My Powerchip Review

[MsM3]

good luck hope everything turns out well.

[powerchip]

Surprised at how many group buy people had questions still via pm. Guys I encourage you to contact me if you have a question, some benefit of this thread is people who had pc tunes who have been worried from what they read are contacting me to find out if they need to be reflashed. By all means contact me and lets work it out, and thanks for the support from those of you who understand my perspective.

Matt

[kal112]

hmm i was looking around for a tune, and i was going to get powerchip but now !! i don't know.

i want a good gain tune any suggestions ?!!

[alpine335i]

Originally Posted by kal112

hmm i was looking around for a tune, and i was going to get powerchip but now !! i don't know.

i want a good gain tune any suggestions ?!!

Search. You will find tune threads all over the first page too.

[mazda3ndp]

so what happens if one has the powerchip tune and wants to flash back to OEM, will powerchip retune to OEM? Personally I am thinking of retuning to OEM, if all this blame game is going on over emissions, imagine if this were over a blown motor... i dunno, just speculating here

[hogwild]

So I have been trying to follow this thread but am still not sure if the tune I got last year is what???? I dont want to go in to get smoged in Cali to find out I cant pass because of the tune and all of sudden Powerchip is out of business and Im stuck with a tune with no one to take it out or fix it?????? I am now concerned.

[Ben335]

Originally Posted by hogwild

So I have been trying to follow this thread but am still not sure if the tune I got last year is what???? I dont want to go in to get smoged in Cali to find out I cant pass because of the tune and all of sudden Powerchip is out of business and Im stuck with a tune with no one to take it out or fix it?????? I am now concerned.

Here is a pretty simple test. When you start your car pay attention to your dash. If you see the Service Engine Soon light up for a couple of seconds and then go off, then you are fine. If the SES light never comes on, you have problems as your CEL is completely turned off.

Worst case scenario, you can always go back to the stock tune and that would solve your problems.

[bills742]

Well I guess I'll chime in here as well since I was part of the group buy with Ben and Don. I also failed emissions due to readiness when I was under the impression that I would pass. I too was told that the threshold would simply be altered and not turned off completely. I contacted Mike yesterday and he told me there would be a $50 shipping charge each way for the flash kit to correct the tune. Is Mike still part of powerchip? Regardless, I will be contacting Matt for a solution.

[dcgolfdr]

Originally Posted by hogwild

So I have been trying to follow this thread but am still not sure if the tune I got last year is what???? I dont want to go in to get smoged in Cali to find out I cant pass because of the tune and all of sudden Powerchip is out of business and Im stuck with a tune with no one to take it out or fix it?????? I am now concerned.

I went conservative and went with Dinan to match my midpipe.

[BPMSport]

Hi everyone,

I was just alerted of this thread and my intention is to post a response shortly. It will most likely be on Sunday as I have a pretty packed schedule until then.

Thank you for your patience and I look forward to responding to clear this up.

[lvwirelessguy]

Originally Posted by Mike@Powerchip

Hi everyone,

I was just alerted of this thread and my intention is to post a response shortly. It will most likely be on Sunday as I have a pretty packed schedule until then.

Thank you for your patience and I look forward to responding to clear this up.

Mike,

No disrespect intended here, but I think a lot of people here feel that you are representing Powerchip as an employee of their company and that is simply not the case.

My hope is that someone from Powerchip will start lurking around these forums a bit more in the future so that fires can be put out before they get started.

[Ajax-Prime]

[BPMSport]

When people started contacting me regarding their check engine light being turned totally off - I was in awe as much as the general public was. I immediately went down to my car in the garage and lo and behold my CEL light was completely disabled, not just for the 02 sensors as it was advertised to me. This was verified by turning my ignition on, and checking for CEL illumination.

