In early June I went to Pro 6 Cycle to have my 2008 GSX-R 750 tuned after installing a full R77 Yosh exhaust, K&N filter, and Power Commander 5. After hearing some great things about their shop and reading a few great reviews I thought for sure they would be the place to get what I wanted out of my bike.
On my tune day everything seemed to go great. There was nothing that concerned them and the bike ended up making 130whp which I was more than pleased with. Under WOT the bike ran great, but in the low end something felt a little off. It was hesitate and gurgle when leaving a light, or when cruising at partial throttle. I talked with a couple people and they said it was normal for the power commander to have this issue down low. So I let it be for a few more days until we got a hot week where the temperature was above 30 degrees. This is when it got worse, and I mean really bad. The bike just ran like complete crap. Hesitating and gurgling all the time, and made virtually no low end power. After owning a boosted car for many years I knew right away that the bike had to be running rich. Sure enough I noticed the bike was smoking like crazy on acceleration and my exhaust was black! I gave Pro 6 a call and spoke with John who told me it was all because of my full exhaust and that the bike wasnt meant to make power bellow 7,000. I said that`s fine, but the bike runs like crap. It has nothing to do with power and that I was going to put on another dyno.
I had taken my bike to Orillia Motorsports when it was stock for a baseline dyno pull and I was going to put it on after my tuning at Pro 6 to see a true difference. When I took the bike there I asked him to do an AFR datalog to see if my suspicions were true. As soon as the bike started moving on the dyno it would dip in from a good 14.x AFR right down to 10.3-10.4 AFR. It sounded terrible on the dyno from idle until about 5,500 where the AFR would jump back up to around 12.0 and ended up making 131whp on his dyno in top end. It was obviously the problem was in the tuning. I called John and told him my problem. He dealt with it very well and said come in for a clean up tune at no charge. I was pleased to bring my bike back down to get this problem resolved.
So they put the bike back on the dyno and do their fuel adjustments. I take the bike around the block and sure enough it is running like crap again, but not as bad as before probably because it was a cooler day. I waited another couple days with it and once again when it got hot outside the bike was a complete disaster. It was smoking again, so I did an oil change at 2,000km's and the oil just reeked of gas. I called John back and explained the bike is still a mess, and once again he said it was normal and that it was all because of my full exhaust system. I said it nothing to do with the exhaust since the bike ran flawless with the power commander supplied BASEMAP and that it had to do with their tuning! So I put the basemap back in and the bike ran perfect. It was obviously back down in power in the top end, but it was so much more enjoyable because it wasn't running like crap. After a little while the bike stopped smoking too!!! A basemap ran much better than their 3 hour tune!
I was thinking to myself how could a shop with so much experience botch such a simple tune! So I asked John if they used a wideband for tuning.......NOPE!!..... I was shocked to hear this and said how do you tune partial throttle? Do you smell the exhaust! The top end is one thing. You can throw the fuel at it until it stops making power, then pull some back, but the low end is another thing. I told him that I will be taking the bike to another dyno to have it tuned PROPERLY with a wideband. I took it to Orillia Motorsports where I should have done it from the beginning and the bike came back PERFECT! Made the same power on a stupid hot day as Pro 6's tune, but the bike was mint down low. What a difference in response and torque and pulled so smoothly through the whole powerband. So I left Orillia Motorsports paying $180 for a perfect tune, where I paid $310 at Pro 6 for a crap one!!
I called John back and explained to him that the bike is perfect now and makes great power. I wondered if thought I was full of it, so I told him I would gladly put it on their dyno again to show them. At this point I said it would only be fair if I was given some sort of a refund. I was willing to accept up to 50% back since I only got 50% of a tune. He said this wasn't possible and that we could work something out with a store credit! Even will all of the ******** I had to go through I calmly agreed with him and said I would be down to buy some new tires in probably a month or so. So I now needed tires and asked him what I had for a store credit, and well that store credit turned into him giving me some discounts on parts. I said I don't need parts, I need tires, and he said there was nothing he could do for me. I thought in the beginning that he would have good customer service, but after putting up with this ******** for a month and having to spend more money elsewhere he basically screwed me completely over.
That's my story. Sorry it was a long one.
I had the same issue with the first tune at Pro 6 where I uploaded the basemap so it would run better.
