I dont see what the big deal is about tuning cars. I agree that if not done properly, you can do some serious damage, but providing you dont cut corners and take your time, you can end up with a powerful car that is reliable. Having a road car tuned to a high output does'nt automatically mean it will break down or be unreliable. One of my dad's car's is a Ford Seirra Cosworth (sapphire), which he has managed to get over 400hp+ out of, with things like uprated cams, turbo, injectors, ECU and much more. The car's now done 75k miles, with 55k of them being with the engine how it is now. We have never encounted a problem with it, apart from a turbo pipe popping off, which was sorted by putting a stronger pipe and clips on it.

At the end of the day, some people are'nt happy with the performance of there cars when coming out of the factory, and so they seek more. If its there car, then leave them to it. If they do it properly, then they will end up with a faster, reliable car. If they do it wrong, then they will end up with a slightly faster, yet unreliable car.

edit: btw, when i meant tuning, i meant things like uprated brakes, suspension, engine etc. I agree that some cosmetic mod's are silly.

Quote from Stigpt :

Modding cars is 99% of the time, simply put... STUPID.

lol u enjoy racing oviously other wise u wouldnt be on a live for speed forum

how can u state this when 80% of all race cars out their were standed type cars at one point, then modiyfied?

but their are alot of idiots out their that wack a huge turbo (ie T51r) on a high comp 4cly and wonder why it it blew up running 14psi with 11.1 compression

the sience of modiyfcations of anything can come down to such a fine art that you might only find 5 people in the world that know everything their is to know about what you wish to achive.

99% of the time it is.

Imagine the roads 'round where I live - any standard hatchback is more than fast enough to be fun (i.e. 100 mph) - having a RWD car which has 500 HP is more "fun" on the bends, but 700 HP (in a car originally designed for maybe 400) would be crazily fast, and probably very uncontrollable...

lol jakq u oviously arnt a car enthuiest some people i know drive around with 500-650 HP at the wheels ie 800+ at the flywheel and they just drive it cause its not about the power its about having it their for what when they want to go to the track

That's where the 99% comes from...

I'm not a "true" car enthusiast, but I know that fun-wise, speed is not the deciding factor.

The most worthwile mods for 'fast road' use are braking and suspension upgrades.
A little fettling the engine won't hurt, but most commonly are just a freer flowing exhaust and filter, maybe then topped off with cams and management/remap.

Quote from Stigpt :

Modding cars is 99% of the time, simply put... STUPID.

Who would you rather trust? the Giant headed, glowing veined wizard engineers the actually designed the car from scratch, or the pot-belly beer grubbing mechanic from the corner that with a lot of luck managed to do the 1st year of university?
One thinks like "hmm if ve increze zee rear ride height by 0.05 centimeterz, ze car will have aprroximatly 0,867371 newtons of exztra downforze".
The other thinks like "if I remove this bit HERE and put this new part there, car will go faster! wee!"

A couple of cases I got first-hand contact with:

1) One of the most usual mods around here, is fitting wide tires on the front of Smart City cars. They have fat rear tires and thin front tires cause they dont have power steering, and its a short wheelbase light rearwheeldrive car. thin tires at front = understeer which balances the oversteer from the RWD. Still, in the rain, smarts are pretty tailhappy. (I know, I drive one )
This guy, from a chip-tuning shop down the street from me, chipped his smart, and put fat front tires in it. Car was pretty fast, and was even more lively than usual smarts. Couple weeks ago (start of june, IIRC), he came to the shop in his wife's Espace. Asked him what happened to the smart. Answer:
"I was driving fast, having fun, then when I had to take a left turn, the rear suddenly started sliding and spun me around. I ended up in the opposite lane, facing sideways and got hit by a another car."
Car was totalled, and to add insult to injury, since the police's report of the accident said that "illegal modifications to the car" were partly responsible for the accident, the insurance company billed HIM for the 1'500€ of damages to the other car.
Obviously, fat front tires = much more oversteer, and he spun a slow-going city car with THAT smart move.

2)Guy from school bought an old 5-series BMW (dont quite know which). Sent it directly to "rice school", where he lowered the car to "look cooler".
about half a year later, he said he suddenly lost control of the car in the highway when he went over some kind of bump - car spun around and he ended up in the ditch. First thing he did after? changed the susp back to the original, is a much happier man.
Obviously, stiffer suspension, lower car = less compliance over bumps. Worse yet, if you change the roll stiffens ration from front and rear and/or the spring stiffness ration from font and rear the car will feel different. Change it too much... and you can (and problably will) crash.



