5.29 and 35s

I just got re-geared to 5.29s and on 35s. The shift points and gear changing is at least acceptable now.


This isn’t a case where I am chasing all the performance, dependability and reliability are still primary concerns.

however, Speedo, miles and such would be nice to have correct and if there was some better shift points or minor changes that made the truck even better I’d be up for it.

I know up to 2017 there are plenty of tuners. Whos tuning 2018 and up that yall recommend?

 

OTT is an option for turning NA and you have nothing to worry about on your reliability...it all comes down to maintenance. You could also consider a pedal commander and a speedo calibrator if you're needing to save some coin...but tuning is always the gold foil!

 

Need to have the truck reprogrammed for the tires and gears. Shift points are all wrong because computer thinks it’s stock. Multiple ways to do it.

 

If I’m gonna do it I want a full time. Trying get an idea of who and cost.

 

Ran into some awkward shift points and having some rev hang with 35s. Not a good solution but I went 37s and that seems to solve the problem

 

I'm running g 4.88...went the pedal commander route then had OTT tune done. Took off the pedal commander after the tune didn't feel it was needed,smoothed up theshifts truck just runs better,worth the cost.

 

Go get an HP Tuner (supports up to 2021) to apply your new gear ratio cuz the computer is still using the original ratio.

 

I have a 2018.

HP Tuner is a fantastic tool. It will do everything you want, but cannot correct the speedometer. The only way to get then speedometer corrected is to install a calibrator from either HyperTech or Rough Country.

The HP Tuner will allow you to input gear ratios, which will help with the trans. Further, you can dig so deep into full transmission and TCC control that it’ll make your head swim. There is a huge pile of help on HP’s forum and a few guys that were way more helpful than you’d expect from a stranger on the internet.

Cost:
The HP Tuner is $400
You’ll pay $200 for credits to allow your tuner to work with your ECU.
Tuning can be done by you, or a tuner shop. Just depends on what you want. For free, you can adjust transmission stuff, adjust for gears, input new tire sizes, and a handful of other little things. A tuner shop will be able to tidy up your fueling/timing and squeeze a little more power out. More than that, my shop was able to substantially lower my peak torque RPM. IIRC, it dropped from a peak at 3,800 to 2,950 RPM. This was huge.

I paid $850 for tuning and dyno time.

The speedometer calibrator is in the $170 range if I remember correctly and pretty easy to self manage.

 

I would be cautious with OTT especially if you have 5.29's and 35's. I have their tune and it will hang in gear waaaay longer than it should when you like for instance accelerate to get on the highway from an on ramp. I can step on the gas and it downshifts and revs quickly then I get off the gas completely and the RPM's start dropping slowly but still in the lower gear and takes forever to recover. He told me that it was my "weird combination of gears to tire size" and I had the same setup as you do. I now have 37's and the stupid shift is still there. When I contact him each time he gets pissed as usual

 

Holler @snivilous , he helped my truck to shift nice and smooth.

 

Dang, that's not great to hear...seems like a typical response with VF software folks...granted, this is hugely a generalized statement I made. There's always optimizations that can be done but getting the "custom" touch is a PITA unfortunately...best case scenario is to learn it yourself and tune it yourself...

 

for $170, the rough country speedo calibrator fixed my speedo and took care of the wonky shifts points when installing 35s. my truck has it's power back and shifts just like when it was stock, the only difference I can feel now is the added weight of the truck when braking. well worth the money.

 

Glad your speedo is corrected, but any change to shifting or drivability you’re experiencing after a speedo correction is 100% placebo.

All that device does is changes the signal goi g to that little red needle on the dash.

 

And if he can’t figure it out, hit up SlowNStock over on the HP forum. I owe that fella a hefty bag full of beers after everything he helped me with.

Check this out for an example of the detailed help I received. This HP thingie really is a beautiful device once you start to understand the language.

https://forum.hptuners.com/showthre...de-all-the-torque-limiting-stuff-Transmission

 

I appreciate @Downytide shout out, but truth be told all I'm doing is running the TRD trans settings. If anyone wants that I can send you the HP Tuners TRD file and just copy the values over. I've been super happy with it, as have most people I've talked to. Easy and worth trying at a minimum (again, requires HP Tuners).

 

Does anyone else have experience with this? I'm running 5.29 gears on 35s with a dirty deeds exhaust and I'm contemplating the OTT tune.

