Originally Posted by
ksoggs
I just had a huge debate with one of the engineers from GM who supposedly worked on the stage kit. And he claims that the stage tune is completely re-written OS. It is like a new "version" of the computers software, and not at all just a tune. It supposedly deals with many situations much better, it is better designed for higher boost levels, and it is written for the 3bar Map's.
If any of you were in the cavalier tuning crowd... the stage kit is supposed to be similar to the "gmpp supercharger tune" for the Z24 2.4L. Which became the holy grail of OS's for anyone boosting the twincam engine (if you dont know, the twincam "ld9" was the previous generation of the ecotec, and it was based off of the quad4 which came before it.)
Less-important to us... but one of the biggest "features" of the stage software is the elimination of the "learn down" issue, which supposedly would not allow your car to notice any gains out of aftermarket parts unless you were specifically "tuned" for them". Because the LNF is a Torque based system, everything is based around torque. From GM the car is rated at 260hp 260ft/lbs... so the computer is "pre-set" to give you that... so if it is a hot day and the air is thin, the computer will compensate by adding timing or boost or whatever, to get you to 260/260 on a crappy day... likewise on a good day... cold dense air and and all.. the computer will pull timing and boost etc to keep you at 260/260. Well... if you bolt on a 3" exhaust and downpipe, and throw on some charge pipes, and maybe an intake.... but dont tune... the computer will just think "man it is a REALLY nice day, too bad gm told me only 260/260" and it will scale back the engine to keep you at the rated power, even with all your mods.
Supposedly the Stage Kit changes that "always 260/260" to "at least 260/260" and so it will "learn up" but no longer "learn down"... But for us HPT folks... it is not a big deal, because we have easy access to the torque tables as it is... so if we add some parts that allow us more torque, we can just bump the table (if we havent already). But this is a huge deal for the bolt-on crowd that doesnt tune.