Help with a tune for a 2008 Acura CSX Type S

[EFICU]

You're welcome, glad you're happy with it. I'll put together the low octane map as well for the next time I hear from you. If I forget to post it next time we talk, just remind me please.

[Moist]

Hey EFICU,

I wanna apologize as I won't be able to grab the datalog today but I can grab it tomorrow if thats ok. Haven't been home today and didn't drive the car. I will get it as soon as I can tomorrow

Thanks

[EFICU]

You're all good, no problem at all. Whenever you get it we'll look at it, no rush. Thanks for letting me know. Talk to you tomorrow.

[Moist]

Here is my next datalog haha. Car has been great! Was a bit cooler today but otherwise nothing else just nice to kick in vtec all smooth haha.


Thanks!

[EFICU]

Had a couple knock pop up, so we'll keep working on it. I was also looking at the vtec crossover a little closer and I think we can lower it a little bit to get a little better performance from it. It looks like it's losing acceleration from 4300-4600, so I moved it down to 4300 in this next one. See what you think and let me know. Not that you do third gear pulls in real life, but it might help in some scenarios. Other than that it looks really good for everything else.

Same datalog and driving style.

Moist.SD.Rev12.1 (FInal)(Vtec4300)(SportPedal).fpcal

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[Moist]

Sure thats no problem I will flash it as soon as I can. We have been getting a bit of smoke here due to the forest fires in a different province. Do you think that might have a effect on the tune?

[EFICU]

It should be a negligible impact if any. If you were driving through a fire with heavy smoke you might get some type of drivability issues, but nothing unsafe. It would be struggling to get clean air basically for combustion is all. With residual smoke from a nearby fire you should be just fine.

[Moist]

Makes sense haha thats good. Here is the next datalog. Sorry for getting it so late wanted to go with no traffic but turns out decent amount of people were out at night haha. Near the end I was sort of just half playin around haha. But yeah hopefully its good!

Thanks

[EFICU]

Man it looks great. Had one knock in the part throttle area. I don't think it's a major issue, you have over 4000 data samples in that area and only registered one knock. But I took out just a little timing there to make sure it's gone. Fueling looked great, needed a little touch up from where we lowered vtec down to 4300. It looks like the crossover was a little stronger with it at 4300, hopefully it felt that way in the car.

Here is the next one. This should be the one, again, haha. Then we'll see how it looks, and we'll verify it over multiple days again like before. I just want to make sure it's as good as possible for you.

Moist.SD.Rev13 (Vtec4300)(SportPedal).fpcal

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[Moist]

haha yeah tbh it seems like a awkward area haha but thats great to hear! It definitely did feel awesome having vtec there absolutely loved the feeling haha. Cool I will flash it tomorrow and Ill do a run tomorrow!

Thanks

[EFICU]

Yeah it seems like every time I do a Canadian higher elevation car I learn something from working on your cars. I am working with another guy on here who is in the higher elevation and we had his vtec at 4100 before, then we moved it down to 3800 and he liked it even more. Now we're trying it at 3600 and his initial impression is he liked that too. His fuel curves are very different from your because of mods and TSX cams. It seems though the elevation likes the high cam earlier in the rpms which is interesting, but if it works that's all I care about. Glad it felt better, all the little things add up to making the car more fun to drive.

[Moist]

Crazy I didn't realize it would be that insane of a change hahah. I have always been curious but is lowering vtec that much healthy for the engine?
Otherwise wow idk why it felt real fast tonight. Almost like it wanted me to keep revving it up higher but of course I didn't want to go too fast as it was dark out haha.

Also Im curious what do the tsx cams do in terms of performance?

Thanks

[EFICU]

Yeah it definitely liked the lowered vtec point. Looking at the injector data around the engagement point, it's not falling off anymore right before vtec like before. Honestly we might even be able to go around 4000 on your and see what you think. It might give you that same kick you feel now but a little lower again at 4000, totally up to you though. Overall though it did look like the car was a lot faster, haha. Looking at your pulls they look more like lower elevation type pulls which is pretty good for you elevation there. That 1st through 4th gear you made looked like a lot more fun, and the 3rd gear pulls looks a lot stronger. Lowering the vtec point won't make those multi gear pulls faster, but the third gear pulls definitely got up and going quicker with it at 4300.

