Tuners and "credits"

[Scottm]

What is the 'credit' thing? What vehicles need it? I'm guessing it's a bribe paid to the gov't to let you tune your ecm. Of course you should never modify a pollution controlled vehicle for the sake of all humanity, but for a $50 kickback, they will tolerate it. Am I getting warm?

And what do we think of this HP tuner? Will it do what's needed on the legendary 0411?

https://amzn.to/2TU1stv

 

[sync]

HPTuners or EFIlive will NOT do 96/97 PCMs. (That's to my current knowlege)

98+ and 0411 are good to go.

I wanna say credits are locked to the Vin number? I'm still learning all this stuff myself.

 

[Erik the Awful]

Don't blame the government for this one. They're selling you a physical device, but as a tuner is typically a use-once device, they don't want to sell a handful of tuners and then everybody shares them around and there's no market for their device. It's also one of the main reasons I've never bought a tuner, even though I could probably get another 50 hp out of my Mustang.

 

[0xDEADBEEF]

I'm not sure why but I think you need 2 credits to tune that PCM.

I'm about to do this for the first time myself.

 

[1952Chevy]

I've been a little confused on this as well. I know you need credits to do the tune, but do you need credits every time you modify the tune? Or just to unlock that vin?

 

[yevgenievich]

Credits give access to specific vin number for programming that ecu. Once purchased, can change things as needed. Buying more credits can unlock ability to tune all ecu's of certain year and model vehicle and so on. Old versions of efi live were unrestricted, but only early vehicles can be tuned with it.

 

[stutaeng]

Credits are needed just to unlock the ECM. You can go back and mess with the tune any other time...

I'm just learning the basics myself. What I understand though is that it's vehicle specific for the credits? So if you have a LM7 Silverado and an LM7 suburban, I "think" you need 2+2 = 4 credits? I'm trying to figure that out myself. But I think that's correct.

Obviously, if you only have one truck, that's not a problem...but having several vehicles I think it could get expensive? Or if you are tuning for buddies, etc.

 

[Scottm]

So how many do you need to put a newer 0411 ecm into a 97 k3500?

 

[stutaeng]

Just 2 credits.

 

[Frank Enstein]

The newer the vehicle the more credits needed to tune that vehicle.

Some of the newest vehicles need the ecm to be unlocked, but that is for 2015 and newer Dodges and Rams and 2019 Chevrolets. Don't quote me for the year breaks. The info comes from my addled brain.

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