Well i bought an sct xcal 2, and when i went to install it, it said wrong car. the xcal supposedly has a custom tune on it, so is this maybe why it said wrong car? the guy said he returned his car back to stock. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

My guess if you bought it used that it did not get returned to stock before he sold it to you.

 

I'm guessing the guy you bought it from used it. As soon as he used it it became locked to his vehicle.
That being the case the SCT XCAL 2 locks itself to that VIN and cannot be used on another vehicle.
The only exception is that it will read trouble codes on any ford vehicle.
I know because I read the instruction manual that came with mine.

 

I would tend to believe it is locked to another VIN, probably a previous owner. I did, though, find a similar issue on another Ford product.
Quote from Ryan @ SCT -
Every "wrong vehicle" error I have seen in testing has been due to something changing the file in the factory pcm. For the first post, since you said the last successful operation was returning the vehicle to stock, download Xtreme tune, and then "unlock" the tuner, note, you may need to reprogram the device with the tune files again.
To summarize:
1) Connect your Xcal2 to your computer via USB.
2) Download Xtreme Tune and run the program.
3) Click the "Unlock" button.

Here is a link to the SCT forums. You might find out more doing a search, or post the question right there. Wish I could help more.
http://www.sctflash.com/forum/index.php?

 

o cobrabob if only you would of answered before today, i talked to sct and they said the exact same thing, i unlocked it today and i'm so happy now. lol. now i'm just trying to set the datalogging up...but i think i have to download a newer program to "convert" this one to the newer programs. then i'll be able to download the firmware then get the ball rolling. once i do that, the tuning will begin.