Finally found my car, 2011 9C1

[No Moa]

Nice!

[K9Vic]

Looking good, glad someone finally tried 13+ Impala wheels and that they fit properly. Been thinking about them for some time and knew the specs all looks right, but never tried.

[cal30_sniper]

Finally got around to doing the G8 Console installation. Full write-up with photos and parts list here: https://www.newcaprice.com/forum/viewto ... 628#p16628" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Here's a few shots of how it turned out:





Next up on the list is '14 SS spring swap with '12-13 PPV shocks and struts. Have the springs, waiting for the shocks and struts to arrive. I also have a set of Kooks 1 7/8" long tube headers and 3" mid-pipes on order, along with a pair of PRC ported LS3 heads with hollow stem valves and .650" dual valve springs. That will form the basis of my cam swap/DOD delete. I'm heavily considering a TR6060 6-speed swap while I'm in there.

[mercialogo]

looking good. I so wish that mine was black. but I got a good deal on the Silver one. How did you go about the Spotlight delete?

[cal30_sniper]

looking good. I so wish that mine was black. but I got a good deal on the Silver one. How did you go about the Spotlight delete?

I did a hasty job on the body work because I did it in December, so it was super cold out, and I'm still not fully moved into my new garage. Basically, I pulled all the spotlight stuff out, and then did some aluminum body tape with some body filler to smooth out the bumps and gouges left where the spotlight was cut, and then painted/clearcoated that with the duplicolor colormatch stuff. Later on, when I finish getting 220V wired in the garage for my compressor, I'll mix in the Caprice with some of the body work that I'm doing on my '73, and do a proper panel plug with good filler and a blended base coat/clear coat over the spot. I have to touch up a scrape behind the rear passenger door that was hidden with just vinyl wrap when I bought the car as well. On the inside, I just ordered a new piece of pillar trim from GM. Completely changed the look and feel of the car.

[cal30_sniper]

Spent the day buried in HP Tuners and working on refining this formerly soft cruiser that wanted to be a sports sedan. Suffice to say, the factory tune is incredibly restrictive. Using a combination of bin files from a 2016 SS, an 09 G8 GXP, and a 15 Camaro ZL1, along with a lot of time, patience, and tuning of the MAF table, I'm pleased to say I made a huge improvement in the driveability and smile factor of my car.

I'll start by saying I'm a complete newbie to the OBDII tuning game. I've done a good deal of tuning Speed Density TPI F-bodies, including a ground up build with Vortec heads, an LT4 cam, and Holley Stealth Ram intake, so I do know my way around this kind of stuff somewhat. A college education in Mechanical Engineering and a graduate degree with heavy focus in the same area doesn't hurt either. That all being said, this is just a first foray into something I'd like to learn a lot more about.

I haven't deviated much from factory GM table swapping yet. I did the STFC tune to my MAF table, but other than that, I've just been experimenting with different Idle, Spark Advance, Torque Management, and Shift Point settings. So far, the difference in the car is night and day.

Here's what I've messed with so far:

-Set the Throttle Opening Rate Limits to 100% (same settings as the 2015 Camaro ZL1)
-Set the Desired Throttle Area Maps to the values found in the 2016 SS (seemed like a good compromise between aggression and fidelity. On my to-do list is to try the slightly more aggressive ZL1 settings)
-I started with the G8 GXP part throttle and full throttle shift tables, corrected for gear ratio in our cars (divide everything by 0.89 for 3.27 -> 2.92 conversion)
-Tripled the factory Shift Torque Factor Adder Multiplier Table. This table is negative numbers that are multiplied by 1.0 in 1-2 and 2- shifts, and then added to the overall torque factor to determine how much torque reduction happens during the shift. Negative numbers mean they are actually reducing the torque management during the shift. Tripling the numbers really built up the post shift power coming out of 1-2 and 2-3 shifts. I tapered this down to zero towards the higher torque portion of the table in an effort to find a compromise between quick shift recovery and trans longevity.
-Copied in G8 GXP A6 high and low octane spark tables, then added back in any values from the factory PPV table that were higher. The final step to this process was to copy in the sub-1800rpm spark advance from the 2016 SS (which were significantly lower advance than the GXP). I wanted the lower advance near idle to smooth out off-idle manners with the SS idle-spark tables. I ended up having to take back out a degree of timing in 3 or 4 locations due to small appearances of knock retard during testing.
-Copied in 2016 SS Idle spark advance tables. They were significantly lower than the GXP or PPV idle spark values. This made it sound a little tougher at idle, something I'm sure will be multiplied by the headers and mid pipes that are going on soon.
-Copied the 2016 SS Idle speed tables. Again, after playing with the VCM scanner mode, I found the slightly higher idle speeds just sounded better.
-Copied in the Power Enrich vs TPS tables from the 2009 G8 GXP. This causes PE to be entered from a smaller throttle angle. I may try some of the ZL1 values later, as they are even more agressive at lower RPMs.
-Fattened up the PE Enrichment Ramp to 0.1 (up from 0.01 for a factory PPV). This was the factory setting for the 2016 SS.
-I've been playing with the Shift Inertia Factor Profiles. My latest tune used the values from a 2011 Gran Sport Vette, with a factor of 1 added across the table. I've since found a mixture of tables from the 2014 Corvette Z51 and the 2015 Camaro ZL1 to be more aggressive. I'll be trying the more aggressive of the two in my next tune.
-I disabled the Electronic Throttle Control Portion of Torque Management. This also resulted in sharp increase in post-shift performance. I still have spark angle torque management enabled. I think it serves a noble purpose in passenger comfort and mechanical longevity of the drivetrain.
-Bumped up the shift point to 6200RPM, resulting in a nice increase in post-shift power band and performance
-Set all part-throttle shift speeds to a gear-matched version of the 2016 SS. (again, divide by 0.89)
-After disabling LTFCs and PE, I ran 4 iterations of STFC tuning until all of my STFC were withing +/-1% of 0. Some of the full throttle settings were off up to 12% off of stoich with the CAI and axle backs that I've added. This will have to be done again following the header installation.

