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The Best/Decent AEM Mapper in UK?


bolarbag
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OK so for us poor unfortunates with an AEM and without the money to go change our minds now whats the best way forwards?

 

 

Hang on I don't consider my self an unfortunate and I have two different AEM systems, neither do I resort to prayer;).

 

The original question was about decent AEM mappers. Several have been mentioned, at least two of which fly round the world to map AEM. The have successfully mapped cars with power levels that most £100K+ Super car owners can only dream. All this on an engine designed at the end of the 80's( may be wrong).

 

I think Chris and others have hit it on the head, modifying cars to produce 2x,3x,4x, 5x etc the power of the stock motor costs big money. It also takes time to be done properly. There are quite a few systems out there that will control the 2JZ some cost more than others but all have a number of mappers some better than others. For me AEM still represents very good value for money in the right hands.

 

Bolarbag, before this thread makes you and others rush to Ebay with your AEM, get in touch with one or two of the mappers mentioned for AEM. Talk to them about what you want to achieve, take their advice and you will have a car you will enjoy. Even if you have to adjust your budget or your expectations.

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Just to show that GEMS / AEM ecus find their way into all sorts of weird and wonderful creations, witness this current ad from a friend of mine:

 

3.5 litre, 220bhp all alloy, quad cam, V8 with 5 sp manual gearbox complete with injection & GEMS management. Gearbox - 5 sp manual sits in front of engine with diff in engine sump thus locating engine in line with wheels....and if you are thoroughly confused.......remember it is air cooled. sounds awesome! Ideal for something but not sure what. Made by one of the worlds most innovative manufacturers. Ring 07703-162409 if your curiosity gets the better of you....! £1800

V8.jpg

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85%?? C'mon be sensible.

 

The figure maybe more than 85%, but that was a quote from Dusty himself, and looking through the aem forum its not hard to see, but not on the scale some of the people have mentioned.

 

I am one of the people who has net access at work day in day out, so I can research for hours at a time. I think I've learned enough to realise that the aem is a very capable ecu, were just short of decent mappers. My concern now is...apart from the fact that I've provisionally sold the aem plus bits for a silly low price, the aem is in the middle of an 'upgrade' as has been mentioned, which as far as I can see can only increase the number of bugs for the next year or so until they get sorted.

 

I may have a chat with Dimitri, but unless my buyer pulls out, which he would be a fool to, then I'm heading to the motec camp.:rolleyes:

 

Many Thanks terminator for the pm by the way, I value all input from experienced members;)

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Fair enough.

 

I should point out before people start banging on about bugs in the new software, that although it is being "revised", this is only a beta release and the older version of the software is currently what all ECU's should be using. I should imagine this will be the case for at least the next year or so, and even when the new software is fully released, you will still be able to use the older software if you're concerned with bugs. I should also add that the kind of bugs I'm talking about are in how the user uses the software, not what the software does.

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Just to show that GEMS / AEM ecus find their way into all sorts of weird and wonderful creations, witness this current ad from a friend of mine:

 

3.5 litre, 220bhp all alloy, quad cam, V8 with 5 sp manual gearbox complete with injection & GEMS management. Gearbox - 5 sp manual sits in front of engine with diff in engine sump thus locating engine in line with wheels....and if you are thoroughly confused.......remember it is air cooled. sounds awesome! Ideal for something but not sure what. Made by one of the worlds most innovative manufacturers. Ring 07703-162409 if your curiosity gets the better of you....! £1800

One of these ?

t7004sale.jpg

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I just got off MSN with arnout over here and he has told me also that the AEM is a solid performer. He has them on all his own cars that need one. Basically I think that maybe in the development stage engines that can't hack it don't hack it.

So its like this for me.

I know that my gearbox is a weak point in the system. Its not built AFAI can prove and is 16 years old with no service history. If that goes kerbang whilst trying to force 1.4 bar of T61 T04 power through it then I have been warned. Also lets be fair here if my 16 year old engine again with no service history lets go whilst attempting to push nearly twice its original power out of it then I may have to accept again that the engine is at fault. Its all well and good being a bit bandwagon when more than one engine goes pop but just remember this. I know that Thor and whiffin have blown AEM tuned engines during tuning. Both of them also have previous outstanding results and have continued to have outstanding results.

Today Dan outputted a car with no worries (albeit a bit low on power for its spec but thats hardly surprising giving this weeks slagging off). I hope for both mine and Dans sake my 16 year old car ---- I'll say that again 16 year old car doesn't let us down in a fortnight.

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I guess that's another ECU to avoid for the next couple of years so that they can work the bugs out.

 

In all fairness, the bugs should'nt be an issue, but it would be one more excuse a less than competant mapper could use against ya;)

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I know that Thor and whiffin have blown AEM tuned engines during tuning.

 

"Blown engine" covers a myriad of problems though - let us not forget this. A mechanical failure on the dyno is a regular thing is this world. Be it a conrod letting go, a bearing picking up, oil starvation, even blocks cracking - this stuff you really can't predict and it does happen. As you and others have said, it's part and parcel of the game we are in and the chance we take.

 

The only physical engine damage a mapper can be held accountable for is, in my opinion:

Overrevving during tuning

Pushing for more power than the customer asked for

Letting detonation run away and melt a piston

 

because they are the only things a mapper can influence.