And I live about 3kms from the Portuguese track of Estoril.
Every trackday is funny watching some kinds of cars crashing:
Big powered RWD cars driven by men in their mid-life crisis. (H2000, some porches, saw one mx5 having a really stupid spin and crash while braking), and... ricer cars.
Those crash with a regularity that has me betting on how many laps they gonna do before they end up in the wall/gravel.
Funniest so far was some dude with a Saxo Cup, all riced, lowered, about a billion speakers inside, supah paintjob, uber rims, super low profile tires... then flipping it LFS-style in T1 by clipping the inside kerb.. I loled the entire afternoon on that one

Absolutely agree! Your post is officially endorsed by the Tristan Cliffe Endorsment Process

Quote from MAD3.0LT :

lol u enjoy racing oviously other wise u wouldnt be on a live for speed forum

how can u state this when 80% of all race cars out their were standed type cars at one point, then modiyfied?

but their are alot of idiots out their that wack a huge turbo (ie T51r) on a high comp 4cly and wonder why it it blew up running 14psi with 11.1 compression

the sience of modiyfcations of anything can come down to such a fine art that you might only find 5 people in the world that know everything their is to know about what you wish to achive.

There is a HUGE, no a HUGE difference between analytically modifying a car to make it better on a track (this rarely involved bolting parts on from a ricer shop, but stuff that has been calculated in much the same way as the original OEM parts you are replacing to reduce the road compromises), and bolting on a huge bodykit and the largest turbo/intercooler you can fit under the bonnet (or through the bonnet if you're a complete retard) and crossing your fingers that it will work vaguely well as a transport device.

Judging by your posts you clearly don't actually understand how to modify a car in the slighest, and are one of the 'bolt it on and hope it works' kind of fools that cause insurance premiums to rise and make respectable members of the public laugh at you. You might have a go at racing, but you won't do very well at it.

On chiptuning: I'm pro chip tuning, if done by a proper company, it'll make your car run smoother, you'll get a higher mileage and a bit more power.

On power for fun: I drove my dad's Mondeo 125 HP for a few days now, yesterday I returned back to my 60 HP Fiesta again, and actually I found it really fun to drive it. The steering is so light and easy, the car is hopefully going to be scrapped, so I can drive as bad as I like, it goes around corners very well. It was just awesome to drive it again.. It really surprised me.

Quote from MAD3.0LT :

lol u enjoy racing oviously other wise u wouldnt be on a live for speed forum

how can u state this when 80% of all race cars out their were standed type cars at one point, then modiyfied?

but their are alot of idiots out their that wack a huge turbo (ie T51r) on a high comp 4cly and wonder why it it blew up running 14psi with 11.1 compression

the sience of modiyfcations of anything can come down to such a fine art that you might only find 5 people in the world that know everything their is to know about what you wish to achive.

Quote from MAD3.0LT :

lol jakq u oviously arnt a car enthuiest some people i know drive around with 500-650 HP at the wheels ie 800+ at the flywheel and they just drive it cause its not about the power its about having it their for what when they want to go to the track

I lol'd at your ability to misinterpret what both of them meant.

Edit: http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?p=832221#post832221

Quote from sgt.flippy :

On chiptuning: I'm pro chip tuning, if done by a proper company, it'll make your car run smoother, you'll get a higher mileage and a bit more power.

On power for fun: I drove my dad's Mondeo 125 HP for a few days now, yesterday I returned back to my 60 HP Fiesta again, and actually I found it really fun to drive it. The steering is so light and easy, the car is hopefully going to be scrapped, so I can drive as bad as I like, it goes around corners very well. It was just awesome to drive it again.. It really surprised me.

I have yet to see a 'chipped' car that gives more miles to the gallon AND more power/torque - without changing the internals of the engine the overall efficiency is likely to remain almost exactly the same. Plus standard cars are usually tuned for economy over outright power anyway - if it was possible to get more power, more economy and a smoother engine that easily then they would have come like that. You have been fooled by clever advertising and sales-speak.

