weak pistons, and high mileage.
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These safety devices are designed to protect you and your engine and are the most important emergency factors that your ECU uses to save your engine when things go horribly wrong. And believe me with unsafe tuning practices, problems happen quickly and they can cause major engine issues like cracked pistons, head gasket failure, bent/broken rods, bent cranks and pistons exiting the block. Unfortunately there are a lot of insane tuners out there, they cause a lot of engine failures, and you alone are left holding the bag.
These safety devices are designed to protect you and your engine and are the most important emergency factors that your ECU uses to save your engine when things go horribly wrong. And believe me with unsafe tuning practices, problems happen quickly and they can cause major engine issues like cracked pistons, head gasket failure, bent/broken rods, bent cranks and pistons exiting the block. Unfortunately there are a lot of insane tuners out there, they cause a lot of engine failures, and you alone are left holding the bag.
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Making power is all about getting more fuel and air into the engine however when you cheat and use timing to make a name for yourself you show a blatant disregard to your customers and concern for their cars. Knock is knock and pistons are not designed to hold up to the stress of it, not even forged pistons. Forged pistons are only designed to hold up to the stresses of increased pressure created by extra boost and high compression forces of a high-performance engine. However the force of Knock will destroy a forged piston just as quick and easy as a cast piston and your only defense is a mechanically sound engine (as a system) and quality tuning.
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JMTC's tuners have been dyno tuning cars for over 20 plus years, starting on the OBD ECUs back in the 90s. Also since JMTC focus/specialize on the Mini Coopers (and cars with the same engine) and has a lot of experience on these cars, turbochargers, engines, and ECUs. JMTC knows how to make power, but more importantly we know how to deliver it in a safe manner. JMTC understands how to make safe power without taking shortcuts or risks with our customers cars. JMTC wants your car to run strong, last long and deliver the driving experience you want and doing it as safely as possible.
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