Just broke in my MR with 5000km. any ideas on where to find a tuner in Toronto?

 

ONIJDM. Hwy 400 & Steeles

 

they have a 2 wheel dyno, how can they tune a EVO?

 

The guy with the X GSR and Evo1 tunes his cars there and told me to let the Evo guys know that, so obviously they must have access to a AWD dyno.

 

There are two schools of tuning. Dyno tuning and road tuning.

Road tuning is how I'd want my cars tuned form of the art because that is where the car is to excel... on the road/track.

Road tuning is challenging though as one needs to find safe places to do so and it's easy to get distracted with flying laptops, cables, etc. not to mention outside world hazards like oil spots, potholes, broken pavement, water, road undulations, expansion gaps, etc.

Dyno tuning is another tool that some tuners have in his/her bag of tricks to complement a good road tune, not replace it. IMO dyno tuning does not adequately account for wind resistance but then again, I don't think that is the point.

There are cars where road tuning is a dicey proposition. 2WD cars running sub 11 and AWD cars running sub 10 (ie. little traction under 100kph) are a serious handful in real life conditions so sometimes loading sessions need to be moved to a dyno where datalogging can occur under a safety controlled (ie. tie downs) and artificially enhanced traction environment (ie. smooth rollers with two contact patches per driven wheel).

 

I'd say dyno tuning is the way to go. To adequately measure quantitatively the difference a component would make, you need a measuring instrument, hence a dyno. Street tuning is really "seat of the pants" tuning...it "feels better"...but is it really? Changing wind conditions/direction could easily alter things especially if your vehicle is light (ie. a Civic). But under a controlled enviroment, ie. constant temp , you can really tell whether a component is making or losing power, versus another component, or ECU changes. Ideally you want to eliminate as much non-controllable factors as possible, ie. human, nature...

One only need to look at Formula 1 and the amount of wind tunnel testing performed versus track testing for their aerodynamics.

 

Yeah I agree with that. Too bad there arn't as many tuners over here in canada as there is in the states. Finding one with experience and a AWD dyno isn't a simple task as looking it up in the phone book.

Usually these things are done by word of mouth, on these forums or at events. I only have heard of 2 and 1 of which I have been to.

1. Four Stars Motorsports
2. Magnus Motorsports

I believe both of them have AWD dyno and can tune. I've been to four stars for the AEM / Mobil1 event during the winter. I have still yet to go to magnus to check them out.

 

Consider InnovativeTuning right over the border in the US too.

Mike the owner does amazing work

innovativetuning.com is there site

Good luck with whoever you choose

 

What do they use to tune? I know for the Evo X, Four Stars motorsports uses ECUtek. I'm not sure what Magnust Motorsports uses. Anyone know?

 

We use ECUflash on X's and Ralliarts, and evo 8's and 9's , anyone of you are welcome to drop by and check out our facility.

We also tune Motec, AEM, TEC, HONDATA, bigstuff, DFI, EFItechnology, and anything else in between, name it we've tuned it, name the car it was probably tuned here, many places rent our dyno for their own purposes. We also do flashes for Mercedes, BMW, Porsche, Ferrari, Lamborghini etc.