The easiest way to make your car feel more powerful is to make it noisier. An extra 2 or 3 dB(A) will give you the impression of an extra 10 or 15 hp. Match that up with a rolling road in the same workshop that can be 'biased' to read about 15hp more than you had, and all suckers will actually believe the miracles chip tuning can deliver...

lol my main point i was geting across is their will allways be people that do things the smart way and others that do it the stupid way.personaly my car is setup for track use and is extreamly tail happy on the roads (ie the locker makes this so) but i dont do stupid or do things to look cool its all about enjoying what u have and having fun

the _ONLY_ thing you can change on your car to really improve it is to change the original parts with better-built ones, or ones that will give better performance. But its not a "bolt on and pray" process.
For starters, the cars that can get "upgraded" are the CHEAP CARS.
You arent going to do nothing good by "upgrading" your rx7, or your series5 BMW, or your S2000.
Those cars are expensive enough that the big-headed engineers already did the best they could (which means problably the best that CAN be done) to find a good balance between performance and reliability.
On the other end of the scale, the cheaper cars have a third parameter - low cost. This is why the 1.1liter, 60hp ~11000€ cars have disk brakes in front and drum brakes in the back - the drum brakes are MUCH worse, BUT they are a LOT cheaper, and last longer, too. Plus, since htey are worse, they give the very safe front brake bias a road car needs.

For THOSE cars (the fiestas, saxos, 106's, Aygo's...) a "Upgrade" is possible. IF DONE RIGHT.
You dont just slap on ventilated disk in the front and back and pray.. you FIRST find out what the brake bias is, THEN get rid of the drum brakes at the rear, put in good brakes, then go calibrate your new brakes to have the same brake bias (maybe a little less to the front - emphasis on the LITTLE), then check if the wheel's cambers is still right, see if the new brakes weight more or less then the ones before and see if you have to adjust the rear spring due to the weight change, then if the hydro can support the increased brake force that needs to be applied to the rear brakes, then go out and test if the tires can stand the bigger brake force without locking up... etc etc etc.

Wanna change the exaust system for better performance? thats a LOAD of trouble - you'd better really REALLY know what you are doing.

About the only things you can put that are just bolt on and presto are better air filters, and little things like that.
Even something as simple as fitting wider tires can give a lot of grief. Lowers the mileage (i.e. increased fuel consumption), can make the tires rub the wheel wells.. etc etc etc.
Just go and find some car setup (for a road car) in LFS, and "rice it" - lower susp, increase springs, fiddle with the dampers a bit (or like some shops do, just lower the ride height and away you go). You'd be surprised with the (awfull) results.

Quote from Stigpt :

You dont just slap on ventilated disk in the front and back and pray.. you FIRST find out what the brake bias is, THEN get rid of the drum brakes at the rear, put in good brakes, then go calibrate your new brakes to have the same brake bias (maybe a little less to the front - emphasis on the LITTLE), then check if the wheel's cambers is still right, see if the new brakes weight more or less then the ones before and see if you have to adjust the rear spring due to the weight change, then if the hydro can support the increased brake force that needs to be applied to the rear brakes, then go out and test if the tires can stand the bigger brake force without locking up... etc etc etc.

People laugh at me when I suggest they think before modifying. People seem to think that NOTHING can go wrong when they bolt a rear axle with discs on it in place of the original with drums (some models have discs on the expensive versions), and they don't even consider the fact that the rest of the braking system has to modified to suit...

With exhausts, I think it's almost (almost) guaranteed that an affordable exhaust upgrade (downpipe, centre section, rear section - not manifold) will DECREASE performance, but INCREASE noise. All sound and no go. Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Even replacing the manifold is unlikely to improve performance unless it's quite a bit different - and in most cars there isn't room for primaries of the right length or diameter...

But without idiot ricers, sorry, Tuners, the car world would be a lot duller - who would we laugh at?!

It depends on what type of exhaust you get I would say...

Below shows the result of a rolling road test between a standard exhaust and a Peugeot Sport GrpN exhaust fitted to a 106 Rallye S2. The test was carried out at the 106 Rallye Register K&N Rolling Road day in 2002. The dynograph below shows the Peugeot Sport exhaust gradually produces more power than the standard exhaust as the speed increased.



Not that bad for approx £230.

For starters, never trust power figures from rolling roads - they vary a LOT on the same day, so what you see there could just be the fact the humidity changed. I doubt they took the sports exhaust off again and rechecked to average out the improvement?

Secondly - where are the losses? It's IMPOSSIBLE to get something for nothing (no including the negligable cost). More peak power would almost certainly reduce peak torque, or just change the shape of the curve - neither are apparent here, which is another reason I'd take them with a sack of salt. If it was THAT easy to produce more power/torque when why didn't Peugeot do it in the first place? Noise - silencers on a road car (miles from the engine) have virtually no effect on performance, but a big affect on noise, so I doubt they couldn't get that power increase (if it's possible/real/believable) and maintain sensible noise...

It's all too good to be true, and that is why I don't trust them.

You have got to assume that when Peugeotsport developed the exhaust it was to give an improvement over the standard system, else they would have just used the standard system on the Rally-going 106s.

