Releasing a few horses

[royhedger]

Hello,
What's the simplest way to release some more bhp on my 1990 turbo?
I don't want to release so much power I need to mod the engine, just enough to be noticeable and the max without it ruining engine parts...

Any help appreciated

Roy

[dragonflyjewels]

I have a richmod and hubby has a robou - both modified ecus. Rich stopped making them quite some time ago, and Robou has recently wound right down, so you will likely have to try to find a secondhand one.
We took my turbo to a rolling road day and put her on for 3 runs with each variant of ecu which we had printed all on one graph for comparison - it's on my thread 'Lily's Transformation'.
Dont worry about damaging your engine - the turbo conversion was designed by Porsche and they gave it 190bhp. Needless to say, Volvo with their safety hat on only wanted faster overtaking, not top speed so they changed the ecu to bring it back down to about the 120 mark. The modded ecus both deliver around 160 so well within the tolerances Porsche designed. Volvo didn't change anything other than the ecu.
There have been suggestions that the auto boxes can't handle the mods but I don't know if that's the case. No problems at all with manuals.
Someone on here will probably still have contact details for Robou, if you speak to him very nicely he might do one for you.
Good luck !

[royhedger]

Thanks Sylvia
yes, mines an auto so need to be careful I guess.

If anyone has a messed ucu I'd be happy to take it off their hands .

R

[Paul-b]

I had my ECU modified by Robou earlier this year and I'm more than happy with the result. There's a useful increase in performance but the setup is optimised for real world driveability rather than outright power so I don't think there should be any reliability issues on a properly maintained car in good mechanical health.
The only issue I had was entirely of my own doing as I hadn't considered the implications of sending the ECU to the Netherlands to have the work done. The ensuing complications with customs meant that Robou wasted a lot of time and effort sorting things out and I'm afraid I caused him considerable inconvenience. I think there should be a way of sending items to the EU as a temporary export which should smooth things out, there's probably someone here who can advise.
My car is also an automatic and I'm aware that questions have been raised about the durability of autos with uprated engines but I'm inclined to think that it's more of an issue with more highly tuned, hard driven cars. I'm normally pretty gentle with the car but if I'm using the power, as much as I can, I try to avoid full throttle gear changes by changing down manually rather than relying on kickdown and easing off a little as the revs rise to trigger an upward gearchange in order to reduce the stress on the friction linings.

Paul

[royhedger]

Hi Paul,
Mines an auto as well, and I definitely don't want to do anything that affects the auto box.

Will have to give it some thought, and do a bit of research.

Do you just remove the ECU and send to Robu, and when it's done it's sent back and you plug back in?

R

[Paul-b]

The Bosch system on turbos uses two control boxes working together, one controls fuel delivery whilst the other controls ignition and boost, it's this one that needs to be modified. It's located towards the front of the centre console and can be accessed by pulling back the drivers side footwell carpet.
You'll be able to see it wedged into a lump of industrial strength polystyrene with a big multipin connector plug and a rubber hose attached. It's quite tight but just pushed in place so there are no fixings to undo.

I was fortunate enough to find a spare unit which I could send away so I could keep the car on the road but if you want to do that be aware that there are different versions designated by label colour and any replacement needs to match the existing one. Once refitted it will work straight away but just needs a bit of simple tweeking to get the best results, instructions are provided.

As for the transmission, I've not many miles with the new setup but my gut feeling is that driven with a bit of consideration and with good maintenance there shouldn't be anything to worry about.

Paul

[royhedger]

Good idea Paul ref the spare unit.
I think mine has an orange label on it.
I may ha e a look-see if I can find one, but looking at Robou's thread I'm not sure he's still doing the mods anymore?

[Paul-b]

Mine was only done a few months ago so you may be alright. It's worth sending him a p.m.
As I mentioned previously you just need to be very careful about how you arrange customs declarations when shipping. I caused him more than enough inconvenience and it wouldn't be fair to put him through it again.