WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

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Okay guys, now is the time we take our destiny into our own hands! I'm tired of that piggyback thing and I'm tired that no company other than RRM is interested in serious power mods for the RA.

RRM has their piggyback and that's fine... but we need more choice and I'm tired to wait. I strongly believe we need an ECU reflash program tuned for our cars. As in: you plug a laptop, reflash the ECU and now the engine gives us more HP and improved torque.

"What the hell is he talking about" you're asking? Well, as far as I know, all OBD-II equipped cars (that means most cars on the road today) can be accessed though the OBD-II port under the dash and retuned for maximum performance. This has been done commercially for many cars and is also done everyday all around the world on individual cars.

So I believe that all we need to do is convince any good company out there that the RA is an interesting car to do this for because we are gonna buy it afterwards (if they can demonstrate they did a decent job at it, of course).

Does anybody think this is a bad idea or is not gonna work?

Yes? Well then post your comments right here so we can discuss the whole thing and understand why we won't ever have the luxury of a reflash.

No? Well then start contributing because I think I've already exausted the sum of my technical knowledge on the subject.


The goal here is first to determine if it's feasible to have this car tuned and a reflash done. Then, we must show that we are gonna buy the program if someone is willing to invest and make it available.

So start posting guys, 'cause I swear to Pete I'm not gonna wait 2 more years for this car/engine to be replaced before I do something about it...


UPDATE

RA owners currently supporting the project:

1- WoRkZ
2- shiroboi
3- Hess
4- r3z0nate
5- Ralli04art
6- boozeup&riot
7- vonzipper
8- RPRalliart04
9- AlkalineTrio124
10- GoMikey
11- biglou360
12- D'Ralliart
13- amax
14- GearDownSon
15- waxwozax
16- Arithmetic

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WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

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BTW: I hope this thread is not gonna be locked or deleted because it could be considered some kind of threat to existing vendors on here. I sure hope one of them would jump onboard and make this happen anyway...

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WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

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First contribution: I just found an example of something similar offered on Subaru models.

http://www.crawfordperformance.com/p...g/ecutek.shtml

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WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

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And here's what one of the best company in the business is doing... I find it simply amazing!

http://www.goapr.com/Audi/products/directport.html

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chowetime

iTrader: (16)

Have you checked out one of this site sponsors - Dynoflash they advertise that they can do them for the EVO so I can't see why they would not be able to help you out.... my thoughts for the reflash is not much, but would probably suit the person that has limited mods or no mods at all.... keeping in mind that all engines even the same built engine will behave differently in just normal everyday running... why? because it is a cast made product, and is imperfect to begin with

I think for time vs money vs performance the best results will always come from a piggy back type ECU even a SAFCII will give you better results especially in a N/A car the results that you have been looking at are from boosted cars so any result that you see from them is always going to seem like a huge increase in h.p but in fact they would of gotten a better result if they used a piggy back because the tune would of been specifically designed for that particular car and not from a generic base model state of tune

but hey everyone can only get what they can afford and this is certainly one of the cheaper ways of getting bang for buck for a near non modified car

just my 2cents worth

shiroboi

iTrader: (20)

I am all for this, and my only question is, why haven't they done this yet. I'd Love to get some extra HP outta my car with no hardware add ons. I'm behind you 100%

WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

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Of course this would not be the for people who want to extract 100% performance from their engines... but hey, more HP is more HP. Give me some! And yeah, most turbo cars which are reflashed gain a ton of power... but I can't believe you wouldn't be able to extract 10 more HP from our engine. This is a great engine and in my opinion it was very conservatively tuned (for durability and fuel economy reasons probably).

And remember that we are talking about flashing the existing ECU without permanently affecting anything. So you could have it flashed with a basic performance map at first... but you could then have a more agressive map loaded later on, one that would be tuned taking into account the presence of a CAI or SRI for example. All in all, the biggest advantage reflashing the existing ECU is that it's completely reversible/swapable! Did I mention you need no hardware installed?

It's also completely invisible when you get your car to the dealer for routine maintenance like an oil change, tire rotation or even pre-winter inspection. As long as they don't plug the diagnostic computer in, they won't ever know it's been flashed. That also means that the OEM map can be saved and reflashed if something bad was to happen and you had to take the car in under waranty.

