Chips Know It All - Buy the magazine!

[Ken]

I won't type the complete article of course, but I will give you a tease, and hope you go out to buy your own copy. See if this will meet your needs when it comes to your questions about C4s and modifying the chips for its computer.

TEACHING AN OBD DOG SOME NEW TRICKS
by Shawn M. West P.E.

When it comes to custom tuning, the bulk of the reporting tends to focus on the new OBD-II engines such as the LS1 or the older carbureted applications, but not much is written about early C4 Corvettes or the TBI/TPI F-body cars. With the OBD-I setup, the first thing everyone craves is a "performance chip," which can easily cost $250 for a stock configuration and twice that for a custom design.

But dig this: with a little computer savvy, do-it-yourselfers can create their own custom performance chip for very little loot. In this article, we'll talk about the equipment necessary to program your own chips, then we'll review some of the key aspects of creating the custom chip. Finally, we'll look at a test case to measure the impact of DIY tuning on the performance of an '86 Corvette test mule.

Before we did any programming, we consulted with pros Craig Moates (www.moates.net), Jesse Azzato (www.azzatochips.com), and Sean Collins (www.accordcentral.com), regulars on the Internet at www.corvetteforum.org and www.thirdgen.org.

We're here to provide some initial exposure to DIY chip tuning as well as the capabilities and the current state of the technology. This investigation is by no means complete.

Now run right out and buy your own copy of Chevy High Performance magazine's October 2004 issue to read the rest of the article.