I went to bat for all of these customers (and myself), and Matt honored free free flashes for these people. The CEL light being turned off was originally put in the code by Jeremy, now with OE tuning. I really put a lot and time and effort into trying to coordinate all of the re flashes. I felt just as the customers did that it was unacceptable to have the light turned completely off, and that definitely was not what I advertised. For this reason, all customers (to my knowledge) were sent a flash kit, at our cost of about $100 ($50 overnight each way). This was the right thing to do and I accommodated many people to take care of this issue. And I specifically told Matt that this should be at no charge to the customer, and he agreed.

Dondon, as far as the shipping, I'm really surprised that you've posted something negative on behalf of me when I have done nothing but try and help you out. I spoke with Matt and he did not want to entertain shipping a flash kit out to you a second time, at another cost of $100. I explained to him that I didn't think that was fair, because the customers purchased the software with the understanding that the thresholds would be raised, and that the customer should not bear the burden of this mishap. Matt agreed to pay for half of the shipping, which is essentially paying for a one way trip ($50). I called and spoke with DonDon at length and told him that I tried my best and agreed with him that he shouldn't be liable for this shipping charge, and that Matt agreed to cover half of this shipping to clear this up. DonDon then called me a couple days ago and was furious that he was charged $50 for shipping - which is exactly what he agreed to with me on the phone. I have no reason to lie as it doesn't benefit me in these situations. I told DonDon and Ben specifically that I was happy that Matt agreed to cover half, but not happy that he didn't agree to the other half. DonDon says in his OP that "I was even ok with splitting the shipping but they wanted to charge me for their mistake?", which is exactly what Matt agreed to - $50, which is half of the shipping. Regardless, I told Matt and DonDon that I thought it should be covered 100%.


Ultimately the decision is in Matt hands, not mine. I've worked with Powerchip stemming all the way back to 2008, and have never intentionally misrepresented anything to a customer. As many of you know, cars are a big hobby of mine and the car tuning industry is not my main business. Anything that I have ever said to a customer was verified either by Travis (who is no longer there), or Matt. I stand nothing to gain by being untruthful. I spoke with Matt on the phone regarding refunds, and forwarded emails from Ben and Don to him to try and mediate and resolve the issue. Matt sent me an email on 8/3 which stated "Refunds are within first 2 weeks no exceptions, Wayne won't entertain that idea and cat delete cars shouldn't apply to even the 2 week return policy." Like I've said previously, the decision is not mine - I have just tried to be an advocate for the customers.

Regardless, Matt and I will continue to do anything we can for the customers experiencing issues. The Powerchip tune is a very solid tune, and I think our customer service has come up quite a bit over the last few months. Please feel free to contact Matt or myself for any assistance. We look forward to resolving these issues moving forward and I really apologize for any inconvenience this has caused. I myself have to get flashed back to stock in order to pass emissions here in CA. I tried to offer DonDon/Ben as many solutions as possible, such as flashing back to stock, getting smogged, and then flashing back with the tune. I told him that between the smog that is due and the next smog we would probably have a more definitive solution for him. I even went as far as pulling up the Siemens documentation and roughly telling him the procedure to have the readiness codes set, which is:

Idle for 3 minutes cold
Drive between 20-30 for 5 minutes
Drive between 45 and 60 for 5 minutes
Idle for 5 minutes
Switch car off and leave it off for 5 minutes

While:
Not exceeding 3k rpm
Not exceeding 60mph
There are no large fluctuations in throttle position

I believe that i have done everything in my power to remedy this situation, and also believe that I have gone beyond the call of duty in terms of trying to be a mediator between the customers and Powerchip, to ease tension and keep everyone happy. Again, if you are experiencing any issues, please contact Matt or myself and we will do our best to resolve it to your satisfaction.

Thanks,
Mike

[TOOMANYCARS]

I had mine flashed, on location, at the Powerchip group buy when they had it in the NY/NJ/CT area last year. Jeremy and Mike were professional to deal with, online and in person, I told Jeremy, on spot, to flash the car with stage 2 software but don't touch any emission related coding, and that's exactly what I got. Car was noticeable faster and more responsive and still a joy to drive to date. Although check engine light came on numerous times due to Fabspeed's failure delivering quality HFC, but I had installed the Akra delete-R to deactivate the light. When the time came for inspection (NYS), I simply swapped out my straight pipes (threw junk HFC to garbage & replaced with straight pipes) for factory primary cat pipes, which were modified to go with the Fabspeed's X-Pipe. I have to admit it's pain in the butt happens once a year, but I think it's the only solution to have the best of both worlds. I'm not saying I'm on Powerchip's side nor fellow members', but I'd been playing with cars for 10 years, and there is absolutely no way around emissions if you live in states which vehicle codes are strictly enforced.

