Read loads on here in the last few months about various "WonderChips" that add 150bhp for on £49.99 (available from Woolworths etc) but i have a question...

My friend is currently in the market for a Superchip for his Version 4 Sti. He seems to be strolling into it without any real info as to how effective they are and from what i've read on here the rows always seem to centre round the Unichip/Link - has anyone any experience of the Superchip?

And as this could well start a huge row, if anyone with any advice/experience could e-mail me (to save litigation/libel/beingcalledaprat etc) i'd be grateful.

The car currently "boasts" 22b arch kit, black windows, quad lamps, AP Brakes, 18" OZ's, loads of tat under the bonnet and looks, errr, "different!"

So is the Superchip the next in a long line of disasters, or do they work?

Thanks

Russ

 

Don't know if anything has changed recently, but the Superchip is just a circuit board that fools the ECU into seeing a lower boost, the boost is then raised by a bleed valve. No regard is paid to fuelling ignition timing etc.

So basically you've got an engine thats fairly marginal on UK fuel, which you then raise the boost pressure on by a substantial amount without changing the engine map. You will possibly/probably get chronic detonation, which may not actually be noticible during the winter (colder charge temp, less likely to detonate), but during the summer.........

To sum it up Superchip = BANG

If you want to see if they are telling porkies to you , call up superchips and ask if any superchipped Impreza Turbos have gone bang. They have, they may or may not tell you

[This message has been edited by Paul Wilson (edited 16 January 2001).]

 

From my investigations (not experience I hasten to add) it sounds quite dodgy indeed when you consider that the STi is designed to run on 100RON Jap fuel. If he is already running on SUL + octane booster he may be approaching this - say 98/99RON. To then try to increase boost in this situation without changes to ignition or fuelling sounds like a recipe for an absolute ******* disaster if you ask me! DET-TASTIC. ENGINE EXPLOSIONS ETC. ABSOLUTE SUICIDE.

If he has such a "nice" car, then why not spend a few more notes on something like a Link which will probably run SAFER than his existing map on UK fuel and may liberate extra performance into the bargain?

I briefly looked at Superchip again for my MY00 UK spec after Falkland were telling me it was wonderful and relatively safe if the boost is not jacked up too far. But the risks would seem to outweigh the benefit of a small saving upfront, in that an engine rebuilt costs ££££.

In summary, the Superchip may work for a short time, but ??? I wouldn't sleep at night!

Some of the other guys I'm sure will give you more informed/experienced/technical descriptions.

EDITED to say sorry Paul, crossposted with you, but we seem to agree!

[This message has been edited by john banks (edited 16 January 2001).]

 

Russ,

I had a superchip on my last Scooby, MY98, for eight months before I sold the car. I had no problems at all. It made a huge difference to performance. My car was put on the rolling road before and after the chip.
The only mods I had before the chip were a Pipercross cone filter and a fully decatted Mongoose exhaust system. It pushed out 237bhp. The chip then pushed it straight to 278bhp. I was then told the boost would be turned down a tad to make it more safe and the end result was 276bhp.
The car was still pulling you into the seat at 130mph , it was very quick.
The biggest difference I noticed was the car just kept on pulling. I never took it flat out but the needle would just roll straight past 140!
I never had a problem with it at all. But I generally don't thrash the pants off it everywhere.

Scotty.

PS: I'm not going to Superchip my MY00, though. Due to everything I have now read and been told. Just in case

 

Russ.

Have a word with "Alex Feher" or "James Nieto" at Van Aaken developments in crothorne at the TRL with regards to a super chip. They are main dealers and are honest guys, if they think the setups not right, they wont take you for a ride. Very similar in approach to Bob Rawle and Branco with the Link (BRD). I am not entirely sure if they have even chipped a UK scoob with a superchip for whatever reasons, I suspect that this is due to lack of info on what the superchip has done the the many variants of the Impreza from UK/WRX/STI/22B etc etc....they know the super chips products and the maps that are required, they did in their defense manage to squeeze around 200bhp from my golf 1.8T last year that resulted in a 13.4 quater mile time on a warmish day. At the time, nobody except AMD would touch my car, incidentally in 20k with the chip I had no problems and great fuel consumption. Like I said, the scoob and superchip appears to be a grey area as not many people due to hearsay have gone for it.

