Just wanted to come online and give my impressions after installing the XCA L2. First off I ordered a 87 perf, a 87 towing and 92 perf. However when I received my XCAL2 today and only had one 87 tune and that was the towing. I decided to go ahead and load it up with the 87 tow since that's what was in the tank. I didn't really expect a whole lot right off the bat because I know this is something that gets stronger with time. I have modded many vehicles before such and silverado w/5.3 and dodge ram with hemi and also an acura rsx type-s. I put an intake, exhaust and programmer to each and let me say I never really felt a seat of the pants gain with any of those. Now back to the XCAL2. I took my brother for a ride with me while the truck was still stock and did some 0-60, 0-90 and rolling 20 runs so he could see how the truck responded. I then downloaded the 87 tune from troyer and repeated those same runs. By the way I just put 20's on the truck w some 285/50/20 tires which slowed me down a bit. The difference in the troyer tune and stock was very noticable to me and my brother almost immediately. The throttle response was night and day. I have always thought the tip in on the f-150 was good and pretty quick but now it has some ***** when it kicks down. I can't wait to run the 92 perf tune when I run through this tank of gas. I know this has been said many times but this is how the truck should have run to begin with. I feel like this was money very well spent for myself. The only mod I have on my truck is a Corsa SI/SO sport exhaust. Just wanted to let you guys know my impressions and to thank Mike and his staff publicly for the great product.

 

Thanks for the post,I hope you post the progress.Waiting for mine,possitive comments after the first install is what I've been waiting for.Thanks again!!

 

Me too here!!!! I'm too excited and patiently waiting

 

Fellas, I too am in the long line of waiting patiently like a kid on Christmas...It's exciting to hear the first time impressions...Thanks

Joe

 

Delivery was botched on the 8th as Dale must have gotten lost or was back in the pack as usual and fell asleep before he found my 'hood.

I finally managed to pick it up yesterday and after reading the Troyer and SCT docs, I loaded it right there at the UPS center. While it was loading I thought "this is not the best place to be doing this" but no hitch in backing up the stock program or loading in the 93 perf.

I disconnected the XCal2 and fired it up. No, not that - the truck!!!

I hit the button and disabled O/D and started rolling. There was a noticable difference in shifting and it's all good. I haven't done a WOT yet but it leaps off the line much better and 1-2 is quite firm while 2-3 is less firm but not anything like the p.o.s. stock program. I think my stock program was literally killing my truck.

With O/D enabled it is definitely better than stock. I think O/D is not good for this trannie. The truck seems to wander between 3-4 to much between 45-55 mph. I did notice that with O/D enabled it doesn't downshift with 1/3 - 1/2 throttle when going 20-30 mph when I would think it should. Further evaluation will be done with this.

The only think I am concerned about is that I noticed when stopped or barely crawling and I give it some gas (in traffic) I occasionally heard a new sound and I am not sure what it was. I was only giving it a very little throttle - stop n go traffic. Would I get cheapo serpentine slippage from minor throttle inputs in 1st gear? Perhaps someone can shed some light on this.

I am going to guess mine is one of the factory leaners. There are times after shifting into a higher gear that it seems to be in a slight lull or hesitation.

Do you folks drive with O/D disabled most of the time when under 55 mph or what is the rule of thumb for O/D?

Thanks,
Rooster

 

I want, I want, I want, I want, I want... Gotta wait a little longer...

 

Hi txnolebd,

Glad to hear you are enjoying it! Our tuning does wake the truck up like it should be, and to get that much difference just from tuning on a 3-ton truck is quite an improvement.

Have fun,

 

Got my xcal2 on Wed . Ups man dropped it off at 1:45 . I leave for work at 2. Lets just say I got to test my tune on my way to work , since I didn't leave until 2:20. Wow , the throttle response it great. The truck really jumps at about 3000rpm and keeps getting it until it shifts around 5000. Mike I'm really impressed with it . Thanks. Hope to talk to you soon about pullies and a fan kit. I gotta put in a few extra hours at work first.

