HP Tuners Tutorials

[Gregski]

notice how we are building up our file names, they are all forced in proper order by the 00, 01, 02 prefix, and then the name tells us what went on in the config file.

don't worry the file names are not going to be 4 miles long in the end, at a point when we are done with the housekeeping tasks and have deleted the codes we no longer need, we will rename the file to something like "15 - Baseline" and start tuning and appending new detailed info to the file names. Hope that makes sense.

Brian Freeman (on Facebook) makes a great suggestion of using short file names with the 01, 02, 03 prefixes and then fully documenting the changes in something like Excel, brilliant!

[Gregski]

Who says the GM Engineers don't have a sense of humor. Notice how when we read the PCM (in Part I) it told us the Hardware was specifically for a GM Gen3 V8, or a 4.3L V6. So why on this green earth are they pumping out the tach signal for a 4 cylinder, am I the only one who notices stuff like this, ha ha.

[Gregski]

and write your changes to the PCM, so yeah I know this is going to start to sound repetitive that's deliberate, my grandma said we learn by repetition, so are YOU going to go against what grandma said, I sure ain't

the process will always be the same (rinse, lather, repeat)

0. Start with latest base file
1. Make some sort of changes
2. Save config file with a new descriptive name
3. Write to the PCM

[Wgesnerjr]

Gregski,
You are a bad man! Now I want HP Tuner. :-)

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by Wgesnerjr

Gregski,
You are a bad man! Now I want HP Tuner. :-)

Ha ha, yes get it, if for nothing else to use it as a proper code reader, cause you see it is three tools in one.

1. Scanner ie data logger.
2. Editor ie allows you to FLASH / tune your PCM.
3. an engine code reader

So I paid $300 just for the HP Tuners dongle ie hardware thingie that plugs into our OBDII port and then I had to pay an additional (2 x $50) so $100 dollars for something they call credits to be able to make changes to my PCM, see until you buy the credits you can only read but are not allowed to make changes, but I like to isolate and keep things separate, plus you may not have $400 in the first month so you can spread the financial strain into two months type a thing.

[clay68c10]

Please keep these coming! Thanks for doing this tutorial. I’ve done a fair amount of tuning with TunerPro on TBIs, but it’s nice to have an intro like this to keep down on the brain damage when learning a new system.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by clay68c10

Please keep these coming! Thanks for doing this tutorial. I’ve done a fair amount of tuning with TunerPro on TBIs, but it’s nice to have an intro like this to keep down on the brain damage when learning a new system.

Well folks you can thank Clay for motivating me to post Part III, thanks for the kind words my friend.

[Gregski]

HP Tuners - Part III - Change Tire Size and Gear Ratio

In this section we will take care of two things to make the automatic transmission shift points happy, we will enter our tire diameter and our rear diff gear ratio. You can use the link below to enter your tire specs to get the diameter if you can't do it in your head, ha ha.

Tire Size Calculator

We will also enter the proper Gear Ratio, 3.73 was a popular ratio, but yours will vary, there may be a taggie tag on your pumpkin if you're lucky telling you what your gears are.

I know I preach making one change at a time but we have to use our common sense, if the settings are related it's ok to combine them, wouldn't you agree? (For example later on we will disable codes for both rear O2 sensors in one fell swoop instead of two separate configs, it just makes sense.)

1. Again we start in the comfort of our own home, we fire up our laptop and launch the Editor. Open the file we saved in Step 3 of Part II. (Now this is your new base file, assuming that it all worked last time, see how this works now?).

2. Make changes in the Editor, this time we will make two simple changes since they go hand in hand, we need to change the Tire Size, in my example I use 28.9" (235/75-R15) and the Gear Ratio, mine was 3.73.

3. Save the changes you made to a new file and call it something like "03 - VATS Disabled V8 Tach Signal Tire Size Gear Ratio"

4. Now you get to move the operation to your truck, hook up your HP Tuner to the OBDII port and then your USB cable to your laptop, turn the key to the ON position, launch the Editor program, and simply write the new changes to the PCM.

Note: sometimes you have to write the entire tune file to the PCM, sometimes it is perfectly happy with only writing what's changed, more on this later.

More words with each pic:

I like to call this First Series Housekeeping, the Second Series will focus on disabling the error codes for the components we deleted during our swaps: O2 Sensors, EGR for pre 2002 donor vehicles, EVAP, Fuel Level/Pressure, etc. stay tuned!

[Gregski]

just some click bait

how much horse power is each one of those HP tuner stickers [ahem] decals good for?

oh you can use that shtick to backup your 00 - Original Config file, hmmmm

[Gregski]

so the Gear and Tire settings live outside the regular bottom window pain where we are used to making changes thus far, and you get to them using the Edit \ Gear/Tire Wizard

[Gregski]

i was scratching my head trying to reverse engineer the possible tire size my 2001 GMC Sierra had as 29.20" did not match what TireRack listed as the stock tire, oh well

[Gregski]

this is the Tire Calculator from

https://tiresize.com/calculator/

[Gregski]

we simply enter our numbers in the two New boxes accordingly

[Gregski]

and we name our file something that will make sense to us 18 months from now

[Gregski]

and we write the changes to the PCM, some call this FLASH the PCM

[Gregski]

HP Tuners Top Tip # 2

Maybe some of you will prefer the Navigator folder tree view like what we see in File Manager [pronounced: "My Computer"]

[Gregski]

as you can see it's the same Menu Items as up above but in what I would consider a hierarchical fashion

[Gregski]

I like this view better for some reason because although I may not know all the stuff under say Engine, I can easily stare and compare the amount of yellow folders there to the number of folders under System and though I may not know what the hewk they all do, I know there's more stuff under Engine than System, maybe that's silly to some of you, maybe it makes sense

[Dapapadon]

I just ran across this thread. And I just ordered a new laptop yesterday. I plan to order the HP Tuners after I'm sure the laptop is reliable. So I'll be following this thread. I plan to LS swap my '70 C20 sometime next summer. Nice write up. Thanks!