Get as much info as possible, saving pennys in the first instance when playing with mapping and chipping is normaly linked to the reasons they fail and end up costing more in new engine components you need! Go for the repulatble Link/Unichip and make sure that when you get it done its explained fully what its doing and what to look out for i.e Knock..etc etc


Hope this helps.
Ronnie

 

Ronnie raises an interesting pint that I had forgotten about, you're mate could always get a superchip, and then, VERY IMPORTANT this get a Knock Link, it's a stand alone bit of kit that moniters whether the car is detting or not. Cost is only around a £100 or so. At least then your mate will be driving from a position of knowledge of what is going on in his engine. Remember that lighting up the red lights is not a target

[This message has been edited by Paul Wilson (edited 16 January 2001).]

 

princess still has the superchip in her my95 uk car. it is ridiculously fast! has had no probs at all, and is getting a full magnex exhaust this week. however, she did get the boost turned down a bit, just in case! however, she misses the oomph and is turning it back up a bit !
ive got a my00 uk car, and if i didnt have the warranty, i'd go unichip, ive not read a bad word about it, and the cost is more than reasonable.so it looks like i'll have to stump up £2000 to have the ppp and keep my warranty

 

I was told by both Falkland and Powerstation that Superchips are safe and will not cause your engine to go bang provided that they are set up sensibly - ie no more that 1.15 bar boost - AND THEN LEFT ALONE. Problems seem to be mainly caused by people getting used to the improvement and then trying to fiddle with the bleed valve to get a bit more. Leave well alone and you should be OK. Lets face it, a company like Superchips which has been on the go for a long while now is hardly likely to risk their reputation by marketing something which is almost certainly going to blow your engine, as some people seem to think. Just my pennyworth

Raymond.

[This message has been edited by RaymondH (edited 17 January 2001).]

 

When Superchips is only "bleed valve" is`nt it safer buy electronic boost controller from Racelogic and set it to 1.15Bar?

 

My Great experience with a S/chip upgrade from a Scooby main deal!!

I have a Catalunya MY97, so far I have done:

Dump V, 17" wheels, full magnex system, brakes, induction, suspension, window tints......

I wanted more power?

On my way up north I stopped at a main scooby dealer, they claim they are the 3rd largest in the UK.. the reason for stopping was because my Cat was overboosting, it was only serviced 2 days ago.

dealer was on the case of this problem and sorted it.

while I was waiting at the service desk, I saw a board for customers highlighting they could do performance upgrade extra 30bhp, extra 30% more torque for £400 all in.

I enquired about this and was told the person who comes in to do this use to work for Prodrive, he knows what he is doing, he has done many for them before.

They use a superchip piggy back board on the ECU and bleedvalve. All this is then configured on a laptop, timing, fuel cal, etc.

The sales director had this done on his demo car as well, they have done plenty with no problems.

I thought to myself it's a main dealer my engine could not go bang and if it did I have a receipt from the dealer as well who confirms he will give me a new engine.

SO I said ok! and was it worth it!!!!

my boost is running at 1.3, the forge piston dump valve makes a noise Oh! even at low boost, there are no flat spots! all the way to over 160 without even hitting the redline at top end. On the motorway I am doing a ton 1 other person in the car, I am in 5th gear, push your foot down, you here the turbo/waste gate groan and the car pull's man, I mean the needle moves as quick as the rev needle. At first I bottled it at 150 then went the whole hog! excellent!

The driving was done as a test after the dealer completed the fit. The dealer had a demo P1, so we agreed to put it to the test I drove the P1 and the dealer sales manager drove my car, Man that P1 is good but not that good, I could not take my car with the P1 at any point from stand still to crazy speeds. WICKED!

I have had this done 3 months ago no problem.

I am still running it on UL which is fine, but does it drink, like a fish. When you are doing 150-160 the needle on the fuel just drops! crap...

From the horror stories I here,I think when s/chips are fitted you must!!!

1- Not fiddle with the bleedvalve
2- Boost should not go any higher than 1.3bar
3- the fuel,timing,calibration must be re-mapped
4- If the fitter is not doing the sorting out the fuel etc on a Lap top! DON'T DO IT!!!!!!

The other day I took my car on a rolling road test- WWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOW 284bhp

If you follow the above advice, your car will not go bang!


I look forward to your comments

TC


[This message has been edited by TopCat (edited 22 January 2001).]

 

TC,

If the tuner was able to adjust the fuel, and ignition........You DON'T have a SUPERCHIP, more likely a UNICHIP. These are VERY different, and should not be confused.

As for running 1.3bar on a UK car, please come back in six months, and tell us how you're getting on.......if you haven't been banned for speeding (and admitting to it on this forum !!!).

Just trying to work out what goes first...your engine, or your licence.

Mark.

 

topcat
good for you mate, at least your having fun!!
was it definately a superchip? can i have some of your happy pills??

