At least you could get the necessary gears for the Jeep. Most cars don’t have them available, and a number of states have vehicle and traffic laws that make it illegal to make changes that affect the odometer.
There is a lot to be said for analog controls, but most people aren’t good enough to make them useful. Drive by wire, as long as the software is decent, is a safer choice for most drivers.
]]>Back in the day, speedometer gears lived in the tail of the transmission and drove a cable to the speedometer/odometer. Compensating for bigger tires required actually installing a new gear in the tail of the transmission, like I had to do for my old Jeep. Nowadays it’s driven off the ABS sensors at the wheels and is all electronic. So it’s nice to be able to adjust the speedometer without installing a new gear in the transfer case tail (where it is on the old Jeeps), but it does require a tool to adjust the computer, sigh.
I’m running the stock tune, mostly, all I diddled was the accelerator response time. The stock settings are set up for 32″ tires and 4.10 gearing, which is pretty low gearing for such a powerful engine in such a small vehicle, and opens the throttle valve somewhat sedately in order to protect the driver from a sudden burst of power (the 3.6L Pentastar makes somewhat more power than the original engine that my Jeep was designed around). Thing is, while that was acceptable with the small tires, with the big tires it makes the Jeep respond very sluggishly to throttle inputs. With those big 35″ tires I’m not going to get whiplash!
]]>If I moved from Florida to Colorado I would definitely have to hack the settings, the same way I had to diddle the carbs on my MGB-GT when I drove from Monterey to Rochester, NY in the 1970s. Every time I filled up I had to tweak things to keep the engine working reasonably well.
Given all of the changes you have made and the altitude changes you deal with, it makes sense that you would want to achieve a better tune than the factory provides.
]]>I’ve often wondered how it is that Superchips avoids getting sued to a splot on the road. All I can surmise is that Chrysler realizes that suing them would be more negative publicity than pretending they don’t exist….
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