COBB Tuning Blog

Al from Dyno Flash recently posted dyno results on NASIOC for their ICS / Dyno Flash ‘08 STI Project car. They were using the AccessPORT for engine management, with custom tuning done by Al using our AccessTUNER software. Just to show what’s possible now days with proper control of the stock ECU.

Great job to Al and co… Same to the rest of the amazing tuners we work with that are constantly pushing the envelope on these cars! Not to mention helping us make our solutions better for everyone.

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After much anticipation, the AccessPORT has been released for the Mazda RX-8.  If there is one thing the RX-8 needs, its a little more umph.  The AccessPORT helps in that department, along with a host of other features such as fuel economy monitors, gauges to monitor your engine (such as coolant temp since the stock gauge doesn’t move until its too late), performance tests (0-60 mph, 1/4 mile) and more.

In addition to our tuning, our AccessTUNER software suite for the RX-8 is now in the hands of capable and talented tuners around the country so that they can help create custom tuning maps for use on the AccessPORT to cover anything from turbocharged and supercharged RX-8s to wild NA setups.  Hopefully now RX-8 tuners and enthusiasts will have one less obstacle in their way when trying to get the most from their cars.

Below is a dyno result from one of our earlier tuning sessions.  We’ll post more finalize results on our website shortly, or you can head over to our forums where some beta testers have posted their own results.

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A few posts ago we showed some pictures of our EVO X and various parts under development. With the engine finally fully broken in now, we were able to do some testing and finalize the design of a few parts including our SF Intake.

Below is a dyno graph of our results from the SF Intake testing. Most of the gains come by way of leaning out the A/F mixture. Even though we maintained the exact same MAF housing size as stock, the change in air flow is causing the car to run leaner. This has been the same as reported by nearly everyone else testing intakes on their EVO X. Fortunately, it’s not unsafe. In fact, the stock EVO X runs so rich (black smoke out the tailpipe rich) that it causes our wide-band lambda sensor to go off the chart.

This part has now moved into production and should be available for purchase this spring!

For raw dyno graphs including boost and A/F ratio, click on the image below:

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As you may know, we’re NOT a fan of running a car at full load on the dyno until we’ve properly broken in the engine. However, we were constantly asked today what it did on our dyno so we succumbed to the pressure and we went ahead and made a few WOT pulls with only a scant 100 km on the clock. <sigh>
OK, here are the results. A few things to keep in mind.

a) We use a Mustang AWD dyno and all power figures are at the WHEELS. Not the highest reading dyno out there, not the lowest.
b) Runs were made in 3rd gear due to the speed limiter coming on in 4th. Partial runs in 4th produced better torque but we hit the speed limiter before peak HP. Remember, this is a JDM model and thus has a 180 kph (~112 mph) speed limit…too be removed soon!
c) We’re at ~4000 ft altitude here in SLC. Thinner air, less power. Even with turbos. Hard to directly compare NA to Turbo but a brand new stock Z06 puts down 405 HP to the wheels on our dyno.
d) A 50/50 mix of 91 octane and 100 octane was used, which isn’t too different in octane rating from the fuel normally used in Japan.

Blue Line is torque (peaked at 416 ft-lbs)
Red Line is HP (peaked at 419 HP)
Green is Boost (peaked at 13.8 psi)
Gray Line is A/F Ratio (dipped down to around 10.5:1)

We made nearly 440 ft-lbs torque in 4th gear since it could load the engine a bit more, and I’d suspect that with some time to properly break in the engine and removing the speed limit, we’ll see maybe ~450 HP (wheels). Not too shabby!

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And the verdict is….

3825.6 lbs.  10 gallons of fuel.  Keep in mind this is a Japanese version, the US models may be a little different (more?).

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Please don’t rice out your GT-R.   (Yes, this is actually in the manual)

Someone needs to turn this into a t-shirt!

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Our R35 GT-R arrived early this morning. We’ll post more info shortly, it’s going on the scales now and then on to the dyno.

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[Updated with more pics]
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In my opinion, Japanese car manuals have the BEST illustrations. Here are a few memorable ones from the new R35 GT-R manual.

First up, a nice reminder not to let your soda can get behind your brake pedal. A bad situation in ANY vehicle!

If you’re unlucky enough to have your new R35 break down on a train track, use your included flare to alert the train operator. (Who thinks of these horrific scenarios?!?)

Real friends help you push your R35 off the train track and clear of certain disaster. Just remember to put the transmission into Neutral, or else you may lose your precious R35… oh yeah and some things called friends. ;-)

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As you know with the previous post, we have a new GT-R (R35). Here are the pictures of it being loaded into the shipping container as it headed over here from Japan.

Bye for now… we’ll post more pictures next week of our R35 here at our shop and the parts we’re prototyping for it….including of course the AccessPORT for the impossible to crack ECU!

