AMS Tune

[Roadrage]

Just a quick update, got a phone call from AMS Wednesday morning informing me that the full ecu tune is available. After telling Dan at AMS I was racing in the Wanna Gofast 1/2 mile event in Hot Springs, VA on this Saturday,I don't think you will have my ecu's back before Friday. Dan ensured me if I send my ecu's by Thursday I will overnight them back to you Friday. Long story I removed my ecu's and shipped them to AMS and they already sent them back to me. I will let everyone know how it performs at event with some good videos as well.....

[M6-Coupe]

Wow... interesting. Can't wait to see some real world numbers such as 0-60, 0-100, 1/4 mile and 60-130 mph

[Sharif507]

Bro this is awesome, i shipped mine last night, i live outside the us so hopefully monday ill have mine back, let me know how your car runs!!!

[Msizzle]

goodluck with it!!

[BimmerGuy25]

That's awesome. Good luck, and make sure to post videos along with some real numbers lol.

[Roadrage]

Really did not have time to dyno car after installing tune got ecu's on Friday and made the 4hr journey to 1/2 mile event which started Saturday. For the drive I filled up with 93 and the car ride very smooth but do notice the gears seem taller than before. The only official numbers I got today was 149 mph on 93 and 154 mph on race fuel all speeds for 1/2 mile. The car was still adapting to the race fuel as my mph was going up but after running the car hard all day on 8th pass near finish line car started going into limp mode for transmission over heating. Not to mention event was in the mountains 3900 feet but after letting car sit for 45mins everything was good. I decided to call it a day but I will be dynoing car next week and post results. I will also post videos from event .

[m6beast]

Originally Posted by Roadrage

Really did not have time to dyno car after installing tune got ecu's on Friday and made the 4hr journey to 1/2 mile event which started Saturday. For the drive I filled up with 93 and the car ride very smooth but do notice the gears seem taller than before. The only official numbers I got today was 149 mph on 93 and 154 mph on race fuel all speeds for 1/2 mile. The car was still adapting to the race fuel as my mph was going up but after running the car hard all day on 8th pass near finish line car started going into limp mode for transmission over heating. Not to mention event was in the mountains 3900 feet but after letting car sit for 45mins everything was good. I decided to call it a day but I will be dynoing car next week and post results. I will also post videos from event .

Great results may see you in the am

[gmd2003]

Originally Posted by Roadrage

Really did not have time to dyno car after installing tune got ecu's on Friday and made the 4hr journey to 1/2 mile event which started Saturday. For the drive I filled up with 93 and the car ride very smooth but do notice the gears seem taller than before. The only official numbers I got today was 149 mph on 93 and 154 mph on race fuel all speeds for 1/2 mile. The car was still adapting to the race fuel as my mph was going up but after running the car hard all day on 8th pass near finish line car started going into limp mode for transmission over heating. Not to mention event was in the mountains 3900 feet but after letting car sit for 45mins everything was good. I decided to call it a day but I will be dynoing car next week and post results. I will also post videos from event .

Def being in the mountains hurt but something was not right . My M6 CP did 1/2 mile in 154 mph stock tune with full exhaust and hits the limiter at 158- 159 mph on 93 octane with my current Dinan tune and the BMS set to 3.5 . I know I'm at sea level but 14x anything is way too low for 650whp .You should have been well into the 160's even at altitude .

[Roadrage]

Nice meeting you out there M6beast great time and I will be letting you know when I am ready for your cold air intake setup. GMD2003 not sure just thinking car still adapting tune has not been on the car for a full day and I was already on the track. Not making excuses as well but my car is not CP but altitude played a big part, I will be calling AMS tomorrow just to let them know the results.

[messm6]

As m6beast will tell you with his intake the tune has to adapt as well. George can walk you through the adaptation process. It's basically the same process he does with the new MSR intake. One day is def not enough time for it to adapt. Took me two weeks with the new intake and full Ecu remap as well as dct tune. It's common to go into limp mode when not adapted. The car is an absolute beast now (if it wasn't already) and will be getting on the dyno this week. It's def well above 700hp just waiting to get on the dyno.

[m6beast]

Originally Posted by Roadrage

Nice meeting you out there M6beast great time and I will be letting you know when I am ready for your cold air intake setup. GMD2003 not sure just thinking car still adapting tune has not been on the car for a full day and I was already on the track. Not making excuses as well but my car is not CP but altitude played a big part, I will be calling AMS tomorrow just to let them know the results.

