Well got the Thundermax with auto-tune installed and I've got to say I'm pretty impressed, once I got it going the bike ran as smooth as.  Didn't get much of a chance to give it a good test run hopefully tomorrow morning.  But I could tell right away that the exhaust was running leaner than the 1200 Stage 1 map that I'd been running after the 883/1200 conversion.

Fiting of the main unit takes like 5 minutes if it wasn't for the auto-tune install would have been easy:

Fitting the auto-tune took a bit longer.  The Sportster auto-tune is a seperate unit to the BT Thundermax, this is because of lack of space under the seat.

 

Removing the factory 02 censors was a pain, I had to remove the header pipes and the censors themsevles were ceased in.  I couldn't get them off with a spanner.  I had to remove them by putting the censors in a vice and twisting on the header pipe.  That worked well though.

Got the new wide band censors on and ran wiring for the front one under the tank.  The rear one is right next to the unit so I just ran wiring from under the battery cover.

Managed to fit the auto-tune module under the side cover without too much trouble, the instructions directed you to put it on the frame tube behind the rear cylinder but I didnt' like  the sound of that.

 

 

 

 

OzBlue,

I took the bike for a good 150k run on the Sunday after I installed the Thundermax and it worked great, accellerated through the gears really evenly, idled better than before and like they say throttle response was better. All was good.

Way to go KC.

Being a bit of a computer person I'm sure you will be playing with AFRs and all sorts of stuff soon. I'm still way impressed with how mine is going.

thanks for the post Kingchops.. i have been thinking of getting my 2007 XL883 upgraded for a while now. After reading your post i think i will go with the Screamin Eagle 883/1200 conversion kit as i my bike is pretty much stock other than cosmetic changes.. Has anyone else out there done the SE 883-1200 conversion for 2007/8 models ?

I will let you know if that's the case...  I just ordered the SE 883-1200 kit which includes the 1200 heads and Stage 1 air cleaner.    Also got the SE Pro Super Tuner and SE .551 Performance cams. 

Hi kingchops now that you have had both fuelpak and thundermax i was wondering if you could give me your honest opinion of the two except for the price difference also what did you pay for your thundermax.

Dav,

There's no real comparison between the Fuelpak and the Thundermax, they are two very different units. The Fuelpak is great for a low cost simple stage 1 solution, ie when all I added to my bike was pipes and air-cleaner on the stock 883 the Fuelpak ran great. But when I did my 1200 big bore upgrade the Fuelpak just didn't suit, there's not enough flexibility in it's settings to allow it to work with engine upgrades. And also V&H don't provide any documentation on what it's settings actually do.

The Thundermax on the other hand provides a great deal of flexibility in it's configuration and also has the auto-tune which adjusts itself to your specific bikes configuration. Documentation is great on the Thundermax as well there's a detailed configuration guide.

I paid around $860 AU delivered from M&M Cycles.

Hi Kingchops ive been trying to follow the progress you and some of the others have been making with your tmax's how is it now i was reading before how the engine light coming on seemed to be a common thing and it was put down to engine temp sensor how did you over come this and also the thing i am particulary interested in is have you been able to change any settings yourself i.e. idle i am pretty keen on them they seem to be a pretty hot topic on the forum cheers.

Dav,

The issue with the engine light on the Sportsters is fairly minor, it was related to the engine temperature threshold being set too low on the base Thundermax map for the Sportster. The Sportster has the engine head temp sensor buried in the head of the rear cylinder therefore the temperature reading should be set higher than the big twins, ie around 400F. Setting it to that fixed the problem for me. The other issue I had was some minor pinging on hard accelleration, this is still an issue but with the latest firmware it is much improved on my bike. And once I've done around 500km's from the last time I loaded my map I should be able to reset my auto-tune learning to fix it.

All in all the Thundermax is great it performs better on my bike than anything else I have tried, ie V&H Fuelpak, factory download using the SERT etc. I highly recommend it.

Hi Kingchops just wanted to ask how did you get on to m & m is that on ebay or do they have their own site cheers

M&M come highly recommended as many on here have used them for parts and their service and prices are great.  Their website is:

http://www.mandmcycles.com/

 

HI i have a second hand sportster 883 which has balcony type pipes on it ,is there any way of finding out who the manufacture of the pipes would be and what size baffle. Reason being i was looking at putting on the K&N performace air filter part no RK-3929 and the V&H fuelpak but not knowing the pipe manufacture i may get the wrong calibration.

KC is the thudermax worth it for an 883 with pipes and screaming eagle air stage 1?

Thanks KC

Hey KC

did you consider TTS instead of Thundermax ?

Fat Tony

Im not to fussed on extra performance and dont have a lot of bux .I have a set Screaming Eagle slip ons and would like to put a better looking AC on my 48  ,KC can you tell me what would be the most affordable way of achieving this re fuel packs etc .
cheers
48fan