Mapping a Car
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Right before any of the piss takers take the piss I'm genuinely interested in learning how you map a car. I understand enough to know about a dyno and how it gives you information about your engine.
But mapping a car to get the best performance out of an engine is completely different to having your engine on a dyno'ed. How do you do it, take the cars through the rev's etc to get the best performance when you have to do it on an open road. How do you explain it to the 'Royal Highwayman' if you get caught speeding that your just doing your job and mapping a car.
How can you get the best out of a car when your limited to a road where you can only go so far with a car before you HAVE to give up the speed.
PLEASE don't take the mickey I'm really interested in finding out what Stu and Harvey and that other bloke from Grove do.............
But mapping a car to get the best performance out of an engine is completely different to having your engine on a dyno'ed. How do you do it, take the cars through the rev's etc to get the best performance when you have to do it on an open road. How do you explain it to the 'Royal Highwayman' if you get caught speeding that your just doing your job and mapping a car.
How can you get the best out of a car when your limited to a road where you can only go so far with a car before you HAVE to give up the speed.
PLEASE don't take the mickey I'm really interested in finding out what Stu and Harvey and that other bloke from Grove do.............
Last edited by **Claire**; 02-11-2008 at 02:29 AM.
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Find a nice long steep hill, and take runs in different gears, revs and throttle%. Tune fueldelivery, ignition timing and so on till the car runs perfect.
There is soooooo much you can do, and I don't know 1%
There is soooooo much you can do, and I don't know 1%
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Women and maps don't go. It'll end up, upside down.
Joking aside Claire, Stu did a massive thread on mapping and I am trying to find it for you. It's great.
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I've spent so much time with cars that I think it's about time that I actually understand what bhp and torque really mean but what I really want to know is how do you map a car through the gears? And get the best performance etc when you can't really do it to the maxim because you might get caught??
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I've spent so much time with cars that I think it's about time that I actually understand what bhp and torque really mean but what I really want to know is how do you map a car through the gears? And get the best performance etc when you can't really do it to the maxim because you might get caught??
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I've just realised the time lol!!
I'm now up with the dirty stop out's from a Saturday night!!
Oh the joys of having a 9 week old baby
Seriously though I know Stu will be on here to answer some of my questions!!
I'm now up with the dirty stop out's from a Saturday night!!
Oh the joys of having a 9 week old baby
Seriously though I know Stu will be on here to answer some of my questions!!
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I know that they have the computer thingy so it can tell the exhaust gasses etc and the boost gauge I think (I'm probably talking shit now but I want someone to tell me how it really works), like mapping a car on the open road as opposed to on a dyno, there has to be a difference, because when your driving a car your forcing air into the engine and when your dyno'ing ' it you don't have the same affect's as on an open road
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I'm not sure Claire. I just know Christian likes to use the Dyno and if I remember correctly Karl Norris said similair to you. There are some intersting threads I am trying to find for you.
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https://passionford.com/forum/showth...ristian&page=2
There is a good thread, and I quote from Karl.
Benni.
There is a good thread, and I quote from Karl.
Just to clarify folks, I was in no way criticising torque of the devil. I was simply commenting on the problems associated with RR's and in no way was singling out TOTD.
Christian, as much as I consider you a friend, I totally disagree about mapping a car on a RR. You simply CANNOT map a turbocharged car running high boost levels on a RR. You cannot sustain enough cooling adequately to maintain both ACT's, load, radiated cooling and of course extraction cooling caused by air flow both under and over the car. You also cannot create the necessary pressure differentials required to allow airflow through the radiator and intercooler matrix, as you would on a high speed run in the real world.
RR's are great diagnostic machines for fault finding and a good tool for checking out the effect of things such as cam timing, etc, but you cannot map a highly boosted turbo engine correctly
Christian, as much as I consider you a friend, I totally disagree about mapping a car on a RR. You simply CANNOT map a turbocharged car running high boost levels on a RR. You cannot sustain enough cooling adequately to maintain both ACT's, load, radiated cooling and of course extraction cooling caused by air flow both under and over the car. You also cannot create the necessary pressure differentials required to allow airflow through the radiator and intercooler matrix, as you would on a high speed run in the real world.
