Superchips safety...

[DieselViking]

Yeah, so I recently got ahold of a Superchips tuner for a good deal and will be running it my truck until my warranty is up, as I would imagine the Superchips is a relatively "conservative" piece of tuning equipment, and I'm waiting till I have more green for an SCT, headstuds, TQ convertor and such. The unit has a 59/92, 97/145, and 105/160 HP/TQ setting. My truck's an '06 (built Nov. '05), so the bugs oughta be out of it and it hasn't had any problems so far, knock on wood. I know once you start tuning things you can't complain or whine about damage, and that more power means more wear, whining is not my goal. So, maybe the techs or guys who are ultra-familiar with these rigs can chime in: how safe is it to run the truck on the upper levels on a regular basis? Is it wise to only program the performance levels once in a while? I mean I'm not gonna always put the hammer down...I can't afford to blow too much $$$ on diesel every week. I don't do much towing, so can I program it to the highest setting and just cruise on that without any major worries? On the max setting it'll be getting under 400 hp...this should be low enough to not require studs, tranny mods or stuff like that...I just wanna have a little fun now and then as a daily driver, to remind me of when I had my Corvette. Opinions, ideas?

[Blue01F250]

I'm no tech, but I do think your thinking is correct and you have hit the nail on the head...

but, I'm sure some of the techs will be along sometime soon

[Goose]

should be ok if ucan keep ur foot out of it ;-D

[LvTitan]

at the power levels of that programmer, you will have no problems containg the power. remember that once you get used to the power, and can be more conservative on the go pedal, you will start seeing the increase in mileage on the most powerful setting. unlike gassers, us diesel get better mileage the more we crank them up..

also, you can change the settings as often as wish without harming anything. matt has reflashed his ecm literally THOUSANDS of times and no worries. the only thing to consider is that every time you reflash, the tranny goes back into relearn mode for a few hundred miles, so it may shift weird and be jerky right after every reflash.

[sevenmalards]

I don't see on your sig. that you are running an aftermarket intake. If not it would DRASTICALLY help, and a more open exaust

[LvTitan]

Originally Posted by sevenmalards

I don't see on your sig. that you are running an aftermarket intake. If not it would DRASTICALLY help, and a more open exaust

actually your factory intake with the donaldson filter is the best thing you can use on that motor. unless you are making more than 500HP at the wheels you should leave the factory setup there.

the factory setup will hold about 8lbs of dirt, and as long as you change them when the sensor says to you should be fine. if you want to change the filter just for looks, then get the AFE stage 2 it has proven to be the best at filtering out the fine particles.
your money would be better spent on an SCT first before an intake.
gauges/exhaust/SCT

[Blue01F250]

on the 6.0L.....


SEVEN - you would be correct in talking about our 7.3's

[DieselViking]

Thanks for chiming in guys. I've been thinking I was right on about the Superchips being fairly safe but I want all the opinions and info I can get. And I will go easy on it...I LOVE seeing how much mileage I can get to a tank. It's a game to me. Yeah, I'm keeping the stock intake for now, might get something else once I go SCT. As for the exhaust, right now it ends [I]right[I] after the cat, with a 90 degree out the side of the truck just past the cab. My next purchase is a 3.5 MBRP downpipe. I figure since I shortened the exhaust already, once I add the downpipe I won't need to do the whole rest of it 4 in.

[LvTitan]

true. just so you know the mbrp downpipe isnt a whole lot bigger than the stock one, but it sure has nice smooth bends where the stock one has a lot of kinks in it, as a matter of fact i was gonna tell you not to waste your money on it when i first started this.. but the more i think about the difference between them, the more i'm going to shut my mouth about it. if i hadnt already wasted this much time typing, i'd just hit back page and forget the whole post..

[DieselViking]

Hmm. Yeah, the mandrel bends are good for the flow. .5 inch increase in diameter should be roughly %15 increase in flow depending on the physics end of things. I mean I could also get a 4 inch downpipe that'll bolt up to the cat and then get some 4 inch pipe and a coupler to clamp on after the cat...but the cat's 3.5 inches and I'd like to keep it on so I don't see the logic of having "4 inch downpipe...3.5 inch cat...4 inch pipe." Course I could delete the cat, but I dunno if my conscience will allow that. Haha. Actually I just read an article in the latest Diesel Power that says the cat on our trucks doesn't really do much for emissions except act as a burner for particulate waste, since the EGR on our trucks takes care of the greater part of bad emissions.