BTW, I'll check with him, but I'm quite sure our local Mitsubishi tuner would have no problem acquiring the necessary program and maps and reselling and reflashing them on our cars. So the company who would come up with those maps would only need to license the product to local guys who would come to them and ask. We owners would have to do the job of finding a local tuner and asking him to buy the maps, butif more than one guy is interested, I can't see why he would be interested...

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otter

iTrader: (14)

Both Dynoflash and TurboTrix do flashes for the Evo, however, it seems unlikely to me that TT would be interested in the Ralliart. Those interested should send a PM to Al of Dynoflash to see if they'd be interested or not. $199 for a reflash is a good deal, though they only do mail-in's, so you'd be without your car for 4-5 days, unless you paid for overnight both ways.

Vishnu also does Evo flashes, so you could also contact Shiv about doing one for the Ralliart.

The problem with all these guys is that they don't have a Ralliart shop car to mess around with, so it'd be difficult for them to make mulitple flashes for cars with different mods.

Search around the base Lancer forums, chances are that they've already tried to get people to do flashes for them. If they failed, then chances are we'll have a hard time getting someone to bite.

Hess

Count me in!

WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

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You mean they do not sell the maps and you have to take the ECU out of the car and send it to them?

Hmmmm... I'm not prepared to send my ECU to the US and risk it being lost or damaged during shipping. How would I fix this in a timely manner and how much would it cost me then? If I can't afford a custom tune, I sure can't afford risking the ECU. If someone is gonna do this for us, the ECU has to stay in the car... I'm sure most other owners will agree.

Maybe most of the EVO guys are willing to risk their ECU... but I think that most of us RA guys are not that rich and don't have a backup car waiting in the driveway either.

It has to be a solution like APR, where they have resellers in most major cities and you can just drive over there, get the thing reflashed and enjoy it on the way home.

Of course, APR's maps are more expensive, but it's also a much better/more complete product... So just a basic reflash should not be as expensive. The 200 to 300$ ballpark is quite reasonable IMO.

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r3z0nate

iTrader: (3)

I'd do it.

WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

I don't believe there should be more than 2 or 3 different maps done. One for a completely stock RA, one for your run-of-the-mill CAI/SRI modded RA and one for an all out intake and exhaust RA. Shops willing to do this would simply have to offer a free reflash to 3 different owners, each with these specific configurations and they'd be all set.

I don't care what the ES/OZ guys did, the RA community is a strong one and if we could get someone to make a nice crank shaft pulley for us, we can also find someone willing to put together some reflash maps as well.

Joe signed over 60 people up for his pulley and ended up running out of the stuff, let's do the same for the reflash damn it!!! Go, go, RA, go!!!


note: As you can see, I strongly believe in this project and it would take some darn strong arguments against it to have me abandon the idea. If we all stand up and believe in this and are willing to go through with this, there's no way a serious tuning shop is gonna turn down 50 or 60 times 250$!

Now there's the matter of doing the actual reflash once the maps are done and sold. I still have to do some research on how most of the tuners sell and distribute theirs... but I believe most local tuning shop already posses the necessary tools to reflash most OBD-II ECUs.

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Ralli04Art

iTrader: (6)

1- WoRkZ
2- shiroboi
3- Hess
4- r3z0nate
5- Ralli04art

boozeup&riot

iTrader: (12)

I am all for this project and have only been waiting patiently for someone to do it!!!!!! count me in.

WoRkZ

iTrader: (2)

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Thanks for the support guys.


I was also hoping that the more knowleageable of the members would also pitch in and discuss the idea with us... I don't want us to look like idiots when we try to present this to a potential tuning shop/reseller.

One of the questions I've been asking myself is this: If a company interested in doing this for us makes this software available to tuning shops for resale, how are they gonna protect it from being freely distributed? They would have to recup. their original investment and turn out a profit... and I know I don't trust every guy out there to be honest and not, uh... "share" the maps.

I know APR has their own encription on the software they sell, but for just one car, nobody is gonna want to engineer an encryption software. Then again, are all OBD-II systems similar? Can an encryption scheme be licensed buy the tuner/maker so that it's reflash maps can both be widely distributed and secure? Or is an authorized vendor's contract be enough of a deterrent so that techs and resellers don't make the maps widely available.

You may think this is a question to be researched by the prospective tuner who would sell the maps... but remember this is a micro-market product we're talking about. The more research we do for them, the more attractive it is for the company to become involved because of diminished development costs.

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