Si Anyone tuning without increasing boost?

garf117

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Back when I had another turbo car (ecoboost mustang) I got with a custom tuner who helped me smooth out the power band and make the car easier (for my personal driving style) to drive on track. Is this something anyone has tried with the 1.5t? I am finding a lot of tuning to raise the boost psi giving decent hp gains and great torque, but is anyone shooting for specific hp/tq ratios? Would love to talk with someone in the tuning world for these cars.
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With the base tunes on Hondata and especially Ktuner, there are tons of driveability tweaks to adjust the tune to your style without adding boost. You also can go into some of the tables and adjust things if you know what you're doing.

On the other hand, Derek Robinson (@D-RobIMW) is a master tuner who could work his magic for you with a custom tune.
 

fenix-silver

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Don't have too much to offer beyond the option to keep stock(ish) boost levels, but even just setting more aggressive boost ramp and boost responsiveness makes a world of difference. I'm sure if you talk to a tuner though, they could help you accomplish what you're looking for. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be too many people playing around w/ their own tunes like there was in the Subaru community.
 

varge

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Back when I had another turbo car (ecoboost mustang) I got with a custom tuner who helped me smooth out the power band and make the car easier (for my personal driving style) to drive on track. Is this something anyone has tried with the 1.5t? I am finding a lot of tuning to raise the boost psi giving decent hp gains and great torque, but is anyone shooting for specific hp/tq ratios? Would love to talk with someone in the tuning world for these cars.
Depends on what you want to achieve. You can make ~10% throughout the powerband by optimizing AFR and Ignition, but if you want a flat torque delivery you will have to adjust boost as well. If you could describe your goals I could give you a couple hints
 
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garf117

garf117

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Depends on what you want to achieve. You can make ~10% throughout the powerband by optimizing AFR and Ignition, but if you want a flat torque delivery you will have to adjust boost as well. If you could describe your goals I could give you a couple hints
I'll give you an example of a problem I ran into dealing with a tuner on the mustang forums (the tuner was very nice we just had a miscommunication).

I was looking for a tune that didn't need to increase power but utilized a larger front mount intercooler and new spark plugs on track. I was wanting improved reliability and to extend my lap range running at a hard clip. I sent this to the tuner and he was like "sounds good I'll smooth out your tq band and see what I can do"... When I re-tuned my mustang I went from running a consistent 21psi to 26psi with a lot more boost coming online way earlier in the rpm band. We got back together and I explained that it wasn't more boost low down I wanted and don't need to ever really go above the stock boost levels. It was more cam timing and throttle mapping that I was after. We pow-wowed through a few emails and I got what I was after. End result was me being able to do 10/10th's at Road Atlanta for a full 30 min session without seeing any problems in coolant or oil temp (though the brakes did fade like an 80's hairdo by the end of the day).
 
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varge

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I'll give you an example of a problem I ran into dealing with a tuner on the mustang forums (the tuner was very nice we just had a miscommunication).

I was looking for a tune that didn't need to increase power but utilized a larger front mount intercooler and new spark plugs on track. I was wanting improved reliability and to extend my lap range running at a hard clip. I sent this to the tuner and he was like "sounds good I'll smooth out your tq band and see what I can do"... When I re-tuned my mustang I went from running a consistent 21psi to 26psi with a lot more boost coming online way earlier in the rpm band. We got back together and I explained that it wasn't more boost low down I wanted and don't need to ever really go above the stock boost levels. It was more cam timing and throttle mapping that I was after. We pow-wowed through a few emails and I got what I was after. End result was me being able to do 10/10th's at Road Atlanta for a full 30 min session without seeing any problems in coolant or oil temp (though the brakes did fade like an 80's hairdo by the end of the day).
Well I'm afraid you can't get that level of fine tuning with KTuner, at least not with the end-user features. Maybe the tuners ones can do this, you could contact Dereck Robinson for that. With the end user software you can alter boost/ignition/AFR and some drivability aspects like throttle response, boost ramp rate and spool times.
 

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This is exactly the sort of thing I’d be after as well. I would love the drivability improvements of a good tune, without adding any additional boost beyond stock peak.
 

gtman

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This is exactly the sort of thing I’d be after as well. I would love the drivability improvements of a good tune, without adding any additional boost beyond stock peak.
It's really simple. You can go into the boost table and adjust power how and where you like it. Or just chose a psi preset from a simple dropdown menu. End users have the ability to tweak things like throttle and turbo response, turbo spool, boost ramp etc. which all can greatly enhance driveability.

You also have the ability to run multiple tunes of varying boost pressure switchable on the fly.
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