Evolve VS Alpine

[shashankj88]

I've heard a lot of great things about both Evolve as well as Alex from Alpine on this forum. I am looking to delete my primary cats and do an engine and DCT tune with the exhaust overrun calibrated in. I'd like a little flexibility in terms of being able to play with a few things by myself as well since I also work as a calibration engineer and kinda know what I'm doing. Looking for suggestions regarding which direction to go in. Open to other tuner or tuning tool options as well..
Thanks

[eatsleepboost]

Oh boy. This is gonna turn into this thread...

http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1477712

[mkPOTO]

not going to happen regards to any tuner willing to let you mess around with there calibration.

[Solo_M_Tech]

I don't know any company that will let you modify their software.

[///M3Fresh]

Like previously stated no one will let you play around with their software. What specifically are you looking for on the evolve tune overrun that you'd like to know? I've been running their S65/trans tunes for the about 5 years now, on two separate M3's.

[shashankj88]

I've only ever worked on fully instrumented vehicles with stand-alone ECU's, so I guess that I was a little curious about figuring out the capabilities on a bone stock, production vehicle. With the over-run, I was looking to see how much I could calibrate within reason keeping the boundaries safe, the valve overlap, spark timing and injector cal.

[shashankj88]

Power is not the goal. 400 + hp at the crank is more than I need. The goal is slightly worse driveability.

[Solo_M_Tech]

This has to be a troll post.

[shashankj88]

Why? Coz I don't know and I'm asking?

[///M3Fresh]

Originally Posted by shashankj88

I've only ever worked on fully instrumented vehicles with stand-alone ECU's, so I guess that I was a little curious about figuring out the capabilities on a bone stock, production vehicle. With the over-run, I was looking to see how much I could calibrate within reason keeping the boundaries safe, the valve overlap, spark timing and injector cal.

I don't know the technical calibrations but I have many iterations of the overrun feature that they(Evolve) have done for me. I load and try them and use whats best. The overrun feature is relatively new to the MSS60 and I feel that either its not possible to dial in perfectly or vendors haven't truly unlocked it from my experience.

Simply, the easiest way youll know its too aggressive is youll truly start misfiring from too much fuel combusting and igniting up to the header/head. Outside of that once youre happy with how the over run feature works for you, you can then do oil analysis and see if there is an increase of fuel levels in your oil. That would be a red flag the feature isn't designed right or too much of it and it needs to be scaled back.

As far as drivability, I have a feeling you will notice almost like a dead spot in your pedal. This is the amount of gas pedal travel you need to input to initiate and keep the overrun going but in day-to-day driving it can be annoying. For example, while my car is DCT I still prefer to back off the throttle when shifting (instinct driving MT cars) and when slowly rolling on the throttle I notice a dead spot that will not be there if I load a non overrun feature. Personally I want my cake and eat it too and haven't found a solution yet. I think there may be a vendor on here that does a true over run without any input of throttle. Ill have to confirm from a few other members to be for sure.

From the looks of it though Alex's tune with overrun works the same as Evolves, when it comes to initiating it but I cant speak for the drivability, yet. Hope that helps.

[shashankj88]

Originally Posted by ///M3Fresh

I don't know the technical calibrations but I have many iterations of the overrun feature that they(Evolve) have done for me. I load and try them and use whats best. The overrun feature is relatively new to the MSS60 and I feel that either its not possible to dial in perfectly or vendors haven't truly unlocked it from my experience.

Simply, the easiest way youll know its too aggressive is youll truly start misfiring from too much fuel combusting and igniting up to the header/head. Outside of that once youre happy with how the over run feature works for you, you can then do oil analysis and see if there is an increase of fuel levels in your oil. That would be a red flag the feature isn't designed right or too much of it and it needs to be scaled back.

As far as drivability, I have a feeling you will notice almost like a dead spot in your pedal. This is the amount of gas pedal travel you need to input to initiate and keep the overrun going but in day-to-day driving it can be annoying. For example, while my car is DCT I still prefer to back off the throttle when shifting (instinct driving MT cars) and when slowly rolling on the throttle I notice a dead spot that will not be there if I load a non overrun feature. Personally I want my cake and eat it too and haven't found a solution yet. I think there may be a vendor on here that does a true over run without any input of throttle. Ill have to confirm from a few other members to be for sure.

