101 Motorcafe?

[AzzurrA]

ok... my stance on locking ECU's...

it's okay to lock the ECU IF the owner of the ECU agrees to it.

I.e. when they book the car in for a tune, you say to them "You do realise that we will lock the tune on this car" and if they say "okay" then i have no problem with that.

What i have a problem with is workshops who do it underhandedly and don't tell their customers that they lock the ECU, and then the customer wants to get the car retuned somewhere else for whatever reason, and find that they can't get it retuned, and will be hit with a $1000 'unlocking' fee

I'm sorry, but the workshop/tuner DOES NOT 'Own' the tune, or the ECU.

They have been paid to provide a service/product (in this case the tune) and what they are effectively doing by locking the ECU is not providing the product (access to the maps that the customer paid for).

Not sure on the legalities of this, but sooner or later, someone is going to wisen up and take a workshop to court over something like this.

If the workshop is wanting to lock the tune to provide a warranty on the tune/engine, then go for it, but if the customer wants to get the car retuned somewhere else, just tell them that as soon as they provide them with the 'unlock' code, their warranty is null and void, don't charge them $1000 for a pin code.. that's just insanity.

Varun - you are going on about not disclosing tuning ability... if you were a good tuner, wouldn't you WANT people to know how good you are? Apart from warranty issues, the only reason i can think of for a tuner to lock an ECU would be to hide how crap his tune is from other people. It's not like you can just use a tune from another car on a car with similar mods... sure, it will run, but it will still need tuning to get it to suit that particular car, so its pretty much pointless to 'steal' someone elses tune.

[r33_racer]

Im with Azzurra on this one.

[MountainRunner]

Hey guys,

I understand you can unlock the PFC if you have the FC-Logit Software. I have it for the R32 GTR (and I think it does R33 GTR as well).

Anyway, if anyone does have a locked PFC and wants I'm happy to let you use my gear to unlock it.

I'm with you guys, you pay for a tune and you own it unless you have signed some sort of licensing agreement. Warranty is an interesting point, although

I think a better solution would be for a workshop to say "If you want full warranty then we lock the ECU". If you want it unlocked its $50 (or whatever a reasonable cost is for the 10 minutes it takes to do) but your warranty is over.

Paul

[zuboo]

Went in to 101 today to have a chat to see what is the story, as all things happens there is 2 side to every story, so this is what i found out, the ecu was locked when the last owner got the car tunned, they got a phone call off phee to ask for the unlock code, the code that was used is a code that is used for a number of vehicles, they told phee she would have to send the ecu to them to have it unlocked, because they were not going to give out the code to the public, phee said she needed it quicker then that, and 101 told her to call motec to get it unlocked, motec are able to bypass password with there own code, with out losing the maps, as for the $1000 this is news to them, they have never charged for and ecu to get unlocked, but they do ask for the ecu or car brought back so they unlock it or clear the code.

[varun_gtr]

thats exactly right, 2 sided stories end up blown way out of proportion. ben the old owner knew that the ecu will be locked and he was more than happy to resume tuning. the reason for this is to protect further tinkering to what 101 did to his car, the engine was "standard" and that was the given limit of the engine. when the call came to 101's knowledge they wanted the password, and yes this particular password is a commonly used password by rob the tuner and all that was said by us was "NO" send it to motec. what ever happened from then on was heard by us from zuboo and cambell from this forum. i hav lashed out not knowing wat is going on sorry for that but it is beserk to charge $1000 but us the people who get by hearing it, we dont actually know the full story.

[Noy]

always good to hear 2 sides of the story. I'm guessing you work there varun_gtr? if not maybe the guys from 101 could be shown this thread to further clarify the matters..

The business i work at was slandered on the net and on other forums and its not nice reading it....

[phee]

Ahuh...

I know, and a few dozen other people know what 101 said as they ALL called them and got the same answer, so don't think I am the only they told this story to.