[DoNDoN]

Originally Posted by Mike@Powerchip

When people started contacting me regarding their check engine light being turned totally off - I was in awe as much as the general public was. I immediately went down to my car in the garage and lo and behold my CEL light was completely disabled, not just for the 02 sensors as it was advertised to me. This was verified by turning my ignition on, and checking for CEL illumination.

I went to bat for all of these customers (and myself), and Matt honored free free flashes for these people. The CEL light being turned off was originally put in the code by Jeremy, now with OE tuning. I really put a lot and time and effort into trying to coordinate all of the re flashes. I felt just as the customers did that it was unacceptable to have the light turned completely off, and that definitely was not what I advertised. For this reason, all customers (to my knowledge) were sent a flash kit, at our cost of about $100 ($50 overnight each way). This was the right thing to do and I accommodated many people to take care of this issue. And I specifically told Matt that this should be at no charge to the customer, and he agreed.

Dondon, as far as the shipping, I'm really surprised that you've posted something negative on behalf of me when I have done nothing but try and help you out. I spoke with Matt and he did not want to entertain shipping a flash kit out to you a second time, at another cost of $100. I explained to him that I didn't think that was fair, because the customers purchased the software with the understanding that the thresholds would be raised, and that the customer should not bear the burden of this mishap. Matt agreed to pay for half of the shipping, which is essentially paying for a one way trip ($50). I called and spoke with DonDon at length and told him that I tried my best and agreed with him that he shouldn't be liable for this shipping charge, and that Matt agreed to cover half of this shipping to clear this up. DonDon then called me a couple days ago and was furious that he was charged $50 for shipping - which is exactly what he agreed to with me on the phone. I have no reason to lie as it doesn't benefit me in these situations. I told DonDon and Ben specifically that I was happy that Matt agreed to cover half, but not happy that he didn't agree to the other half. DonDon says in his OP that "I was even ok with splitting the shipping but they wanted to charge me for their mistake?", which is exactly what Matt agreed to - $50, which is half of the shipping. Regardless, I told Matt and DonDon that I thought it should be covered 100%.


Ultimately the decision is in Matt hands, not mine. I've worked with Powerchip stemming all the way back to 2008, and have never intentionally misrepresented anything to a customer. As many of you know, cars are a big hobby of mine and the car tuning industry is not my main business. Anything that I have ever said to a customer was verified either by Travis (who is no longer there), or Matt. I stand nothing to gain by being untruthful. I spoke with Matt on the phone regarding refunds, and forwarded emails from Ben and Don to him to try and mediate and resolve the issue. Matt sent me an email on 8/3 which stated "Refunds are within first 2 weeks no exceptions, Wayne won't entertain that idea and cat delete cars shouldn't apply to even the 2 week return policy." Like I've said previously, the decision is not mine - I have just tried to be an advocate for the customers.

Regardless, Matt and I will continue to do anything we can for the customers experiencing issues. The Powerchip tune is a very solid tune, and I think our customer service has come up quite a bit over the last few months. Please feel free to contact Matt or myself for any assistance. We look forward to resolving these issues moving forward and I really apologize for any inconvenience this has caused. I myself have to get flashed back to stock in order to pass emissions here in CA. I tried to offer DonDon/Ben as many solutions as possible, such as flashing back to stock, getting smogged, and then flashing back with the tune. I told him that between the smog that is due and the next smog we would probably have a more definitive solution for him. I even went as far as pulling up the Siemens documentation and roughly telling him the procedure to have the readiness codes set, which is:

Idle for 3 minutes cold
Drive between 20-30 for 5 minutes
Drive between 45 and 60 for 5 minutes
Idle for 5 minutes
Switch car off and leave it off for 5 minutes

While:
Not exceeding 3k rpm
Not exceeding 60mph
There are no large fluctuations in throttle position

I believe that i have done everything in my power to remedy this situation, and also believe that I have gone beyond the call of duty in terms of trying to be a mediator between the customers and Powerchip, to ease tension and keep everyone happy. Again, if you are experiencing any issues, please contact Matt or myself and we will do our best to resolve it to your satisfaction.