Had a great time! When ever you ready just hit me up anytime. The altitude played a big part for everyone not just for you. I saw a bunch of guys there that were running 6-8 mph slower then GA and FL half mile races. Even my M4 ran 151 in FL with no traction and ran 147 here with better traction and more WHP. My M5 ran 157-158 and a customer of mine M5 ran 154-155 which has more power then what he had in GA and in FL. The Porsches were down also 6-8 MPh that I know personally from last events with more mods on the table.

Here's some pics and one of all the M's that were at the event.

Either way had a great time and Once again great meeting you hope to meet and do it again soon!

[gmd2003]

Originally Posted by Roadrage

Nice meeting you out there M6beast great time and I will be letting you know when I am ready for your cold air intake setup. GMD2003 not sure just thinking car still adapting tune has not been on the car for a full day and I was already on the track. Not making excuses as well but my car is not CP but altitude played a big part, I will be calling AMS tomorrow just to let them know the results.

It's not a piggy back its a real tune so the 4 hour ride to the event should have been enough time for adaptation . The limp mode is concerning as well . I've tracked this car in 90 + degrees and high humidity for 30 min sessions and never had the transmission or engine overheat . Seems like something isn't right , get the ECU scanned and look at the codes , may be something besides the tune . The bottom line is your car wasn't making any where close to 650whp and it wasn't the altitude .

[bigbrian]

Originally Posted by gmd2003

It's not a piggy back its a real tune so the 4 hour ride to the event should have been enough time for adaptation . The limp mode is concerning as well . I've tracked this car in 90 + degrees and high humidity for 30 min sessions and never had the transmission or engine overheat . Seems like something isn't right , get the ECU scanned and look at the codes , may be something besides the tune . The bottom line is your car wasn't making any where close to 650whp and it wasn't the altitude .

I agree that it shouldn't take time to adapt to the tune because it's an ECU tune and they are changing variables directly -- not tricking or mimicking anything like a piggy back tune.

I can see how the altitude might play a part in the power loss though. Get the car strapped to the dyno and let's see some pulls and numbers on the chart.

Brian

[Roadrage]

Had the ECU scanned and only two faults were from having catless down pipes but it does feel good looking at dash an no CEL lights Posted a pic of the car at the event and also just put my new show season wheels on... Will be dynoing car this week Brian.

[chask]

Originally Posted by gmd2003

It's not a piggy back its a real tune so the 4 hour ride to the event should have been enough time for adaptation . The limp mode is concerning as well . I've tracked this car in 90 + degrees and high humidity for 30 min sessions and never had the transmission or engine overheat . Seems like something isn't right , get the ECU scanned and look at the codes , may be something besides the tune . The bottom line is your car wasn't making any where close to 650whp and it wasn't the altitude .

Originally Posted by bigbrian

I agree that it shouldn't take time to adapt to the tune because it's an ECU tune and they are changing variables directly -- not tricking or mimicking anything like a piggy back tune. . . .
Brian

I found this in the S63TU PDF in the sticky located at the beginning of the M6 section http://www.6post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=803495, titled S63TU Engine Training Manual w/ Full Technical Info. The following is located in Section 9 on the Engine Management System on page 77 (page 81 of the pdf):
"The after-run starts after terminal 15 OFF. The Adaptation values are stored during the after-run. The DME control unit uses a bus signal to signal its readiness to "go to sleep". When all the participating control units have signaled their readiness to "go to sleep", the bus I outputs a bus signal and the control units terminate communication 5 seconds later."

On page 76 (page 80 of the pdf), they describe terminal 15 as the wake up terminal:
"The DME control unit is woken up via the wake-up line (terminal 15Wake up) by the Car Access System (CAS)."


Terminal 15 apparently goes hot (DME comes alive) when the key gets near the car or maybe when you unlock the door, either via a button press on the key or by putting your hand on the door. I'd bet terminal 15 goes down when you shut off power to the car (my guess is on the second press of the "Start" button on the dash or when you lock the door). Whatever the cause for triggering terminal 15 to drop, at that point it looks like the DME and all computers on any of the various buses used to control car operation (CAN et al) do some final housekeeping before shutting down entirely. Whatever it is that shuts down Terminal 15, it seems pretty clear that this triggers the after-run period and that the adaptation values are stored during the after-run period. There is no telling if they are used during that running period. There is also no indication if there is a limit to the change the DME will allow during adaptation. It is also conceivable it could be limited to a small percentage change though I'd bet if they went that route there are some things that get whatever amount of change they need if engine reliability or safety are at issue - like too lean, too much knock, too much ignition timing, too much boost, etc.

