Jet Mass Air Flow Sensor Upgrade for Ford 5.4 engine

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iceman302

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I was thinking of the Superchips programmer myself. They did the research and dynoed it at 33 rwhp gain for the Raptor. Is this a good choice? I don't know if $339.00 for 33hp is worth it or not. I plan on staying with the stock exhaust(no headers on this baby) and the price for headers on this truck will be out there. So not much left for me to do right now.

Superchips/SCT have a ton of experience tuning the 5.4 but I would make sure of two things: 1) the tune is Raptor specific and 2) that you have access to a tune that accounts for your CAI. I forget exactly how they operate but I think they have tunes that you can download from their site that have been updated for various intakes.
 
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brinkwolf

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Superchips/SCT have a ton of experience tuning the 5.4 but I would make sure of two things: 1) the tune is Raptor specific and 2) that you have access to a tune that accounts for your CAI. I forget exactly how they operate but I think they have tunes that you can download from their site that have been updated for various intakes.

Well the one I saw was the same one for the Raptor as for the standard 5.4 F150 but get this. The Raptor get 33hp from it and the standard f150 gains 38hp. What gives? Why 5 more hp for a standard f150 5.4 is what I can't figure..
 

iceman302

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Well the one I saw was the same one for the Raptor as for the standard 5.4 F150 but get this. The Raptor get 33hp from it and the standard f150 gains 38hp. What gives? Why 5 more hp for a standard f150 5.4 is what I can't figure..

That is odd. Is that maybe the older 5.4 that was rated at 310 hp? I'm not sure. Maybe the upgraded Raptor tune is a little less aggressive.
 
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brinkwolf

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I guess but I still don't know if it justifies the money. Maybe I'll keep an I out for one on fleabay at a decent price. I saw one that was like new only used once that went for $200. but missed on it.
 

iceman302

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I guess but I still don't know if it justifies the money. Maybe I'll keep an I out for one on fleabay at a decent price. I saw one that was like new only used once that went for $200. but missed on it.

Based on advertised horsepower claims, you paid more for the JET MAF sensor than you would for the Super chips tuner. If it was me, I'd send the JET flying and get your money back, then spend another $200 on the tuner. In my experience, a tune is the biggest (and best bang for the buck) mod that you can do.
 

Droid

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Think that's a great idea.

I know very little about Ford tuning yet, but did gain a reasonable amount of knowledge during my 12 years of GM pickup ownership. The GM LS1 derivatives *love* a good tune. And on the pickups at least, changing a few parameters with regard to shift points and eliminating stupid delays added to wait a few seconds before going open loop really seemed to wake it up.

On GMs, there were two types of tuners. The first type was the "handhelds" like Hypertech, Superchips, and Diablo, which simply let you load there "custom" tune. These were never highly regarded by the people who knew what they were doing. Everyone who wanted real performance did not use a handheld, they used computer-based software such as EFILive or HPTuners and then programmed their trucks using an OBD2<->USB interface. Alternatively, people would pay a tuner to use EFILive or HPTuners to custom tune their truck (sometimes even renting the hardware by mail). I've used both a Hypertech handheld and EFILive, and the difference was night and day. The big upside (and downside) to the computer software based tuners is that you spend time logging sensor data from the truck, adjusting the tune, and getting it perfect.

Additionally have looked at the mechanics of the tune Hypertech used on my GMC Sierra using EFILive....scary shit. For instance, the difference between their 87 and 91 tunes was simply to kick up the timing 2* in every single cell of the RPM*MAF high octane spark table. Additionally some of their tables were quite rough. I'm not a tuning expert, but this looked fishy to me.

Have yet to figure out what's good on the Ford side. I'd buy HPTuners in a minute if they supported 6.2s, but their stuff only works up to 08 5.4s. EFILIve doesn't do Ford. And I think SCTFlash only caters to tuning shops, not end users.
 

iceman302

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Nice addition, Droid... all correct. I've always relied on a dedicated tuner that was able to tweak and update my tune as the mods progressed. Basically, the hand held programmers are a more aggressive version of the factory tune in the way that they still have to cater to a broad range of customers/vehicles. The issue is that what works great for one truck might only work so-so on another. In the end, the best way to go is to invest in a tuner with experience tuning your particular vehicle... one that relies on a flash tuner through the OBD II port. A couple of my buddies own a shop just up the hill and I pay them $25 for a dyno pull with A/F every time I have the tune adjusted for a new mod. That way I can confirm that the A/F is safe and everything looks good.
 
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brinkwolf

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Well your lucky there Ice because I don't personally know any of the dyno guys around here and they charge top dollar because of all the racers here.
 
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