tscompusa2

iTrader: (22)

Brandon came to me with a limping car. I discovered him from one of the threads on here where he had issues and I offered my help to him. He was previously tuned by some very reputable places, but weather changes, and other misc things have caused his tune to go downhill.

I fixed both his fuel and timing maps, smoothed them out, gave him faster spool up, more response at cruise & part throttle while increasing his MPG as well as making his evo drive 100x smoother. He is super happy with his evo now minus some minor phantom knock we have to filter out due to kelford 272 cams and a noisey clutch. He will chime in here and explain more details maybe.

Fuel being used: 93octane
Boost being used: 26psi
Location: NJ/NY

Mods:
Stock 9 Turbo
ETS 3" FMIC
Injectors
Walbro
ACT Clutch
Kelford 272
Intake & Exhaust
BOV
MBC

POWER GAINED: +75whp
TORQUE GAINED: +75wtq





There was more in the car, but I felt the owner didn't want to go much more then 26psi since he uses the car as his daily driver and needs it to be reliable.


I asked the customer to write a review and he asked me to email him what all I did to the vehicle
and in return he responded with this:


Retuned Evo IX by VR-Speed


I was tuned about a year back and was pretty happy with the way my car
as driving but lately i was having some drivability issues which let me
to find a huge boost leak and some other random issues. I decided to
shop around for a retune and I made the right choice.

I have been having some knocking problems for almost a year now and I
havent been able to track down what has been causing it. I contacted a
few different tuners and while that all had great input I just got a
certain feeling about the quality of service from VR-Speed. They were
responsive and very helpful.

First they told me what to look for in my engine bay, anything that can
cause a knocking sound. I found that my bov was hitting my fan shroud
as well as a bolt lodged between my oil pan and transfer case. This
alleviated some of the false knock i was getting and we determined the
rest of it was from the Kelford 272 cams. In my previous posts I had
pictures of my old spark plugs that were shot.. this was most likely due
to the excessive fuel as well as the low timing causing some
detonation. Before i found my boost leak my stock injectors were
running at 120% IDC and flooding the cylinders with gas.

I turned my boost pressure down about 2 or 3 psi while trying to
diagnose my issues...The car was running pig rich and only 6* timing at
red line due to it knocking.

VR-speed pulled my timing in the mid range, increased it from mid to red
line and leveled my AFRs to target 11.5 . We also increased the boost
from 24psi to 27psi spike tapering to 20 on a hallman MBC. The V7 BIG
fuel and timing maps we remade from scratch and the car drives smoother
then ever.

The knock multiplier was modified slightly to take into account the
kelford cams and now i get minimal if any knock.

VR-speed was constantly at my service, always available when i had to
give them logs, got me an updated tune within a few hours and got the
full tune dialed in in under a week!

The car never drove so smooth, it spools sooner then it ever did and the
power hits harder then ever.

All of this was on a stock turbo
FIC 850cc injectors
ETS Black 3in intercool
ETS LICP
Stock UICP
Kelford 272 Cams
O2 Dump and full 3in exhaust with a test pipe
Hallman MBC
ACT HDSS Clutch

I went from 300hp and 292tq to 378hp and 366tq all while getting better
gas mileage and more comfortable cruising.

xexitenglishx

iTrader: (20)

Im the owner of the car and everything he said is 100% correct. Ive been having some random knocking problems and Tom has been helping me through diagnosing it as well as giving me a great tune. He has pretty much wrapped up the tune but is still very responsive and actively still helping me with all the questions ive been shooting at him.

Thanks Tom for great customer care! Hopefully ill get some 1/4 times for you soon!

Fast_Freddie

iTrader: (50)

Great job Tom! Looks like you woke it up and nursed it back to health!

tscompusa2

iTrader: (22)

Thanks Fred. Ya it was in bad shape lol.

Jerm__

Nice to see you really cleaned up the powerband. Looking nice and smooth! congrats to both of you!

EVO IXMR

iTrader: (6)

I bet you this car has no springs or retainers??

BillSpec

Are you implying valve float?

tscompusa2

iTrader: (22)

yep. I told him to get them, although not required. His valvetrains pretty noisey though How hard are kelfords on stock valvetrain if hes not reving past 7k?

EVO IXMR

iTrader: (6)

I knew it..lol..The valve springs are working very hard to keep up with lift of those cams.As far as you question tom yes even that hes only revving only to 7k...I bet your peak *is only around 9 to 10 * with out getting knock?

EVO IXMR

iTrader: (6)

from looking at the graph those are the starting symptoms of float it starting to dip..If he would run more boost and a bit more rpms they it would be worse.

EVO IXMR

iTrader: (6)

lol that post was for your question..

tscompusa2

iTrader: (22)

12-14* at redline. 4* at peak boost. so the kelfords are destroying his valvetrain? Its not knocking uptop, only downlow which is right where the cams knocked on my personal car lol. We filtered it out now though. It wasnt bad either.. you know its phantom knock though when you get multiple clean pulls with 0 knock counts then all the sudden the knock train with the same load/timing being seen

BillSpec

Gotcha!

EVO IXMR

iTrader: (6)

I was close..lol..If he keeps the stock turbo and leaves the boost around this psi then no as of now, but in due time the springs will weaken and it's possible for them to fail..

If I was him I would invest in a nice kit like supertech dual spring retainer kit for added safety and the car more power and pull harder from the kit.

.If you look on their site or gsc it will say for the most power and to take full advantage of are cams require springs.

.I went threw the same issues and when, I did the kit I picked up 30 whp all over the rpms band with 2 psi less boost and 2*less.

EVO IXMR

iTrader: (6)

Yes very true but those knocks shouldn't be ignored that goes to show you something mechanical is the issue and in this case the springs..As far as the tune goes good job gaining more power all over and be super smooth.,