But hey, you guys are the ones who live in the area and make the decision if you will give them your hard earned cash, so it's your final call who you believe.

[predator]

I'm sorry, but the workshop/tuner DOES NOT 'Own' the tune

I'm not sure there.. the tune is probably their intellectual property, as they have spent the time doing the research and getting it to where it is. To do that from scratch, they'd charge the consumer 10 times as much.

It's probably the same as my industry, we own the code, and the way in which the system is designed. If not, any john cobbly would pay the $x for our system we've build and developed over months and months, and could therefore on-sell that to anybody else they knew, and profit from that many times over. In effect, why go to us at all after that, even though we spent $x getting the system to where it is, and using our knowledge and knowhow.

The logistics of a car ECU tune aren't altogether that different. I have no problems with the policy to be honest, as long as the consumer *knows* this is the case. If they don't like it, they are welcome to go elsewhere.

[phee]

I understand a good quality w/shop locking an ECU, but warranty should be void once it becomes unlocked. If something goes bang after it is unlocked then the tune can be downloaded and it is easy to tell if it has been tampered with so I don't see what the big deal is.

[gtr spec]

well i just signed up to this forum to say your a bitch...

u come here and spend the whole time bagging out a very well known company in brisbane and the gold coast. You didnt even pay for the bloody tune in the first place it was the previous owner !!!

so i guess u can wipe that 400hp estimate from your sig now ?

[R33S2]

When I had my Microtech installed it was unlocked, but due to a dodgey bastard fiddling with it (unkown to me) my tuner locked it after he fixed it for free, his side of the story was that it was my tune, as I had paid him to do it, and I could leave it unlocked if I wanted, but he pointed out that he would rather it locked as all it takes is someone to plug in with a laptop and copy it, and that also a locked ECU is legal as the AFR's (emissions) are gauranteed by him.

[AzzurrA]

well i just signed up to this forum to say your a bitch...

u come here and spend the whole time bagging out a very well known company in brisbane and the gold coast. You didnt even pay for the bloody tune in the first place it was the previous owner !!!

so i guess u can wipe that 400hp estimate from your sig now ?

go back to boostlosing and have a cry there... we don't tolerate wankers like yourself here

if you'd even bothered reading ANYTHING, you would see that since the car was tuned by 101, it has been rebuilt bigger and better in every way, as well as being retuned by someone else.

[gtr spec]

and if u had of bothered reading the other thread which was 45 pages long, you would know that the rebuilt got rooted and the car is now down in sydney or melb getting fixed again...

all im trying to say is, if your not happy with a company say it once and thats it, dont go bagging them out over 4 different forums continuously.

Edited November 23, 2006 by gtr spec

[r33_racer]

i thought she said it was in darwin??? are we all talking about the samething here? or am i lost?

[phee]

Yeah I am in Darwin, which brings me to the point, if I got poor service from a QLD company I would deal with it and move on, if I was played by a QLD company for $1,000 to unlock a code then I am going to be a little more than ticked off.

I joined this forum just after the car blew up to ask for rebuilding advice in the forced induction arena. When the engine was rebuilt and we were having the problems with getting the code from 101 I made a thread in general discussions asking if anyone knew the owner before Phil, who turns out to be Ben. Someone found the for sale thread that Ben posted and I gave him a call and asked if he could help me out. He called 101 for me since he paid the money and I didnt have any luck but he got the same reply I did. Not about the $1,000 - but sending it back to them.

After that I gave up on 101 but my mates on PF kept trying to ring through for me to get the code. It was the owner of PF who was told it wasnt 101s problem and if I really wanted it it was mine for the cash. Thats when PF and I got ticked off. We got in contact with MoTeC and a base map will wipe the old tune, which if that is what 101 were trying to protect then they didnt have to worry. Unfortunatley to be able to change any settings still, even with the now base map in the ECU, I would still need the code to unlock it.

