F8 HD Tuning F8 ECU Tune Review (Pure Turbos)

Hey guys, I just wanted to share my experience tuning super cars I’ve had and the experience of tuning my F8. I have had a McLaren 570, Lamborghini Huracan, Porsche GT3, and now the Ferrari F8. I have modded 10+ other cars that aren’t super cars as well (Audi S4, C63 amg, BMW M8, etc.). My experience with tuners has been pretty poor–they all claim to be the best, and none seem to have it down. Some of them seem more like marketing companies than actual tuners.

I originally had my 570 tuned by VF Engineering. The tune drove like stock, and the flames were awesome, but after losing a race to an upgraded turbo C63 amg I decided I wanted more. I saw a lot of DME Tuning ads on Instagram, so I decided to give them a shot. After getting my ecu back from them, I quickly had multiple engine errors on the dash, and the car kept going into limp mode. I didn’t want to break my car and I ended up switching to a local tuner which also didn’t make much power, and the flames were pretty lame. I had a bunch of other issues with it being a McLaren and ended up selling it. The GT3 I didn’t keep long enough to mod because of how slow it was and the Huracan I ended up twin-turboing with Sheepey Race. I then got bored of that and ordered my current F8. The F8 has been amazing, but the speed isn’t there in stock form. Since I had a bunch of poor experiences with other tuners in the past, I didn’t really know where to go. I tried all the Instagram tuners, and none were very bespoke, made the power they claimed, and were safe. After shopping for a while, I came across HD Tuning on Instagram and shot them a DM. Matt the owner/tuner answered, and I spent weeks questioning him on his experience, practices, tuning experience, etc. because with a car that expensive I didn’t want to have issues. Matt custom tunes every car that enters his shop, everything is bespoke, he does the actual reverse engineering, and he has been tuning cars for almost 20 years. He has done private label tuning for a bunch of big name shops including: Boden Autohaus, GMG Racing, Weistec, BBI, and Royalty Exotics, just to name a few. He was one of the first tuners to figure out how to disable the GPF filters on the F8 in order to run catless files and he is still the only tuner I have seen to date to get an F8 to hold flames out the exhaust for multiple seconds.

My experience with HD Tuning has been nothing more than extraordinary. Matt took the time to make my car the exact way I wanted it to be. I currently have just under 13k miles on my F8 in under a year, a lot of which have been dyno pulls, racing, car rallies, and more. It has not been a garage queen by any means. The tune that he has created drives like stock, is as reliable as stock, but makes ~200whp more than stock on 91 octane. I have also attached the dyno graph of it making 820 whp on pump.

Another benefit I love is that you get direct access to the person controlling the software in your car, when you call HD it’s Matt who answers the phone. The experience is 1 on 1. If I ever had a problem or a question with other tuners it was hard to get an answer and it didn’t seem like anyone knew what was actually going on or how to help me. Not fun when my car was in limp mode and had CEL’s. It feels like all the tuners are sharing one file and if anything goes wrong they have to talk to a dozen people to find out what to change or fix. With HD I’m talking directly to the person making the changes and got my car to be exactly what I want because of that. Truly bespoke rather than a commodity, it’s like going to the Tailor Made personalization program. What’s in my car is the only one in the world like it, made how I want.

My mod list includes:
HD Stage 3 Tune
Pure 1000 Turbos
CSF Intercoolers
Voodoo Design Catless Downpipes + Exhaust
BMC Filters

 

Boost is less than stock since the turbos are larger. And no, I don’t have before sorry.

 

I honestly haven’t looked

 

Dyno jet can’t be played with that’s why I used that. But before numbers would have been nice yes.
I have draggy numbers as well.

 

Mainline will read highest out of all of them.
It made 591whp stock on a MD awd 500 but kept forcing itself into wet mode. Didn’t know I needed a tool to put it in dyno mode at the time. Learning curve :/

 

I haven’t done any 1/4 mile. I did a half mile event and trapped 173mph on 21/22” Michelin 4s’s

 

Bump

 

Low 5s on 91 in ~3k ft DA

 

The gears are very short which kills the 60-130. DA doesn’t help either, should be a high 4s car at sea level.

 

My f8 did 6.1 with downpipes and a tune lol… ouch.
Ran 173 in the 1/2 on 22” Michelin 4S’s.

 

Pista also weighs less and has different gearing. DA plays a big factor as well. I have a set of r888s on my stock 20s and I’m sure I can dip into the 4s with them, but the weather sucks in Arizona in the summer.

 

I get what you’re saying. They’re burnout machines stock even. I have noticed the powerband has shifted higher up the rpm with bigger turbos so traction down low is actually better.