Jordan '94 Z28

Hey guys, I was wanting some advice as to what performance chip would be best for my 1994 Z28 LT1. And what the pros and cons are for them. Thanks for the help!

RamAir95TA

The term "chips" is a thing of the past. Most all QUALITY tuning is done either on a dyno or a mail-order tune. Mail-order tunes are wildly popular nowadays. My personal preference is PCMforless, but there are plenty other choices available.

Just be sure to avoid things like piggy-back performance chips, hand-held tuners like the Hypertech, etc.

mrmint69

What he said!

moparman

Your '94 doesn't have a chip. Go with the previous advice.

Jordan '94 Z28

The pcmforless was only adding 10 - 40 more horses to the engine where as with the 'chips' they were supposedly adding 75+...can anyone break down the differences between the two and the actual gain of buying one?

RamAir95TA

Is this a joke post?

You don't honestly think that an off-the-shelf generic chip can add seventy five horsepower, do you?

PCMforless (or ANY other mail-order tune) is light years ahead of said "chips", even if it "only" adds 20hp.

Where do you see a performance "chip" adding 75+ HP?

Jordan '94 Z28

First of all this isn't a joke post.

Secondly I was just poking around on different 'performance' sites and they all had these claims of adding 75 horsepower it looked fishy that is why I posted on here.

Injuneer

Most of the "chips" are actually small plastic cases with a resistor inside, to splice into the throttle position sensor or the inlet air temp sensor. If you look over those sites carefully, they generally claim the same huge HP and MPG gains for every chip they sell, whether it's going into a 3-cylinder Geo or a 12-cylinder Ferrari. That, in and of itself should make you suspicious. Totally implausible. The chips (aka resistors) do NOTHING.

People buy these, and get the placebo effect, thinking since they just spent $69 on a "chip" that magically reprograms the engine management system, their seat-of-the-pants dyno can actually feel the HP. In fact they have just spent big $$$ for a 10-cent resistor in a 50-cent plastic box. Even if 1/2 of the people send the "chip" back, to get their money back, the seller has still screwed the other 1/2 of the people out of big bucks, which the seller is stuffing in his pocket to take to the bank.

If it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn't true.

If you drove a large displacement diesel truck, you probably could make 75-100 extra HP with a complete retune, even if it was a generic program in a hand held programmer. But you aren't going to see that, or anything close on a moderate displacement gasoline V8. And that's assuming a quality tune, not a resistor in a plastic box that looks like a "chip".

Jordan '94 Z28

So what would be a good horsepower adder without going to new pistons and heads for a super charger.

bw_hunter

A cam change gets you a big gain even with stock heads. Add ported heads and you gain even more. You don't need a supercharger to make good power....

So what is your goal? If it's drag racing you start with your desired ET and work back to power.....

Jordan '94 Z28

My goal isn't to drag race or anything. Just looking to give it more punch. Just wanting to give it back all its horses it has lost over the years. I had also considered a rebuild and just cleaning out all the gunk and swapping some internal parts to make it more youthful. But that is a huge project and I don't currently have a garage I can keep it in while I'm working on it.

raulz28

If you don't want to rebuild it then go with the basic bolt ons full exhaust, intake, and maybe some 1.6 rockers. Is your car an A4 or M6? If A4 a high stall converter with some bigger(numerically) gears would really wake it up.

Lilatlboy6969

if you want a "chip" that works then go with jets' perfmance chips.. they change shift points and a little fuel/air mixture differences.. i just chipped mine this past weekend and yes there is a huge difference in shift points but not so much in hp.. it seems to have more power because the shift points use the power band a bit better than the stock shift points do. now for manual transmissions i would highly advise a mail order tune or something because there is no changing shift points on them and the extreme minute hp gains from the chip wouldnt even be worth the time installing it on a m6

RamAir95TA

I have to agree with Fred's mentality. Those Jet chips don't do much and, for the cost, you could have a custom-built mail-order tune that WILL increase horsepower. The flexibility of such a tune FAR outweighs what mediocre gains those Jet chips could every provide.

bw_hunter

These engines have remarkable longevity so you may not even need to change any internals to 'make it more youthful'. As mentioned, stay away from the piggyback chips, of any brand, they're worthless. And yes, they lie.

Do a proper maintenance including a good tune up. Check the compression while you're at it. That'll give you a good idea of the engines health. Be sure to change the wires when doing the plugs....and don't skip on quality.

Look, an engine is basically an air pump. If you remove the restrictions in getting the air in and out you'll get a performance increase....mostly by freeing up power that's already there. Go with a cold air induction kit, go with a good catback exhaust. Do the throttle body bypass. When you're ready, go with new valve springs and 1.6 ratio rockers....you can do that in your driveway. Add a 160f thermostat and have the rear gears swapped out.....you'll need a tune for both of those.
All that will really wake up the car without doing a tear down....

Good luck and enjoy!