SCT X4 w/ 5-Star Tunes - One Week Review

[Chris@FreedomMotorsports]

Chris - No, I haven't talked to Mike on the phone... only email. I feel we're communicating clearly via email, but I did email him this video this evening and asked him to call me if he thinks a phone conversation would be beneficial.

Here's a 25 second video I made on my ride to work on Friday; you can see that the truck shifts 5 times (4-5-4-5-4-5) in only 17 seconds at a 40 mph cruise. I just can't believe this is normal.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FNOQCE19WI

That doesn't seem normal to me. I admit that I do not run a performance tune so I don't have personal experience to compare to. Have you sent a link to that video to Mike? I will send it to him now either way. The only time I personally can see that as "normal" would be in varying terrain that has you constantly going from one extreme uphill to another. In my experience, the shifting should hold the higher gear until a grade causes added load enough to make it down shift. But not back and forth like that.

 

[slowjoe]

Mine has mellowed out. It's learned where it wants to be. Sorry as I have no idea the mileage, I have been crazy at work and I'd say it only really got driven back and forth to work for the week and a half it's been on. 10-12 miles a day city driving.

 

[Iman]

Great customer service.

 

[BAJASVT]

I was communicating with Mike & Scott from 5-Star via email, but Chris (Freedom Motorsports) recommended I talk to them in person. Mike was out when I called, but I talked to Scott about my issue for about 20 minutes. He was very receptive to my concerns, took notes, and said they'd work on a new custom tune for me. They emailed it to me yesterday, but I didn't get a chance to try it out until late last night (after 1am). I was only able to put about 4-5 miles on the new tune, but my first impressions were VERY GOOD!!! The truck has all the power of the full performance tune, all the benefits of the performance shifting, but it's no longer searching for gears at the shift transition speeds. It seems I now have about a 3 mph overlap between shifts during normal acceleration/deceleration (daily driving conditions).

For example, my most problematic speed of 40 mph. The truck will shift into 5th when I accelerate to 40 mph, but if I start to coast or slow down, it doesn't down shift to 4th until I drop to about 37 mph. Same goes for the up shift; it won't shift back to 5th until I get back to 40 mph.

Like I said, I only had a few miles to test it out because it was so late. Normally I would have just waited until the next day to try it out, but I'm actually not going to be able to drive the truck for a few days, so I wanted to get a few testing miles in and provide some feedback to 5-Star. I'll put some more miles on the truck next week and let the adaptive learning set in before I report back again.

 

[WRCRaptor]

Where is S.M Michigan are you going 40mph you drive to slow!! LOL Maybe some time after you drive it for a while you could take me for a ride so I can compare my 91P tune to your 93P and see the shifting difference.

 

[BAJASVT]

Where is S.M Michigan are you going 40mph you drive to slow!! LOL Maybe some time after you drive it for a while you could take me for a ride so I can compare my 91P tune to your 93P and see the shifting difference.

Well I live in Grosse Ile and the highest speed limit on the island is 35mph. I'm about 5 miles from the free bridge and 8 miles from the toll bridge... that's not much, but a minimum of 10 miles a day if I only leave the house once. The cops are pretty lenient up to about 5 over, but it's a fairly small community so you're going to get busted if they see you going any faster than that too often. Plus, a Raptor isn't exactly incognito. LOL

Another part of my daily commute to work is Village Road in Dearborn between Oakwood and Southfield... 25 mph speed limit, police patrolled often, and the truck was doing the same thing there between 3-4 shift at 30 mph.

It was also doing the same thing between 5-6 shift at 50 mph.

What tune/tuner do you have? When you have time, set your cruise control at any speed just a few mph below a shift point. Hit the cruise control + button (+ button 1 time = 1 mph) every 5-10 seconds until the truck up shifts. Then hit the - button one time and I bet it down shifts. With my new tune the truck no longer does that, but if you get into the throttle it downshifts just as hard and fast as with the full performance tune. Other than that, I doubt you or I would notice any difference between our tunes if you have the 5-Star 91P tune.

 

[JJ f150harley]

Baja what tune did u change, ur 93performance?
The reason I ask is this happens to me too, so I switched to the tow tune but I want to be able to use the other ones too.

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[WRCRaptor]

I was joking about the speed, now that I know you are on grosse ile I hear you about the speed. I am in Troy we drive a lot faster here. I am running 5star tunes on a sct itsx tuner no issue here.

 

[apeezie289]

I was joking about the speed, now that I know you are on grosse ile I hear you about the speed. I am in Troy we drive a lot faster here. I am running 5star tunes on a sct itsx tuner no issue here.

I have an iTSX tuner off my power stroke & interested in getting some tunes from 5 star. What has been your experience with this tuner & 5 star's tunes?


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[WRCRaptor]

So far so good. Got my itsx from Freedom Motorsports although the tunes are 5 star. I did have some trouble at first but the SCT tech support line remotely updated the firm wear and that sorted it out.