{"id":22564,"date":"2025-01-21T06:19:48","date_gmt":"2025-01-21T06:19:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/?p=22564"},"modified":"2025-01-28T06:39:24","modified_gmt":"2025-01-28T06:39:24","slug":"working-in-dts-monaco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/working-in-dts-monaco\/","title":{"rendered":"Working in DTS Monaco"},"content":{"rendered":"

With everything set up, you are now ready to start working on your van. Remember, you are now going to be fiddling with the brain(s?) of the van itself, so you do run the risk of messing things up. I have heard claims that you may be able to brick your van when you do variant coding, however, I\u2019m not really sure that\u2019s true for most things. But as a precaution, keep all of this in mind and carefully document your own steps, including backing up coding files. You can upload entirely new ECU software and perform flashes in DTS Monaco, and I\u2019m sure if those things go wrong, you can badly mess up your car, however, presumably a reflash back to stock can reverse the process. I won\u2019t cover any of that here, since I haven\u2019t done any of that in DTS Monaco, although I have used KessV2 to install the absolutely fantastic Kerma tune – but only via their direct help and instructions.<\/p>\n

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In the main DTS Monaco window, click the \u201cOpen a workspace\u201d button and select the Workspace you just created. In the following, I\u2019ll be using the Workspace I have been using for my van.<\/p>\n

As per normal, it will ask you if you want to do an ECU update. Press NO. Wait for the program to load and you should now see your Workspace in DTS Monaco in all its glory. Remember those SMR-d files you imported as part of creating your Project? Those are the \u201cLogical Links\u201d on the left. Note, several versions are available because there are different interfaces that can connect – only the connected ones will work and be active. In the example below, you\u2019ll see me having highlighted the \u201cHU6\u201d ECU that controls the MBUX.<\/p>\n

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Defeating the firewall(s)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before you can start doing any variant coding in DTS Monaco you need to defeat a firewall. Softing, who created DTS Monaco<\/a>, presumably put these in place to ensure that only Real Professionals can work on your van. Right.<\/p>\n

What firewalls are in place varies based on model year, etc. For my W907, I can open up the firewall via the EZS167 ECU, but before I show you how to do that, let\u2019s first log into the BCMFA2 ECU, since that\u2019s the way to open up the firewall in older vans. In the list of logical links, right-click on EZS167 and select \u201cNew Tab for Logical Link\u201d. When you do this, you keep the link to that ECU open and you can have multiple ECUs open at the same time. In contrast, if you were to click through to this ECU via one of the tabs on top, you\u2019d lose the connection once you click through to another one where you might want to do some coding. By having a single tab just for this ECU, you can ensure the connection is kept alive throughout your session.<\/p>\n

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Once that link is created, a new tab will open. In the new tab, go to \u201cGeneric Jobs\u201d and select \u201cSecurity Access Level 37\u201d. Press the \u201cTransmit\u201d button and you should see a bunch of text in the window below. Provided that you see no text in red, in an older van, you should now have turned off the firewall.<\/p>\n

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In a newer van, however, the process is a little different and, as mentioned above, done via the EZS167 ECU instead. Do the same process as described above, but this time it\u2019s \u201cSecurity Access Level 3B\u201d.<\/p>\n

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Click \u201cTransmit\u201d and provided that you see no red text and have \u201cacknowledged\u201d displayed under \u201cResponse State\u201d, your firewall should now be deactivated.<\/p>\n

Variant coding<\/strong>
\nNow, it is time to perform the actual variant coding. Open up the relevant ECU governing the features you want to change and open it in a new tab. In the example here, we open the MBUX\u2019s \u201cHU6\u201d ECU. Once done, you first want to select the \u201cExtended Start\u201dand press Transmit in the new ECU tab you opened up:<\/p>\n

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Provided that you correctly disabled your firewall and still have the relevant ECU (EZS167 and\/or BCMFA2) open in a tab, you should see another \u201cacknowledged” Response State. The ECU is now ready for coding.<\/p>\n

Go to the \u201cVariant Coding\u201d tab and select your ECU. It should connect – if not, press \u201cConnect\u201d. Underneath the ECU you will see the \u201cDomain\u201d list. This is where the functions of the ECU can be accessed and is where you will actually find the values to change. In the example below I select \u201cAudio Handle Write\u201d to add a fader and balance to the MBUX (well, I already had it set to \u201cON\u201d, so in this example I turn it back \u201cOFF\u201d):<\/p>\n

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Find the relevant feature in the \u201cFragment\u201d column – here, \u201cBalance Fader Menue\u201d. Double-click the value under \u201cMeaning\u201d (this is what you\u2019ll change it to) and a dropdown menu will open up – select the new value you want. The original (or, rather, current) value is under \u201cOriginal Meaning\u201d:<\/p>\n

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Also, notice the binary coding string under \u201cRead from ECU\u201d (what the ECU is currently coded for) and \u201cCurrent Coding\u201d (what you just selected). Once everything looks good, press the \u201cDo Coding\u201d. Provided that you have done all previous steps correctly, you should see no pop-ups and the bar next to \u201cDo Coding\u201d go to 100% and the new value presented under the \u201cMeaning\u201d column and Current Coding == Read from ECU.<\/p>\n

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IF you get a pop-up, Google the error code – something went wrong in previous steps. I would suggest restarting the session again. Did you turn off the firewall? Turn on Extended Start? Those ECUs still connected?<\/p>\n

Provided that everything went as expected, your ECU should now have the new values. HOWEVER, they haven\u2019t actually transferred yet, so you need to go through a few additional hoops. Last step.<\/p>\n

Making new variant coding values permanen<\/strong>t
\nIn older vans, a \u201cHard Reset\u201d of your ECU should be sufficient to make your coding changes permanent, however, for newer vans, you need to go through a few more steps, so let\u2019s do that first.<\/p>\n

Click back to the open tab with the ECU you just changed variant coding for. In the \u201cDiagnostic Services\u201d search box, first find the \u201c[31] Synchronize to Non-volatile Memory Start\u201d. Click Transmit, and provided everything upstream was done correctly, you should get an \u201cacknowledged\u201d Response State and no red text.<\/p>\n

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Next, click \u201c[31] Synchronize to Non-volatile Memory Results\u201d, followed by Transmit. Again, you should get an \u201cacknowledged\u201d Response State.<\/p>\n

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Now, it\u2019s time to perform the Hard Reset of your ECU:<\/p>\n

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Do a Hail Mary, turn off the van, open the driver\u2019s door, wait a few minutes, do another Hail Mary, and provided that your van did blow up in flames, the changes should now be permanent! You can check that by turning on the van (engine off), logging into the relevant ECU and then checking – here, you\u2019ll see my \u201cBalance Fader Menue\u201d is once again \u201coff\u201d.<\/p>\n

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With everything set up, you are now ready to start working on your van. Remember, you are now going to<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22577,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2038],"tags":[1591],"views":3200,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22564"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22564"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22564\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22578,"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22564\/revisions\/22578"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22577"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.obd2tool.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}