Ok, so I read through the sticky up top.

It said that a tune is recommended whether I plan to mod or not.

I do plan to mod, but with just a few bolt ons *AEM intake, single exhaust.*

The only thing I'm worried about is reliabilty.. I've never tuned a car and I don't know if there are certain things I should be doing maintenance on more than others.

Any input is great, thanks.

 

It depends on your mods if a tune is necessary. It's best to get a tune to get the full potential of your parts. I remember there was a big ole' thread on this. ;]

 

search my friend you will find what you need.

 

The tune is only as safe as your tuner. Either find a popular Evo tuner in your area, do a remote tune from Mellon (or similar), or go for the Cobb Accessport.

 

Sorry, i tried searching. Maybe I was putting in the wrong keywords, but i couldn't find anything on tunes and reliability

 

I was thinking the same thing. Im not very car savy, but I know at one point in time in the future I want to put on the basic mods lik the OP. The only thing that's holding me back is the fear of losing the reliability once the car is tuned.

 

A tune can be as safe or as aggressive as you want. It's a matter of communicating your needs to the tuner. If you're like me and don't take anyone's word for anything, you need to put a little time into understanding what's going on, and log your car. This way, you'll be able to see how it's running and decide for yourself whether it's within your range of comfort.

 

For you guys wanting stock or lightly modded cars the Cobb Accessport is a very safe choice; especially if you don't live nearby to a dyno tuner.

 

a good tune will be reliable
they are the best bang for the buck if you are looking for more hp
we sell a few tunes like the Cobb that a few have recommended

-anthony

 

Careful with this.. my buddy had his 06 mustang tuned after he put turbo in and the mech. blew his turbo and won't pay to fix

 

Well you're also talking about a car that was never meant to be turbocharged in the first place. If you monitor your car regularly and maintain it, there's no reason a tune shouldn't be perfectly reliable. These motors are strong. I've run my car with a pretty aggressive tune for nearly 20k miles now.

 

Talking about apples and oranges....

 

Your car is already tuned, factory tuned.

Getting a dyno tune (by a good tuner) will be just as safe. You just need to tell them what you want, (conservative tune, performance tune, etc.)

The most important thing is to go to someone that knows what they are doing. Find other people in your area on this forum (or not on this forum) and find out where they go to get tuned.

And I've always been told, driving your car with mods and a tune is safer than driving your car with mods and no tune.

 

Yeah, you're right there. Without a tune, a change for any reason will throw codes. Those codes are often times sensor measurements that are indicating you're running too lean, which is deadly for engines.

Untuned, I can say that the past year was scary at first and now mild later -- I don't have the tune but disliked the codes. So I only drive it at the limits of the engine now at the track, after I've given the ECU a few laps of increasing throttle position/speed to let it begin mixing it more richly. Easing into that style of driving helps me enough that I've thrown no codes for many months now. But a tune is still peace of mind (and performance) I'll be doing next spring or even over the winter up at AMS. Travel time means money to me currently and I've just had enough time + money to get away for anything in the past year (except Webelos camp. Well worth the unpaid time off!!!)

 

An after-market cat-back wouldn't require a tune, would it?