That's the extent of the tune I ran today. I cooked up some more modifications this evening that I'm going to test out tomorrow. At the moment, I'm running basically stock shift pressures, shift times, and TCC engagement settings. I swapped out all of the 2016 SS shift times, pressures, and scalars, along with the TCC settings into my sport mode settings for my current tune. If I'm happy with the Sport mode when I test it tomorrow, I'll move those values up to the Normal mode, and test out the 2015 Camaro ZL1 values in the sport mode. The two most aggressive shift points I've found so far are the 2011 Corvette Gran Sport, and the 2015 Camaro ZL1. I'll try both and see what I like or don't like about them. Something similar to one of them will likely end up as my sport mode tune.


If that sounds like a lot, it's because it is, at least for a beginner. Long story short, it has made a huge difference in how the car feels so far. In particular, I've always been pretty disappointed and annoyed by the auto trans settings. With the right blend of factory settings, I don't think I'm going to be quite so perplexed by the electronic trans in the future.

I'm going to start playing with the torque management settings next. Perhaps the overlooked 2011 year model might actually be able to defeat the intrusive traction control after all.

[s/c'd cav]

with the tuning , you are comparing 2 different motors , the PPV being a 6.0 lower compression L77 DOD motor , to a 6.2 higher compression motor , with a more aggressive camshaft

[cal30_sniper]

with the tuning , you are comparing 2 different motors , the PPV being a 6.0 lower compression L77 DOD motor , to a 6.2 higher compression motor , with a more aggressive camshaft

Kudos to you, your wikipedia game is strong.

There's a grand total of 12 cubic inches difference between the motors, and 0.3 points of static compression ratio. Put in another way, the LS3 is a .060" overbore of our engine. Same heads, Same intake, and a very slightly larger cam. Now, lets talk about the effects that has on the portions of the tune that I swapped into mine...

1. Transmission Shift Points, Pressures, and times : Not a Hill of Beans
2. Electronic Throttle Settings : Zero Impact
3. Idle speed and spark advance: Little to none
4. Main Body Spark Advance Tables : Some variation can be expected. Lets talk about the factors at work here...

The main factors that influence a spark advance table are twofold. First, you need to determine what spark advance gives the most torque at each engine operation location while still leaving an adequate spark knock safety factor (commonly displayed on an RPM/MAP graph, unlike our cars which use an RPM/Airflow graph, but they do the same thing). Then you have to determine what level of spark advance will give you the throttle response, fuel efficiency, and emissions burn that you're looking for throughout the rest of the engine operating range when you're not in power enrichment and not trying to make every ft-lb of torque the engine is capable of squeezing out.

The main contributing factors that have to be considered include engine and vehicle parameters:
-Cylinder head/Combustion Chamber design = biggest contributing factor
-Dynamic Compression Ratio = second biggest contributing factor
-Valve Event timing
-Piston Speed vs Engine RPM
-Vehicle weight, gearing, and intended usage (i.e., the "load" that the engine is going to see under it's designed driving conditions) = This has an impact from the design intent point of view, but not the actual spark map. Since the spark map is load normalized, it essentially removes these factors from the mix.

Of those factors, we have exactly the same cylinder head and combustion chamber design, exactly the same piston speed vs rpm, and a nearly identical dynamic compression ratio. The LS3 has a slightly higher static compression ratio due to the overbore, but also a slightly larger cam, which brings down dynamic compression ratio to something that I would argue is essential identical to the L77. The valve events are different, but the cams are on the same LSA, and the valve events are centered around the same points, so the actual impact on timing is little more than changing the dynamic compression ratio as stated above. Our cars are about 100lbs heavier than a G8 GXP, and about 160lbs heavier than an SS Sedan, with a 10% longer gear ratio. Those factors combine to place the engine under a little more load at various driving points, but with the timing determined by engine load vs RPM, and such small differences in encountered driving style, it's also essentially negligible.

Long story made short: the biggest differences between the two vehicles is their intended usage. The SS was engineered as a sports sedan, and the Caprice as a luxury sedan and police cruiser. The spark maps are built at the factory accordingly.

I wouldn't recommend a straight reflash of a 2011 Camaro SS tune into a 2011 Caprice PPV ECM with a VIN rewrite, due to the cumulative effects of all the small differences. However, if a person were to do just that, I would be willing to bet they wouldn't run into too many drievability issues. The only significant difference would be the MAF and VE fueling tables. The MAF tables should be individually tuned to the vehicle anyways, and the VE tables are going to be shut off to do that anyway. The vast majority of the difference between our engine and the LS3 lies in the tune, not mechanical differences.