Anteater Tuning

C

CumminsRamFF

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In New to this forum but not to diesel trucks. I am finishing up a total rebuild (thanks to a rotted frame) of my 2003 dodge ram 2500 5.9 cummins with a Firepunk tow master 48re with a Firepunk Anteater. I'm at the point of my rebuild that I'm ready to set up the trans tune in the anteater, and have several questions I need some help with.
I live in the Catskill mountains of upstate NY so as soon as I come down one hill or mountain ( i know not mountains compared to the west coast!) I start right back up the next.
The truck will usually either have a flatbed of hay, or a trailer with about 10,000lbs.

1. Does anyone have a good daily driver tune they would mind sharing as well as a good tow tune that may give me a good base for the above conditions?

2. Some things say I have to lock the throttle valve lever to the rear on the trans, I've also read that if I have a working throttle valve cable then I don't have to lock anything and can just use it. What do I need to do for things to work correctly and not damage my new trans?

3. What's the ideal anti hunt mph, and governor psi modifier?

4. I see there's just a lock and unlock speed for torque converter, if it is set so it locks in 2 or 3rd, when it shifts, does it shift locked? Or does it unlock, shift and then relock?

5. Has anyone used a Pac brake exhaust brake with the anteater? I'd love to connect the Pac brake wires into the Anteater wiring harness to the same pin outs as the install diagram shows for with a factory tcm/ecm. Will if function the same hooked to the anteater? Command tcc lockup prior to applying exhaust brake ect?

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can provide!!

Charlie
 
CumminsRamFF said:
In New to this forum but not to diesel trucks. I am finishing up a total rebuild (thanks to a rotted frame) of my 2003 dodge ram 2500 5.9 cummins with a Firepunk tow master 48re with a Firepunk Anteater. I'm at the point of my rebuild that I'm ready to set up the trans tune in the anteater, and have several questions I need some help with.
I live in the Catskill mountains of upstate NY so as soon as I come down one hill or mountain ( i know not mountains compared to the west coast!) I start right back up the next.
The truck will usually either have a flatbed of hay, or a trailer with about 10,000lbs.

1. Does anyone have a good daily driver tune they would mind sharing as well as a good tow tune that may give me a good base for the above conditions?

2. Some things say I have to lock the throttle valve lever to the rear on the trans, I've also read that if I have a working throttle valve cable then I don't have to lock anything and can just use it. What do I need to do for things to work correctly and not damage my new trans?

3. What's the ideal anti hunt mph, and governor psi modifier?

4. I see there's just a lock and unlock speed for torque converter, if it is set so it locks in 2 or 3rd, when it shifts, does it shift locked? Or does it unlock, shift and then relock?

5. Has anyone used a Pac brake exhaust brake with the anteater? I'd love to connect the Pac brake wires into the Anteater wiring harness to the same pin outs as the install diagram shows for with a factory tcm/ecm. Will if function the same hooked to the anteater? Command tcc lockup prior to applying exhaust brake ect?

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can provide!!

Charlie
Click to expand...


Welcome to compd! There are a lot of helpful people on this forum, just have thick skin and you’ll be fine.

1. I have a daily driver tune that I run on my 15 that suits my needs. It took me a good bit of time to get it exactly to my liking and I assume that’s what you’ll have to do if your as picky as I am. I can send you the base file or mine if you’d like

2. You’ll want to lock the Tv lever about 80% to the rear. We got it close to where we thought 80% was and then checked pressure and adjusted from there

3. Always left my anti hunt at 3mph and governor pressure set at 60psi

4. Mine stays locked during the shift as long as it’s over your set value. Only time it’ll unlock for a split second is on your downshift

I’m sure if you have other questions that don’t get answered on here you could call Andy or email Firepunk and they’d get you an answer.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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Thanks for the fast reply! Thick skin isn't an issue, I had to deal with plenty of DIs yelling at and berating us for 6 months to then have a job where the public calls us names and such daily.

A copy of what you have come up with would be a huge help.

I'll machine up a piece to lock the lever. Is there any cautions or down side to The tv being locked at 80% all The time? What pressure should I be looking for?

The exhaust brake question was posed to both Firepunk and pacbrake, both said they haven't had any experience with the combo, so unless someone here has experiance, I guess I'll be the test case.
 
CumminsRamFF said:
Thanks for the fast reply! Thick skin isn't an issue, I had to deal with plenty of DIs yelling at and berating us for 6 months to then have a job where the public calls us names and such daily.



A copy of what you have come up with would be a huge help.



I'll machine up a piece to lock the lever. Is there any cautions or down side to The tv being locked at 80% all The time? What pressure should I be looking for?



The exhaust brake question was posed to both Firepunk and pacbrake, both said they haven't had any experience with the combo, so unless someone here has experiance, I guess I'll be the test case.
Click to expand...