[daddyjeep]

nicely done there Gregski

[clay68c10]

Hmm, I see shift light as an option. Anyone using that? What a cool feature with a factory 5k tach.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by Dapapadon

I just ran across this thread. And I just ordered a new laptop yesterday. I plan to order the HP Tuners after I'm sure the laptop is reliable. So I'll be following this thread. I plan to LS swap my '70 C20 sometime next summer. Nice write up. Thanks!

Glad to hear it, you will benefit from having both!

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by daddyjeep

nicely done there Gregski

feedback means a lot to me, otherwise I'm just wasting my time

[Gregski]

HP Tuners Section A) Disable the Oxygen Sensors (O2s)

In the First Series we took care of some housekeeping items such as disabling VATS, setting the Tach Signal for a V8, as well as inputting the correct Tire Size and Gear Ratio. Now in the Second Series we take on disabling all the codes that pertain to components that we chose to delete during the swap.

There are two schools of thought when it comes to LS Swaps and disabling the codes, some say drive the truck and see what codes it throws than research them a bit and if applicable, delete them. Nothing wrong with that method, but since I like to prep my PCM ahead of time before the engine even swallows a drop of gasoline, and especially since I know exactly what was deleted after all I deleted it, we might as well prevent those Codes from popping up ahead of time. Also and this may tip the scales, if you do your diligence and delete all the codes the best you can for the components you deleted than your MIL should not come on. However if it does, you should turn off the engine and look up the code rather than ignoring it assuming, eh it's probably for one of the items I deleted, and blindly press on with a glaring MIL. Hope you followed that logic.

So before we disable the secondary oxygen sensors, let's at least get the lingo right. We've all heard about the dreaded Engine Codes, but what are codes? Well essentially they are simply alerts.

When it comes to O2 sensors we may have heard the terms "Bank 1" or "Bank 2" what's a bank? I think of a bank as "Cylinder Head" and usually the cylinder head that has the #1 cylinder in it is Cylinder Head 1 (so in GM's case driver side) or "Bank 1" which by defualt makes "Bank 2" cylinder head 2 (aka passenger side in the GM world).

If we are thinking of the vehicle in terms of front to back as if we were following the exhaust flow, (leaks don't count, ha ha). Sensor 1 is the oxygen sensor in front of the catalytic converter (the cat) and Sensor 2 is behind the cat. And honsetly who knows where Sensor 3 lives/lived in my case it was already disabled? ha ha

Tunistas let's wrap our heads around these Oxygen Sensor codes as it may seem overwheling at first. Yes there may be 20 codes but there are only 5 conditions. Say what? only 5 things can happen, and here they are:

O2 Circuit Low Voltage

O2 Circuit High Voltage

O2 Circuit Slow Response

O2 Circuit No Acitivity Detected

O2 Heater Circuit

Now as you can see in the attached chart some conditions (such as O2 Circuit Slow Response) only happens on two sensors (and generates P0133 and P0153 codes) while other codes (such as O2 Heater Circuit) can happen on all six sensors (P0135, P0141, P0147, P0155, P0161, P0167).

If you look at the attached color coded chart I hope it helps you conceptualize what codes we will be nuking, all red codes get disabled.

Now let's look at the Black Magic that it takes to disable these codes, we have two controls:

• SES Enable
• Error Mode

If it was up to me I would break it up into a third control so it would look more like this:

• SES (Enable / Disable)
  
• MIL (MIL On First Error, MIL on Second Error, No MIL Light)
  
• Report Code (On / Off)

1. Again we start in the comfort of our own home, we fire up our laptop and launch the Editor. Open the file we saved in Step 3 of Part III. (Our last saved file is always our starting point).

2. Make changes in the Editor, this time we will make changes only to the O2s that say "Sensor 2" regardless of what Bank they are on, these are the sensors behind the cat that we most likely deleted by thinning out the wiring harness. Refer to the colored chart attached or the cheat sheet below and Disable the SES on these and set the MIL to No Error Reported:

P0137 P0157

P0138 P0158

P0140 P0160

P0141 P0161

3. Save the changes you made to a new file and call it something like "04 - Disabled O2s"

4. Now you get to move the operation to your truck, hook up your HP Tuner to the OBDII port and then your USB cable to your laptop, turn the key to the ON position, launch the Editor program, and simply write the new changes to the PCM.

Note: sometimes you have to write the entire tune file to the PCM, sometimes it is perfectly happy with only writing what's changed, more on this later.

I promise you we will not Geek out this much for every batch of codes we delete, ie EGR, EVAP, Fuel Level, etc. This is our first batch so we are getting aquainted that's all.

More words with each pic:

[Gregski]

just a random pic of some of my old Oxygen Sensors ie O2 Sensors to get us in the mood

these are the ones with the square plug and the other kind that is actually on my truck is the flat plug, just sayin'