So, the boss has given the go-ahead to get the Xcalibrator, which should be reason enough, but I'm still in need of more convincing.

It's kinda like wanting something for a long time, then when you have the money, you wait anyway.

So anyway, the throttle lag bugs me, especially today as I tried to pass a cement truck, and that's definitely one thing I'd like to improve.

I am, however, still a little nervous about the warranty issue.

So, anybody wanna talk me into the Xcalibrator?

 

Well, im in the same boat you are, or I was untill about 10 min ago. I have a 2year lease and a totally stock f105. I Had a Ram with a Hemi before this, about 5 months ago. Then I saw the Xcal chip. Man the throttle lag bugs the hell out of me, when with my ram i could hit it and it would go. Then with all the power I think it will be worth it. I called Troyer today and after that I was convinced. Im gonna be calling toamrrow to order it up. So really it is alot of money but think about what you are getting for it, and that you will be able to reuse it if you get a new truck.

 

Simple. List your reasons for NOT getting it. And the warranty issue is a 'state of mind' issue, not an actual physical issue. So let's not get all hung up on a non-issue. Besides your fear of possibly being denied warranty on some unforseen failure even though it hasn't been an issue for anyone else (except those stupid enough to tell the service advisor they have a tuner), list any other reasons for NOT buying it.

 

They cannot deny you warranty unless they can prove that the tuner caused the problem. Even if you have a tuner and you tell them you do (which really isn't very smart), they still have to prove it.

If throttle lag is your major issue, and you do have the money to get the Xcalibrator (or the permission for your boss to get it) I am not sure what more anyone could do....

My major complaint with these trucks (besides the brake dust) is the throttle lag. So I bought the Troyer Perfromance Stage 2 kit. After reading HellboundF150's posts in this forum, its a no brainer to me....

Although it sounds like I may need slicks now....

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by phenom
I am, however, still a little nervous about the warranty issue.

Come right out and ask your dealer if installing a tune will void your warranty.

I asked the service manager at my dealership if my warranty would be voided with a tuner. He told me no, not at their dealership, but he couldn't speak for others. He believes in the advantages that the tuners give to our trucks. The dealership sells the 1714 at their parts counter.

 

I have the money, and the okay from the boss/wife, I just hafta do it.

I didn't come right out and straight-up ask that, but after talking to the warranty guy at my dealer, I was definitely given the impression that my warranty would be voided if a tuner was discovered.

 

I've got the 1714 now, is the Xcalibrator a better device? What are the major differences?

 

Asking a service manager if an aftermarket performance modification is going to "void the warranty" is an invitation to them telling you that ANYTHING you do to modify the vehicle will "void your warranty." Want to know one of the big reasons why? Because when they do work under warranty, they get paid far less to do that work than when you or I have to pay for that *exact* same work when we pay out of our pocket - so there are a number of dealerships who will go out of their way to avoid doing warranty work - and this is an excellent example of one way.

Remember, they can *SAY* anything they want to in a hypothetical situation, and they aren't breaking the law - but the TRUTH is you have very specific rights under the law in this regard, and the truth is NO, you warranty CANNOT be automatically voided just because you are using some aftermarket part - whether it is performance, appearance or replacement in nature - this applies to ALL aftermarket parts.

You have the right to do anything you want to your vehicle, and to use any part on that vehicle you want to - as long as what you use or do to that vehicle does not actually *DAMAGE* the vehicle, then by law your warranty remains intact. It's the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, and you can learn all about it over at www.sema.org - Those are the people we largely have to thank for protecting our rights as vehicle owners, as if it weren't for them, the automakers would still have a complete monopoly on all parts, and they got away with those shenanigans for many years before the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act. Some still try to jerk vehicle owners around, so the smart vehicle owner knows his/her legal rights and enforces them, rather than begging someone's paid help to dictate what you can and cannot do with YOUR OWN PROPERTY.

The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act is a good set of "fair play" rules that protect the consumer and the automaker form each other - there are also some vehicles owners, like some Lightning owners for example, who will do serious modifications pushing their vehicles WAY beyond any reasonable limits, race the vehicle to death, and then it blows up, take the mods off, tow the vehicle in and swear they never modified anything - that isn't right, either. Fair is fair.

