- When it comes to tuning late model cars, it's becoming increasingly difficult to replace
the factory ECU with an aftermarket standalone ECU that's easily tunable by
aftermarket tuners.
This is because modern cars rely on intricate communications between a variety of
electronic control modules in order to make everything work properly.
I'm talking here about aspects such as the automatic transmission, even your gauge
cluster and your air conditioning.
So for late model cars, the more popular technique has been reflashing the factory ECU.
Essentially this is a technique where we can download the factory data out of the ECU,
manipulate it in the same way that the OE calibration engineers do so and then
flash it back into the ECU.
Of course as time has gone on, even this is becoming increasingly complex and we're
here with Chris from Banks Power to talk about an alternative solution for tuning
factory ECUs.
So Chris first of all just talking about the problem I just highlighted there, it is
getting increasingly difficult to reflash these factory ECUs, can you tell us what are the
problems there facing these aftermarket reflashing companies, why is it getting
harder for them?
- So the OEM manufacturers are actually basically encrypting these ECUs to the
point that no one can crack them.
So I think historically people are getting inside information to be able to figure
out how to unencrypt them but it's just getting harder and harder for everyone
to do it so we're finding many modern vehicles are hitting a block wall there.
- And the L5P which is the latest generation of GM's 6.6 litre V8 diesel turbo engines,
that's a case in point here.
When that was originally released, it wasn't something that could be tuned.
Can you tell us what was the problem there, was that the encryption?
- Yeah that's mostly the encryption.
So eventually someone found out I guess that you can crack open the ECU and go
through a pretty extensive process to replace some of the components to actually
get past that.
But it's definitely not user friendly to make that happen.
- We've gone through that with our own development vehicle and it's not user
friendly, you're right, particularly from our side of the world, we had to send the ECU
all the way to the U.S., it's also an incredibly expensive process where that
factory processor is actually removed from the board and then replaced with one that's
then programmable.
So let's talk about your alternatives, what is it that Banks Power have developed and how
does this work?
- So we have a product called a Derringer which is an inline tuner.
Inline tuner is really nothing new, it's been around for at least 20 or 30 years now.
But what we've done is we've modernised it by taking the OBD2 data off the ECU and
using that to basically refine the calibration and make it more safe than anyone else.
- OK so let's talk about the terminology you've used there, first of all inline tuner.
So this isn't a reflash, you're not actually modifying the factory ECU at all,
it is just left completely intact and this is an add on module.
Where do you add this into the system?
- Yeah that's correct so this is a plug and play module where we intercept a couple of
different signals on a diesel engine like the L5P, it's going to be the fuel rail pressure
and the manifold pressure sensor.
So what it does, it takes the input data from the sensor into the control module,
the Derringer, it looks at those values along with the ECU data and determines how much
extra fuel and extra manifold pressure we can add to it and it amends the signal so
basically check the engine to give us extra boost or extra fuel rail pressure.
- So in very very basic terms, if we just dumb this down, one of the ways we can
get a lot more power out of a diesel engine is by adding additional fuel.
So let's just deal with that for a start, so in order to do that, you're intercepting
the fuel rail pressure signal, so can you tell us what the Derringer does in order to
get more fuel into the engine?
- OK so the Derringer, the L5P has two signals, it's a rising and a falling signal, so we intercept
both of those and look at it.
So let's say it's commanding 2000 bar of fuel rail pressure and we know that's 4.0 volts.
So we want to basically add 300 bar to that so we'll basically say that now we'll output
the signal as 1700 bar, so maybe that's 3.8 volts.
And the ECU looks at that, says hey I'm not making enough fuel rail pressure so it'll
turn up the fuel pump and basically try to raise the pressure back up to that.
So now we have the original 2000 bar plus the new 300 bar so we've essentially raised
the fuel pressure by 300 bar.