 

Russ.
If he's got an import then definitely tell him to avoid Superchip and go for Unichip or Link, as both of these can be mapped to make the car run safer on UK fuel. The Unichip doesn't cost much more than Superchip either.
Powerstation are the main Scooby tuners for this, and their banner ad can be seen above.
Also, do you have any pics of your mates car? I'd like to see this wide arch kit.

Stef.

 

Last year I bought a 2nd hand car which had a superchip in. I called up Superchips to ask them for an engineer's report on the installation (to show my insurance company) and they replied that "it isn't in our interests to do that". Their chips may be great for all I know, but I personally wouldn't want to use a product from a firm with that kind of after-sales support, so I removed the chip. Just something to bear in mind if your friend goes down this route.

 

I had a 95 turbo, magnex decat/bbox and had a chip conversion done on it by Motorsport Engineering in Ross on Wye.

This was really before I knew anything about detting and all the rest of it. Anyway, the chip that was fitted was mappable and was done with a laptop out on the road - real world driving conditions and all that ( I always thought it was a "Superchip" but feel now it must have been a Unichip from what I have learned).

I took the car back twice to have it tweaked as boost was dropping off above 5000 rpm. Anyway by the time I was happy it was holding 18psi to the rev limit, and was very very quick. As quick as my P1, I am sure although it is always difficult to be sure without having the two cars together) and far far quicker than the standard RB5 that followed it.

I asked at the time if I needed to use 97ron fuel. "No, as the engine is not approaching det" was the answer. Not that I knew what that meant at the time.

I did about 30,000 miles in this car within the next 12 months, with absolutely no probs at all.

Whichever chip I had, I can thoroughly recommend it. Better fuel consumption too.

I think I'll ring them in the morning and see if they will do the same to the P1...

 

Van Aaken do know about Superchipping an Impreza, they did mine! That was before I learnt about detting and had it replaced witht the PE Phase 1.

 

Hi guys,

read your responses, the tuner was an x pro-drive bloke, the dealer was main stream Scooby dealer. They tell me it is a Superchip, I am up their again for some other stuff, I will double check whether it was a unichip or Superchip. They used a Laptop to sort out fuel and timing.

My car is a UK car to answer someone's question.

Hang on I will call them now....Standby........

Just spoke to them and it is a Superchip, the laptop stuff was all crap.

I notice when I drive the boost die's down at 5.5revs which is the safety point.

I spoke to the fitter and he said that you mess around with the bleedvalve of up the boost by other means and yes your engine will blow up. The dealer service manager and chief engineer agreed as well.

So the moral of the story is leave the dam thing alone it's at its safe maximum.

Still bloody quick though as I a have mention in my reply above, I recommend it.

Someone mentioned getting nabbed for speeding and loosing my license....I have a clean record since driving 12 years ago, yes it is a risk but so is life...live it to the max my friends, that is why we drive the Scooby, we all know the Scooby is all go as well as show!.....Just be careful..you blink your in the stink!

Thanks for reading
Any comments ????

TC

 

Comments: well ... combine

>>4- If the fitter is not doing the sorting out the fuel etc on a Lap top! DON'T DO IT!!!!!!

with

>>it is a Superchip, the laptop stuff was all crap.

Dunno, but there must be a message in there somewhere

 

Was this xProdrive endgine tuner the same bloke that prepped Richard's car for the Monte Carlo?

Just curious.

R

 

This is reply from my question from Superchips:


Thank you for your enquiry. The conversion we offer for this car only
allows us to raise the boost of the car as we cannot physically chip the car
due to the nature of the ECU. There will be no damage caused by this as we
have modified many of these with no mechanical damage reported. This
conversion will gain you 30-40bhp and 20% increase in torque. For further
details please contact your local Fitting Centre. Details of your local
Fitting Centre can be found on our web site.

 

How old is that info, The ECU has a piggy back board wired up which I can see, and you guys are missing the the point if you up the boost which is already set on 1.2bar max or play around with the bleed valve it will go BANG! also if you don't have a full exhaust system and induction fitted it don't help, the tuner bloke said the fit a s/chip to a Scooby is hard work to get right.

At the end of it all if it goes bank I have a printed invoice for the performance upgrade from the main dealer and I WILL sue or get a new engine fitted.

The Scooby Shift guys and I don't even need the redline and I get thrown in my seat every time at quarter trottle, and man has that dump valve got loud and I'm talking about the low boost at 3000 rpm ttttsssssccccccccctttt!!


Top Cat

 

can i have one of your happy pills before u go bang?

[This message has been edited by spudgun (edited 24 January 2001).]