We only got through from the guys at MoTec, who were reluctant to release any info ad passwords, as you would be, but Dale (10sec_rx7) told them what 101 had offered and MoTeC were less than impressed, so stayed on the phone while we wiped everything clear and stayed on the phone so get the cold start and ignition correct. THATS SERVICE!

I made a comment about 101 and what happened in the thread I started trying to find Ben, but I was offline a few days and when I got back couldnt find it so assumed what I had said broke forum rules and it was deleted. I didnt start a new thread or complain because I didnt see the point in it.

I wasnt aware of this thread until someone PMed me with a link who knew about what happened over on PF, and they obviously thought it was important enough that I should say what I went through with them.

I dont go around bagging out 101 and my only conversations about them I have, on and offline is in this thread. Someone originally asked for opinions from experience. I gave mine. Once again I am from Darwin, and have already mentioned that I am not here to try and sway everyone into a hate 101 club because I am not, I am also not interested in lying or making up stories to slander a company I have had no other contact with other than a a few very frustrating phone calls.

It is easy to say to send the ECU away to get it unlocked, but I wasnt aware it was locked until the Saturday it went on the dyno, and my mate who I flew up from Sydney was leaving on Tuesday. It is expensive to fly someone up for something, and get nothing.

I dont earn enough to justify $1k to unlock an ECU, and I wouldnt be putting my reputation on the line if I was making it up. As I have said earlier, believe what you want, I am sure 101 have done some great jobs, they wouldnt still be open for business if they didnt, but they didnt do a great job with me.

This thread wanted opinions, thats what I gave.

Edit: This isn't another "stick that up your ass" post, cause quite frankly that's lame. I don't know who gtr_spec is either, and not too interested in finding out but I do want to add the car is 15kms away from me, and it isn't going to Sydney or Melbourne so getting facts straight before posting accusations is important.

Just so you know

Edited November 23, 2006 by phee

[frankxinyu]

so did 101 want 1000 or not???

we are getting different answers here. either one of you is lying.

[zuboo]

, but they didnt do a great job with me.

You did not have any work done by them, you just asked for the code and they said no, and they told you to call motec. Like i said before if motec wanted you to have the map they could have given you there back door password to keep the map on the ecu, and if the tunner knows what he is doing he would not want to start with someone else map and would not take too much time to do a new one.

I might be wrong but on another forum you said the wastgate had a hole in it, so the car was over boosting and blew, then rebuilt and dynoed, after it started over heating, and the tunner and the engine builder were blaming each other, you then draged the engine builder through the mud on the forum which he come on and defend him self, then said you were getting it built in syd and selling the car.

Apart from not giving you the code i can not see what 101 did wrong, and motec did the same thing, they showed you how to wipe the map but did not give you the password to access the map that was on the ecu.

So it comes down to you have had no work done by 101, but bag the shit out of them, you your self said they did not ask you for $1000 but your friends who called said it would cost $1000, dont you think if they wanted $1000 for the code they would ask the owner of the car for the money not there friends, on another forum you were asking users to call them and take up there time, call them over and over, do skids up and down the street and to call them on a pay phone and leave the line open so they get no phone calls. All for a code that motec could have gave you but chose not to, think about it

Edited November 23, 2006 by zuboo

[Blitz_R33]

on another forum you were asking users to call them and take up there time, call them over and over, do skids up and down the street and to call them on a pay phone and leave the line open so they get no phone calls.

LoL you have to love the "two sides to every story" story.. Now that part is funny n lame at the same time

[phee]

read the thread again zuboo, my user name on there is 'phee' and I was busy organising the tunes away from a computer when that discussion was going on.

there seems to be a 101 bandwagon going around here, and I am not too keen to get involved and try to stop it, so I have said my piece and what happened, it's your money and your decision who you go to!

[Garndi]

so did 101 want 1000 or not???

we are getting different answers here. either one of you is lying.

I thought there was a bit of bullSh!t going on as well!.

thanks Zuboo for the update and clearing things up (keep up the good work), its always a pleasure to get the 2nd side of the story........