- So basically you're just lying to the factory ECU, tricking the signal,
telling it it doesn't have as much fuel pressure as it is wanting to achieve
so it'll then raise that fuel pressure and can you just tell us how that additional
fuel pressure results in more fuel being delivered into the engine?
- So basically since the injectors are, the quantity of fuel injectors are a
function of the pressure as long as they're on time.
So the inline tuners don't change the on time, they just change the pressure
but with that higher pressure, you have more quantity of fuel, better atomisation as well,
so some other benefits there which gives you more power.
- So basically you're holding the injector, or the factory ECU is holding the injector
on for the same pulse width but because there's more fuel pressure or differential
pressure across the injector, more fuel is being delivered into the cylinder for
that period of time.
Now the problem is if we just add fuel, we are going to make more power but
we end up with a richer air/fuel ratio, we end up creating a lot more heat,
we also end up with potential for creating smoke in the exhaust system.
Not great when we're talking about emissions equipped vehicles.
So the other aspect of that there that you mentioned is the manifold pressure signal.
So you're intercepting that and cheating that signal as well, what's the effect of doing that?
- So by adding the extra fuelling, like you said you're going to get rich
conditions, you're going to have extra, higher EGTs.
You're basically going to be limited in the amount of power that you can have before
you run into these limitations.
So by intercepting the manifold pressure and checking it to add extra air or boost
pressure, you bring the air/fuel ratio back to its original level, that's the goal at least,
and that gives you better control of the EGTs, less chance of having excess soot and
basically a safer, more sustainable power level.
- Alright that all makes sense and these technologies as you've mentioned,
they're not new, you haven't really created anything new here in terms of something
to cheat those signals.
They've been around for a while but conventionally what I have seen with these
piggyback modules that do exactly that is they just cheat the fuel pressure and the MAP
signal everywhere and this is where the Banks Power Derringer does go a little bit
further with that OBD2 signal so an you talk to us about how you're using that signal
and how you're manipulating the manifold pressure and fuel pressure signals as a
result of that?
- OK so our Derringer connects to the Idash 1.8 which is the OBD2 gauge so that's basically
the control unit, that's getting all the information and sending it to the Derringer.
And we're using things such as EGT, trans slip, EGR activity, RPM, AFR as well to kind of
basically fine tune the calibration.
So when we calibrate the device we look at exactly when the ECU kind of catches
that there's something going on and that something's not quite normal so we can
fine tune the calibration to adjust the amount of fuel and the amount of air in those particular
spots to make sure that we give the absolute best performance possible without having
any issues like check engine lights.
- Yeah so that interface with the OBD2 port allows you a lot more control over exactly
when and where you're delivering that fuel as well as the safety elements there,
monitoring aspects such as the EGT.
And you just touched on the factory ECU knowing that something's not right and I
wanted to just dig into that in a bit more detail 'cause of course as we've seen the
ECUs become more and more sophisticated, they, you can't go crazy with fuel pressure
or manifold pressure because the ECU will pick up something's not right.
So what sort of development do you do to figure out exactly how far you can push
these things and where the limits lie?
- So we just do a very thorough calibration job on the product itself.
So we slowly creep up on it, we add more and more fuel, more and more air
and we kind of find the optimal level and then once we, if we do run into some kind
of limitations such as a check engine light 'cause of the fuel rail pressure signal,
we'll look at exactly where that occurred using freeze frame data or the datalog that
we take when we're calibrating and then from there try to figure out what we
can do to avoid that from happening.
So things like changing the calibration in that one spot or ramping in or changing the
rate of which we're amending the signals, stuff like that.
- And can you give me some indication, let's say for example the L5P obviously
one we're personally interested in, what sort of gains over a stock calibration are you seeing
with the Derringer installed?
- So we're seeing about 60 horsepower, 100 pound foot of torque, right around there
and also if you add an air intake system, we found ways to kind of change the EGR
activity to add an additional 20 horsepower.
So if you have both of those two products combined, about 80 horsepower.
