So I decided to have my Firebird looked at by a dude who has worked in Pontiac dealers, instead of just putting another 02 sensor in. He hooked his computer up to my car with it running and saw that it had a tune- said he could see the oxygen sensor working, but that it was "lazy". He suggested that the tune was making the car run way too rich and was giving me the repeated 02 sensor issues. He asked me to get the programmer, put the car back to stock and then bring it with me so he could tune it himself.

So I went home to check it out and it looks like a fairly easy process to flash the prom back to stock. However, there's a cartridge sticking out of the Hypertech that says 1997 Corvette, Camaro, Firebird 5.7 LT1: cam-headers-s/c, with my VIN written in by hand underneath all that. Does this mean my car has a cam installed? If so, I wasn't aware of it. Does the s/c mean supercharger? I know it doesn't have a supercharger. Is this cartridge simply an all in one thing for people that have one or some combination of cam, headers and/or a supercharger?

I'm cool with putting the car back to stock if headers are the only thing it has done, but if it has a cam, I have experience that tells me to leave the tune in place or it'll run poorly.


Any ideas/ comments?

The cartridge typically was used to install a custom tune. You told Hypertech everything about the engine, and they developed the tune and put it in the module, and sent it to you to plug into the HPP programmer. It is not used for a "generic" one-size-fits-all tune.

Are there any signs in the engine compartment of a blower having been removed?

Nope, no evidence of a blower- maybe I oughtta call Hypertech.

Does a cartridge like that contain all the info needed for a s/c or is it one that you can pick and choose from?

OK, so I called Hypertech and they told me the cartridge contains info for cam, headers and s/c. You could buy the cartridge and then install the tune when you got the parts. So I set it back to stock, but am considering bringing the header tune back into the mix- it's not as fast as the Hypertech tune....