Thanks,
Mike

Mike,

I have talked to Matt extensively and he has no recollection of you talking to him about my shipping issues. He even told me that if you said $25 was the shipping charge then he would have given it to me. You said you went to bat for me but the VP of the company does not even know what you are talking about? You then texted me to "stop putting words in your mouth" when you are doing the same to me with the post above? I never agreed to $50 and if I did then why would I call you to complain about it? You need to stay out of this whole ordeal as I am now dealing with Matt from this point on.

Don

[BPMSport]

Originally Posted by DoNDoN

Mike,

I have talked to Matt extensively and he has no recollection of you talking to him about my shipping issues. He even told me that if you said $25 was the shipping charge then he would have given it to me. You said you went to bat for me but the VP of the company does not even know what you are talking about? You then texted me to "stop putting words in your mouth" when you are doing the same to me with the post above? I never agreed to $50 and if I did then why would I call you to complain about it? You need to stay out of this whole ordeal as I am now dealing with Matt from this point on.

Don

I will ask Matt to personally post in this thread and address these comments directly. I am also willing to produce phone records. I was just as confused as you were when you called me and said "my card was charged $50". Do you remember my response? It was "that's correct, you agreed to half of the shipping charges which is $50"

It's ridiculous to say that Matt and I did not have a conversation SPECIFICALLY about your shipping. In fact, if I recall correctly, I talked to you, then told you that I had to talk with Matt, and then called you back which is when we discussed the shipping charges.

You are acting like I am working against you. Considering I spoke with Matt and told him that it should be covered totally, it makes absolutely no sense that #1 you say Matt has no recollection of this conversation, and #2 that I would set an arbitrary price of any amount considering I believed that you deserved to have it covered.

It's simple - I called Matt and told him it should be covered completely. He did not want to entertain that idea. He then agreed to cover half. I called you back and you agreed to pay for half of the shipping. Now where our misunderstanding lies is in the total cost of the shipping. Obviously I spoke with Matt and you were charged HALF which is $50. If I hadn't spoke to him don't you think you would have been billed $100? So it comes down to a matter of fact that you thought you were going to pay for half of $50 instead of half of the $100. I did text you and said "stop putting words in my mouth" because you said that I agreed to $25. When in reality I got Matt to agree to $50 instead of the full charge of $100.

I should have told you to call Matt and not try to mediate to reduce the shipping fees. This is a perfect example of going above and beyond to help someone and having it bite you. Do you think I care if you were charged $100, or $25, or nothing? Do you think I get a commission from what you are charged on shipping? Really - get real. My best interest was for you to get free shipping, which I couldn't get agreement from Matt on because that's close to $200 total in shipping between the two re-flashes. What do you think I gain out of charging you shipping? Absolutely NOTHING except an unhappy customer, which is why I tried to have it covered pro bono.

This is besides the point, but you were sold the M3 tune at a HUGE discount - $600 total. And that was for three of you for helping us organize the group buy (mainly Ben335i). Our CEL Delete tune retails for $1490 and sells for $1190 as the board discounted rate. It was cut in HALF for you as a good faith gesture from me when this group buy was organized. I spoke to Matt on the phone just now and read him your post and his words were "that's not what I said". It seems as if there was yet another miscommunication not only between me and you over $25, but between you and Matt as well.

[DoNDoN]

Originally Posted by Mike@Powerchip

I will ask Matt to personally post in this thread.