I'm not denying that perhaps it gives a little more top end power (5hp), but it will come at the expense of low down torque, which competition cars don't need so much... If it was better all the way across the rev-range then surely they'd have fitted it as standard, especially if the improvement only cost £150 (cost price).

I've seen chiptunes tested on rolling roads, and most of them came out with better performance (meaning a smoother curve), and afterwards most of them had better mileage. And I'm talking about turbodiesels, these aren't modded in any other way except chiptuning, so I doubt it's the sound making the difference.

My dad thinks the same way like some here do: if a manufacturer could get higher economy and better performance, they would have done it already. But if you get a good chiptune, it'll get tuned for that specific car, every engine is different and standerd chips need to cope with every engine they build and cover the differences without too much notice.

I can't see how so many people (also people really into cars) can be so positive about chiptunes, and then I see other people who just have an idea about it, looked at people who did it wrong and go spread the word chiptuning is evil.

I agree. You CAN get a power/torque increase along with slightly higher MPG. This does'nt mean you will get a huge increase in MPG, but its usually about 5-10. When my uncle first got his ST220 Mondeo a while back, the first thing he done was get it chipped and setup on a rolling road. He done rolling road runs several times during the day, and the results were almost exactly the same during each test, apart from .5 of hp here and there. After getting it done, he got a HP increase from 221hp > 237hp. (i would tell you the torque increase but i cant remember that, but it was an increase) Also, the trip computer says his MPG on his trip from his house to his work is 29mpg. After getting it done, it rose to 36mpg. Not alot, but still an increase.

Not a lot? That's a 25% increase! A manufacturer would KILL to gain 1% power (221 - 237) AND get a 25% increase in fuel economy. It's just bollocks I'm afraid. Cleverly sold bollocks, but bollocks nonetheless.

Every engine is slightly different (although production tolerances these days are such that the variation is going to be 1% in output and economy).

The only way to get that much increase in power and economy is to either increase emissions - not a good idea as it won't pass MoT tests - or to massively decrease reliability - which is fairly likely.

Seriously - if one day of programming and rolling roading could improve MPG by 25% and power by 1% (I note you only claimed peaks - what was the rest of the output like?) then why would a manufacturer that spends perhaps 10 man years developing a car not do it? Don't you see the bullshit?

Chipping can sometimes decrease the life of parts greatly. If for example you have a completly un-modified skyline r34 the turbo will last 60k+ miles. If you get it chipped the life span of the turbo can drop from 60k+ to around 16k miles.

IIRC I remember seeing something similar to this on German TV one evening, some small tuning company knocked out a chip that gave this Golf Diesel more then double the power it had initially. I found it hard to believe until I thought it through for a moment and the only reasonable explanation would be, why develop multiple engines when you can just offer the same with less power?

Everyone gets the same car just with more or less the same gadgets and the only difference is the performance in the engine, nothings changed but they rake in more money. Its no real performance gain, but a more a performance release/unlock.

Quote from Rooble :

IIRC I remember seeing something similar to this on German TV one evening, some small tuning company knocked out a chip that gave this Golf Diesel more then double the power it had initially. I found it hard to believe until I thought it through for a moment and the only reasonable explanation would be, why develop multiple engines when you can just offer the same with less power?

Everyone gets the same car just with more or less the same gadgets and the only difference is the performance in the engine, nothings changed but they rake in more money. Its no real performance gain, but a more a performance release/unlock.

True, if I pass school this year, I'm getting a new Fiesta S. It has the same 1600 TDCI the Focus has, it has 90 hp. But in the Focus you have the option for a 1600 with 109 hp too. It's the same engine, just not available in the Fiesta. So I'm probably going to get it chiptuned to about 115 hp. Should be manageable. But only after half a year, so I know there's nothing wrong with the engine to begin with.

How is the engine detuned? Solely through electronics? What do they change? Massively retard the ignition and limit the throttle opening? You can't just inject less fuel (it'll go lean, run hot and do nasty things, not to mention pop and cough with incomplete combustion). You can't only do 7 sparks in 8 (it'd run pretty roughly...).

Whilst I suppose a certain amount of power could be lost via electronics, it would be a hell of lot easier to just fit, say, softer cams.

Quote from sgt.flippy :

And I'm talking about turbodiesels, these aren't modded in any other way except chiptuning

What about a bigger turbocharger, intercooler, methanol/water injection, propane injection, nitrous, cams, pistons and other engine internals, intake manifold, increasing bore/stroke, bigger injectors?

Quote from tristancliffe :

How is the engine detuned?

They make midgets come to your house at night and piss in your gas tank.