basic engine management

Rallytech14

Rallytech14

New member
hey guys,

im a senior in high school i just got my first subie

2002 WRX

i dont know too much about engine management.

i was planning on doing just catback exhaust and intake

for starters

i know that with any car you have too tune it after mods like that too get anything out of them

i was looking at the cobb accessport, or should i just have someone tune for me?

i saw someone with a UTEC for 250$, whats a UTEC? it says it already has maps on it. is it a handheld tuner like the accessport? would that be a good investment?

whats a ECU flash?

what are the "stages"? ive never really understood that

i guess i really dont know what i need or buy to do to get decent performance, engine management wise that is

any info anybody could tell me would be great.

thanks!

 
dflwrx

dflwrx

New member
For anything short of a wild race build, or a car that NEEDS on the fly map switching (ie, not 99% of street vehicles) a stock ecu reflash is the way to go.

A stock ECU reflash requires no new hardware if you can find someone with the required cable to plug into your car's OBD2 port. I'm sure there are a handful of other people on this forum aside from myself that have the cable (tactrix cable). I've tuned quite a few cars from scratch in the past with a variety of EM systems, including the stock ecu reflashes, but I just don't have time to do much tuning anymore. The nice thing about a stock ECU reflash is that even if you can't find someone to "tune" your car, it should be very easy to find someone that can at least load a stage 1 or stage 2 base map onto your ecu.

My personal recommendation for your situation would be to find someone on the forum with a tactrix cable and Romraider and ECUflash (free programs required for stock ecu reflashing). Once you've identified that person, you can have them tune it, if they're knowledgeable enough and willing, OR you can have that person help you find a map on http://www.romraider.org that they've checked out and looks good. From that point they should be able to help you load the map onto the ECU and take a few logs of the car at WOT to make sure it's not knocking and to make sure driveability seems good.

My only other recommendation would be to stay away from any intakes that don't explicitly state they have an inner diameter of 65mm. Larger diameter intakes alter the cross sectional area inside the MAF housing and cause the car to run lean. On a stock turbo WRX there are essentially no power gains from an aftermarket intake compared to the stock airbox with a decent filter in it, so you might want to consider saving your money. You can get ~ the same performance and ~ the same sound by removing the air intake silencer inside the passenger side fender. IT's a quick job and the turbo and diverter valve are both more audible afterwards. If that's your primary motivation for getting an intake I'd simply pull the intake silencer out and save the money you'd spend on the intake to spend on a new Uppipe or downpipe.

 
2point5RS_Dan

2point5RS_Dan

HATER DAN
Make one thread for your car instead of 600000000. Read the nasioc link above. Just go open source to stage 2 if your insistant on more power.

 
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