 

Today Dan outputted a car with no worries (albeit a bit low on power for its spec but thats hardly surprising giving this weeks slagging off).

 

If I got what I considered an unjustified slagging off I wouldn't change the way I did things in response to it :) If he's confident with his 1.8bar maps why stop now.

 

-Ian

 

PS I reckon your car will be fine 'cos you'll strangle him otherwise ;)

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muffleman and gaz1 i will add more to this when i get back from holiday as Girlfriend aint happy with me at moment and has threatened to throw laptop into sea lol

 

:rlol: Yeah no probs mate, shut the laptop, order another cold one and forget about us til you get back ;)

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I know that Thor and whiffin have blown AEM tuned engines during tuning. Both of them also have previous outstanding results and have continued to have outstanding results.

 

Very strange, I dont recall ever blowing an engine with an AEM fitted, think you have your wires crossed with this one somewhere, probably some bullshit floating around or your just making it up?

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OK maybe I have wires crossed on this one. I know an aristo engine let go and he now has an aem fitted (i think he may have had the emanage on it before then). Don't get me wrong here I am not having a dig at any trader here at all. I am merely trying to point out that failures happen on engines even at the best of places and that the tuners of those vehicles weren't responsible for the failures I am sure I was talking with a guy that had a supra with an AEM auto that popped itself with you some time ago Paul but if not I stand corrected and apologise unreservedly for any offence this may have caused.

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OK maybe I have wires crossed on this one. I know an aristo engine let go and he now has an aem fitted (i think he may have had the emanage on it before then). Don't get me wrong here I am not having a dig at any trader here at all. I am merely trying to point out that failures happen on engines even at the best of places and that the tuners of those vehicles weren't responsible for the failures I am sure I was talking with a guy that had a supra with an AEM auto that popped itself with you some time ago Paul but if not I stand corrected and apologise unreservedly for any offence this may have caused.

 

No probs, glad we cleared that one up! Back to the topic then.

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Who fitted your Motec, Owen Developments? Nice post Simon, all good points.

 

Yep, Owens.

 

Again I don't know where this "rep for being unreliable" has come from? As far as changing to wasted spark, it's really not a problem. You can fit a DLI (much like you have to with the Autronic) and voila! Problems solved.

 

It's reputation for being unreliable comes from the many posts on places like Supraforums from people who have had failures (or at least say they have). It may well not deserve that reputation, I don't know, but it does have that reputation.

 

As for wasted spark, I agree you can sort it out, but then you have another thing to fit, go wrong, put extra strain on things. It's a disadvantage, just as Motec's pricing is.

 

You'll always get a kind of religious war with ECUs it seems between the various camps. They all have advantages and disadvantages. For me, the fact I didn't need a DLI, greater percieved reliability and build quality, greater flexibilty with things like injectors and the wider availability of tuners that would map Motecs were the reason I went that way. I also preferred the software. For others the extra cost and fact you can't control the autobox from a Motec may swing things the other way.

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i think that customer service may have alot to do with the bad reputation of some ecu's

 

i know aem's is shite and the forum is not much better at getting back to you and helping so when something does go wrong its not sorted and people moan, usually on the t'internet.

 

also ive no doubts that a motec or two have failed but if they have sorted it out very quickly which ive no doubt they will then the moans wont happen???

 

i think in an ideal world we would all have the money to spend on a motec with all the features etc but unfortunatly its not an ideal world and the AEM is a cracking ecu :)

 

Mike

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I think we should have an AEM thread where people detail there setup, mapper, result and give a brief description of there AEM experience.

 

Somthing like :-

 

----------------

Year :

Man/Auto :

Mods :

Power/Torque :

Link to dynomap :

Mapped By:

 

Overview :-

 

-----------------

 

I for one like the unit and any of the issues I have come up against have for most part been solved by myself utilising the AEM forum, as I said before, its the plug and play part of the sales speil that is confusing things here and it should be changed to plug compatible.

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Mines not really relevant as it was on a nissan :D

 

But heres mine:

 

Year : 1993

Man/Auto : Manual

Mods : 850cc injectors, Greddy TD05-18g Turbos and lots more mods

Power/Torque : 479 RWHP/410 Torque

Link to dynomap : Not available

Mapped By: Steve Simpson

 

Overview :- Great ECU, had no issues with it, was really easy to install and map, i put a base map on it to get it to the mappers and steve did the rest. Unfortunatly we did have a few problems but only with the car which turned out to be loosing pressure from the bottom end but cant fault the mapping!! even took it back when we thought we had sorted the problem and we couldnt get anymore power out of it and he didnt charge me to do the remap :)

 

Mike

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Could this little section be made a sticky for all ecu's? How hard is it to create a new section in the forum, it would be good to see this aswell as section I was thinking of...driving techniques....economy/street/race/ for example what to do in the event of back end swinging out,

 

I think this clubs great but theres definitely scope for other educational subjects to be made more noticeable, we want to keep more members and sup's on the road!

 

As for search its a great thing, but its good to be reminded of some subjects and get fresh views on things from time to time;)

 

Oh, back on topic:)

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Year : 1996

Man/Auto : Manual

Mods : 1000cc injectors, t51r and lots more mods

Power/Torque : 650hp/750 nm at 1.3 Bar...

Link to dynomap : Not available

Mapped By: Dan Turner

Comments:- There was a pressure leak at 1.3 Bar...

 

It will be going back soon for its final map

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