Ideas on chip relocation.

[joegreen]

Hello, my ecm is mounted under my bench seat. Whenever i want to burn a chip i have to get out, go to the passenger side and reach behind the seat and feel up underneath for the ecm and remove the chip burn it and then repeat the process to replace the chip. Its such a pain to do now that i am burning chips daily. I had an idea to relocate the chip via a cable like the one used on the ostrich. I was browsing moates website and see they sell a chip extender. If i go the chip extender route and then buy the emulation cable and zif its like $50 with shipping just to move my chip. I did some googling and it seems others have relocated the chip without needing the chip extender. Seeing as im a poor college student i am trying to do the chip relocation on the cheap. I am interested in seeing how you relocated your chip and if you used a chip extender and what problems you ran into.

[steveo]

wouldn't temporarily relocating your entire ECM would be preferable? even if it isn't very well secured to the vehicle, can't you just leave it hanging out somewhere?

you wont be tuning forever, unless you're OCD, once your tune is good enough you might only want to access it a couple times a year for basic touch-ups.

[dktool]

wouldn't temporarily relocating your entire ECM would be preferable? even if it isn't very well secured to the vehicle, can't you just leave it hanging out somewhere? you wont be tuning forever, unless you're OCD, once your tune is good enough you might only want to access it a couple times a year for basic touch-ups. In my P30 it is located in front of the steering column, I was able to remove the PCM, fudge the cables around some and strap it to the left side of the column with the chip facing to the rear. I was prepared to extend the harness if needed, now I just have to do a semi-contortion move to swap chips. "you wont be tuning forever, unless you're OCD" that's funny, you know me well and we have never met !

[joegreen]

I could relocate the ecm but I don't want too. My truck cab is not very big and I have my wiring harness routed through piping I would have to remove. I don't want the ecm sliding sliding around when I make turns. Also the ecm is mounted under the seat on rubber isolators. I would have to unbolt and move my seat in order to unbolt the ecm. Long story short it's to much effort to move and I don't have any good place to put it with passengers or other stuff that occupies seat and floor space. I know people have run extensions from the ecm to mount a chip outside the ecm and I want to know what they did.

[myburb]

I left all my original wiring in place. I made an extention from a piece of old harness I got with a ecm and used used audio connector from a olds radio for the end that hooks to the original wiring. When your finished just unplug it and your'e good to go. No need to change any loomed cable. Mine sit on the trans tunnel and slides under the seat. Been two years and no problems. I do the ocd. This is for a 7427/6395 pcm.

[Six_Shooter]

I've used the chip extender and it works great. No drops outs, no communication errors, nothing.

The problem using something that doesn't have the same design as the chip extender is that you have no signal amplification going on, and noise could be an issue.

[joegreen]

I saw online I think on thirdgen where the chip extender was causing a problem. Also it seems like people have successfully extended the chip without an amplifier. I just wanted to see if anyone had hands on experience with extending the chip from the ecm. So far 1 vote for the moates chip extender.

[joegreen]

I went ahead and purchased the cable, chip extender, and zif from moates to relocate my chip. It's good to support people who produce these unique items.

[joegreen]

I received my items on Saturday and got it all hooked up. The chip extender with the 3 foot ribbon cable work great. Here are some pics of my ecm and chip extender.

[Six_Shooter]

:wtg:

[DavidBraley]

I had no idea something like this even existed until reading this thread... Very cool! I need to get one of these.

[joegreen]

My total came to around $47 but I think the price for each individual item was very fair and the shipping was very fast. Ordered Wednesday night and they shipped Thursday and it arrived Saturday. Its so handy to have. I actually didn't know there was anything like this either. I came up with this whole idea to extend the chip by myself. I was going to buy some sockets and make my own extension. I was doing a little research and discovered moates already had plug and play components for this task. I highly recommend the moates equipment.

[steveo]

looks really good, nice to have a decent zif on the other end too.

[joegreen]

I was contemplating buying a cheap zif on eBay but I thought what the heck I like the quality and reliability of the Aries zif in the ecm so I might as well just get another and know it works. Nothing like trying to save a few bucks to end up causing headaches in the future.

[Stokes1114]

How is this setup working for you? Im debating doing the same thing since getting behind the glovebox gets a bit old.

[joegreen]

The setup has been working great. I haven't had any hiccups with the cable or chip extender. I have driven on some pretty bumpy roads and everything keeps a good connection between the ecm and chip. If you do decide to extend your chip I would get the 3 foot cable. Its only a dollar more than the 18in cable and the added length is convenient. My ecm is not in the most convenient location for chip swapping so this extender has been fantastic for accessibility. I would say its a luxury item though. Its not necessary but its nice to have. Like moates says, its the poor mans ostrich 2.0

[Stokes1114]

The setup has been working great. I haven't had any hiccups with the cable or chip extender. I have driven on some pretty bumpy roads and everything keeps a good connection between the ecm and chip. If you do decide to extend your chip I would get the 3 foot cable. Its only a dollar more than the 18in cable and the added length is convenient. My ecm is not in the most convenient location for chip swapping so this extender has been fantastic for accessibility. I would say its a luxury item though. Its not necessary but its nice to have. Like moates says, its the poor mans ostrich 2.0

Thats good news to me. I was wondering the size cable you bought. I have the 18 inch for the autoprom while emulating but the 3 ft is what I want to just relocate the chip. I prefer the chip burning as Im still getting the feel for things. Definitely going to get these parts asap!