It's ridiculous to say that Matt and I did not have a conversation SPECIFICALLY about your shipping. In fact, if I recall correctly, I talked to you, then told you that I had to talk with Matt, and then called you back which is when we discussed the shipping charges.

You are acting like I am working against you. Considering I spoke with Matt and told him that it should be covered totally, it makes absolutely no sense that #1 you say Matt has no recollection of this conversation, and #2 that I would set an arbitrary price of any amount considering I believed that you deserved to have it covered.

It's simple - I called Matt and told him it should be covered completely. He did not want to entertain that idea. He then agreed to cover half. I called you back and you agreed to pay for half of the shipping. Now where our misunderstanding lies is in the total cost of the shipping. Obviously I spoke with Matt and you were charged HALF which is $50. If I hadn't spoke to him don't you think you would have been billed $100? So it comes down to a matter of fact that you thought you were going to pay for half of $50 instead of half of the $100. I did text you and said "stop putting words in my mouth" because you said that I agreed to $25. When in reality I got Matt to agree to $50 instead of the full charge of $100.

I am now sorry that I EVER went to bat for you. I should have told you to call Matt and not try to mediate to reduce the shipping fees. This is a perfect example of going above and beyond to help someone and having it bite you. Do you think I care if you were charged $100, or $25, or nothing? Do you think I get a commission from what you are charged on shipping? Really - get real. My best interest was for you to get free shipping, which I couldn't get agreement from Matt on because that's close to $200 total in shipping between the two re-flashes. What do you think I gain out of charging you shipping? Absolutely NOTHING except an unhappy customer, which is why I tried to have it covered pro bono.

This is besides the point, but you were sold the M3 tune at a HUGE discount - $600. And that was for three of you for helping us organize the group buy (mainly Ben335i). Our CEL Delete tune retails for $1490 and sells for $1190 as the board discounted rate. It was cut in HALF for you as a good faith gesture from me when this group buy was organized. Again, I deeply regret having helped you at all, and I will make sure that Matt posts here to clear this up. I spoke to him on the phone just now and read him your post and his words were "that's not what I said". So I'm not sure if it's Matt and I conspiring against you for no reason or if you are too thick sculled to comprehend what was said.

This is really unprofessional of you to make a post like this. This is great customer service being provided here by Powerchip. So am I making this whole thing up that Matt said this to me? What would I have to gain from doing this? You are sinking Powerchip lower and lower and I am pretty sure this is exactly what they did not want.

[PedM5]

hi don,

Mike did go to bat for you, but after our conversation the first time around I assumed the amount we agreed upon was ok with you, a guarantee of 25 bux or comped was not agreed upon. I wasn't aware until talking to you guys that you were told we change tolerances and after talking to mike he told me our previous group told him that's what we do. As I said on the phone I don't blame you for getting angry, etc. When there's communication via proxy there's bound to be misunderstandings. if you were guaranteed worst case scenario is 25 and best to be comped that was not the case. 50 bucks is no big deal but obviosuly its the principle of the matter which I am sympathetic to. If I knew you were guaranteed 25 of course I wouldn't want to upset you over 25 dollars difference but that's not how it was explained to me.

At any rate, the important thing now is keeping your car on the road and I will work closely with you to make sure that happens. Please call my cell phone to update me when you can even if its late. Mikes intentions were not sinister and neither was ours, let's fix your situation and we can have a drink and laugh about it later

[m33]

It's funny -crazy - bugged out how your apart of power chip and had no idea that you had a tune with such symptoms ! Shows a lot of carelessness ......

Originally Posted by Mike@Powerchip

I will ask Matt to personally post in this thread and address these comments directly. I am also willing to produce phone records. I was just as confused as you were when you called me and said "my card was charged $50". Do you remember my response? It was "that's correct, you agreed to half of the shipping charges which is $50"

It's ridiculous to say that Matt and I did not have a conversation SPECIFICALLY about your shipping. In fact, if I recall correctly, I talked to you, then told you that I had to talk with Matt, and then called you back which is when we discussed the shipping charges.

