DIY Tuning - how to begin?

[T3Bunny]

There SO MUCH hidden in plain view (and sometimes just hidden) that its easy to miss stuff. I just wanted to post that link since this has become a sticky and I felt its vital that people know there is always more options.

[84ae]

Yeah, the only thing I would add is that tuning is a skill.

If you are new to tuning, it will seem difficult at first and your engine probably won't run quite the way you want it to. As you work at it, though, two things will happen:

- you'll narrow in on the optimum settings for your engine,
- you'll learn the skill of manipulating the various parameters, to get them to work together to produce performance, economy, driveability, etc.

So read all you can, then give it a try. And don't give up if you don't get it running perfectly in a half an hour. Like any skill, it takes practice. Keep working at it, and you'll eventually get the skill perfected, and not only will you be thrilled with how your engine runs, but you'll be happy to have a new (and quite rare) skill!

Lance.

Exactly.

Starting out new I learned how the various variables (pun?) all contributed and to what degree towards power/torque, a/f, etc.

It's just learning those, and learning to identify when to change one over the other.

It helps a damn lot to work at a dyno shop, but I'm still a relative newb, though, really. I suck at figuring out timing.