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[This is a long post, hang in there]

I’ve been harboring a secret from you all for a looong time… I’m a closet GT-R fanatic. Since a child, I’ve always been interested in cars. My pre-teen years were spent pouring over automotive magazines, dreaming of one day owning a Porsche 959 or some other exotic. At some point, I started an interest in Japanese performance cars and still vividly remember a Road and Track article written by Sam Mitani covering some exotic Japanese iron including a green RX-7 (FC3S) with an overheating 20B transplanted under the hood. That article alone solidified my decision to buy a RX-7 Turbo II as soon as I could afford one, which sent me down to the path that led me to where I’m at today. Along the way, I fell in love with the Nissan Skyline GT-R, which I’ve kept as my dirty little secret. Until now.

It first started with a Gunmetal Grey BNR32 in old Option magazines. Shortly after, the BCNR33. Not everyone was a fan of the R33 but I always appreciated its potential. Then while watching some Japanese videos a friend of mine from Hawaii sent, I was introduced to the Hakosuka GT-R in the movie Battle King (a red one was driven by the father of the hero’s female interest/girlfriend). By the time the BNR34 came out (in Bayside Blue!), I was officially obsessed. Now I’m extremely fortunate to own some, including a white Hakosuka and a beloved Gunmetal Grey BNR32 (DOT legal).

As you can imagine, when news of the new GT-R (R35) coming to America broke… I was beyond excited. Finally, we had an opportunity to tune the Japanese supercar and see where we stand against the best of the Japanese tuners. I’ve long been interested in that challenge, and through pure luck, determination, or a mixture of both I think we’re ready.

To get a start as early as possible, I decided to go ahead and order a car direct from Japan. This way I could order the color and trim I wanted, without the risk of getting nailed with markups that now appear to be the norm for US dealerships. This entire process has been nearly a year in the making with a lot of planning, discussion with the US government to make sure we could bring in the car legally for R&D purposes, etc. Just so you know, we’re doing this 100% legit. Our GT-R won’t be used EVER on the street. It is strictly a R&D vehicle that will be driven on the track only. I’m perfectly OK with that as we will be using this to develop new product and test it on the track, which is what we end up doing with most of our demo cars anyway…

Enough babbling, on to the pictures. Here’s our R35 prior to being loaded into the container on route to America. We ordered a White Base model. The fancier seats, wheels and stereo weren’t worth it considering they’ll be replaced anyway.

Up next, loading into the container…

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We’re starting our own in-house composite department in order to produce our own line of composite parts. To kick things off in the right direction we sent one of our talented mechanical engineers, Billy Brooks, off to 3dyn to learn the black art of carbon fiber lay-up from the same masters that did the full carbon body on our Time Attack WRX.

Billy recently posted on his blog a few pictures of some of the work he’s been doing as part of his intensive training regiment. Looking good, as would be expected when you’re training with the absolute best in the industry. If you are ever in need of a composite solution that’s properly engineered and works the first time, definitely look up Mark and his team of 3dyn.

Yum… dry carbon goodness…. this isn’t show carbon, it’s extremely light and extremely strong carbon. Fancy gel coats for that ‘wet’ look just adds weight which for this application, we don’t want.

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Josh and team have been working hard on our new EVO X exhaust system. After polling many people, and a lot of internal discussion, we decided on the ‘quad tip’ style as it fit the look of the new EVO and would be a bit different from the 4″ round duals everyone seems to be doing. I really love how this setup flows with the lines of the rear bumper.

Josh has been posting some great pictures on his own blog, and I took the liberty to steal some and post them on here as well. Hopefully he won’t mind. I’m just excited in the way these came out and can’t wait to get started on production!

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Our much anticipated cool air box for our SF Intake is now available. It will be up on our website, and on their way to dealers, before the end of this week. Overall we went for a clean, if slightly understated, look with of course a high degree of function and a lot of ‘attention to detail’ features, . Even things like the original front air scoop is retained as a fresh air source.

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Debuted at SEMA, our Sports Springs for the 2008 WRX are now available and shipping. Check out the pictures below to see the difference in ride height. Our design goal for these springs were to:

a) Improve handling and increase spring rate, but to also match the stock strut valving.

b) Improve ability to rotate the chassis/decrease understeer which required slightly higher spring rate increase in the rear

c) Lower the stance but not so much that upset the suspension geometry, particularly in the rear where you can really get some bad angles unless you plan on relocating pick-up points ($$$).

The result is something you can enjoy on a daily basis, while still having the confidence to attend the occasional High Performance Driving School (HPDE) or Auto-x.

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Recently Gillman Subaru, in Houston Texas, put on a huge Subaru enthusiast get-together. We were excited to be able to work with Gillman on their 2008 WRX. From the looks of the event, it had a great turn-out, and even Travis Pastrana was there to sign autographs. It’s really encouraging to see a dealership reaching out to the enthusiast community like this. Bravo, Gillman. I only wish more dealerships ‘got it’.