From the looks of it though Alex's tune with overrun works the same as Evolves, when it comes to initiating it but I cant speak for the drivability, yet. Hope that helps.

This is super helpful, thank you. I think that the dead-spot comes from an aggressive spark retard but I'm not sure. I'd have to look at the BSFC maps to tell if the injector timing is delayed also. There's several ways to induce over-run. What I was going for was how the Abarth 500 does it. It's a little simpler and shouldn't give you that dead-spot. You basically deactivate the fuel cut-off on lift pedal and use the VVT to induce valve overlap. so you'd have the pops and bangs as fuel ignites in your hot exhaust only on lift pedal condition. Production cars usually don't have this as it damages the O2 sensors. This is why I was trying to figure out how each tuner approaches it and what degree of capability they have.

[///M3Fresh]

Originally Posted by shashankj88

This is super helpful, thank you. I think that the dead-spot comes from an aggressive spark retard but I'm not sure. I'd have to look at the BSFC maps to tell if the injector timing is delayed also. There's several ways to induce over-run. What I was going for was how the Abarth 500 does it. It's a little simpler and shouldn't give you that dead-spot. You basically deactivate the fuel cut-off on lift pedal and use the VVT to induce valve overlap. so you'd have the pops and bangs as fuel ignites in your hot exhaust only on lift pedal condition. Production cars usually don't have this as it damages the O2 sensors. This is why I was trying to figure out how each tuner approaches it and what degree of capability they have.

Yea, the fact that we don't really get the zero's and one's puts us in the dark and we can only speculate. I have talked to a handful of Gintani tune owners and Gintani appears to be doing it right, a true overrun. No throttle input, and no dead spot. Problem is I don't want to spend 700-1K just to fix the overrun when I've bought Evolve tunes for my last 3 M3's from them and each was 600+

Where abouts in MI are you? I just moved from Michigan, lived there the last 25 years of my life.

Edit: Outside of the Overrun feature, Evolve has been awesome, or I wouldn't have kept staying with them. Their customer service is top-notch! I didn't want it to sound like I am unhappy with my Evolve tune, more so to say a feature isn't perfected, yet! And they are willing to try and solve it.

[shashankj88]

Originally Posted by ///M3Fresh

Yea, the fact that we don't really get the zero's and one's puts us in the dark and we can only speculate. I have talked to a handful of Gintani tune owners and Gintani appears to be doing it right, a true overrun. No throttle input, and no dead spot. Problem is I don't want to spend 700-1K just to fix the overrun when I've bought Evolve tunes for my last 3 M3's from them and each was 600+

Where abouts in MI are you? I just moved from Michigan, lived there the last 25 years of my life.

Edit: Outside of the Overrun feature, Evolve has been awesome, or I wouldn't have kept staying with them. Their customer service is top-notch! I didn't want it to sound like I am unhappy with my Evolve tune, more so to say a feature isn't perfected, yet! And they are willing to try and solve it.

That makes sense. I decided to go with Alex (Alpine) purely based on all the great reviews I read about his work. Maybe he'll be receptive to answering some of my questions.

I live in Ferndale at the moment. You should say Hi if you come visit again.

[///M3Fresh]

Originally Posted by shashankj88

That makes sense. I decided to go with Alex (Alpine) purely based on all the great reviews I read about his work. Maybe he'll be receptive to answering some of my questions.

I live in Ferndale at the moment. You should say Hi if you come visit again.

I had some family in Ferndale and lived just a few miles north of you, in Troy.

Let me know how it goes with Alex. I used him for all my coding on my cars surprisingly. Even my wife's X5. If he can get it right and not have it effect drivability I would be open to getting a new tune!

[shashankj88]

Originally Posted by ///M3Fresh

I had some family in Ferndale and lived just a few miles north of you, in Troy.

Let me know how it goes with Alex. I used him for all my coding on my cars surprisingly. Even my wife's X5. If he can get it right and not have it effect drivability I would be open to getting a new tune!

Sounds good. I'll post an update here once the whole process is done.

[opihi5]

Evolve is probably the most flexible tuning company imo. I've had them send me countless files with different settings and testing backfire tunes. Other companies like bpm or gintani usually limit you to one or two files.