Despite 1,064 horsepower in a factory Corvette ZR1, the aftermarket always wants more, and after Burger Motorsports managed to wire in its JB4PRO system to get 1,170 wheel horsepower on 100-octane race fuel, HP Tuners has now broken into the ZR1’s advanced new Bosch ECM (different from the Stingray but shared with the Z06) to deliver even more. 1,180 whp and 1,094 lb-ft of torque, to be exact, and the only mechanical change is a pair of high-flow downpipes, with 109-octane race fuel supporting the effort. At this point, you might be thinking that the ZR1’s 5.5-liter LT7 twin-turbo V8 must be a highly-strung engine just to achieve stock figures, and pushing its limits is not wise. True. But HP Tuners knows what it’s doing.
HP Tuners Unlocks More from the ZR1 with Careful Calibration
As noted by Car and Driver, a lengthy and detailed Facebook post from Matt Sanford of HP Tuners explains how careful one needs to be when tuning the LT7 for both power and reliability. He says that, while some tuners may soon promise even higher figures, the HP Tuners software increases output by roughly 15 percent in the middle of the rev range and 10 percent on the top end without risking heat. Sure, peak output can spike, but that increases heat. Yes, the turbos have an official limit of 137,000 rpm, and that may well be conservative, but pushing too far could lead to insufficient fueling or cause clutch slippage. Matt claims HP Tuners’ software does neither on the dyno nor on the road. You can watch the dyno run of the tuned ZR1, which is owned by Cleetus McFarland, here.
For the record, the stock ZR1’s crank figures translate to around 904 hp and 704 lb-ft at the wheels, assuming a 15 percent driveline loss. Performance figures for the naturally aspirated LT6 in HP Tuners’ tuned Z06 have not yet been disclosed, but we assume the stock figure (670 hp at the crank) will have been vastly exceeded, likely well beyond 700 hp.
Tuning a ZR1 Safely Sounds Scary
According to C&D, tuning the Bosch ECM requires a bench flash from HP Tuners. Once reinstalled in your ZR1, the car’s nervous system can be calibrated, logged, and scanned using HP Tuners’ MPVI4 OBD-II system with VCM Suite software on a Windows computer. Because this is such a new system, only a beta version of the software is available, but now that a way into the ECM has been found, it won’t be long before it’s refined for a full release (and before others experiment and find any shortcomings). The ECM upgrade will set you back $1,499 on its own, and then you need 10 “Universal Credits,” or tuning tokens, at $49,99 each to download the new coding. Still, just shy of $2,000 isn’t bad for near-ZR1X power. Speaking of, we can’t wait to see how much can be extracted from the hybrid once tuners learn how to correctly calibrate everything there. And once more meaningful mechanical upgrades are developed, the prospects will be truly tantalizing. Bugatti power in a Chevy? We’re here for it.
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