Yes it's safe to lower vtec to within a reasonable rpm. Most boosted applications like it around 3600 ish, depending on setup and mods. Hondata says you just don't want to lower down to like 2000 or something like that. I don't think I would go lower than 3600 because I don't see where you would get the benefit of it honestly. Maybe, you never know. Maybe some stroker motor with a full on built setup, or a drag race car that still has the vtec system maybe, but for a street car I couldn't see the benefit with a stock (ish) engine.

TSX cams have a little different profile than the 8th gen Si, or CSX in your case. So they pick up a little here and there, and allow a little more flow. I don't have a ton of experience with them, but for the price and the OEM quality they are a nice piece. If you're doing the cam swap yourself it might be worth it, if you're paying someone to do it you might go with a setup that makes more power so you don't have to pay for a second install for more hp cams someday, but it's all up to you. Everyone has their reasons and wants, which is what drives this industry and makes it great.

Other than that, the datalog looked great. No knock again, part throttle fuel was dead on, WOT fuel needed a couple tweaks. Let me know if you want to try vtec at 4000 in the next one, or if you would like to keep it at 4300. Either way is fine with me, I just want to give you the option for the vtec rpm. If you're more comfortable with it at 4300, then let's roll with that. If you're okay with trying it at 4000, we can do that. Just let me know and I'll post the next calibration for you.

[Moist]

Yeah haha that little pull to 4th was pretty wild. I'm glad the datalog is better this time around. I can definitely feel the difference compared to the 4600. I feel bad cause I missed second on that one pull hahaha. But yeah I do like it at 4300. I wouldn't mind testing out 4000 just to see how the datalog is but otherwise 4300 does feel perfect as is to be honest.

Also good to know about the lower vtec I was always sort of curious as you see people do some crazy lowering with it haha. The TSX cams sound interesting I guess its perfect like you said for a person wanting to get OEM sort of power. Id love to do power mods but honestly just with this intake this car is feeling great. I think in terms of Mods I will just do a full hybrid racing shifter, bushing, cmc and linkages just cause I feel like I miss 2nd somehow haha. Also I do like a great feeling shifter.

[EFICU]

Sounds good. Give this one a shot with vtec at 4000 and see what you think. From what I see the increase in power should be the same, just coming on at 4000 now instead of 4300. Will it kick harder, I don't know for sure, it would be more the same feeling just earlier in the rpms now. Of course, now that you know how it should feel you might psych yourself out. Haha. And be completely honest with me, if you would rather keep it at 4300 if that felt better just let me know. So test this one and see what you think.

Yeah I mean years ago I would have been guilty of not understanding why or how vtec lowering would help or hurt. I know back in the 99-00 Civic Si days, we didn't have i-vtec like these newer ones have. So vtec was really high and it came on at one rpm no matter what you did. Guys had very basic vtec adjustment tools to make vtec kick lower, but most of them didn't realize that doesn't necessarily give you more power unless it's tuned for it. Now with Hondata and datalogging capabilities we can make better decisions based on data. Not to mention i-vtec has made the whole system that much better by having a high and low threshold with varying parameters for vtec to engage. You can have vtec low like we're trying, but only have it engage under heavy throttle which is great.

You definitely have the right intake to have an intake only car. It would definitely help with some exhaust mods, but it looks like a lot of fun just with the intake. So you made the right choice with the intake for sure. Yeah on my old 8th gen I had the TWM shifter and shifter base bushings, HR cable bushings, and the EM1 CMC and slave. The HR shifter cable bushings and the EM1 CMC made the biggest differences in my car. The CMC and slave for obvious reasons, but the cable bushings really helped the feel. Then the shifter and shifter base bushings helped a lot too. I also put a 9th gen Si shift knob on mine which helped the feel a lot for me as well. The shift knob is always a preference, but adding that to the 8th gen package made a big difference to me, and looked really nice IMO.

Anyways, here is the next one. Made a couple WOT fuel changes, and the vtec change to 4000. See what you think, this one should be the one, so see what you think on the vtec rpm. And let me know how it goes.

Moist.SD.Rev14 (Vtec4000)(SportPedal).fpcal

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