I've had plans to test an exhaust brake with my anteater but have never taken the steps to do it. I have the valve out in the shop.
The lever lock should be easy to do, or you could buy one from Firepunk. I ran a zip tie on my 12V for quite a while.
80% TV travel is about as far as most valve bodies seem to tolerate before they don't want to shift appropriately. I used a slide caliper and set the overall travel based on the dimensions I found.

The governor pressure modifier functions as an offset for how much governor pressure is required to make the transmission shift. Mine for instance refuses to shift back to 1st if the modifier is below 65.

The drawback to having the TV tied is the additional heat built up when stalling at stop lights or other low airflow conditions. It's quite manageable depending on your setup.

Sent from my motorola one 5G using Tapatalk
 
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I would post the last file I ran but I genuinely have no idea which laptop I used to make it.

Sent from my motorola one 5G using Tapatalk
 
When you mention heat build up while at lights and such. Is that due to being in drive with low or no airflow? Basically if my truck is idling in park is that a concern then as well? I thought I read elsewhere about putting the truck in neutral at a light to help fluid flow. Does that help here or is it a mute point due to the tv lever being locked open. I eliminated the factory heat exchanger during my build and upgraded the front cooler to a mishimoto one, which I'm hoping will be a better setup.
 
CumminsRamFF said:
When you mention heat build up while at lights and such. Is that due to being in drive with low or no airflow? Basically if my truck is idling in park is that a concern then as well? I thought I read elsewhere about putting the truck in neutral at a light to help fluid flow. Does that help here or is it a mute point due to the tv lever being locked open. I eliminated the factory heat exchanger during my build and upgraded the front cooler to a mishimoto one, which I'm hoping will be a better setup.
Click to expand...
You're right on par, putting the truck in park or neutral removes the load being placed on the torque converter and lowers the heat saturation.

I could be off on the TV playing a role in fluid coupling, maybe one of our friendly engineer types here can confirm or dispel that one.




Sent from my motorola one 5G using Tapatalk
 
And lube in park is only built in to some valve bodies, so cooling in park may differ depending on who sat up the valve body.

Sent from my motorola one 5G using Tapatalk
 
The lube in park will be a question I'll have to pose to one of the guys at Firepunk since I bought their built trans. I know their site says it has a firepunk towing valve body, but I'm not sure exactly what that means, or any specs on it.
 
1. Does anyone have a good daily driver tune they would mind sharing as well as a good tow tune that may give me a good base for the above conditions?

email me at lavon@firepunk.com and I'll share a tune file (add which anteater you have, the file that comes with the anteater should be a good baseline, you just need to edit your gear ratio, tire size and calibrate your TPS

2. Some things say I have to lock the throttle valve lever to the rear on the trans, I've also read that if I have a working throttle valve cable then I don't have to lock anything and can just use it. What do I need to do for things to work correctly and not damage

We have a fixed throttle valve bracket on our website here. https://shop.firepunk.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=258&search=lever
the fixed throttle valve gives you a lot more consistent shift points since your throttle valve pressure is always the same.

3. What's the ideal anti hunt mph, and governor psi modifier?

anti hunt is usually 3mph, this makes the anteater not command another shift until 3mph over/under the previous shift.

the gov pressure modifier is better explained here.

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4. I see there's just a lock and unlock speed for torque converter, if it is set so it locks in 2 or 3rd, when it shifts, does it shift locked? Or does it unlock, shift and then relock?

It will shift locked. if you command a 4-3 downshift, it will command a unlock for .5 of a second.

5. Has anyone used a Pac brake exhaust brake with the anteater? I'd love to connect the Pac brake wires into the Anteater wiring harness to the same pin outs as the install diagram shows for with a factory tcm/ecm. Will if function the same hooked to the anteater? Command tcc lockup prior to applying exhaust brake ect?

While i haven't done it, the control works the same, the Pac brake simply grounds the lockup wire to engage lockup and it will work the same way on the anteater harness, if the lockup wire gets ground signal, the converter will lock.

Also as far a a fixed throttle valve, we set our valve bodies up to still have a functioning boost valve, this will make 125-140psi before lockup and 175-200psi after lockup (depending on 47/48re there are some variables)but when your at idle the pump volume is low enough that pressure comes down to 90-100psi and you don't get much excess heat from the added pressure. Now if you run a constant pressure vb, that will leave the boost circuit open and make that extra 50psi all the time and will generally run more heat in stop/go traffic

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can provide!!
 
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Lavon, thanks for the response. This right here is exactly why I bought a firepunk trans and anteater! I've heard good things about the products and great things about the owners and support. I'm looking forward to getting to finally drive and use these products in the next few weeks.
 
CumminsRamFF said:
Lavon, thanks for the response. This right here is exactly why I bought a firepunk trans and anteater! I've heard good things about the products and great things about the owners and support. I'm looking forward to getting to finally drive and use these products in the next few weeks.
Click to expand...
Old post, but did you ever get the PACBRAKE and anteater working together?
 
good stuff in here..altho i admit..part of why im selling mine it is all the capabilities are kinda over my head....
 
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