BIG thanks to friedicecream, beavicih, and samagon of NASIOC for the photos.

Head over to NASIOC for more great pictures and info about the event.

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Today we released our own calibrations for the 2008 STi. If you already own an AccessPORT (part# AP-SUB-003), just download the firmware update and you’ll be ready to install. If you’ve driven a 2008 STi, you’ll know how much the car desperately needs a tune. The power delivery from the stock tune is choppy and inconsistent. With the our mapping, not only do you get more power but it’s SMOOTH and CONSISTENT. Exactly how it should of come from the factory.

Our mapping also retains the SI-Drive functionality. Many people are confused by exactly how SI-Drive works inside the ECU, but what it does NOT do is switch between three completely different maps/calibrations. All it ultimately does is change the throttle mapping. Intelligent is basically throttle cut in half. Sport is normal throttle mapping and Sport # is aggressive throttle mapping. Same fuel table, same ignition table, etc. We keep with that same functionality. We may change how it works in the future but for now, we’re using SI-Drive the same way Subaru designed it.

Here are the results:
To download the firmware update (AP-SUB-003 ONLY), click here.
To see what maps we have available for the 2008 STi, click here.
For ordering info, click here.

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It’s going to be a busy month. The Mazda RX-8 AccessPORT is near completion. It’s off to beta testers as we speak… A long time coming, and of course there are a few naysayers but the reality is… it’s coming. SOON. Check out the teaser video Jaron put together. For those that may not know, Jaron (along with the others in the production team) hand assemble and test EACH and every AccessPORT shipped. So when you place your order for the new RX-8 AccessPORT, good chance that Jaron actually had his hand in the assembly of it. I know that may shatter the “big profit mongering, blood sucking” image some want to pin on us but it’s the reality of who we are. Small, proud, and enthusiast driven.

Enjoy the video.

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We recently released a new firmware update for the North American model Subaru AccessPORT. A lot of good stuff is included, as we continue to improve the functionality and features of the AccessPORT. It’s hard to believe we only released it back in Dec. ‘06, considering how far it’s already come and all the potential it still has. Maybe I’m biased, but I think it’s cool to see all the work the engineers put into improving a device (through free updates) people have already paid for rather than focusing all their attention on the next generation device for people to buy.

A few screenshots of the new features:

Instant and Averaged Fuel Economy

An improved Live Data screen with a fade-away header and footer that makes navigating between parameters easier and more intuitive.

I hope you never see this screen, the Fatal Error (or System Error if you can read Japanese). Still, while I dislike any reason this screen may be displayed I love the graphic. Biggie did such a great job with the “sick AccessPORT”. (please don’t sue us Apple!) That being said, one of the reasons to do the update are much improved error handling and recovering when an error occurs.

So if you own an AccessPORT for a Subaru vehicle, you need to update! It’s easy and FREE! Find out more here.

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A little behind on posting this but the upcoming release of the AccessPORT in Japan reminded me of our last Japanese tuning trip. Immediately after the Tokyo Auto Salon, Christian, Billy and I (Trey) headed out to Takasaki to do some testing.

First up, we need to do some testing with the EVO IX. Here’s Billy putting the AccessPORT through the paces.

Next up, we did some dyno tuning on Cusco’s GRB (new STi). This is part of the process to train and eventually hand over full tuning duties to Cusco. In March, we’ll fully hand off all tuning duties to Cusco for their version of the AccessPORT. That won’t be the last time we tune cars in Japan… plans are already in motion for COBB Japan. Stay tuned.

While we normally visit Cusco’s race facility, they have another facility in Takasaki that serves as their showroom and where the sales staff operate from. We’ve shared before but here are more shots of their amazing showroom.

SuperGT (JGTC) Impreza

Dirt Trial Impreza (hint to Cusco…two things. Pat Richard. Pikes Peak. Do it!)

Finally, walking through Takasaki, in the Gunma prefecture, you see some crazy stuff sometimes. Everything from a new Lexus LS wearing 888 plates (the number 8 in many Asian cultures means prosperity or wealth) to this…. a normal looking building with a few quite amazing vehicles just sitting unassumingly at its base. Aside from the middle “car”, these are all full size. Any guesses to what they are?

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Not wanting to give all our attention to it’s little brother, the Mazdaspeed3, we decided to finish up the development of our SF Intake for the Mazdaspeed6. Honestly, the Mazdaspeed6 is a great car. It’s really a shame they didn’t sell better for Mazda and were all but given away by dealerships at the end of their production run. Anyway, I’m glad we’re able to dedicate some time to make some parts for it.

Below is a pic of the (lacking powdercoating) production support bracket for the SF Intake, production MAF Housing w/ integrated velocity stack and air-flow straighteners (black composite plastic) and the smooth radius silicone tubing (blue). Expect these to start shipping in limited quantities before the end of the month.

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