Ok, new truck and $300 from the goverment, hmmm.. What to do... Well after much thought I decided to give the Superchip another shot. As many long time readers may know that I was less than happy with the performance of the chip in my last truck (Y2K RC/XLT/OffRoad/4.6L) . Sure I noticed a *slight* increase in power but mainly kept it in because I liked the firmer shifts. I sold my old chip a couple months ago not expecting to buy another chip.

That was then...

Thanks to the goverment I decided to give Superchips another shot and ordered my chip from Mike yesterday. Holy Crap!! What a difference in this truck. I don't know if my old code (XJB1) was one of the codes programmed on a Monday morning or something but this time around the difference is night and day. Aside from the firmer shifts (which actually could be a little firmer) the power increase is what I noticed first. Even normal acceleration appears to be a little quicker in the same RPM range. (I religiously keep the tach below 2000 in city driving to keep the mpgs up)

Sorry to ramble, just wanted to let everyone know that I am very pleased with my Superchip this time around.

 

Y2KOffRoad, is your new truck a 4.6L too?
By the way, whom did you purchase your first chip from?
Glad your happy with it..

 

That's the kind of post thats gets me closer to buying! Question for anyone that may know....If I give my code to Mike, can he tell if it's a "Monday" code or a decent one. I was wondering why there would be differences in the codes performance wise, rather than an indentifier of what options the truck may have.
I'd hate to buy the chip and not "feel" anything.
Thanks.

 

I have the 5.4L on the 2001 now.. (Thought I checked the signature box) I can't really complain about the 3 different motors that I've had but I will say that the 4.6 and 5.4 are very, very close when it comes to gas mileage.

Both chips were purchased from Mike T. who I believe has better customer service than the other Superchip vendors I've found.

I can't say the official reason for the differing codes because I don't know why. But I'll tell what I've heard. Codes can vary depending on the geographic region you live in, the firmware is constantly evolving and improving, bugs (yes they exist even in ECMs) are fixed, not to mention the more obvious ones, engine size and tranny.

I'm sure Mike can shed much more light on this subject than I. I would love to hear more information on this. Well guys, enjoy the weekend, and I'll talk to ya'all on Wednesday when I return from the Mountains!

 

Hi Y2K Offroad,

Thanks very much for your post!

We're very glad to hear you're happier this time around, though in all candor, we would much have preferred to have made you this happy the first time around as well.

I suppose the very first thing I should say is a heartfelt "Thank You for giving us another try!

Just to give you some information on this, for whatever it may (or may not?) be worth to you, let's go over a few basics & specifics.........

First, there are indeed "shades and grades" of original factory programs, to be sure. I don't know if I would use your term literally, "Monday morning" as you put it, but there are certainly constant running changes and updates, usually for minor driveability issues for the most part, though other issues as well from time to time, absolutely. These F-150's, as the world's most heavily produced vehicle, have more different factory software revisions that any other vehicle type that I'm aware of.

They really don't have much of an effect on the *stock* power levels, or in how much power we can add when we're talking about these late-model V-8 F-150's, for the *most* part. Every once in awhile we'll find a code that can take a bit more timing, but that's fairly rare. In other words, we're adding the same basic amount of timing, etc. to each of these programs for the 4.6 motor, and then in the programs for the 5.4 motor. The 4.2 V-6 is a bit different as it is tuned a bit more conservatively, and has a deficit in the below-2500 rpm range, it's pretty weak down there even though it has a decent power output of 205 hop stock, below 2500 rpm it's a bit of a dog and there are a few things we do differently as a result of it's own particular traits.

Now among vehicles of the same basic configuration (meaning their ultimate weight), I do think that it's easier to feel the Superchip a bit more in the 5.4 than the same identical-in-all-other-aspects truck with the 4.6, however, that is really a function of the final power-to-weight ratio. Now in terms of the shifting, the newer 5.4 trucks have the 4R100 tranny whereas the 4.6 gets the 4R70W. Sure, we *could* make them all shift harder than our "standard" performance program does, but that isn't what most of our F-150 customers are looking for, so we reserve that for those who really want it. It's basically best described as a "towing" type of shift calibration, so it won't upset livestock being towed, for example, etc., while still reducing slippage noticeably and firming the shifts, along with providing noticeably quicker powertrain response to input from your right foot.

While both the 4.6 and the 5.4 pick up about a 10%-12% power gain, there is a bit of a range there, about 2%, and when we add that to the fact that if we're starting off with more power to begin with (the 4.6 having 220-231 hp depending on model year and the 5.4 having 235-260 hp depending on model year), 12% of 260 hp is going to feel like more than say, 10% of 220 horsepower will, if we have an extreme situation where a particular 5.4 is one of the "stronger" ones and your previous 4.6 was one of the "weaker" examples, perhaps, and that is possible.

Now of course I am "assuming" (uh-oh...) that both of these trucks were configured identically (super cab to supercab, 4WD to 4WD, etc.) with the sole exception of powertrain; if there are any differences there, that will of course affect weight and skew the comparison one way or the other, as would different fuels, etc., but you already know all of that, I'm sure.

If you get a chance, I'd love to get a chance to speak with you about this a bit, as there are some questions I would like to ask, just for both our respective curiosities, so if you'd like to give me a call, collect, please do if you have time some day.

Getting back to your previous XJB1-code vehicle, that code was not used for very long, and we haven't had an XJB2 to date among our customer base, so without doing a bit of checking, it may well be that XJB1 was the only code of that series; whether Ford has good success with that particular code or not, I couldn't tell you, what I can tell you is that it wasn't used for long, and not many vehicles have it. It might be a code that Ford just didn't care for the results on, or it may have been a quite natural progression of ongoing R&D changes tht brought it's demise just like every other code will ultimately meet it's demise.

There were also some advances made over the past 12-18 months with regards to just a bit more additional power below 3000 rpm in the 4R100 automatics, and that too, is probably a factor in your case since you now have the 5.4 motor in this truck. It's not an increase in *peak* power, but it does give a little bit more power to the rear wheels below 3000 rpm, and that helps driveability. The comment we heard most often from those who had compared both programs on the same vehicle said it made the vehicle actually feel al bit lighter, that was the most common descriptive phrase we heard when those comparisons were being made some time back. That alone could perhaps account for this, but most likely, it's a combination of these factors that have gone into your results and your perception of the differences, etc.

If you'd like to call us sometime, I'd be happy to speak with you about this, and in the meantime, thanks very much for your post & comments.