In several other posts I have read M6Beast's suggestions for doing an adaptation. You probably ought to search for and read his directly because I am not sure i will get it right. But as I recall he suggests several hard runs through 3rd gear, and doing it in 4th a few times if you have a safe place. Then shut down and leave it overnight, followed by a few more series of these full RPM pulls (2000 RPM to redline, WOT) with an overnight shutdown. As I recall he also suggests giving it a couple of days between doing these wide band RPM pulls. The car will pull better the next day after each time you do this, and after 2 weeks or so the adaptation will be pretty much complete.

My car has not been modified. My only 'mod' is I run 101 gas I get at a local station. Yeah, lucky me - my pump gas is 101 octane! It had only break in miles on it - no full throttle, no revs above 5000 RPM (or was it 5500 - don't like to remember or even think at all about those days very much ). It also had only had 93 octane gas up to the point I got in it (~245 miles), or at least that is what I would think - probably about one tankful. Although the car seemed pretty hot after the break in service it just did not feel quite right - did not seem to have everything an engine tuned this highly with all this high tech stuff on it should have. So just to see what would happen I tried M6Beast's adaptation method. I ran a few pulls through 2nd and 3rd gear. This was tough because I usually don't drive anywhere near that fast (well, in 2nd yeah but definitely not 3rd). I did not even attempt it in 4th. After two more pulls I could tell a noticeable difference. The next day it was even better. I gave it a rest for a day or two then went after it again. After a few days of this on/off cycling I could tell the gains were diminishing but it was still getting better. I quit after a couple of weeks. The car was quite the beast at that point.

I have no doubt that the DME learns the car's behavior in its environment. It also appears that there may be some algorithm in the education. I suspect that it can learn a lot one day to the next, but have a feeling it also needs a few repeated days to more or less cement some learned values into longer term memory. It kind of makes sense when I think about it. You want the system to rapidly adapt to sudden changes (like driving through some are of the country where you don't normally go and are forced to use a tank or two of 87 or 89 octane gas. But you don't want those changes to be permanent when you can get some higher octane fuel, or return home and are running 93 again. Then again, I could also see using some sort of moving average or statistical analysis might be a bit overboard as well.

I only wish I had a place to try a low RPM to redline pull in 4th, but to me it's not sane to try that on a public road. Not to mention you lose your license for a year or two for just going 10 or 20 over and probably spend some time in jail. I hate to think what a judge might do if you were nearly doubling the speed limit. In addition there is a venture I am involved in that requires I not have any big charges like those, and especially not ones that would endanger law enforcement trying to catch me. So I pretty much live like a Boy Scout - well, mostly anyway.

The point being, I am not so sure that the car with the fresh tune would necessarily have adapted yet, at least not completely. I guess a lot of it would depend on how well the accuracy of the tune was matched to the needs of the specific mods on the car. Even though it was a tune done in the same way the factory would do one, even the factory tune appears to have learned something. At the least, I would imagine the difference in altitude would have made the DME wonder what the heck was going on and maybe more so with so little time with the freshly tuned DME on the car.

I'll concede that perhaps my car was learning the 101, but I did this again a couple of weeks later and again got some noticeable improvement. It was seat of the pants (also a little tire squeal where there had been none before), but my seat has been in a bunch of cars with everything from small to huge improvements (did it for about 20 years or so). I don't think this was my imagination though it has been a while since I've done this. I guess it could have been weather related too, but it's been getting warmer and that should reduce performance. That said, I am thinking about getting something like a VBOX so I can quantify stuff like this. I had forgotten how much I enjoy futzing around with this stuff. Measurements are so much better than seat of the pants - just remember to correct for atmospheric conditions (pressure, temperature and relative humidity (RH)). Without that you'll be chasing your tail a lot - maybe miss an important direction to take things, or possibly start chasing something that was only due to a good weather day.

