megasquirt or holley EFI ?

Since the IRS was nice enough to give me back some of MY money, it's time to pull the trigger on a engine management system for my Gen III hemi build. This will be a drag race only deal with E85 for fuel. Either of the systems mentioned will do everything I need. I realize the megasquirt system will require more legwork, but money still talks pretty loudly. There doesn't seem to be any wiggle room on megasquirt price. Is there a "deal" to be had on the holley HP system? If the $$$ are close enough, I think I want the holley system.
Any and all input is welcome.

Feel free to call me (number is on my website efiexpert.com). I can help with the Holley side of the equation after a few questions such as TB type (DBW or cable), etc...

Talk to Monte... I got my price from him.. maybe\
he can help

Give the guys a call at DIYAUTOTUNE.COM or MS3PRO.COM(same people) great service and the MS3 stuff is a good value.

I just fired mine up this weekend with sequential fuel and spark. I went the longer route and chose to assemble my ECU myself. It is an MS3X which has most of the features of the pro but lacks a few of them. The Tunerstudio program for Megasquirt stuff is easy to use, mine fired up and idled first hit of the key this weekend.

The MS stuff can do as much as you want it to really. Traction control, Dry or wet nitrous control, sequential fuel and spark, flex fuel etc.

The holley stuff is really cool but its not cheap. I no doubt have more labor in my setup but I saved lots and lots of money vs the Holley Dominator which is the closest feature wise to my MS3X.

Is the Mega Squirt software still open source where you can modify it?

If a carb is is not in your future go with MS over Holley.

It is available for peer review and end user modification, but you are only allowed to use it on licensed hardware. To most that won't matter, to Richard Stallman it would.

Care to elaborate, or is it a "just because" scenario...........Said this before, but have yet to see a serious race effort with MS on it.

Monte, I was hoping you would chime in. Would you care to quote me a price on holley system?

Your definition of serious race effort is probably a lot different then most people not in the business. The most serious use of an MS3 I have found is Lee Sicilio's twin turbo hemi daytona that did 283mph on the salt flats a few years ago.

The support system is the biggest killer of the MS3, you can't phone up a hotline and get the help you need when you need it. That alone is worth the extra money for the Holley

I think you would be better off to contact him
in a PM or get his phone number and talk to him..
he isnt gonna quote prices over the net
EDIT
if you want any kind of a deal

This is kinda what I was getting at. The MS seems to be more science project type stuff. Build your own, do your own legwork, learn a lot about EFI likely, but more or less be on your own. Someone that is very familiar with EFI can make anything work. The box only does what you TELL it to do. Navigating the software and being ABLE to tell it what to do seems to be most people's issue. Electro-Motive was much the same way. It worked fine, if you totally understood the system, but the only guy that seemed to was the one who designed it and he was not a racer. From jump, it was a goal to make the Holley very user friendly and not have so much of it be "EFI speak". You don't want the average guy overwhelmed when he opens the software and sees terms he has no idea what they mean. Holley tech is also very good, plus we teach classes on it at the plant. From the basics, to advanced levels. The guy who teaches it, is not an engineer. He is just a guy like the rest of us and makes it easy to understand. The classes have hands on training as well, where you go out in the Power-Lab and makes changes on a running engine and see what does what

I'm not up to speed on MegaSquirts technology, but if you go that route, make sure they have programming to work with the Gen 3 cam and crank tone wheels. And you will have to know which crank tone wheel you have, also.

I worked on injection a LOT but all my part was
the mech hard parts, the tank, lines, rails,reg and
the injectors... all the electronic parts I never
played with... and thats the hard part to understand..
I went from the full return style system to the in take
return system

I think the MS3PRO the non science project, fully assembled ECU is quickly catching on. It has phone support, training classes, etc that the "science project" grade makes you do a little more leg work for.

Lots of Drag Week class winners have been science Project MS cars over the years as well as lots of land speed stuff.

In MY scenario I saw the Holley stuff in Action on roadkill when they did the engine and EFI swap in the middle of PRI. I thought it was cool and I wanted it, then I looked at the price once you buy all the stuff to make it work and I pooped a little. That's when I started to dig around on the MS stuff and I am glad I did. I learned a lot doing it the "hard" way and I saved a ton of cash.