- That's a decent increase and the other aspect there, I assume that that's going to
be a safe calibration regardless whether you're driving around in an unlaiden truck
or you're towing a massive load up a long hill?
- Yeah that's correct and we also have active safety features so we're the only inline tuner
product to use bypass relays.
So let's say some signal is out of the norm or you kind of lose power to something,
our products will have relays that automatically
snap the signal back to stock and completely bypass everything.
So that's another feature that helps keep the vehicle safe and running smoothly.
- Now as well as the Derringer, you do have a range of gauges for displaying a variety of
different information and I'm just interested in diving into those.
Obviously the more data that we can gather, the more thorough we can analyse how
the engine's performing, particularly when you're developing calibrations like you are,
then this gives you a lot more information to know the quality of your tune.
But I'm just interested in finding out a little bit more about how you get the data
into these gauges so can you tell us how they work?
- OK so the gauge itself plugs into the OBD2 port and it'll read everything that the ECU
has to offer.
So we have it programmed for pretty much every mode one parameter that's available as well
as quite a handful of vehicle specific proprietary parameters.
- So this means basically, even if you don't want to add any additional sensors,
you plug that straight into the OBD2 port and you've got all of the basic
parameters and potentially some more advanced depending on which particular
vehicle you're dealing with?
- Yeah, some of the modern diesels we're seeing over 80 parameters just from plugging
into the ECU by itself so it's pretty extensive.
- And then if you want to go a little bit further, maybe you want to add something
unique, maybe you want to analyse that turbo performance in a little bit more detail,
maybe add some pressure and temperature pre and post turbocharger or turbo speed,
how can we go about doing that?
- So yeah the system's expandable for up to four Idash gauges to monitor everything
and from there you can also add sensor modules.
So we have a five channel analogue module which as four analogue pressure, temperature,
zero to five volt signals along with one frequency input so you can do stuff like
RPM or turbo speed.
You can have up to six of those on one system as well as we have a four channel
thermocouple module which gives you four EGTs or any thermocouple input.
That could be run into the Idash 1.8 and you simply configure it on the gauge itself
to say this is, channel A's the pressure sensor, it's in the manifold, channel B's the
temperature sensor, it's in the manifold.
And we also automatically calculate special parameters for analysis.
Things like manifold air density which we hold a patent on, displaying and monitoring that
system.
So I'm sure some of you guys are familiar with manifold density but the Idash will
automatically display that to you in real time so you can datalog and monitor it
and kind of evaluate it for performance.
- So it means you don't have to go and calculate that for yourself.
Now in terms of datalogging, is this purely through the gauge or is there the ability
to datalog and then analyse in a bit more detail on a laptop software?
- So the gauge itself has a micro SD card in the front so all you do is you pop in the
card and you configure the datalog for up to 100 different parameters,
up to 20 samples per second and then you just hold the button down and it starts to
datalog and it records.
We also have a flag marker so if you have like a knock event or some kind of incident
you can put a marker in that datalog.
Once you finish you take the SD card out, it's a .CSV file so it's a universal file format.
Pop it into your computer, you can use Excel is the most basic thing but there's a handful
of different data analysis programs that you can use to dive into the data and
really see what's going on with your engine.
- Now those sensor modules that you were talking about just a moment ago as well,
these communicate via CAN so basically you could think of them as an analog to CAN
converter?
- Yeah that's correct.
So we have our own CAN bus network that we call Banks Bus so it's a closed loop
system but yeah it's all CAN bus so you only have to run one wire through the firewall.
It really simplifies everything, all the modules stack together to really make it compact
and easy to wire up for the individual, it's very expandable.
- Yeah I think that's probably important to mention because if you are going to be
adding a lot of sensors, the wiring can be a real headache so dealing with just a two
wire bus makes that nice and easy.
Look it's been great to get some insight on that product Chris, thanks for your time there.
- Thank you very much.
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