Putting A Chip In A TBI Truck

TylerZ281500 · Feb 27, 2019

How do i word this

Ive followed his builds, ive exceeded his do nots and everything in between that supposedly couldnt be done, many people have, some of which was worthwhile other times not. The guy caters to the misinformed and easily taken advantage of that dont want to spend the time educating themselves at this point in his sales career, im told he was once reputable and good, but hes done this at least a decade since i started with TBI, he likely doesnt care anymore. Some can say they dont have the time, if you dont have the time to finish a build, simply dont start one. His site is full of misinformation, this thread as well is packed full of misinformation. No over the counter "chip" is gonna do much any any truly efficient good without being datalogged and modified from there.

Have i used his chips? Yes ive had both personal and downstream experience, i data logged my own truck, the chip he sent was the biggest load of crap ever, he bumped fuel trims diddled with timing a little and called it a Tuesday, the amount of horror stories ive seen directly correlate to all the other trucks ive encountered fixing because of his "oh so wonderful" chips.

He never hurt me, he forced me to learn a new skill set and from there on constantly reinforced my decision that the guy may have been top shelf **** once upon a time, not anymore. Most any "mail order" tune is a gimmick and youve far better in both the present and future to have it logged accurately.

Gavin · Feb 28, 2019

TylerZ281500 said:
How do i word this

Ive followed his builds, ive exceeded his do nots and everything in between that supposedly couldnt be done, many people have, some of which was worthwhile other times not. The guy caters to the misinformed and easily taken advantage of that dont want to spend the time educating themselves at this point in his sales career, im told he was once reputable and good, but hes done this at least a decade since i started with TBI, he likely doesnt care anymore. Some can say they dont have the time, if you dont have the time to finish a build, simply dont start one. His site is full of misinformation, this thread as well is packed full of misinformation. No over the counter "chip" is gonna do much any any truly efficient good without being datalogged and modified from there.

Have i used his chips? Yes ive had both personal and downstream experience, i data logged my own truck, the chip he sent was the biggest load of crap ever, he bumped fuel trims diddled with timing a little and called it a Tuesday, the amount of horror stories ive seen directly correlate to all the other trucks ive encountered fixing because of his "oh so wonderful" chips.

He never hurt me, he forced me to learn a new skill set and from there on constantly reinforced my decision that the guy may have been top shelf **** once upon a time, not anymore. Most any "mail order" tune is a gimmick and youve far better in both the present and future to have it logged accurately.

Right on.

Data logging and learning to tune yourself is the best route for someone getting deep in the weeds on a build for sure. For others, doing slight modifications (fire/fuel/air/exhaust bolt-ons, mild cam) and wanting to retain mostly stock aspects then moving on with their lives and building other things, a mail order chip is still beneficial. Expecting to get an absolute perfect mail order "custom" tune right the first, second, third try can be unrealistic. People have been running one size fits all chip tunes for a long time, they understand exactly what they have and are content. If you're above just ordering a chip and can do the tuning, that's awesome and very fulfilling.

I've had V8 chevys unfortunately run on 3 cylinders before, so anyone saying this or that just can't be done is a fool. This is the most versatile platform to build off of, almost anything can be combined and make power to move. I read through his website because I was told my build was a lot like what he recommends. He's an old guy (from what I read, probably won't be around much longer because of his medical condition so your wish of tbichps no longer existing may come true) and has opinions like everyone else. His cautions and suggestions are just that. I would think so long as you are close to what he suggests his chip is probably adequate.

I'd love to see a precise, detailed explanation of why his chips are so bad and why it leads to him being so berated on this site. I've been fishing for as long as I've been on this forum and have yet to see a good reason to not order a chip from him, let alone bash him knowing he isn't on here to refute the claims. He comes recommended by plenty of other sources. If he provides a chip, it idles in range, stays running through the rpm ranges, hits the power and gas mileage numbers he claims, I don't see a problem.

df2x4 · Feb 28, 2019

I have no personal experience with TBIChips/Harris Performance, but it certainly seems like I've read more bad than good lately. I'm sorry to hear about his health and I wish him the best. However if I had a TBI truck that needed a tune I would do some research and see if there's anyone else who's reputable out there offering that service. Maybe check the Gearhead EFI froums. I'm not even sure who else mail order tunes TBI era stuff...

Gavin · Feb 28, 2019

df2x4 said:
I have no personal experience with TBIChips/Harris Performance, but it certainly seems like I've read more bad than good lately. I'm sorry to hear about his health and I wish him the best. However if I had a TBI truck that needed a tune I would do some research and see if there's anyone else who's reputable out there offering that service. Maybe check the Gearhead EFI froums. I'm not even sure who else mail order tunes TBI era stuff...

This is the problem; very few have actual experience, or adequate experience, but still feel the need to carry on a bad report. I feel like this is CNN and he is Trump. Do I agree with everything on his website? No. Am I willing to drag his business through the mud without both sides of an issue? Also, no; and neither should anyone else. Everyone that bashes his chip then praises data logging sounds like the LS swap guys chiming in on a dedicated old generation sbc build.

TylerZ281500 · Feb 28, 2019

In even minimal build cicrumstances people walk away with a heck ton of issues.

Do i have a leg to stand on here? Not with hard evidence any longer, pro tip, dont keep your laptop on the dash unsecured as it will fly out the window. I had all my logs on there as well as the "base" tunes he provided. it was astronimical what he had done. I can tell you but i cant show you. Ill bash him because my expeneriences almost a dozen times over have come back that i had to fix something he presented as a "good"product. considering he is the one main variable of his own product, and that someone like me, in a localized area of michigan, has had horrible experiences with one product from one company owned by one man, seems like its deserving of being called crap. LS swaps are great, we did CPCC on dual TBIs, ran great, ran TBI on an lt1 lower, not hard at all. LS is great, TBI is great, Vortec is swell, they are all pretty equally cool. Remember at one time everyone was saying just stuff a small block in it. now its LS, then itll be LT.......again.

Gavin · Feb 28, 2019

Sucks about your laptop; that's a hard loss. My outlook is the choices for an easy mail order custom chip are limited: Fast Chips & Harris Performance. Both of which you can go back and forth with to get as dialed in as possible. Otherwise it's Jet or Hypertech for a placebo. It's a hard thing to shell out the money then figure out you could do it better yourself; I just don't have the time, hard/software, or brain space to go thru all the manual tuning. You are the first person to actually respond that has had first hand negative experience so I was hoping you had details. I've heard more good than bad, not on this forum of course, but from a different site, a few shops around here, and the guy I bought a tbi from. It's just a chip running a mildly beefed up vortec; can't be too complicated. I'll cross my fingers and report back when my truck hits the road.

PlayingWithTBI · Mar 1, 2019

Here's what I ran into while tuning my 5.7L 88 C1500. This demonstrates some deficiencies in TBIChips Performance tune and the need for data logging.

This is from my tuning, way more fuel (BLM still running ~127 ave in data logs)