Hopefully after this I will be satisfied with my knowledge of the chip so I can finally buy one without any worries of doing something wrong, I just get really paranoid when it comes to my truck.

Now to my question. What I am wondering is if I change from 91 to 87 octane do I have to flip the chip (I don't know if this is a manual procedure or if the computer knows the difference) from performance to regular and vice versa for 87 to 91. I don't know that I will be able to run 91 all the time and I also want to know if its possible to run 87 on the performance part of the chip.

Sorry if that is confusing. If it is I'll try to clarify it.

One more thing. My truck use to shift around 5300 rpms, after I had a Y pipe with no muffler put in it shifts around 4900 rpms, will a Superchip bring the rpms back up?

Thanks,
mozy

 

There is a switch. It is manual. You put it in one position for 87 and in the other for 91+. You should never run 87 in the 91 position. You may get harmful detonation (pinging).

 

Hi Mozy,

Norm was correct in his response, in that with the 2-program Superchip Flip CHip, you have a 2-position manual toggle switch that is used to flip back and forth between the 2 programs. So it's a simple Flip switch, hence the name of the product, the Flip Chip. Sometimes people think this means you have to remove the chip and physically flip the chip over to effect the program change, but no, it's a simple toggle switch.

I can't tell you exaclty what happened with the change in WOT upshift point from removing the muffler & installing a Y-pipe, you may or may not have something else going on there.

In the powertrain programming of these vehicles, you don't actually go in and tell it exactly what rpm to upshift at, that is done primarily in miles per hour; but due to our specilizing in these vehicles, we know approximately what that equates to in terms of the rpms at which we'll see the WOT (wide-open throttle) upshift point occur at.

In reality, we have to take into consideration a number of thigns that will affect the shifting just at full-throttle specifically, such as the clutch fill time, the rate at which the engine gains rpms in each gear, and other factors that affect when we send the signal from the ECU to the tranny to shift @ WOT. For example, in a stock F-150 automatic, it may have an acceleration rate in 1st gear of say, 1000 rpm per second and with a stock 4R70W automatic transmission, figure it takes about 1 second for the clutches to fill and actually complete the upshift, so the signal is sent to shift earlier than when you want it to actually occur, about 1 second before you actually want it to happen in that particular example. And of course this has to be setup for each individual vehicle and it's modifications, which brings a fair amount of additional complexity into this process. In another example, let's say somebody has an Art Carr performance automatic transmision; in that case, thsoe kinds of trannys will flow more fluid volume much more quickly, so the clutches will fill much more quickly and that has to be taken into consideration. The result of installing a new performance automatic without making any changes to the powertrain program usually results in a little bit lower rpm WOT upshift point, because now the tranny can flow mroe fluid volume quicker, and as a result everything else happens quicker internally.

Same thing goes for when you make changes to gear ratios, tire sizes, add a supercharger wich causes the engine to gain rpms much quicker in each gear, etc.

Another popint here is that you may very well just be dealing with typical factory tachometer error, as the "regular" 5.4 F-150 does not actually shift at 5300 rpm @ WOT from the factory, it's more like 4900-at most 5250 rpm in the Lightning, so it sounds like your tach was reading a bit too high, and we've seen that happen many, many times. We've seen them be fairly close, we've seen them read too high, and we've seen them read too low. Since it's a brand new vehicle and it's running on the factory program, that is my first thought in terms of a culprit; this could just be a bit of tach error combined with a bit more free-flowing exhaust allowing it to gain rpms a bit quicker.

It may be something in what you did, or something else that has been done to the truck in the way of modifications that has caused this effective lowering of the WOT upshift point, or it could be a mechanical problem os some kind. It sounds like it's actually running and shifting just fine, just that it's now shifting earlier @ WOT after those modifications, due to either tach error alone, or the combination of some tach error and the mods.

I suggest that you call us so we can go over this with you in more detail, and see just what's going on there, and whether or not we need to make some specific changes in the Superchip program for you.