DIYAutoTune.com Engine Management Solutions

How we got started:
16.5 years ago, I founded DIYAutoTune.com by merging a passion for technology (I was an IT guy) with a passion for racing (I was/am a car junkie). I was turbocharging my own project MR2, reading every book I could find on the subject, and then got to the point in the project where I needed engine management as well to ensure I could not only make more power, but make it safely! I found this little system online called MegaSquirt (I didn’t name it, I just made it famous), and I built one and used it to tune my engine. I read every book I could find on the subject before getting started, and every word of the MegaSquirt MegaManual time and time again, all before I touched my ECU for the first time, and then I kept reading. I got connected with others on online forums whom were interested in this solution, and found they really wanted it, but it was still difficult for them to understand, and difficult for them to order. I saw an opportunity. I had $1200, a spare bedroom, and an idea. In late 2004/early 2005 I took that $1200 and turned it into $10,000 as a side-gig, still working my fulltime IT job, and being a new dad. In February of that same year, I then took that $10,000 and by the grace of God turned it into more than I could have ever imagined. I had (and have) a wife that was 100% behind me, even when I asked her about quitting my full time IT job back in July 2005, 3 months after we had our first child, and she was all for it! I’m a far better man for having her.

16.5 years later, having founded and run this business has been a blessing of an opportunity and one heck of a ride. I never would have imagined I would have been asked to write a book, but there it is, Performance Fuel Injection Systems (HP1557), available at Amazon and other bookstores and apparently people like it, it holds nearly a full 5 stars 11 years after it’s release! I would never have imagined I DIYAutoTune has grown and evolved beyond what I would have imagined, and I can’t thank my customers enough for believing in us, and helping to make that happen.

Our Products – For the DIYer:
We started out building neat little, well labeled ‘MegaSquirt Kits’ with all of the components needed to build a complete Engine Management System, capable of controlling the fuel and ignition as well as a handful of other features on just about any gasoline (or really, any spark ignited regardless of fuel) engine you could imagine. Think ‘solder by numbers’ with incredibly detailed instructions available online to walk customers through the assembly, configuration, and install process. We designed these kits to be as user friendly as a somewhat complicated project could be. I mean let’s be real! We were making it possible for anyone on the planet to solder together an engine controller and make it work on their car/truck/boat/engine of any kind! This is not a simple learning curve! You’ve got to learn to solder. Then learn to wire the newly built system up to your engine. Then learn to configure it properly for your engine’s crank/cam signals (ignition inputs) and for your fuel injectors and ignition outputs (coils and spark plugs). And no, you’re not done yet—now you get to learn to tune your engine! Every item on this list is an involved topic, which brings us back to the very root of why the system was created in the first place: Education. The engineers that designed this system never forsaw the growth it would have once we got involved, it was a small project online followed by a herd of car geeks. I’m glad I became one of them.
(yes, we even had some people put them on experimental aircraft, and in recent years we regularly provide sytems to multiple unmanned aerial vehicle manufacturers/drone manufacturers. Well… not exactly the kit type product above for those UAV/drone guys…. We stepped it up some before we drew in their business…. Read on…. )

Our Products – For the Professional:
So after years of doing this, years of supporting countless customers with our DIY Products and learning engine management and engines inside and out, racing ourselves and knowing our customer’s needs, we decided it was time to step it up. It was time to take it to the next level. We had customers wanting to use our products that wanted to be able to skip the assembly process, the initial configuration process, and even to streamline some of the tuning process. They loved how they worked, they wanted it easy, and polished/pretty. So I made it easy, polished, and pretty, releasing the first of many Plug-n-play Engine Management Systems in our lineup. The original MSPNP. The MSPNP took all the assembly, installation, configuration, and tuning effort—and did almost all of it for you. You more or less unplugged your stock ECU, plugged ours in instead, and started the car. You then set your base ignition timing to synchronize it with the ECU, and you were up and running, ready to fine tune your racecar to your exact modifications and purpose.

We later, with the same goal of taking all we had learned, and making it easier and more appealing to a different target audience who were on a more normal budget and wanted a polished product, ready to install with no fiddling around with soldering circuitboards, and we created the MS3Pro line of wire-in engine management systems. The MS3Pro was not (originally) plug-n-play like the MSPNP lineup above, though we do now offer a line of MSPNP Pro systems, which are based on the MS3Pro core. The MS3Pro line of wire-in engine management systems was designed to be able to compete with the ‘big dogs’ on the market who professionally built and raced cars, for the amateur racer with a bit more budget available that wanted the polished, finished, professionally engineered and quality assured product that they could install in their own race car, or install in their customer’s race cars, and tune, and in the process build their business around and make money offering our products, and their services (installing, configuring, and tuning).