Originally Posted by bigbrian

. . . I can see how the altitude might play a part in the power loss though. Get the car strapped to the dyno and let's see some pulls and numbers on the chart.
Brian

I'd bet this was a major factor. When I used to dyno I'd use a sling psychrometer to determine atmospheric conditions. The sling psychrometer is like a nunchaku (noon chucks) with two thermometers in the stick. The swinging end of the sticks has a wetted cotton wick up over the bottom of the thermometer's bulb. After you spin it for about two minutes the water evaporation cools the temperature of that thermometer in proportion to the RH. I'd use it at least a couple of times a day, and more frequently if the weather was changing. You would not believe the power correction factors I'd get; 1.0-1.5% was not uncommon and on some days it'd be 2-3 %, this just going from like 9:00 or 10:00 to just after lunch. I can imagine that adding some altitude that probably had some accompanying reduction in humidity too could have a major affect on things. A search said the elevation there is 1220 feet. From what I could tell on the site I found that's worth about a 3/4 psi drop, maybe a shade more. Plus they usually try to orient runways to face into the prevailing winds don't they?

Originally Posted by Roadrage

Had the ECU scanned and only two faults were from having catless down pipes but it does feel good looking at dash an no CEL lights Posted a pic of the car at the event and also just put my new show season wheels on... Will be dynoing car this week Brian.

Love your car. That's really nice! Please post when you get some dyno data. I'd love to see it.

Wanna Go Fast looks pretty cool too. Were you there for both days or just one? How many runs did you get in? In the vids on their site it looked pretty busy. Then again they probably want to give that impression - lots of action. I'd bet there was though.

I think I am going to need something like one of these fault code devices too. It is said ignorance in bliss. I am beginning to think it's a lot cheaper too, at least when it comes to the tools it takes to know what's going on with your M6.

[Roadrage]

Chask,

Thank you and that's a lot of information you provided, I will take the time to dissect it all in pieces so I can get a better understanding with research. I ran only Saturday but stayed for whole event, I was able to get 8 runs in. Was not that busy well organize event and you have from 9am - 6pm to run your car. They only close it down for a hour for lunch but will be dynoing car this week.

[m6beast]

Originally Posted by Roadrage

Chask,

Thank you and that's a lot of information you provided, I will take the time to dissect it all in pieces so I can get a better understanding with research. I ran only Saturday but stayed for whole event, I was able to get 8 runs in. Was not that busy well organize event and you have from 9am - 6pm to run your car. They only close it down for a hour for lunch but will be dynoing car this week.

I can say wether a tune or a piggy back the car always needs to adapt hence when the dealer clears adaptation memory and car runs like shit.

Even though it's a tune the car is not stock and will need to relearn especially with his mods. It won't take as long as it would take with the intake but it definitely needs a couple days to fully adapt. I say a good week to be fully adapted and consistent.

I would wait till next week before you go Dyno the car no rush. Anyway enjoy your beautiful car and great meeting you.

[messm6]

Originally Posted by m6beast

I can say wether a tune or a piggy back the car always needs to adapt hence when the dealer clears adaptation memory and car runs like shit.

Even though it's a tune the car is not stock and will need to relearn especially with his mods. It won't take as long as it would take with the intake but it definitely needs a couple days to fully adapt. I say a good week to be fully adapted and consistent.

I would wait till next week before you go Dyno the car no rush. Anyway enjoy your beautiful car and great meeting you.

+1

[chask]

Originally Posted by Roadrage

Chask,

Thank you and that's a lot of information you provided, I will take the time to dissect it all in pieces so I can get a better understanding with research. I ran only Saturday but stayed for whole event, I was able to get 8 runs in. Was not that busy well organize event and you have from 9am - 6pm to run your car. They only close it down for a hour for lunch but will be dynoing car this week.

FInd some of M6Beast's comments about adapting. Especially the one about the overnight shutdown. I think it makes a difference.

GOt to run. Getting hit by multiple tornado mesocyclone now and need to take shelter.

[Sharif507]

bro quick question, what boost is the car running on the ams tune?

[chask]

Originally Posted by Sharif507

bro quick question, what boost is the car running on the ams tune?

I'm also interested in how much boost the car runs with this tune.

About a month ago someone told me this tune was on the verge of being released and that it would be really good. Is there any dyno data on it yet?

[Sharif507]

Originally Posted by chask

I'm also interested in how much boost the car runs with this tune.

About a month ago someone told me this tune was on the verge of being released and that it would be really good. Is there any dyno data on it yet?

i actually found out elsewhere, it seems the boost doesnt really increase, since they are maxing out with the stock tune already at about 23 psi.