Power Commander or H-D Race Tuner?

I have an 'O5 Road King. I installed Vance & Hines true duals and went with the Stage 1 download from the dealer. Then I purchased a Vance & Hines Fuel Pak to increase performance. Now the engine misses and I'm not happy with the performance. Would like to hear from anybody that has installed Power Commander or has had the H-D race tuner program installed. I'm trying to decide which way to go.

If the dealer installed the stage 1 kit including map download, they are suppose to make sure that it runs/performs as advertised... sometimes they just download the generic stage 1 map and hand it over to you. You should of asked them if they were going to dyno it first to fine tune it prior to you picking up the bike...

Race tuner is very good; if you know what you are doing, you can fine tune your bike to what ever mods you desire but you will need dyno time. I only recommend this if you know how to "map" your ECM. Race tuners actually re-writes your chip, so I would save a copy of the original mapping and keep it in a safe place so you can have a back up to start from scratch again. this is great for peak performance people like drag racers and such...

Commanders are "piggy back" types which keeps your original chip intact and basically overrides the signals received from your sensors on your bike to modify them prior to sending them to the chip. You can get practically close to 90% with this in the performance area without a dyno. But you can, get up to 100% with a dyno and some know how with mapping... Both products are good, one is a piggy back and the other is a re-write...

Kamakazi, just to be clear for davecobb, the various Stage downloads are all fixed map and are all for various Screaming Eagle builds. For example, A bagger with SE air cleaner, SE touring mufflers gets a specific, canned download with no ability to tweak parameters. The SERT and PCIIIUSB work just as you are saying. Another newer choice is the Terminal Velocity which utilizes an O2 sensor to adjust the fuel curves on the fly.

Zippers, S&S, Daytona Twin Tech and others like Thunder Heart have solutions also. With the new EPA rules, we will see more choices that will allow us to keep the emissions where they need to be.

Fuel Pak

If the dealer did a chip burn, and THEN you put the Fuelpak on, you have to get that chip back to its (stock) settings first. Then set your Fuelpak with its settings to your pipes, air filter, etc., and it will make the bike run as it should. I just put the V&H duals, oval slip-ons, SE Stage I filter and V&H Fuelpak on mine 06 FLHXI and it runs/sounds great. The added HP\TQ is nice. Did all the work myself.

Yep, the Fuel Pack will only work with Stock ECU's and only V&H products. There is no "tweaking" the software and you cannot get settings for other brands.

So, you spend $150.00 when you get your bike with SE mufflers and a/c with a Stage I flash of course. Then, you decide to go to V&H Ovals etc and use a Fuel Pack. Now, you have to pay the dealer to flash the ECU back to stock so you can use the Fuel Pack. Let's see, $150.00 + 250.00 + $150.00 = $550.00 To add insult to injury, if you have a non stock cam, higher than normal CR, high flow heads, there is not map for that either.

If I sound like I am a bit ticked off at V&H over the Fuel Pak, I am. They should make it abundantly clear what the product limitations are prior to advertising it.

We sell many millions of dollars worth of V&H products every year. This is the first time I am disappointed in a product of theirs

It's the PC-III for me

davecobb,

I have a '03 FLHRCI with slip on SE Touring Mufflers, SE Intake and Stage one download. I was never happy with the standard Stage One download. I felt that the bike was way too sluggish . After I installed the PC-III I noticed a distinct change for the better in the bike's performance .

I chose the PC-III for it's versatility; if at some later time I decide to change something on the bike (change heads, cams, exhaust, etc.) all I need to do is reload the PC-III with the new mapping. I'm very happy with the unit.

kgc

Thanks for the comments

Gentleman,I think V&H has misled a lot of people if its true that you need to be at the stock level on your ECU before programing the Fuelpak. In the setting reference guide it give you two options to choose from, stock or stage 1 chip level.
I'll been considering going to the race tuner package which is suppose to be the best way to go for optimum performance.

race tunner

I have an electra glide CV with a 103. I put 2 into 1 Sampson Calibar pipe and the HD race tunner. Butt Head at Chester's HD in Mesa advice. I am very pleased. Masiwe

Power CammanderIIIusb

Get the Rev Limiter PCIII
The PCIIIusb can be plugged into a PC with a USB port and you can map and down load maps to install. Or just go to a local center. On thing I have been looking forward to is the Rev Limiter release. If you are just buying, make sure it is included. Those of use that already have one have to reprogram our units. That sucks because originally they were going to allow free flashing of your PCIIIusb to get the Rev Limiter.

I'm looking at the V&H Oval Slip Ons & V&H Fuel Pack. Talked to V&H Cust Service & they told me that mileage will increase or stay the same with that set up. According to the woman I spoke with the Power Commander will add fuel and decease mileage along with the performance boost.

I don't plan on making additional Mods to the engine or chaniging pipes again and looking at the Power Commander maps they didn't have one for the Oval slip ons.

Question is... Was she correct or just dishing out marketing BS.

Thanks,

Richie

We DO offer free flashing to the new program. All you pay is the freight to and from. I would think that any good Indy or HD shop would be able to do it also.

We re-flash any PCIII-USB to the lastest version if it comes to us from the distributor with the older version installed. That way, the customer gets the new program to begin with.