Tuning shops and internet retailers around the country, and around the world, began more and more frequently using, recommending, installing, and tuning our products in their cars and their customer’s cars. What a ride. We eventually rebranded these products AMPEFI, the Lexus to our Toyota in DIYAutoTune.com. The same core stuff under the hood, though designed for different segments of the market. The MS3Pro and MSPNP line continues to be built under the AMPEFI name, and sold by DIYAutoTune.com and countless shops around the world.

Before DIY:
I grew up without a whole lot, you know the story, single mom (widow, my father passed when I was 3 years old in an accident) busting her tail to provide for me and my brother, and doing a heck of a job at it, but if I wanted extra, I had to go get it. My first car was a ’79 Nova with the straight 6-250 motor that used to be my grandmother’s. If I wanted it to stay running, I had to get my butt to Dairy Queen or Taco Bell or Wendys and work my shift, then get to Pep Boys and buy the parts to keep it going, and I couldn’t help glancing over at that performance aisle, but they didn’t have much for a straight 6. I just moved on and changed my brakes pads, or changed my oil, or whatever I had to do to try and keep her alive, though I beat her regularly. ‘The Blue Hooptie’ was her name, and that what all my friends called her. I kept that car going for a year and a half maybe, and then the motor gave up on me. I was more than a little rough on it. But I learned a lot.

Then after I successfully killed that car, I bought a 1979 Camaro Berlinetta for $1000. Holy Crap! I HAD A CAMARO!!! (I remember thinking.) Then the transmission lost it’s reverse gear roughly 2 days after I drove it home. And my job at that point? Delivering sandwiches for Philly Connection. Without reverse. In apartment complexes. Getting nil for gas mileage and having to make darn sure I didn’t get somewhere I couldn’t get out of without reverse, always trying to find a way to park on a hill so that I could roll back and not have to push it. That was fun. And oh man. Pep Boys here I come, now I had a car that you might actually have some performance goodies for! That used to be a fun trip for me. I couldn’t afford most of the parts they had, but I spent plenty of time drooling over the items in their performance aisle. The carburetors, the intake manifolds, the ignition coils that were supposed to be an upgrade, but probably weren’t. I saved up some money and pulled my transmission myself to have it rebuilt, and then put it back in by myself bench pressing that sucker up into that Camaro in my driveway…. No joke, with snow on the ground all around me. I really wanted that car going again. I’ll skip the part about how I screwed up and didn’t get it seated right, and quickly burned up the pump and had have it repaired a second time. School of Hard Knocks…. I’ve got my Masters, and continue to study for my Doctorate it seems. But that’s how I learned so much about so many things.

And I thank God now for the opportunities he’s given me. I truly never could have imagined the ride this would be. The company, the book, heck… I got to build a car and set 13 land speed records for goodness sakes! How freaking cool is that for a poor boy from Missouri? I tell you what… I think back to that Pep Boys performance parts aisle now. I think of the brands I saw on the shelf. If you came up like me, you know who they are. And I am humbled beyond belief to now run a company where on countless occasions I’ve seen customers looking in their ‘virtual performance aisle’ from their web browser, looking at products with the same brand names on them I looked at then. Looking at my products and comparing them. And then making the right choice. DIYAutoTune and AMPEFI. Made in the USA and shipped all over the world. Thank you Jesus for this opportunity and the blessing it has been!

To the community who supports us so well:
Thank you. We love our customers, and I believe a lot of our growth and success has been due to the fact that we have been able to make personal connections with many of you, as through the years we have done everything possible to deliver high quality yet affordable American made product while maintain a human connection with the customers we serve. After all—we ARE our customers, so we know them! I’ve got many customers that are true friends at this point, and business partners that similarly have grown to be friends as well. If you’re looking for your next engine management system, and you’re still on the fence, we would appreciate the chance to help you reach your racing goals. Our MS3Pro Evo and MS3Pro Ultimate ECUs have a Made in America logo right on top of them, for a reason. All of our AMPEFI Engine Management MS3Pro and MSPNP Engine Management Systems are made right here in Gainesville, GA, USA!

I know our customers have a lot of choices these days, and there is a lot of good product out there. I don’t believe there is anyone else in this industry that can claim American Made Product the way we can. Most of our competitors are long ago sold out to a group of shareholders, and the character of their companies has changed. That seems to be the way things go in time in most cases, I’ve watched it happen to countless brands over my lifetime.

But I would love to encourage you in this: Support small business, support American Made Product, support American cities and your local community. And in that, we thank you for your support!

Thank you,

Jerry Hoffmann
Founder/CEO DIYAutoTune.com and AMPEFI