I'm thinking about buying a tuner in the near future and was curious if a custom tune is really that much better over the preset tunes that come with the tuner?
I have an 04 auto GT...only has intake/exhaust/4.10's....
Yes, it is. I honestly wouldn't buy a tuner unless I planned on getting a dynotune. Of course that's exactly what I did.
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C&L 80mm mass air and True Flow pipe, Mac CAI, BBK 65mm tb, Steeda non-piggy back ud pulleys, MGW shifter, RAM HD clutch and aluminum flywheel, 3:73 gears, 2.5" Dynomax o/r x pipe, 3" MAC cat back system w/ 3 1/2" tips, Kenny Brown(front and rear strut tower brace, caster plates, subframe connectors,extreme matrix brace,jacking rails, torque brace, lowering springs), Bilstein shocks, 03-04 Cobra(side scoops, rear bumper cover, top), 6pt roll cage, white FR500's, FMS 2000 Cobra R air dam.
I ran a canned tune for about a week before I ordered a mail order tune from VMP, and even the mail order tune was a lot better. The dyno-tune from ProDyno was money well spent though, it felt like a totally different car over the mail order tune.
Totally depends on the man behind the software.
Custom Dyno tunes will enable you get dead on air fuel ratios,spark advance,fuel tables, MAF counts etc..
Lots of factors can throw off the accuracy of an e-mail tune, each car behaves differently with similar mods especially A/F, if your MAF sensor elements have dirt buildup it will effect voltage & counts which will throw of the fuel mixture of that E-mail tune, BUT most of the Top guys will include a revision or 2 in the price where you datalog all parameters ,send it back to be reviewed then the 2nd custom tune will be sent! That's what I do, I'm in Florida and my Tuner is in South Carolina, Technology isnt' ALL BAD!
Definitely a custom dyno tune with wideband O2 monitoring of the Air/Fuel ratio is preferred.
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Sometimes I think that government fits that old-fashioned definition of a baby: An alimentary canal with an appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.
- Ronald Reagan
Custom Dyno Tune vs. Preset Handheld Tune 