 

I did before I turbocharged. I never encountered that issue. Transmission always shifted and ran how I expected it to. Even when I dropped to 33's with the 5.29's for a bit, I reached out to OTT for an update and they said it wasn't worth it and the transmission still shifted perfectly normal.

 

Same gears, tire size, and exhaust. No experience with OTT, just HPTuners. It took a few iterations to achieve what I wanted, but my transmission control is excellent now. Especially when towing my RV.

If you do go the HP route, I may be able to be convinced to share some trans tune data…

 

I appreciate that. Hadn't given a tune much thought until recently so I'm going to read up on HPTuners vs OTT.

 

OTT uses hpt. Only difference is OTT locks their tune so you can’t adjust yourself and you have to call them. If you tune it yourself or have sniv do it it’ll be open and you can adjust as much as you want.

 

OTT doesn't use HPT, unless I'm mistaken. They use, specifically, VFt... @JustDSM can let us know for sure...

 

They may use both but I know they use HPT because that’s what they tuned my truck with.

 

What all is required to make your own tune with HPT? Other than the plug from HP and the credits of course.

And is their software solely windows based? I don't have a windows based laptop unfortunately and I'm not so sure buying a laptop for the sole purpose of tuning is a wise financial decision lol

Super interested in custom tuning though, especially since my local OTT dealer refuses to touch a truck with long tube headers

 

If you don’t know what you’re doing, you can mess stuff up quick. It’s possible to learn but the tundra isn’t the best platform to learn on. Not a ton of support like an LS or Ford.

OTT just got their CARB certification for tacomas and others are pending per their website so they aren’t going to want to do anything that requires tweaking emissions codes or anything else.

 

For sure. I don't really plan on making any major changes to squeeze as much power as possible right out of the gate. My rigs getting old with 288k miles now, its definitely not a race truck anymore lol.

I mostly just want the ability to make adjustments as I learn more, starting with correcting gear ratios and tire size as well as some of the shift points in daily driving situations and TCC lockup when pulling hills or trailers.

I speak like I'm ready to pull the trigger and order the tuner ASAP but I'm really not. I'm still saving for a regear and the headers (which I'm hoping I'll be ready for by the end of the year) so maybe by then OTT will have changed their minds on custom tuning and I'll rethink on the whole DIY stuff.

But for now I'm leaning towards figuring it out on my own. Nothing more exciting then starting a new hobby

 

There’s enough of us here that can help you out. @snivilous is our resident diy tuning dude.

Personally, I spend more time in the transmission tuning than anything. Throttle control, shift points, lock up points, that’s a bigger deal for me than the 15-20hp the engine tune may give.

 

I have an hour long DIY tutorial I made awhile ago I can send you on YouTube. Should probably update it and make it public at this point. There's a decent amount of reading you can do, there's a thread on here called Tuning with HPT or something that has a lot of info. And if it's not covered in there or you get stuck youre welcome to message me and I'll help walk you through what to do.

 

I'd love to see your video! I've been reading up and watching a bunch of LS tuning related stuff on some facebook groups but nothing toyota or transmission tuning related.

Funny enough the things I feel like I have a basic understanding of now aren't really going to help me on my truck because I'm not really spending a bunch of money on performance mods other than the full exhaust and gears unlike anybody that owns a Chevrolet.

There's countless shops around me that are all over the LS platform, but not a single one for these vehicles. We are only just now getting our first local OTT tuner opening on monday. Before then the closest shops capable of doing it were over 5+ hours in any direction. Now it will only be 2 lol

I'll be checking out those threads in the near future

 

Others have already touched on this, so I won’t add much.

Yes, you can certainly ruin your truck if you go all ham on things. You will want to read and learn up on what does what before touching anything beyond speed limiters and gear ratios!

As far as what you can reasonably tackle, it depends on your patience and willingness to learn. I will say that very little of the tuning process is intuitive with HP. It is definitely a foreign language that you’ll need to bone up on…

But, the rewards are awesome once you learn the system. I’ve mentioned before, but you’re not going to get much power gains from a N/A truck. You can, however, get a lot of drivability gain. But, I’d want a dyno if I were making a custom tune beyond transmission control.

My personal choice is to have the custom tune so I can make little tweaks after some seat time. A proprietary tune from someone else is not necessarily a bad thing, but you’re stuck with what you get from them since it’s locked.

 

We’re an HPTuners dealer, of course we use HPTuners!

We use VFtuners and other software too.