What color should the PCM be, where you plug you chip in.
Silver?

 

Flash: You need to 'scrape' a little of that 'silver' coating off. Be careful to not scrape too hard or deep. You should just start to see the 'copper' surface showing thru the silver. Then clean off the contacts with alcohol or an electronic contact cleaner.

Dan

 

Ok. I did start to see some copper showeing thru the silver.
I just got everything put back together. I fells prety good so far. Man I cant stand driving my L with out a chip its so much better with it.

 

There is NO reason to scrape the silver off
The silver is the metal contact surface... you just need to clean the crap off the contacts down TO the silver NOT thru it

Doug

 

Yeah, what Doug said .

There is no reason to take any of the silver off. While it is true that the copper underneat conducts electricity better, by removing the silver on top, you are making the PCB even thinner, which will only promote more connection problems.

The purpose of "cleaning" the PCM is to simply remove the silicone goo that is there to protect the PCB from moisture. All you need to do is remove that.

On a related note, I have personally had to build UP the contacts on some 2001 PCMs, as they have a thinner PCB and have more connection issues.