Brad

 

Congrats on your new found truck. I have to agree with you when you said that this is the way these trucks really should run. Have fun and be safe. Just try not to get pulled over too much. I had my first pull over last night....., but the cop was being really cool and didn't give me a hard time. Honestly, the power management on these trucks is so smooth and crisp with these tunes, there are times I don't even realized how fast I'm going until I look down at my gauges.....I LOVE MY TRUCK, and I'm sure you and everybody else waiting for their XCAL 2's will too!!!!

 

Hi Rooster!

I drive with overdrive ON all the time, unless I see a potential target

 

From what I've heard, leave overdrive on and just wait to stomp your foot through the floor when the light turns green. Fourty or above, disable overdrive and you feel your truck drop down a gear, and then get on it...........I don't know how to describe it, but once i'm at 40 or above and I turn overdrive off, I can just feel when to gun her...

 

I am just curious, when I have OD on and stomp on it, my truck shifts right at 5000 RPM, actually closer to 4900 RPM from 1-2, 2-3 and I am STILL in third up to about a little over 90 MPH. This is all at WOT, no letting off gas.

So why the need to turn it off at 40 MPH if it doesn't kick in at over 90 MPH? I have the XCal II on order now, so what difference will that make with the shifting? Any comments are welcomed! My truck is BONE STOCK btw and the top end "grunt" of it is amazing!

Hopefully only a couple more weeks of waiting.... Sent in the CWP's on the 27th o' Feb!

Thanks in advance.

 

Hi Brad,

Glad you like it! The difference in throttle response is indeed significant, and it keeps pulling nice & hard, too.

Good luck with it, & we'll be happy to talk with you about the e-fans & pulleys any time - be careful now, don't get any tickets!

 

Hi beowulf,

The issue he's talking about is that it's not good for any overdrive automatic transmission to do full-throttle upshifts into or downshifts out of Overdrive - it's hard on the tranny in any model year.

The typical scenario he is talking about is in the 2004 & newer F-150's from say, roughly about 38-72 mph or so, depending on gear ratio & tire size, if you are just cruising at light throttle and already in Overdrive - if you punch it between those speeds, it's going to do a 4-2 downshift - well, if you do it that way, the torque management (which we will NOT alter on the new 4R75E's on the 4-2 for reasons of durability) really kicks in to protect the transmission, and slows the rate at which power gets dialed in (doing a 4-2). Whereas if you first disable the O/D, which causes the tranny to immediately grab 3rd gear, and *then* punch it, it pulls away quicker & harder. Tapping the O/D cancel immediately puts it into 3rd, and then you can nail it and hit 2nd to rocket away.

It works like that in the 2004 & newer F-150's, but does not in the 2003 & earlier trucks, as they do not have separate TQR for each type of shift, the earlier trucks generally have TQR only for the 1-2, 2-1, 2-3, 3-2, 3-4 & 4-3 shifts - however, this is an issue (meaning not doing full-throttle downshifts or upshifts into or out of O/D) that applies to all 4-speed automatic overdrive trannies for best service life. Just FYI!

We also go over all of that in the docs we send out with each custom tune - so anyone who has the XCalibrator from us has that info, it's in their Troyer Performance docs.

 

Thanks for the helpful info Mike!

I assumed (you know what that means ) that tigga was talking going WOT from a complete stop, at least that was what I was saying.

That makes total sense if you rolling at 40 MPH and step on it, so thanks for the clarification.

Also, were you also saying that it is hard on the tranny to be @ WOT and going from 3-OD? If so, then if you are "gunning" should I just keep OD off? LMFAO, the reason why I ask this is because to get you the shifting RPMs on my CWP's I started from a dead stop, WOT'd through 3rd gear (had OD..oops)
and was at 90+ still in third before I ran outta road and really didn't want to go faster (on that stretch of HWY). I did wonder why OD didn't kick in until I let off the gas.

Thanks a bunch on these explanations. The XCal II is already on order so I guess I will get the docs with that info too.