D2 S8 Remap - worth it or not?

[andycaca]

Originally Posted by Phil303

I'm not interested in making the S8 significantly faster, so I won't be going down the weight reduction/supercharging route.

I was interested to know whether the mapping helped tap a little of the potential that's tucked away behind the factory set-up. From Reffro's reply, they are the results I would hope to notice; maybe not the autobahn speeds bit.

More excitingly; a quick visit to Revo's site shows me there is a dealer 10 minutes down the road. I'll pay him a visit this afternoon and see what he says.

clive atthow certainly knows his stuff. he's also got a 4WD rolling road.

[Phil303]

That's the one.

A mate who works at Lotus was sceptical too. He said some of the cheaper remaps work by convincing the engine into thinking it's colder than it actually is, hence more fuel being chucked in and boosting performance by running rich basically.

I'll let you know what Clive says tomorrow.

[Phil303]

After a vist to the local respected tuner and Revo dealer, the general consensus was 'You can if you want but is it worth it?'.

The age and mileage of the car was questioned and also the fact they aren't exactly underpowered to start with. They asked if I would I notice the difference of 30lbs of torque while pottering around in an old S8. Possibly not.

They then said that the same 30lb increase would make more of a difference to a Porsche but that is a different beast.

They suggested putting it on a dyno and seeing what's there to start with which seemed sensible, but even then the owner of the place was started doing a lot of sucking of teeth and mutterings of 'Well S8's are hard to strap down so it might take all morning...'

I get the impression they thought I'd be wasting my money and their time, so for now I'll ditch the idea, spend some money on new plugs/filters. A Milltek is on the cards for next year so for now, remapping doesn't seem worth it.

[tintin]

Your call…a Milltek's a fair bit more than a Re(vo)map, from memory…and is one of the few remaining things on my list: I just need my existing exhaust to give up the ghost first

[Phil303]

It's not a cost issue really, more a change of approach.

Rather than stick a remap on a car with old parts, I'm thinking a decent exhaust and quality replacement parts as they wear out, then when that's all taken care of, a remap as the cherry on the cake.

Plus I'd like a year or 2 of having vaguely sensible insurance premiums before having to declare the car as modified.

In addition TinTin, am I right in thinking you had the Stage 2? That's one stage further than I want to go but I can see how that would make more of a change than the mild Stage 1 I am considering.

[andycaca]

ever since the exhaust joining sleeve broke (and the car sounded amazing!) i have been toying with fitting a couple of these before the rear box.

car is quiet and serene when i want it, but at the flick of a switch it becomes a snarling animal.

http://www.driftworks.com/blog/2012/...-now-in-stock/

plus i love the name. "retard valve" lol

[Goran]

Originally Posted by Phil303

It's not a cost issue really, more a change of approach.

Rather than stick a remap on a car with old parts, I'm thinking a decent exhaust and quality replacement parts as they wear out, then when that's all taken care of, a remap as the cherry on the cake.

Plus I'd like a year or 2 of having vaguely sensible insurance premiums before having to declare the car as modified.

In addition TinTin, am I right in thinking you had the Stage 2? That's one stage further than I want to go but I can see how that would make more of a change than the mild Stage 1 I am considering.

I think this is the way to go. I'm no expert but I constantly hear from other people that you should always remap after doing the exhaust not before, otherwise you have to remap again afterwards to take account of the different, probably more free-flowing exhaust.

I even heard, not sure how true this is, if you change to a more free flowing exhaust but stay on the old map that was specific for the restrictive exhaust, you can actually lose some power/torque.

[Adrian E]

A Revo map is generic so isn't tailored to the spec of the car - it's flashed to the ECU and you get what you get. For a more tailored remap you'd have to go to MRC or Unit 20 etc.

Ref Millteks - they've stopped production of the S8 exhaust due to lack of demand. They did offer to check European stock holdings amongst their distributors, so the lack of response either means they forgot, or there aren't any.

When I asked about making another batch, they wanted 8 orders before they would do it due to setting up time for the tooling etc. Might be worth a thread on its own to see if you can generate 8 names?

The receipt for mine shows it was about £1k back in 2010 - I think it's a pretty faithful copy of the factory system in terms of boxes and routing and it's cats back. I think it suits the character of the car well as you can hear it's a V8 but it's no noisier than the standard exhaust on an E39 530 Sport BMW from inside the car.

I imagine Hayward and Scott would do one if your pockets were deep enough - the quality would almost certainly be better than the Milltek option and if a batch were to be made could work out cheaper?

[tintin]

Adrian,

Add me to the list if you're looking for 8 names.

[Adrian E]

I've got one on mine - I enquired at a show as I hadn't seen them listed for a while