"Chip stacking" term, am i understanding the theory right?

Was on my way to the airport at 545 this a.m. and got thinking about diesels and the term chip stacking and how they can get double the power from that sorta thing vs just one tuner.

Does it work like this? Please correct me if im wrong....

The plug and play tuner's will alter the signal from the truck PCM and essentially tells the engine on the back side that it needs to allow more turbo boost and more fuel at appropriate RPM to give a gain in output? Now when you "stack" them my theory tells me you hook the two tuners in series due to the plug and play ability of the connectors and the alterted signal coming out of the first tuner is understood as a regular PCM signal by the second box which the second one then further cranks boost and fuel etc...??

Do i have the general idea here or am i way off??

one plug and play and one handheld tuner is a double stack

not at all a clean tune doing it this way

dieselplace has lots of info

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BAD LS1

Was on my way to the airport at 545 this a.m. and got thinking about diesels and the term chip stacking and how they can get double the power from that sorta thing vs just one tuner.

Does it work like this? Please correct me if im wrong....

The plug and play tuner's will alter the signal from the truck PCM and essentially tells the engine on the back side that it needs to allow more turbo boost and more fuel at appropriate RPM to give a gain in output? Now when you "stack" them my theory tells me you hook the two tuners in series due to the plug and play ability of the connectors and the alterted signal coming out of the first tuner is understood as a regular PCM signal by the second box which the second one then further cranks boost and fuel etc...??

Do i have the general idea here or am i way off??

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You should talk to Jack. Thats how his truck is setup.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by WickedSix

one plug and play and one handheld tuner is a double stack

not at all a clean tune doing it this way

dieselplace has lots of info

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That makes sence, and essentially accomplishes the same general theory of operation idea i posted above, except the hand held alters the signal direct from the PCM into the plug ang play tuner then onto the engine. Thats pretty crafty that someone came up with this plan though! Dirty but works!, kinda like using diodes to convert AC to DC.

it isn't all that effective though since most plug and play tuning isn't very good. kinda sloppy. handhelds are ok. my ppe is the best handheld made for duramaxs before going with efi live custom stuff. i am thinking about going with efi live. not sure yet. my brother had his duramax double stacked for awhile. was cool until he got his ppe. lol

Couldn't a manufacturer make a tuner that does the same as double stacking just by changing the software then??

Stacking programmers is not recommended, especially since a lot of them like to raise timing real high. By the time you spend money on two programmers/chips/modules, you'll have spent enough to buy HPTuners/EFI Live.

the powerstroke guys say stacking is a HUGE no-no, best bet is just a 6 position chip

if you research it enough some tuners work better with each other than others. i had a edge box stacked on top of a predator dubbed "bastard stack"...stacking started when most tuners only put out 150hp, someone figured out reflashing with hand held and then throwing a in-line plug and play would get power from both...its not exactly like you add the 2 power level of each together but its close...nowadays PPE Hot+2 e.t is 425hp 620trq...i tried to stack my edge on top of that so that was a "575hp" tune, truck was not happy...my PPE makes as much power as my friends does with efi, and we have almost exact same stuff done...thing that sucks with hand helds you can't change tune on fly which is why i'm leaning towards efi live...hp tuners works on duramaxs to but isnt the greatest, it was more designed for gassers and efi isnt very good on gasser.