NEVER walk into a dealership and ask them for their approval or permission to modify your vehicle - of course they're not going to indemnify you, and that is precisely what you are trying to get them to do - bad idea. Remember, dealerships have little knowledge of whose aftermarket parts are actually safe to use and have proper design, R&D, etc., built into them - of course they can't possibly know all that. That isn't what they do for a living - they fix (usually) vehicles for a living, so they have very little knowledge about modifying vehicles, by and large, or what really is and is not safe and/or appropriate to do, what manufacturers are good to use and which aren't, etc., etc.

There are some dealerships we have selling Superchips products, some that we provide our custom tuning for, some that we provide a LOT of performance parts for, that they sell, install & support on their customer's vehicles - but it's a small percentage of dealerships overall. By and large, usually what you will be told is that you cannot modify anything, or you will "lose your warranty." Speaking of which, it's a myth that your vehicle's entire warranty can be voided except under very extreme situations - if you do something dumb like strap on a nitrous oxide system & blow up the engine, well, that individual warranty claim could be denied - but not your entire vehicle's warranty voided.

Almost no dealership is going to tell you "sure, go right ahead and do xxxx modification and your warranty will still be fine." Of course they aren't going to indemnify you like that, nor should that be expected.

Learn your rights under the law, and enforce your rights. Choose your aftermarket parts wisely, and NEVER let some dealership or anyone else dictate how you use or enjoy your own property - don't even take our word for any of this, learn what your rights are by dropping by www.sema.org Spend time doing your homework as to what types of parts and from who are known to be safe & viable, and do things the smart way.

If you'd like to go over just what types of performance modifications you can reasonably do to these vehicles and not push them beyond their design limits and not cause failures, etc., feel free to give us a call - that's what we do.

 

Hi Yan,

Just FYI - any time you have a question, get into the habit of using the SEARCH feature here - you can look up that information and just about anything else you could ever want to know about this very quickly. Again, just FYI........

Briefly........

It's not that the Xcalibrator is a "better" device - that's not it at all. The Xcalibrator is used to load our *custom* tuning into, and it's the *tuning* that determines the results - not what device is used to deliver the tuning to the PCM.

If you want the best possible results, then our custom tuning is the way to go as we get larger power gains, more performance improvement, better driveability, and many other aspects improved upon further because it is our in-depth custom tuning, instead of "standard" performance tuning.

Don't get me wrong, the 1714 works very well, and it is the best "standard" performance tuning on the market for the 2004 F-150's - and many people are enjoying them!

It's just that if you want the absolute best performance tuning, then you come to use for our Troyer Performance custom tuning, as we have specialized in performance-tuning the F-150 platform for longer than anyone else - which is one of many reasons why we get the best results with our custom tuning.

Just remember, it's the actual tuning, not the device used to deliver the tuning that determines how well the vehicle responds.

I hope this brief info helps, & if you'd like to go over this in more detail, please feel free to give us a call at our number listed below.

Good luck with your truck!

 

This is the best explanation to this age old question of Warranty Voiding I have seen in one post.

Thanks Mike. I will be ordering my Xcalibur soon.

 

re: the warranty info

All that being said, let me clarify a little: The day I spoke to the warranty guy at my dealer was the day my cam phaser tapping got checked. It so happened the guy is a former FoMoCo employee (and I'm a current one), and he said much the same stuff as you, Mike, with exception to the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, which, to no suprise, he didn't mention at all.

He told me about a guy who owned a Mustang who did what you mentioned - a big pile of engine mods that eventually cooked the engine. He then unbolted everything (gauges and all) and had it towed in, wanting a warranty replacement for his engine. They pretty much laughed at him. He didn't even remove the mounting brackets or wires for the gauges and such.

I told the warranty guy I was getting the Magnaflow SIDO catback installed the following day, and asked what he thought about that as it related to my warranty. He told me that, in the "highly unlikely" event that my aftermarket exhaust caused a problem, then my warranty would not cover it. "You're talking about an exhaust, though," he said, and went on to tell me he'd be quite surprised to see an exhaust be a culprit for anything.

So we started talking about tuners, but he was more talking about chips and other mods that did things like remove rev limiters and the such, pushing the engine beyond its means. We didn't get into specifics more than that, as he was doing most of the talking and I was checking my watch for the end of my lunch break.

So, while he did tell me it was probably not a good idea to add performance mods if I was worried about my warranty, he didn't actually come out and say "your warranty will be voided." Thinking back, I'd say he was pushing the corporate message as much as he felt comfortable with.

