Was trying to workout why this lads Impreza's engine has failed at such low miles, then i saw this

Remapped by Duncan Graham at RaceDynamix - 330bhp (Videos and pictures to prove - May 2018)

Although i know these engines don't do well being tuned.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2014-64-S...EAAOSwSjZgaKrv

 

@ £10500 it seems a bargain, throw £5k at it and you will have a forged wrx sti for £15k

 

Just what I thought. One sold in blue for 15k. So why not buy that and forge it.

 

Its a very good price. I remember years ago a blown STI that was 7 years old would be under £5k

 

I think it's quite unfair to say bad map when it was mapped 3 years ago. Anything can change in that time, and the 2.5 isn't exactly known for reliability is it...? So to get to nearly 60k when modified I'd say it did quite well!

 

What makes you think its a bad map? If it happened with the first month then possibly but nearly 3 years later anything could have happened. Maybe owner didn't service it properly n ragged it around everywhere

 

What if you had requested a safe map of 1.25 - 1.3 bar with a reputable tuner and 24hrs later both your head gaskets failed?

 

From experience Duncan is not a reputable mapper, left mine running lean.

 

mine ate itself on the dyno @ roger clarkes just after he finished mapping it (wrx made 355bhp) i was surprised how quick he took to map it, i was there a little more than an hour and maybe 20 minutes-ish.
can i prove he was at fault - no
did the car ever run right again when the new engine was installed and he tweaked the map - no
would i use him again - NO

 

Just heard a few bad reports about his mapping, Like ones above. Please it sounds like its been well looked after. Hence why i asked the question.

 

Always going to be loads of contributing factors to engine failure. Engine is only as good as the weakest part. Engine could have been heading for hg failure and the remap sped it up. How's it been used, rebuilt in the past, was it built using genuine parts or Mickey mouse stock

 

Any mapper that maps around a boost leak and lambda sensor faults should not be trusted he's done it time and time again the only reason he has improved is because he's had to.
If you take your car to a proper garage they can sort those issues and give you a custom map for YOUR car.
And another problem with Duncan is you can never have a telephone conversation with him, so if your inexperienced you won't know to check the basics before you go.
I like Duncan personally he's a nice bloke, but you don't want someone building an extension on your house because their nice, you want someone who is bloody good at their job.

 

I wonder if he went decat before or after the map

 

I 100% agree with the above , and have experienced it first hand , In my mapped experience , firstly JGM who sorted what he could on my car ( included a restrictor pill) then gave me a safe (call for) 1.2 bar map , as my turbo could only make 1.0-1.1 So Simon suggested to look for boost leaks and come back ( he was right) my TMIC leaked at the BOV gasket. Sadly he was not to live long enough to complete the tune. I later went to Duncan as he had taken over Simons book, unfortunately his knowledge was not as extensive and Duncan's failing was that he tried to give me a 1.3 bar map , lost the work Simon had done on a twin map and did not notice a blowing Up-pipe gasket that occurred during the tune at SRR , the problem is that Duncan only hires SRR and he works on "a fit you in schedule " for a cheap price ( I was asking him for a map tweak as Duncan had Simons laptop ) my car lasted a few months. But in Duncan's defence , he is working as a mapper , not a fault finding tech / repair man. If you use his services and have not meticulously prepared the car before the session, then this sort of thing can and does happen. My forged engine I chose to go to Martyn at Ply Engine tuner , because the car is taken in for a day and while they check / repair and fully sort the issues before mapping is completed. In my case they found my tumbler motor was intermittent and it was decided to do the delete . That sort of attention to detail is really what you must have if you have already spent 3-4 k on your forged engine. There is no point trying to cheap it out just with a map only. So while many take a swipe at Duncan on here , it should be remembered that you are responsible for your own decisions and should bear in mind that the map service he offers is just that and only that, if you want / need more than that then a garage backed specialist is where you should go.