31 replies to this topic

[stevegrabba]

Hi guys,

 

I have a 1342 with an SC 7 port head, throttle bodies and storm ECU all supplied via Specialist components.  I recently contacted a company recommended by Specialist components to get the car tuned and running as well as possible.

 

The company has replied back to me offering to remap the car for £395+vat, which we may as well call £475!!  Which is a fair old lump of money!

 

But what if the existing maps aren't too bad and simply require a tweak here and there to the fuel and ignition settings based on a couple of hours on a rolling road?  Wouldn't that be nearer £200?

 

 

Am I missing something here?  Is £475 a reasonable price?  Is a remap required rather than a few tweaks?  Can you recommend anyone else in the York area?

 

 

Cheers guys!!

[imack]

No idea of the costs of 'remapping' vs carb/distributor rolling road tuning, but surely any minor adjustment to injection or ignition map is 'remapping'

[Carlos W]

I'd want a rolling road tune and remap.

[nicklouse]

as above I would expect the remap to be done with the car on a rolling road.

[stevegrabba]

I'd want a rolling road tune and remap.

 

It just seems flipping expensive at near £500!!

 

They have said that they will not work on someone else's existing maps, so a remap is the only way.  So I've asked if they will evaluate the existing maps via a power run, and then tell me what I potentially stand to gain by getting a remap from themselves.

 

At the end of the day I don't want to fork out £500 for someone to tell me that I haven't really gained anything significant.  Or that they found an extra 1 bhp and 1/2 lbft/tq for my £500! 

[Bat]

Hi,

How much have you spent to get to this point, £5k at a guess?

Surely 10% of that isn't a bad price to pay to ensure you're not ruining that £5k investment?

I can see their point to be fair they have to make sure someone else's map is going to make them look bad when there's a problem later. 

Asking for a power run is only going to tell you what the top line of the maps are like there's 90% more map under those top lines.

Remember there's fuel and ignition maps and all the auxillary settings too.

Base timing will need to be checked plus more before they can start mapping.

Cheers 

[mini13]

i would feed that back to SC for a start as they recomended them,

 

Also I would be looking somwhere else, it 1) sounds to steep, and 2) soulds like they are having you on with " terminology"   theres only one way to do the job, put it on the rollers with the existing map and adjust from there. its not a modern car where " remaps" exist

 

As an example a freind had SC set up a K headed mini a couple of years back, start to finish was about 2 hours and around half that price.

[stevegrabba]

Prior to me buying into the car it was set up about 1000 miles ago by Daytuner (Harrogate), so it's not like its just been put together and then simply hoped for the best.  Good money has already been spent on getting it to the stage it is already at now. However, I don't feel that it is running to the best of its potential. 

 

As 'Mini 13' has also said, I would have thought that it could be set up within 2 to 3 hours on a rolling road, at lets say £80/hr...and hence about half of what they are asking! 

 

Perhaps I'm looking at this too simply, but surely all they can do is adjust fuel/air ratios and ignition timing through the rpm range...to give optimum power and torque on the rollers?  Aren't these just tweaks to the maps already installed and hitting 'save' at the right time?

 

Even at £100/hr, what they are asking equates to 5 or 6 hours of work.  Does it really take that long to make the software adjustments via the ECU and a make few runs on the rolling road to ensure that the adjustments have yielded the target improvements?

 

I'll have a shop around and see what other tuners can do for me....

[Bat]

Hi,

Ahhh I see, the extra bit of info makes all the difference!

Im that case yes I would say its a massive amount of money.

You need to speak to other companies. Tell them what you want, what has been done already.

Explain to them what specific things you want taking care of, they need all the info, just like I did.

Cheers 

[mini13]

nope its not you, youve got it bang on,

 

I didnt realize it had already been on the rollers, I was assuming it was one of SC base maps or similar. if its been on the rollers thats even worse. I suspect they just dont want to do the work.

 

who was this with, Ive heard John Sleath is good and pretty sure he has workied with the SC ecu's.

I will say although the SC ECU is perfectly capable the user interface is a bit unintuitive comapred to others Ive used, but any on worth their salt should be able to work with it.

[Steve220]

Sounds about right for a remap. As a comparison, My Evo's autronics ecu mapping session was over a grand. Good work isn't cheap. Any mapper worth their money will check the engine over first as well as go through the utter basics of the map that's already on it before doing any dyno run ups. This is where it begins to add up. Or get yourself a wideband controller and get the ecu to auto map.

[stevegrabba]

I'm told that the guy who set it up at Daytuner was Damien, and although I don't know him, he is thought to be pretty good.  Is John Sleath at Daytuner or somewhere else?

 

Any suggestions around Leeds, York, or the North East would be much appreciated!

 

Apologies for not giving the full picture earlier guys...

 

Cheers...

nope its not you, youve got it bang on,

 

I didnt realize it had already been on the rollers, I was assuming it was one of SC base maps or similar. if its been on the rollers thats even worse. I suspect they just dont want to do the work.

 

who was this with, Ive heard John Sleath is good and pretty sure he has workied with the SC ecu's.

I will say although the SC ECU is perfectly capable the user interface is a bit unintuitive comapred to others Ive used, but any on worth their salt should be able to work with it.

[Bat]

Hi,

Can you give more info about what you think is wrong with the current setup?

Is it lacking power on full throttle or something else?

This will give a better idea of the amount of work involved.

For instance acceleration enrichment isn't something that can be setup well on the rollers, you need to drive it and tweak it and drive it again to get it at it's best. Vehicle manufacturers spend hundreds of hours to get cars to running the way they do nowadays, thats the sort of time that has to go in to it.

Cheers 

[Bat]

Hi,

I mapped an ignition only setup on a mini myself years ago, I put loads of hours into it, driving around and changing numbers in boxes. It went on the rollers had the top line tweaked and that was it. Car was awesome from idle speed upwards with an engine spec that ran like crap on a dizzy below 2500 rpm.

But again loads of hours went into it.

Drop me a PM if you want a chat...

Cheers 

[stevegrabba]

Sure....

 

For background too....I've currently got 4 minis (mk2 1275S, South African GTS, Final 50 S Works and the 7 porter).  Plus I've had many over the past 25 years or so, so not really a newbie in that context.

 

When I bought into the 7 porter I expected that it would be a real flyer.  Its a good spec (Calver built half engine RE13 Cam, timed in by Keith himself, Ultra light flywheel, 10.1 CR, Russel Engineering pistons, SC 7 port head, ECU, Throttle Bodies, SC stainless manifold and SC 2" exhaust, 1.5 roller rockers....with a claimed 108bhp at the wheels).  So expected that it should pull really strongly and should be a flyer etc!!

 

It's only done 1500 miles or so since the re-build.  However, I just feel that any of the above minis in my garage would give it a dam good run for its money in terms of acceleration and mid range.  So, I'd like to make sure that it is running as well as it can and get it to pull stronger when it comes on cam at 2,500 to the 6,000 rpm limiter.

 

Hi,

Can you give more info about what you think is wrong with the current setup?

Is it lacking power on full throttle or something else?

This will give a better idea of the amount of work involved.

For instance acceleration enrichment isn't something that can be setup well on the rollers, you need to drive it and tweak it and drive it again to get it at it's best. Vehicle manufacturers spend hundreds of hours to get cars to running the way they do nowadays, thats the sort of time that has to go in to it.

Cheers