So I installed hardpipes, intercooler, and sri

Went to go tune cobalt with hp tuners and it says I'm locked out of the computer, now I know the previous owner had the car tuned with trifecta and claims it was returned back to stock, anyway, keep trying and trying and sending a code saying that the car wasn't returned back to the stock tune, ok so I go to one dealership and ask them to flash it back to stock, they're asking questions, why I want it, why I don't have a cat, whatever, eventually tell me they went to go do it and apparently the gm system crashed so they couldn't flash it today, but they told me that I might lock the ECU becuz I have a CEL from the catless downpipe and say I might have to purchase a new ECU @$500 nix

So my question is how true are try by telling me flashing it could lock the ECU, I've been trying to finally mod my car and run into problem after problem, anybody heard of this?!!??

 

Sounds like it wasnt fully returned to stock

 

Yea that's why I'm thinking too, just don't wanna dump 500 on a new ECU just to start finally modding the car

 

Send the VIN to Vince at Trifecta and see if it was tuned by him or another tuner and locked. BYT was good for locking down things with different layer combo's.

A write entire will not brick the ECU if done correctly. Sorry for your pain.

What were the HPT errors? VIN/OS mismatch perhaps?

 

Yes you are correct. It needs to have the trifecta cable flash it back to stock or a Tech 2 tool but IIRC the hidden tunes cannot be fully flashed over with the Tech 2 tool so he may just want to use a trifecta cable to return it to stock.

 

the previous owner tuned it himself..guess hes a trifecta dealer....said he flashed it back to stock but apparently didnt

anyway....went to a better dealership and talked to a master tech that knew what he was doing...said "oh u need a reflash...no problem" did it and drove away 20 min later to the tuner.....still didnt recognize it so we had to throw in a different VIN to trick the ECU....either way it got tuned last night and is running like a whole new car...im def happy with how its tuned now.

 

A lot of the Trifecta tuned cars were not able to be read after the fact. And some of them had info on them that also made them fail validation checks after you downloaded the stock tune.

The thing that sucks if you have to buy a new ECM is that you will need to perform a clutch position sensor learn on some if them too before the ignition will turn over.

Also a blank ECM is a blank ECM. Can't connect to them with HPTuners. Make sure it's preprogrammed with a cobalt SS file on it.

 

Another reason to not get trifecta tuned....

 

Nuthugger....

 

LOL I didnt ask for a pic of you but thanks.

 

he did a error by not forcing the stock tune.
there is a option in ezcable.
ezflash/program/force full flash then select your files

my question is why TFT can right over hpt and not the opposite. hpt may have to do their homework.

 

HPT expects the files to pass validation.

Vince wrote his own software and can make it do whatever he wants. This can force the tune to operate outside of the boundaries of what HPT considers a valid, uncorrupt file.

This is also a potential problem when dealing with SCT, EFI Live, HPT and other software tuning the same car.

HPT is also pretty good. I use it a lot. But I notice that it occasionally has glitches. Like I've seen someone's fuel gauge start working backwards for no reason after flashing it. Then flashed it again and it started working normal. That kind of thing doesn't happen very often, but I haven't seen it happen with my SCT software yet.

Then again on some years of late 90s mustangs I've flashed the tune with SCT only to not even have the tune actually flash. Gotta watch that crap.