I just pulled the car apart last month to go higher compression and to switch to pauter rods from crower.

 

Obd2 users also have to buy an obd1 ecu...another $200. Thats a total of $850ish. I bought my aem for $900...but i'm starting to get scared on getting this tuned now. After i've been reading about how much harder it is to tune than hondata.

 

I believe he's upgrading to a bigger turbo setup.


Getting back on topic I believe that you can't say that one is better overall. It really depends on you setup and what you plan to do with the car. There is no "universal" system that will be perfect for every car. If you have a full race car it would be fun to play with all the extra features on EMS but how many people are in that position? Most people have street cars and hondata is tried and proven for street reliability and effectiveness.

 

Just like what I thought, Hondata is way to go. Nobody here make 600whp with AEM EMS no matter how they try.

 

On average dyno tuning, it takes about 1 hour to get peak HP and torque.

With Hondata's autotuning, part throttle can be tuned in 2-3 hours.

With any stand alone ECU like AEM, I wonder how much time it takes just to make it run. then tune part throttle then dyno?

IMHO, if it's a HONDA then do Hondata. Any other car M-O-T-E-C.

I haven't tried any other ECU stand alones but I am welcome to try another brand.

I have mastered the use of Hondata and Any other change will require studying how to use the gadget properly.




[Modified by KOTSEMOTO, 11:26 PM 2/12/2003]

 

Comparing used prices to new prices is not a fair comparision. I have seen used stage 2b with ecu's go for 400-450.00, the add another 150.00 for the obd-2 to 1 jumper so now your at 550-600.00.

 

for obd2 car..aem= same price as hondata(stage 2 or 3)...convert that to canadian rocks eer i mean money..
and I got my AEM for the price of my hondata STAGE 2B
over a 4b Im saving tonnes


[Modified by SiRkid, 3:46 PM 2/13/2003]

 

It is all about what software you are familar with.

The only way to have an accurate judgement between any of these systems is for that person to have exactly the same amount of hours put into them.

If you have an expert Hondata tuner and an expert AEM tuner, any vehicle can be tuned in the same amount of time.

The EMS software is improved and is more user-friendly with every release.

Why is MOTEC the best universal system? Remember, DFI, Haltech, Hondata, and AEM are all Windows based, however, the $5K+ MOTEC is still DOS based.


[Modified by quick108, 1:02 PM 2/13/2003]

 

I actually prefer the Haltech with its Dos based software. It brought the very meaning to simplicty and functuality. It took forever to get the bastard to run 100%, but the software was a joke to learn.

 

exactly. how about someone that has never tuned on either and learns to do both. i think the first time user on hondata will get it tuned quicker. just my opinion. i think its obvious by reading a general consensus of posts. I see more and more complaints about " I cant even get this damn car to idle properly after 4 hours". I have yet to read that post on a hondata car.

 

The AEM EMS has autotune as well.


All I see here is a bunch of people jabbering about products they haven't used or even seen in action.

I have an AEM EMS and I love it. Having an OBD2 vehicle, I could not get a Hondata for less than the price of the AEM. (Hondata + coversion harness + OBD1 ECU + chipping = Money + DOWNTIME) I've never used a Hondata so you know what I'll keep my mouth shut about it because I don't have any experience with it and as such have no basis for saying how hard or easy it is, or how well or poorly it works. And I suggest others do the same.

 

Street honda's should use Hondata becuase it will start up like stock and idle like stock without doing anything drastic.

To get aem to do that you will have to find the sweet spot and play with it for hours, days maybe even months. I can honestly say that even some tuners CANNOT get aem or dfi or haltech to start up like a stock car. However with hondata it will start up and idle like a stock honda.

There is so much more then just start up and idling but do you think any tuner can get aem, dfi, etc., to idle and start up the same as the stock ecu?

IMO if it's for the street, hondata is the best thing to get. If you have time to play with aem and can afford the downtime and have some basic understanding of tuning then get the aem.