I sound like a salesman for MS3 but I am just happy with my experience.

I've worked on very many different efi systems from the early days.
haltech, accel dfi, felpro, electromotive tec 1 and 2. I worked on a motec equiped turbo v6 in the days of the mustang vs buick era. I loved the motec software. Electromotive came out with "wintec" software, which was a scaled back motec rip off. It made the Electromotive system light years better.(original software was DOS command based) I stuck with the electromotive system for my own stuff. It did what I needed it to do (most of the time) The more modern systems (big stuff, efi technologies, holley, aem) are more laid out like a computer template program. I like the old "cartoonish" icon based software.
A telling thing to me is I have never had to work on a modern FAST system. as popular as they are, I would imagine that either they are very straight forward and easy to get correct intuitively, or their support is outstanding and rock solid.
I do a lot of driveabilty clean up for guys that take their cars to dynos to be "tuned". Getting the high power numbers seems to be the goal at most shops. Driveability is the part that makes guys happy.
I worked on my first MS2 a few years ago. This was a pre built, user installed system that was towed to my place to be initially programmed and then final tuned.
The biggest issue for me was getting all of the system info that pertained to this system. The problem is there is more than one software system to run the ecu. It seems that set up and tuning info for both(or more) control software systems is all mashed together in the same source. I was very confused on trying to set up the original configuration, because I didn't know there was more than one. I was looking for screens that didn't exist in the software I was using.
Once getting that straight... I really liked the system. extremely intuitive, simple to navigate, great data logging.
Now the holley. I have 2 complaints that I just need to get over. First is the "template" style format. I don't like looking for drop downs to get to icons. I realize the reason, but would rather have small icons I dont need on the screen, than to have to search for the ones I want. Big deal. I need to get over it.
Second, WAS the lb/hr tables for fuel instead of PW. This can be changed now, so really a non issue. Honestly though I got use to the lb/hr tables and again, I understand why it was done this way.
Holley's datalogging is very similar in operation to what megalog veiwer which I love. The custom icf tables are a dream come true.
I don't see any situation that I will recommend anything other than the Holley system for future builds/friends/customers.

The MS tuning software has got better, but you're right, it still requires you to have a decent grasp of how EFI works. It's not a plug and play system and there is no documentation outlining a standard V8 install. Because the system is designed to be so universal, they don't have a lot of recommended components, therefore a guy can get overwhelmed with all the facets of the software that can be configured. The MS3Pro has solved a lot of those issues, but at like 1000 bucks, it jacks the price up to that of the other systems. The other MS units that can still be had for only a few hundred dollars, but they are more labor intensive to install. Like everything in the car hobby, if you want to save dollars you have to expect to spend hours.

To my way of thinking, how could anybody NOT like the fuel tables in lb/hr. That's a real number that means something. Burn this fuel, make this power. But lots of guys are USED to VE tables, so now we have the option to switch the table over

I agree with you, but years of using pw gets you into a comfortable groove. The whole thing makes more sense with lb/hr. As I said, I do a lot of clean up work. The pw is more helpful in low power situations when getting in that zone of minimum pulse width. There wasn't any of that info in the programing screens, although you could see it in the logging screen. I like the current v4 for that reason.

When I was flowing injectors for Chrysler I had
to play with both.. PW and weight... I flowed maybe
8000 injectors back then... every day flowing injectors
and doing voltage off sets

While they aren't perfect, diyautotune has some decent ones here:
https://www.diyautotune.com/support/tech/install/ their carb to efi one is probably the best and they sell the exact kits they used. The vintage mopar one came in handy when I did mine, and the gen 3 hemi one. Even without perfect documentation, they are better then the ancient holley pro-jection systems I still run on my water pumps, those will be replaced this winter with MS systems though.

Yeah there is some good tech info in there, but a new user still has to do a ton of reading before they've accumulated enough to dive into the configuration stage. I especially liked the writeup on the 77 Nova where the guy did dyno before/after on a stock 350 carb, tbi, tbi w/ timing control and then port efi w/ timing control.