RR's are great diagnostic machines for fault finding and a good tool for checking out the effect of things such as cam timing, etc, but you cannot map a highly boosted turbo engine correctly
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Right I've read that but all it says is just what I said before, you can't really map a car on a dyno, rolling road. It needs to be on an open road, so, to the tuners amongst us, how do you do it/get away with it. You get so many car's through your doors that you must be shittin it every time you go out on a motorway with the cars because if you get caught then that's your lively (sp)hood gone so to speak or am I not understanding what you all do when you map a car??
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Of course you can map an engine on an engine dyno.. and as long as the installation is pretty good, it'll be 99% correct for the road when you go out and check it too. The things that take time are getting the car to idle right and sorting out transient fuel control. The peak power (MBT or det-limited torque) is the easy part.
You shouldn't worry too much about the gears, that's not super relevant to making a calibration. The things to understand about gearing is that when out on the road, the taller gears (and thus time spent in them) causes heat to build up greater than lower gears, which can show det not present in 1/2/3.. this is why you should always do proper road testing in the higher gears.. It's probably the #1 reason that people melt their engines as they're fine for short blats around town or whatever, but as soon as they hold it in in 5th for long periods of time the det creeps in and wipes the engine out..
I think Stu did a guide on mapping.. probably worth having a read.
You shouldn't worry too much about the gears, that's not super relevant to making a calibration. The things to understand about gearing is that when out on the road, the taller gears (and thus time spent in them) causes heat to build up greater than lower gears, which can show det not present in 1/2/3.. this is why you should always do proper road testing in the higher gears.. It's probably the #1 reason that people melt their engines as they're fine for short blats around town or whatever, but as soon as they hold it in in 5th for long periods of time the det creeps in and wipes the engine out..
I think Stu did a guide on mapping.. probably worth having a read.
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There are many pro's a lot better than stu or karl that would agree/disagree with them, as it is a opinion.
On a dyno you can do lots of things that you can't on the open road, a dyno can control the temps perfectly with the right gear, the one I use uses air conditioning where necessary, so air temp can be precisely controlled as can fan draught speed, there is no forcing of air, as the engine consumes what it wants the turbo is the only air force, loads can be held at any speed/gear/torque or bhp for as long as you like which a live map won't be able to do.
Just my thoughts, why not go along to a rr for a look ?
tabetha
On a dyno you can do lots of things that you can't on the open road, a dyno can control the temps perfectly with the right gear, the one I use uses air conditioning where necessary, so air temp can be precisely controlled as can fan draught speed, there is no forcing of air, as the engine consumes what it wants the turbo is the only air force, loads can be held at any speed/gear/torque or bhp for as long as you like which a live map won't be able to do.
Just my thoughts, why not go along to a rr for a look ?
tabetha
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I'm sure there are lots of works level and OEM calibrators who are better.. but unfortunately not accessible!!
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I can see the sense of doing a calibration 99% on the dyno then finalising it on the road. I'd always like to have it checked on the road though.
With regard to loading the engine up, you can hold it back on the brakes but they tend to get a bit hot if doing it constantly. It doesn't have to be done in the higher gears but it would be kinder to the brakes.
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There are many pro's a lot better than stu or karl that would agree/disagree with them, as it is a opinion.
On a dyno you can do lots of things that you can't on the open road, a dyno can control the temps perfectly with the right gear, the one I use uses air conditioning where necessary, so air temp can be precisely controlled as can fan draught speed, there is no forcing of air, as the engine consumes what it wants the turbo is the only air force, loads can be held at any speed/gear/torque or bhp for as long as you like which a live map won't be able to do.
