Honda ecu chipping problems

[rkcarguy]

Originally Posted by Christ

The Honda ECU's have the chips soldered in too, chipping them requires taking out the old ROM and replacing it with an EPROM of equal or greater value.

With OBD-1, the difference between AT and MT is a few resistors on the main board. (For Honda.)

RKcarguy - watch your local laws for now, WA has many Eco-measures in place that are kind of swap-proof... In fact, right now, in Spokane, Washington is the leading edge of the anti-phosphate movement. (Green dishwashing detergents).

We don't have emissions in my area yet, while my car does have a B20B engine swap in it, all the emissions conections are the same and I'm running a stock ecu and cat, so I should be fine. Wa does do emissions testing but iirc they don't do a scan on your ecu or anything, it's just a sniffer test and visual. I've seen in california where they are allowing swaps provided all the emissions systems are in place, swap is done in like brands(honda/acura-nissan/infiniti, etc) and the ecu must be USDM.

Also you don't remove an original ROM in a OBD-1 ecu, you add a jumper which enables another chip to be added to another blank location on the board. You can also use a 512KB or even 1MB chip to burn several maps and control which one via a toggle. Nothing like sticking your buddy with the valet mode and a 3000rpm rev limit when you loan him your car lol
I've socketed several of them myself but don't have the ROM tuning setup.
There is more MPG to be had over a stock tune. I had a 96 hatch with a turbocharged single cam, did an OBD-1 conversion and a chipped ecu.
I can say I have noticed more increases in MPG on OBD-2 cars converted to chipped OBD-1 than I have on chipped OBD-1 cars....
After I got it tuned, it got better cruise mpg because we were able to run the off-boost AFR up to about 15.8:1 without any surging, increasing my average mileage to about 31mpg even with "spirited" driving. It used to be 28mpg when the engine was bone stock. Warm up is quicker and the car has alot more torque and horsepower. I sold it to my boss's son 2 years ago and it's still running great, just put gas in and change the oil.
We have enacted the no phospate thing too, but it's a good thing because our drinking water comes from a lake surrounded by an ever increasing number of fatcat mansions.
It's when they start getting stupid and failing your car becuase your exhaust manifold was a from a different year car and the o2 sensor is clocked different that pisses me off.
I think as long as a vehicle passes the sniffer test and is recircing fuel tank vent and crankcase gasses it shouldn't matter if I swapped a quad turbo V12 into my car...