With all this in mind, including hundreds of posts here at f150online, I talked to my neighbor, who happens to be in calibration at Ford. He also expressed concern about altering (or even removing) the rev limiter, as he recalled durability issues with rev limiters over the 6000 range. If I remember correctly, he also expressed concerns about spark knock in the 90-degree, humid summer. Overall, he was against the idea of the tuner, but not enough to convince me either way.

I forwarded him a few posts by you about some of his concerns, especially one I found that mentioned how you handle the rev limiter (or more accurately, DON'T handle it ), and I haven't had a chance to talk to him since. I am curious about the points he made to me, and I am organizing them for when I give you a call, hopefully in the next couple days.

I am definitely interested in the 9300, and above all (warranty or otherwise), the wife said "okay," and we all know how important that is.

I'll be calling in a few days. Thanks for all your information and contributions to this site.

 

Hi Phenom,

Thanks for your response, & glad to hear you work at Ford & have excellent contacts there (such as in calibrations), etc.

I couldn't agree more - there 's NO sense or performance reward (even in the short term) in spinning a 5.4 motor to 6000 rpm (let alone beyond that), etc., that does no good. In fact, we do not like to see anything more than about 5400 rpm in these F-150's with automatic transmissions, as if the torque converter is frequently pushed beyond 5400 rpm, it will balloon. That is one of the first "weak" links in the drive train terms of absolute number of rpms to turn in a stock mod motor'd F-150, the torque converter. We don't do those kinds of things, as we want our customer's vehicles to have a normal service life - and the last thing we want is for Ford to get PO'd thinking that we're causing them more warranty repairs, so we don't do a number of things simply because it's just not appropriate or safe for the vehicle.

I think it really gets down to platform knowledge - there are *far* too many "tuners" and companies out there who are willing to claim all manner of things to sell their products - I guess that's true in any business. when you get right down to it. Knowledge is key, and marketing far too often consists of much more hype than fact.

I especially appreciated you mentioning that scenario regarding that Mustang owner what he tried to pull - that is outright fraud, and should be treated as such. Those actions drive up the price of these vehicles to all of us, and cause automakers to have to be just that much more vigilant and "err" on the side of denial in the case of a "dispute." Fair is fair, it's just that simple.

We have been privileged to provide custom tuning & many other performance products & services for numerous FoMoCo employees at various levels for many years now - and it's an honor to serve them all.

I do have to admit that I sometimes get on a rant about what some dealerships tell people regarding modifying their vehicles - in our end of things, we many times have to deal with dealerships who aren't interested in fair play, but instead in doing as little warranty work as possible, usually due in no small part to the low labor reimbursement rates under warranty from virtually all the automakers - that is an industry-wide issue.

It's only fair to mention that there are plenty of great dealerships out there, too - like our local dealerships, who do a great job of doing what's fair for the vehicle owner, the automaker, and themselves. It's not a job I envy, to be sure.

Thanks again for your post, & best of luck whatever you decide!

 

The lag is NOT due to the computer program, it is due to restrictive intake. I have an new stock F250 I just placed a K&N FIPK on, and the lag is GONE..simple as that.

That being said, I just ordered an XCalibrator from Troyer.... I have a feeling this truck will be like the disease I have with my motorcycles.

 

Don't know about your F250 but on my F-150 I had removed my stock intake and installed my Airaid and Magnaflow Catbacks before I got my tune and STILL had the throttle lag. So at least on my truck I believe it WAS due to the factory tune. If you say its not the computer (PCM) programming then why did the factory put out a TSB to correct the throttle lag on the F-150's?

 

Hi Ham,

You're absolutely right, it's in the tuning, not in the intake tract.

The other poster (Wryfox) means well of course, it's just that he has a 2001 model F-150 - which does NOT have the ETC system, and thus never had the throttle lag problem we discuss here to begin with.

The problem that we all commonly discuss here as "throttle lag" is something that is specific to the 2004 & newer F-150's *only* - meaning those that have the ETC system (Electronic Throttle Control, or "drive by wire"). And in the 2004 & up new body style F-150's, which are the F-150's that have the ETC system, the inherent throttle lag is indeed in the tuning, just as you mentioned.

If owners of pre-2004 F-150's ever drive one of the newer trucks for any length of time, they'll know the meaning of true "throttle lag!" It's those owners who owned pre-2004's & traded in on the newer trucks who usually complain about the terrible throttle response of the new trucks most - thankfully, the cure is a simple phone call to us for a custom tune.

Of course a good intake kit will help overall throttle response on the pre-2004 F-150's, no argument there - but they do not have the "throttle lag" problem we talk about here, that's is found in the ETC trucks only.