Just my thoughts, why not go along to a rr for a look ?
tabetha
On a dyno you can do lots of things that you can't on the open road, a dyno can control the temps perfectly with the right gear, the one I use uses air conditioning where necessary, so air temp can be precisely controlled as can fan draught speed, there is no forcing of air, as the engine consumes what it wants the turbo is the only air force, loads can be held at any speed/gear/torque or bhp for as long as you like which a live map won't be able to do.
Just my thoughts, why not go along to a rr for a look ?
tabetha
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as for the "what f you get caught" thing, just try not to get caught
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heard a great story about a tuner whos on here mapping a rather high powered cosworth. passed a cop car at silly speed which tried to give chase, driver shits himself "what do i do!" mapped calmly removes detcans, turns round and says "well i don't fancy stopping do you" then calmly puts detcans back on and continues mapping
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Think what tabs is saying people is that tuning/mapping is a matter of opinion, like ALL things in life. You will never find 2 tuners that will 100% agree on EVERYTHING and they will both produce the same maps. They will near as dammit be 90-95% the same but the other 5-10% will come from THAT INDIVIDUAL'S opinion, knowledge and past experience.
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i dont think you'll find one single tuner in the world who will agree that a rolling road is the BEST place to map a car? even those that do it on the rollers. (ignoring cost constraints)
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My post wasn't aimed at RR mapping by the way, but just on the actual map, that every tuner has a difference of opinion on certain aspects and you will find no two tuners that will produce identical maps for the same car. There will be differences.
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heard a great story about a tuner whos on here mapping a rather high powered cosworth. passed a cop car at silly speed which tried to give chase, driver shits himself "what do i do!" mapped calmly removes detcans, turns round and says "well i don't fancy stopping do you" then calmly puts detcans back on and continues mapping
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I must say that after many kilometers of driving with a mapper and all the equipment in the car I cannot imagine complete mapping on the road. I can imagine things like we do - so check up of a map that was created on rolling-road, sometimes small adjustments, but it is still so crazily dangerous. Another problem is that many cars are really NOT roadworthy, I mean e.g. you cannot see around etc. I only 1,5 week ago nearly crashed into oncoming car in a rallycar we were testing, there is so little rear visibility in those small mirrors, big hans-ready seats etc...
There are probably others here whosometimes drive for mappers, and I wonder if they have the same experience that these guys are somehow different. My mapping-guy can look into his laptop when we go over big bump at full speed, and keep calmly talking to me under full braking from 280kph when a lorry decides to move into fast lane... I have no idea how can you do something on your laptop on a racetrack at full pace (we did that too), would make me vomit in 10 seconds probably and the guy seems to enjoy.
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Read the mapping tutorial by Stu
https://passionford.com/forum/technical-essay-archives/33590-live-mapping-tutorial-by-stu-discussion-required.html
Stu has some good articles on mapping and other stuff on his website.
http://www.motorsport-developments.co.uk/stus.html
https://passionford.com/forum/technical-essay-archives/33590-live-mapping-tutorial-by-stu-discussion-required.html
Stu has some good articles on mapping and other stuff on his website.
http://www.motorsport-developments.co.uk/stus.html
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Don't worry about it most people on here would know about the technical details of how to map a car (Including me).... Google is your friend
. as for speeding if you explained to a police man you are speeding because your mapping a car, you would probably get in even more trouble for thinking you are above the law because your trying to get 10 more bhp from an old sierra.
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Don't worry about it most people on here would know about the technical details of how to map a car (Including me).... Google is your friend
. as for speeding if you explained to a police man you are speeding because your mapping a car, you would probably get in even more trouble for thinking you are above the law because your trying to get 10 more bhp from an old sierra.
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...i didnt check my rear view mirror first
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some minutes later the copper pulled us up and was wondering WTF was going on. i explained about the fact the car was being tuned and had bits hanging off of it and he let me off.
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he said "yeah, thought it smelled a bit rich" i was like "WTF, the fueling was spot on"
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