I don't know why I waited so long, but I finally bit the bullet and bought Matt's H&S tunes. As far as the regular tunes he makes for H&S goes, I LOVE them, but that topic has already been covered plenty.
The rest of this will only be pertaining to this tow tune. While I was talking to Matt, I explained how much I NEED a good tow tune. I have a hot shot business that I do on the side. I am legal to gross 33500 lbs and I consistently gross over 28k. My truck is a SRW F350 with 3.73s running 35" tires. It has a ZF6. I know moving that kind of weight is asking a lot of it. To make matters worse, most of the towing I do is through the Appalachian mountains (WV, western PA, VA, NC, SC, GA, NY and eastern KY and TN). I have found that if I go over about 26k lbs, I have to use an exhaust brake if I will be on roads that have a grade of 4% or more. Although Matt is not a big fan of exhaust brakes because of the extra stress it puts on the turbo, valve train, etc., he understood my need for one and agreed to help me out. He made me a regular towing tune (that I will use on flatter states such as OH, IN, IL, eastern PA, etc.) as well as a towing tune with an exhaust brake.
I previously ran the “canned” H&S 250 tunes on “stock” with a LBF of “0”. The timing on those tunes was a little more than I wanted considering the weight I am towing (I know the 6.4 rods are tough but I think that is asking a lot from them). I also explained that since I have to comply with DOT standards and enter every weigh station, I would rather not draw attention to myself by driving a truck that is smoky. Due to the timing being cut back on Matt’s tunes, I expected his tunes would run a little hotter EGTs, EOTs, and would have more lag and less power. All of those would have been acceptable to me to keep the smoke to a minimum and spare the rods a little bit.
I tried his tunes for a 2300 mile run I did in 3.5 days. I was on some very difficult terrain including side roads with grades and I40 through the Asheville area, I77 through VA and WV, eastern TN, etc. The results:
I have no idea how he did it, but I could not ever get my truck to smoke…even when I was grossing 32500. Because I have a gear jammer, I don’t have a TC to slip to get my RPMs up when taking off and my old tunes always smoked pretty good when taking off from a stop running through the gears. What amazed me even more was the fact that it spooled JUST AS QUICK but without the smoke. I didn’t think that could be possible.
I was also amazed that my EGTs didn’t seem to be any higher. Although it is hard to make a direct comparison because weight, grade, ambient temps, etc. play a factor on EGTs, it seemed like my EGTs were actually slightly lower (I would estimate about 50 degrees). Again, with reduced timing, I thought for sure my EGTs would be up. My EOTs also were lower (EOTs are the biggest problem with my set up when towing heavy up long steep grades). I had just gone through the same steep grade near Asheville 2 weeks before with 3500 less than this trip 2 weeks before and my EOTs at peak temp were 4 degrees cooler with Matt’s tunes. The other really impressive thing about this was that Matt’s tunes actually felt a little more powerful (by seat of the pants feel, I don’t have dyno numbers to verify that). Again, with the timing cut back, I don’t understand how that is done when I am running cooler temps.
Finally, the exhaust brake…through trial and error, I have modified my exhaust brake no less than 50 times. Initially, I worked with the EBP desired tables on MCC. Later, I started doing some adjustments on the vanes. I only sent him the table of the “Desired EBP” tables that I use. From there, he did everything else. The exhaust brake program worked better than mine. It controlled my speeds down grades as well as the ones I made, but it came on much smoother than mine. Again, I don’t know what he did to make it work so well, but it was AWESOME!!!
In summary, for all you guys using your trucks to tow (especially heavy), I HIGHLY RECOMMEND buying Matt’s tow tune for H&S. I can’t think of a single negative thing I could say about them in terms of performance and smoke and I sleep better knowing that I won’t be putting quite as much strain on my engine.
Here are some pics from the trip I made using Matt’s tunes. Sorry, I forgot to take a picture of the skid loader that I towed for 358 miles.
The rest of this will only be pertaining to this tow tune. While I was talking to Matt, I explained how much I NEED a good tow tune. I have a hot shot business that I do on the side. I am legal to gross 33500 lbs and I consistently gross over 28k. My truck is a SRW F350 with 3.73s running 35" tires. It has a ZF6. I know moving that kind of weight is asking a lot of it. To make matters worse, most of the towing I do is through the Appalachian mountains (WV, western PA, VA, NC, SC, GA, NY and eastern KY and TN). I have found that if I go over about 26k lbs, I have to use an exhaust brake if I will be on roads that have a grade of 4% or more. Although Matt is not a big fan of exhaust brakes because of the extra stress it puts on the turbo, valve train, etc., he understood my need for one and agreed to help me out. He made me a regular towing tune (that I will use on flatter states such as OH, IN, IL, eastern PA, etc.) as well as a towing tune with an exhaust brake.
I previously ran the “canned” H&S 250 tunes on “stock” with a LBF of “0”. The timing on those tunes was a little more than I wanted considering the weight I am towing (I know the 6.4 rods are tough but I think that is asking a lot from them). I also explained that since I have to comply with DOT standards and enter every weigh station, I would rather not draw attention to myself by driving a truck that is smoky. Due to the timing being cut back on Matt’s tunes, I expected his tunes would run a little hotter EGTs, EOTs, and would have more lag and less power. All of those would have been acceptable to me to keep the smoke to a minimum and spare the rods a little bit.
I tried his tunes for a 2300 mile run I did in 3.5 days. I was on some very difficult terrain including side roads with grades and I40 through the Asheville area, I77 through VA and WV, eastern TN, etc. The results:
I have no idea how he did it, but I could not ever get my truck to smoke…even when I was grossing 32500. Because I have a gear jammer, I don’t have a TC to slip to get my RPMs up when taking off and my old tunes always smoked pretty good when taking off from a stop running through the gears. What amazed me even more was the fact that it spooled JUST AS QUICK but without the smoke. I didn’t think that could be possible.
I was also amazed that my EGTs didn’t seem to be any higher. Although it is hard to make a direct comparison because weight, grade, ambient temps, etc. play a factor on EGTs, it seemed like my EGTs were actually slightly lower (I would estimate about 50 degrees). Again, with reduced timing, I thought for sure my EGTs would be up. My EOTs also were lower (EOTs are the biggest problem with my set up when towing heavy up long steep grades). I had just gone through the same steep grade near Asheville 2 weeks before with 3500 less than this trip 2 weeks before and my EOTs at peak temp were 4 degrees cooler with Matt’s tunes. The other really impressive thing about this was that Matt’s tunes actually felt a little more powerful (by seat of the pants feel, I don’t have dyno numbers to verify that). Again, with the timing cut back, I don’t understand how that is done when I am running cooler temps.
Finally, the exhaust brake…through trial and error, I have modified my exhaust brake no less than 50 times. Initially, I worked with the EBP desired tables on MCC. Later, I started doing some adjustments on the vanes. I only sent him the table of the “Desired EBP” tables that I use. From there, he did everything else. The exhaust brake program worked better than mine. It controlled my speeds down grades as well as the ones I made, but it came on much smoother than mine. Again, I don’t know what he did to make it work so well, but it was AWESOME!!!
In summary, for all you guys using your trucks to tow (especially heavy), I HIGHLY RECOMMEND buying Matt’s tow tune for H&S. I can’t think of a single negative thing I could say about them in terms of performance and smoke and I sleep better knowing that I won’t be putting quite as much strain on my engine.
Here are some pics from the trip I made using Matt’s tunes. Sorry, I forgot to take a picture of the skid loader that I towed for 358 miles.