You are acting like I am working against you. Considering I spoke with Matt and told him that it should be covered totally, it makes absolutely no sense that #1 you say Matt has no recollection of this conversation, and #2 that I would set an arbitrary price of any amount considering I believed that you deserved to have it covered.

It's simple - I called Matt and told him it should be covered completely. He did not want to entertain that idea. He then agreed to cover half. I called you back and you agreed to pay for half of the shipping. Now where our misunderstanding lies is in the total cost of the shipping. Obviously I spoke with Matt and you were charged HALF which is $50. If I hadn't spoke to him don't you think you would have been billed $100? So it comes down to a matter of fact that you thought you were going to pay for half of $50 instead of half of the $100. I did text you and said "stop putting words in my mouth" because you said that I agreed to $25. When in reality I got Matt to agree to $50 instead of the full charge of $100.

I should have told you to call Matt and not try to mediate to reduce the shipping fees. This is a perfect example of going above and beyond to help someone and having it bite you. Do you think I care if you were charged $100, or $25, or nothing? Do you think I get a commission from what you are charged on shipping? Really - get real. My best interest was for you to get free shipping, which I couldn't get agreement from Matt on because that's close to $200 total in shipping between the two re-flashes. What do you think I gain out of charging you shipping? Absolutely NOTHING except an unhappy customer, which is why I tried to have it covered pro bono.

This is besides the point, but you were sold the M3 tune at a HUGE discount - $600 total. And that was for three of you for helping us organize the group buy (mainly Ben335i). Our CEL Delete tune retails for $1490 and sells for $1190 as the board discounted rate. It was cut in HALF for you as a good faith gesture from me when this group buy was organized. I spoke to Matt on the phone just now and read him your post and his words were "that's not what I said". It seems as if there was yet another miscommunication not only between me and you over $25, but between you and Matt as well.

[BPMSport]

Originally Posted by Michael F

I hope this isnt a stupid question.

Why would a tuner completely disable CEL in the first place? I mean what are the reasons they would do it at all?

And just to show I'm really confused what's so bad about disabling CEL anyways?

Don't all tuners disable CEL for CAT delete anyways?

In my opinion it should never be completely disabled, unless the customer requests that it be - for whatever reason - whether it be off road use only, some sort of custom setup that would throw lights, etc..

It's not going to damage anything. People drive with CEL's all the time. Usually it's an emissions related fault that doesn't effect driveability. But it's much better to have it come on if there is a present fault and I wouldn't have it any other way on my car, which is why I pressed for everyone to be reflashed that had theirs, unbenounced to me, turned off.

Tuners usually turn off the rear o2 sensors which can cause the car to code for catalist efficiency in both banks, but wont trigger an MIL (malfunction indicator lamp).

[SonnyJack]

Originally Posted by Michael F

I hope this isnt a stupid question.

Why would a tuner completely disable CEL in the first place? I mean what are the reasons they would do it at all?

And just to show I'm really confused what's so bad about disabling CEL anyways?

Don't all tuners disable CEL for CAT delete anyways?

I think as was stated in an earlier post disabling the CEL only for emissions related codes is the norm because the tune and/or modified exhaust results in codes being generated. But if you disable the CEL for ANY and ALL codes then you are in affect blinding yourself as the driver will never be alerted to any issues with his/her engine.

At least I think this is the major problem. Basically if you're in a state that requires regular testing it's a real PITA!

[SonnyJack]

Originally Posted by Mike@Powerchip

In my opinion it should never be completely disabled, unless the customer requests that it be - for whatever reason - whether it be off road use only, some sort of custom setup that would throw lights, etc..

It's not going to damage anything. People drive with CEL's all the time. Usually it's an emissions related fault that doesn't effect driveability. But it's much better to have it come on if there is a present fault and I wouldn't have it any other way on my car, which is why I pressed for everyone to be reflashed that had theirs, unbenounced to me, turned off.

Tuners usually turn off the rear o2 sensors which can cause the car to code for catalist efficiency in both banks, but wont trigger an MIL (malfunction indicator lamp).

OK, what he said.