I am swapping an LS1 out of a '99 Pontiac T/A or Firebird into a 67 nova ss. When I bought the motor and trans, I also got accessories, emc etc. I have a friend with HP tuners that can tune a 411 ecm (remove cats, etc) so my first question is, will I have any issues running that ecm on a 99? Also, looking on ebay, there are people that will program it with your vin. I don't have the VIN off the donor car so how do I handle that or does it matter? Sorry if this is a dumb question but it's my first swap.

 

No issues, your swap motor comes with the 411 PCM. The VIN does not matter. Some emissions testing requires that the VIN in the PCM matches the one on the car. Doesn't sound like an issue if you plan on removing cats.

 

Thanks, so 99's came with the 411? The one that came with mine is a 09354896 so I wanted to be sure before I picked up the 411.

I got the engine VIN off of the block and tried to work backwards onto the car VIN from a post on here but I'm not sure if I got it correct. The etched numbers on the block were "2X2225445". I'm not too concerned but if the seller will program my VIN in I figured I would attempt to get it.

 

411 and the 4896 are interchangeable computers. 411 is the service part # for the earlier (99-00) computer. There is no need to buy anything additional over what you have. They can run the same OS, same tuning parameters. Just get it wired up and your buddy can plug in to the OBD2 port and away you go. No need to buy something else.

 

4896s were 99-00 cars and trucks. 0411s were 01-02 cars and trucks and 03 Vettes. You can generally flash a calibration from any one of those into the other one. For just running the engine for the swap and tuning the PCM it doesn't matter what VIN is in the PCM. You don't kneed to try and work backwards from any numbers on the block. I'm not aware of any VIN numbers on the block anyway. It's not like the old school blocks that had VINs stamped in them. Now if you are wanting to put the VIN from a 67 Nova SS in it, that isn't going to happen with HP Tuners. Their licensing scheme won't let you. Tunercat and EFI Live can put a mis-matched VIN in it, but I'm not sure if a 67 VIN has the correct number of digits. I've put mis-matched VINs in late model PCMs with Tunercat, but they have always had the same number if digits. Never tried to put that old of a VIN in one.

 

Thanks for all the help, everyone. Sounds like I can go ahead and pick up a 411 and be good to go. I'm sure I'll have plenty of questions in the future..

 

There is no reason not to use the 4896 PCM you say came with your engine.

 

You can have him tune your cars vin into the ecm. I do it for all my swaps just for ***** and giggles.

Get the last eight of the vin off of the block and call your local gm dealers parts department, they always ask for the last 8 of the vin to look up parts. Give that to them and when they type it into their system it will give them the rest of the vin which they can give to you.

 

From what I understand, he's got an older version of hp tuner that at the time he bought years for. Those years were an '00 & '02 so as long as the ecm is one of those two years, he should be able to tune it for me without costing anything.

 

You don't need to buy a new PCM You just need someone to flash a 00 or 02 file in the PCM you have. I would use a 02 file. It is not the PCM service number he has licensed for, it is the year and model vehicle he has licenses for.

 

Thanks, that's helps a ton knowing this now. Appreciate all the help