If you are not going to tune it yourself then get whatever system your tuner has the most experience with. If your tuner is great with pms then get pms, if he's into motec then get motec, etc..

edit - Any system is only as good as the person tuning it.


[Modified by ekb18c, 5:49 AM 2/14/2003]

 

AEM EMS Plug it up, downloaded a program from the AEM site, click on Autotune and drove around for 30 minutes. It tuned the drivablity by itself. Full throttle I tuned myself. Went to the dyno to fine tune it and produced good power. Anyone in the area need help, let me know. It's easy.

 

Will the AEM tune itself using a normal 4 wire O2 sensor?

 

it can but not recommend....I use a wide band o2

 

i messed with o2 feedback with a regular o2 sensor, and had problems getting it to work well. the algorithm wants a more linear response. o2 feedback is basically automapping in real time without making changes to the fuel map. so, i dont think it would do well.

good news is accel based traction control will be fully implemented in the next release. the current release has the basic setup parameters but its not fully functional.

 

With eiter systems auto tune feature just add another couple of hundred dollars to get a wide band O2 meter.

 

Im bringing this post back up from the dead bc I have some questions to add.

Im trying to decide on either system to manage my turbo setup. If I went Hondata S200 Id want to get every option so I would have the option of tuning it myself after the intial tuning by my tuner (who uses Hondata). But the Hondata route requires me to convert to OBD1 which adds another ~$500 to my total price. And I would still need a boost controller too right? which is another ~$500 (looking at the Apex AVC-R).

It seems if you look at it that way the AEM is much cheaper. But I cant find much information about the AEM system on the AEM website, its very vague. I think having a manual boost contoller that I can adjust on the fly would be more desirable than having my ems do it. And the traction control apeals to me but it doesnt go into detail about how that works either. The AVC-R has gear and rpm based boost (poor mans traction control).

Ive been leaning towards Hondata for its proven track record but the AEM just seems so much cheaper for more functionality.

 

Hondata for sure is the best way to go. over 600 horse to the wheels can be accomplished!!

 

The Hondata sounds great but after 4 consecutive bad units we dropped dealing with them. AEM well we got ours idling perfect in 15 minutes start to finish. Not to say that this is the norm we may of just had a bad batch of Hondata units but i dont believe in thier products. Once AEM is used more people will understand it. Dan (93LSivic) was our at my house over the weekend and his buddy he came with drove his turboed B18C CRX over an hours drive wityh not a problem at all. He loves it. I foget the guys name but i hope he is a member here because he know the system very well. DAn is your reading this post something about your Hondata experiences and why you trashed yours and went to AEM. We need more background from users of both.

 

well I have had ems for only like a week now and I'm very happy with it... if it wasn't for a blown fuse and a parameter code that I was missing in the actual calibration from Quaalude I would have got my car running with out a problem in about 2 hours.... I never use Hondata so I can't really compare but I can say EMS was the way to go for me...


[Modified by LJR-LUDE01, 6:23 PM 3/18/2003]

 

so far i hate my s200... 500 for tuning... 450 for s200b...180 for datalogging... 275 for p72 ecu... hondata or someting fried that ecu ahve to get another so im should have gotten AEM.. go aem man

 

Oh boy, this post comes back from the dead. Hondata does seem to have a bit of problems with their newer s100/s200 systems for some reason. Go AEM, but make sure you have a competent tuner. After playing around with the AEM, I dislike the software it has too many features that i dont think you need for a street car. Having said that i will be forced to run it on the turbo s2000 that i will soon to be working on, since hondata doesnt plan on making anything for the s2000's.

 

Tell me more about the antilag and traction control.

 

I have an AEM ems on my sol and my brother has one on his teg. I probably would have gone w/ hondata if there was a tuner in my area, but since there aren't ANY tuners in my area period, I went w/ the AEM ems because it had more features.

It is true that I don't even use half of the features, but I don't have anything negative to say about it.