PCMTec Development Blog

[antus]

Well, HPT did write a real time OS for the '0411. Its not a full recompile, they appear to have manually patched in an init routine that copies some of the main tables to RAM which can be live tuned. Then at the end the PC can read or store the tune, but afterwards it must be flashed in like you would on a normal PCM. In practice its a very ram limited approach and hardly anyone does it because its fiddly and not required - dyno pulls to gather data, then an offline tune update then try again works well for most. It is novel that they managed to implement it on standard flash based hardware, though.

Its certainly possible to replace ROM with RAM and add real time tuning functionality to the protocol stack (eg our NVRAM boards and 11p/12p/the1s enhanced code) but is it worth it? Its certainly a lot easier on the older computers where you can plug in a board and solder one reasonably large by modern standards wire. Having to do SMD rework ups the cost and difficulty quite significantly, and then you still need to patch the code to add support for the custom hardware.

[rolls]

The only time it would be worth it is if you have excess spare ram and spare rom to put new routines without having to recompile existing code. If either are limited then its a lot of work for not much gain.

Adding new command handlers to the OBD routines would be fairly tricky as well.

[Tazzi]

The only time it would be worth it is if you have excess spare ram and spare rom to put new routines without having to recompile existing code. If either are limited then its a lot of work for not much gain.

Adding new command handlers to the OBD routines would be fairly tricky as well.

Theres quite a bit of ram in the MPC chips, so Id take a bet there would be spare.
Only way to know would be to run in-circuit debugger and try identify free and available ram. Im sure Iv read that in one of the softwares... problem is their horrendous cost!

[rolls]

HPT said they dropped live tuning support as it used almost 10x as much support time per as a stock OS. Basically they struggled to make a profit on it even with hundreds of users.

You'd want to be charging at least $1k a vehicle I'd say and with that cost not many people will buy.

[Tazzi]

HPT said they dropped live tuning support as it used almost 10x as much support time per as a stock OS. Basically they struggled to make a profit on it even with hundreds of users.

You'd want to be charging at least $1k a vehicle I'd say and with that cost not many people will buy.

Wow.

Just wow..

[Tazzi]

Rolls,

Anychance you can take some pics close up of the plug side directly opposite the MPC chip? Can you see the tiny (literally pin hole size) vias in organised lines?

And also what are the main partnumbers on the backside of the board?

Ford1.png (1.11 MiB) Viewed 4015 times

Ford2.png (1.44 MiB) Viewed 4015 times

[Macloud]

Hi Rolls,
Any chance of getting access to the alpha/beta ? My main use is not tuning but to write the VIN for FG falcons to secondhand PCM's. I can get keys programmed but no radio access due to mismatch of VIN numbers. Also wondering if its on your list of things to do is to access and copy necessary files for the Trans. ECU. Not sure if you are aware but only ZF transmissions is able to due this not even Ford can do it. All they do is basically copy and paste info from old Trans. ECU to the new one because the Trans. are programmed to the car.
Awesome work by the way.

[rolls]

Hi Rolls,
Any chance of getting access to the alpha/beta ? My main use is not tuning but to write the VIN for FG falcons to secondhand PCM's. I can get keys programmed but no radio access due to mismatch of VIN numbers. Also wondering if its on your list of things to do is to access and copy necessary files for the Trans. ECU. Not sure if you are aware but only ZF transmissions is able to due this not even Ford can do it. All they do is basically copy and paste info from old Trans. ECU to the new one because the Trans. are programmed to the car.
Awesome work by the way.

You can edit the VIN with a hex editor, however my program does not recalculate the checksums. I have written the code to do this in the new editor, however I am not beta testing this yet.

Do you know if the checksum errors will cause PATS to have a cry and stop the radio etc from working? If not then it will work but you will get a permanent checksum DTC error code. If you are happy to wait I will have this functionality released at some point, but not right now.

What cables do you own, openport, vcm2 etc? Need a J2534 cable to use the flashing software.

Regarding the trans ecu I have not spent any time at all on this to date, however we are interested in supporting it eventually. Does anyone know what SCT/HPTs capabilities are regarding the transmission ecu? I have not looked into it at all, I do know that they allow you to edit various maps but I am not sure which maps are in the PCM and which are in the trans ecu.

Anyone know some details on the division of labour between the PCM and trans unit?

[80gus]

Rolls 3.2 HPT onwards allows you to read the mechatronics Auto takes like 20mins for a full read, and about 15 seconds for just a calibration read or write, I have one on the bench if played with if you like to have a go it your more than welcome.

And TAZI that ECU you chassing the numbers from completely unreadable there is a film over it I can see text but would need to remove the coating to even have a slight chance of reading it.

[kojab]