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"stages" and necessary modifications.

4K views 30 replies 10 participants last post by  dankwise 
#1 ·
Sooooooo... I have basically full bolt ons minus downpipe and I have mountune charge pipe+intercooler pipes... What "stage" cobb tune would be appropriate? I'm gonna go with stage 2, what you guys think? One other question.. I'm running a mountune tune 91 Octane but have since moved and have only 92 Octane available, is this a problem? I've heard you can run one less Octane but should never run +1 Octane. Thanks in advance ?
 
#2 ·
first, no down pipe means that you do not have a "stage 3" car, you need to run stage 2 tune or lower...


second, fuel octane... if you are running a 91 tune, then you are tuned to safely run on 91 octane fuel. you can also run higher than that, so yes 92 or 93 octane fuel is fine.


just don't ever run a lower octane fuel than you are tuned for! if a tuner tunes a car for 91 fuel, then putting lower octane fuel in the car will cause the engine to knock and then the car will pull out all of that performance that was added to attempt to keep the motor from being destroyed.
 
#8 ·
Actually that's hyperbole.

I have run E30/E40 tunes om 91 and I'm currently on 100 octane tune running it on 91. If I am on the way up to the track in Bakersfield (McFarland actually) I will put whatever octane I need in the tank and when I go up the Grapevine which is a 2-4% grade so that puts plenty of load on the engine, my timing is resorted.

I have run my best times at that track twice in a row with that method. Even when we pulled the plugs (OE heat range, came with the car) after I damaged the engine, except for #4 cylinder the rest were fine, I can post a pic if your curious.

I had a nitrous backfire that damaged the engine not doing the above.

Remember the car has a wide band in it already, it will not adjust boost like say my SRT-4 did based on air inlet temps at the filter. You get say 22 psi no matter the fuel or outside temps, what changes is how much ignition advance you get.

If your curious on 91 and nitrous I got zero advance. I had a can of VP 101 back at my friend's garage. I don't cry over spilled milk, bought another bullet now it has a GTX3071 attached to it.

Holla
 
#20 ·
It sure is a custom tune. I believe you get unlimited tune revisions within 45 days of the first update. I got my AP from Mountune and Randy updated my car probably 10 times before it was perfect. Idk how you could get a more custom/refined tune than that. Maybe your thinking you need to put it on the rollers and tune it real time in order to be considered custom, but I don’t think anything more could be squeezed outa my car just because I put it on a dyno.
 
#9 ·
And let me guess, you are running a standard Cobb canned tune with absolutely no refinements made will all that crap just like the OP is right?


Well forum you heard it here first, I don't want to perpetuate the hyperbole so DJfourmoney says you can safely run what ever octane fuel you want to with what ever tune you want to and your engine will be just fine! 0% risk...

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk
 
#11 ·
And let me guess, you are running a standard Cobb canned tune with absolutely no refinements made will all that crap just like the OP is right?


Well forum you heard it here first, I don't want to perpetuate the hyperbole so DJfourmoney says you can safely run what ever octane fuel you want to with what ever tune you want to and your engine will be just fine! 0% risk...

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk
im not running a "canned cobb tune" I have them loaded on my accessport by default but I've never used them. My tune is apparently custom which I did not know as mountune didn't really tell me much, they had me load the tune and sent me on my way, gonna hit up Randy and find out more.
 
#19 ·
The car adjust when you put 87 in the tank doesn't it?

Ratings drop 87 octane = 230 hp, 93 octane = 252 hp. There is no rating for 91 octane, but... My very rough estimation is 244 hp

I believe and it's been said before that the space between the top of the pistons and the first ring is very narrow. Another possible problem is the a tight gap for the rings to help with blowby and with initial emissions validation.

With that knowledge I fail to understand not so much an issue with the stock turbo but when doubling the output why running E85 should not be shortcutted by running blends. As I stated in another thread, it's been proven that the more gasoline you have mixed with ethanol the less effective it is. You get the majority of the oxygen content from as low as E20 but higher concentrations upto E85 and E98 have proven to provide extra in-cylinder cooling.

Matt Snow of Snow Performance has blogged that many full time E85 runners are also running his Snow Performance water-methanol systems.

On a stock turbo ST it's overkill, but you can run E30 and water-methanol together to get a couple of degrees of timing since that is the main power adders after bolt-ons with the stock turbo.

In-fact I know Bryan at JST mentioned when dyno'ing the Time Attack car when it still had the stock turbo that he could have made more but that was all he could squeeze out of E30 = 309hp.

Adding water-methanol would have certainly helped.

I know a few Mk7 Golf GTI/Golf R owners who are running APR's canned flash tune with a JB4 piggyback on top controlling water-methanol. This is a called a stacked setup and it's gaining in popularity.

My friend James runs this setup on his 11 second Golf R with the stock turbo. He runs E30 with 50/50 water-methanol. Both the APR flash tune and JB4 tune are 100 octane.
 
#22 ·
The car adjust when you put 87 in the tank doesn't it?

Ratings drop 87 octane = 230 hp, 93 octane = 252 hp. There is no rating for 91 octane, but... My very rough estimation is 244 hp
It sure does... On the OEM calibration which is (often a lot) less aggressive than the calibration most tuners give you.

However the whole reason you have your car tuned to make more power that the OEM calibration leaves on the table , so they get in there and really turn it up to 11. They often get pretty aggressive with the spark advance cause they know the you will be running fuel that is a lot more knock resistant than 87. How aggressive they get is usually directly related to what kind of fuel you will be using.

Also, you are putting a lot of trust in to hoping sensors never go marginal or just straight up fail...

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk
 
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#24 ·
One other question.. I'm running a mountune tune 91 Octane but have since moved and have only 92 Octane available, is this a problem? I've heard you can run one less Octane but should never run +1 Octane. Thanks in advance ?
Before this thread gets derailed with debating fuel octane ratings. To specifically answer your question here. No it is NOT even slightly an issue running 92 vs 91. Whoever told you that you can run -1 but never +1 fuel is misinformed. Always go with the higher rating if your concerned about pre-ignition. It won’t hurt anything. If you were stuck and could only get 100 octane unleaded, guess what, top it off and get on down the road. NBD.
 
#28 ·
This car loves octane I don't know if there's too much for it. When The Tuning School tested VP C-16 they lost power because it burns so slow. C7 Vette has DI as well and detects fuel quality.

Just dumping in some MS109 the car picked up 12 hp with no tune. I would imagine the ST would react the same way because on the stock tune with 250cc jet and unknown methanol content it made 12 more hp = 232hp

Stock was 220 on 91
 
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