Camshaft and headwork without Tune?

v10viperbox · Jan 8, 2013

Does anybody know if it is possible to do heads and camshaft on a Gen III without touching the ecu.

Thinking

Heads Ported
Comp Cam, lifters, and pushrods
Rockers

I already have

Corsa Catback
K&N Intake
Throttle Body
OS Giken rear end.
Stronger Clutch.

California has eliminated the sniffer test on all cars built after 2002 as of the first of the year and as long as the car's ecu has not been fiddled with it seems to be kind of legal to do this now. All the car has to do is report back that the ECU is unmodified and that everything is within normal parameters. Engine parts do not get CARB number so they seem to be fair game as far as I read the regulations.

speedracervr4 · Jan 8, 2013

There would be no point in adding the heads/cam/rockers without having a tune. I don't believe having the ECU flashed with an SCT will throw any flags. What "parameters" are they looking at?

v10viperbox · Jan 8, 2013

speedracervr4 said:
There would be no point in adding the heads/cam/rockers without having a tune. I don't believe having the ECU flashed with an SCT will throw any flags. What "parameters" are they looking at?

Supposedly they have a flashed image of every year/model/make and they compare the actual instructions on the ECU. Then they look at each ODB II flag and each sensor reading to make sure that they fall into a predefined range.

How this is going to work on cars with 50 state legal supercharger/turbo packages that have legal tunes I don't know.

ViperGeorge · Jan 8, 2013

Typical for California. I'd never live there. Big brother watching everything. Move to Montana.

speedracervr4 · Jan 8, 2013

v10viperbox said:
Supposedly they have a flashed image of every year/model/make and they compare the actual instructions on the ECU. Then they look at each ODB II flag and each sensor reading to make sure that they fall into a predefined range.

How this is going to work on cars with 50 state legal supercharger/turbo packages that have legal tunes I don't know.

Geez that's sucky...I would find a "good" inspection station to go to. Maybe one of the Viper performance shops in CA could give you more info.

v10viperbox · Jan 8, 2013

gbatejan said:
Typical for California. I'd never live there. Big brother watching everything. Move to Montana.

Tell me about it. I would love to get transferred to one of our operations in the Midwest. But I have a better chance of being sent to China or NYC

Viper Specialty · Jan 8, 2013

I do not know how it would be possible that they could have a flash image for every car- That would mean they are closer to tuning the Gen-4 ECU's than anybody else! There are dozens and dozens of Viper ECU flashes alone.

I would bet it is little more than the same OBD-2 testing we have here in NY, which checks a for codes and properly operating monitors. In which case... a car without a tune is more likely to fail than a car tuned correctly with a reflash. It is possible to get a head/cam car to pass all of the OBD-2 monitors without having to delete codes provided the setup is built and tuned correctly.

Green Viper · Jan 8, 2013

On my heavily modified Gen 2 with heads & cam, if I run the stock ECU I lose about 35 hp, it also bucks around 2000 rpms. It will run for about 120 miles after reset before it tries to adjust to an extreme and throws a check engine light. If that happens, you just need to reset it. I did this for a while waiting for my tune to be updated.

351carlo · Jan 8, 2013

Green Viper said:
On my heavily modified Gen 2 with heads & cam, if I run the stock ECU I lose about 35 hp, it also bucks around 2000 rpms. It will run for about 120 miles after reset before it tries to adjust to an extreme and throws a check engine light. If that happens, you just need to reset it. I did this for a while waiting for my tune to be updated.

That won't help him get it inspected. Before the check engine light is thrown your ECU would fail the "Readiness" monitors during a scan.

Dan above gave you the info so far. As also suggested, hooking up with a local shop is your best bet. Just because you can mod the car and have it pass doesn't mean it's legal... but that's for another debate.

v10viperbox · Jan 8, 2013

Viper Specialty said:
I do not know how it would be possible that they could have a flash image for every car- That would mean they are closer to tuning the Gen-4 ECU's than anybody else! There are dozens and dozens of Viper ECU flashes alone.
/QUOTE]

I think they only have the factory flash everything else is not CARB/California legal. At least I know of no flash that is CARB certified at this point for a Gen III.

I am skirting the edge law here, but trying to stay legal so that if I get pulled over for smog/modifications I can at least pass the tests.
As far as I can tell internals modifications off stock are fine as long as they don;t trip the OBDII sensors and in the old days you could pass the sniffer test.

Viper Specialty · Jan 8, 2013

v10viperbox said:
Viper Specialty said:

I do not know how it would be possible that they could have a flash image for every car- That would mean they are closer to tuning the Gen-4 ECU's than anybody else! There are dozens and dozens of Viper ECU flashes alone.
/QUOTE]

I think they only have the factory flash everything else is not CARB/California legal. At least I know of no flash that is CARB certified at this point for a Gen III.

I am skirting the edge law here, but trying to stay legal so that if I get pulled over for smog/modifications I can at least pass the tests.
As far as I can tell internals modifications off stock are fine as long as they don;t trip the OBDII sensors and in the old days you could pass the sniffer test.

Click to expand...

I think you are not understanding exactly how a flash works and is applied. There are 10's of thousands of factory flashes for all of the vehicles out there. Every single car is flashed at the factory with some version of software. Every single year car of any make or model could have a dozen revisions. There is NO WAY I could see any auto maker giving out all of their proprietary calibrations. This is not something that you can plug in, check, and move on. You would have to download the flash from the car, and run it through a comparator program, and this would take a good bit of time for each car... and I still dont see any OEM giving out all of that data. I don't know where you got your information from, but I think you have been had.

I could see at most perhaps the OBD-2 pulling the VIN and/or part number of the PCM software revision to make sure it matches the CARB variants of the software/vehicles- but even an SCT flash will retain all of that information provided it is written over the correct original part number PCM flash.

You are putting the cart before the horse on this one. An untuned head/cam car will fail by default 9/10 by tripping the MIL or monitors- so its pretty much irellevent. This is fairly simple to test- put an SCT flash in your PCM with a basic tune for a stock car, and go get inspected. If it passes, you are fine, even with a built head/cam car.

All of this said... find a shop that actually knows what they are doing with SCT rather than just deleting codes and band-aiding head/cam tunes to run "Okay", and you will be fine.

Viper Grenade · Jan 8, 2013

Yes, you can for a Gen 2. Even using the stock fuel system. I have seen two Gen2's work just fine and not toss engine codes. Go as crazy as you want on the porting and use a CC cam or any other "street cam" One was about 525rwhp the other was 540rwhp

With that said, both cars picked up about 40rwhp with a tune.

Viper Grenade · Jan 8, 2013

Edit: should have said mild street cam. CC, 708 or crower stage 1 any of them would be fine.

Camshaft and headwork without Tune?

v10viperbox

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speedracervr4

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v10viperbox

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ViperGeorge

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speedracervr4

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v10viperbox

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Viper Specialty

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Green Viper

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351carlo

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v10viperbox

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