As I'm probably the most "Serious" race effort using an MS3Pro so I should probably chime in..

I've tuned and a still tune many BS3, Holley, FAST, Megasquirt, Stock GM, Ford and Dodge ECUs... Even import stuff like PowerFCs etc.. Having a chassis dyno everything comes across your lap. I used to run a Megasquirt 1 on my Dart almost 15 years ago but ditched it because of noise problems and went to a BS3 as I was tuning tons of them and still do, ended up selling the BS3 as a package with my old turbo setup so I needed a new ECU.

Big reason for not going with a Holley is they aren't really anything better than a FAST XFI, BS3 or an MS3Pro for the money. They are all a clump of very similar stuff that all accomplish the same thing in the end. If anything I think the new Big Stuff 3 Gen 4 coming out is going to set the bar a bit higher for off the shelf systems.


Reasons why I went MS3Pro-

They figured out the damn noise problems from original Megasquirt that drove me crazy..

CAN EGT interface is extremely affordable compared and is nice to trim cylinders cruising or WOT.

Outputs and inputs are easily setup and can use any sensor or algorithm to trigger things like water meth, intercooler pump or fuel pumps vs demand etc.

Easily use a new LSU 4.9 sensor and any existing wideband you may have.

Use Bluetooth and a basic android tablet as a dash customized exactly how you'd like it to show. (Like it better than the racepak I used to run)

Internal logging to SD card then Bluetooth download saves a ton of time plus you never have to remember to trigger it.

Megalogviewer and Tuner studio do most of the tuning for you once you've established your tables.

Things I don't like about MS3Pro-

Not every Joe Blow can just hook it up to their SBC, SBM etc.. and go. Takes some knowhow and wiring experience to do it.

Harder than almost every other ECU to make a base tune to start unless your buying a plug and play version of an MS3Pro.

Have to run an Injector driver box for low impedance injectors (Maybe an advantage as a separate piece..).

They don't make a Plug and Play harness like a BS3, Fast etc etc.. for a normal V8 (Might be coming sooner than expected which will solve pretty much everything I don't like about MS3Pro).


In the end the MS3Pro has more advanced features and the opportunity to develop features than any other stand alone ECU on the market.. but if you have no idea how to use them, the time to learn them or someone to help you, there is no advantage over any other standalone ECU besides price.

Nice thing on an MS3Pro which is like a lot of the other high end systems is cylinder trimming.. This was some we did cruising on drag week on the set of Moran billet Atomizer 2's.



Also some of the datalogged info from a run. I do like the way megalogviewer shows data.




Easy to tell not enough fuel pump and injectors at 100% duty cycle... Things to fix! Also RPM should have drop..

Man, I love those exh press ratios!

1.1-1.4:1 it seems.. as the boost goes up I'm sure it will get closer to 2:1. The Comp turbos have been working well for me and making steam.

The amount of data you can log with an MS3Pro is endless..

Logging driveshaft and doing traction control this time around and a few other goodies..

New converter, injectors, fuel pumps, transmission and some other misc things.. It will be a good year!

I have a FAST XFI 2.0, but have not installed it yet.
I think because they sell a PnP Dual-Sync dist for my 440, pre-made harness (although pricy) and the small ECU size was part of the decision.
I did not want to try adapting a crank trigger, or have to wire a harness, just wanted something to PnP to replace the Edelbrock XT EFI electronics.

I sell Holley, but on stock '09-up Gen3's I recommend the MS Gold. It IS plug and play, controls VVT, MDS, and the active intake. It also doesn't require a separate coil driver like the Holley or a VVT lock out. Again, let me state I'm a Holley dealer and love the stuff, but I can't sell $2500 worth of control that doesn't control the VVT, MDS, or AI (won't even get into the lack of trans control for NAG1). I can sell a $1400 MS Gold system that will, and then a $700 NAG1 controller, and have a customer with a '09-up Gen3 that can truly just swap a modern powertrain.

I didn't know about these, sounds really good. PM sent.