ECU remap or chip tuning?

[Pumaemblem]

Hi ppl.. I have a question. Why is everybody talking about ECU remap or chip tuning.. Why one or the other.. I have stage 1 remap on my Lexus. Also have chip box. If i install it.. Will it harm my engine? If not. How will it affect the engine?

[GMB]

From the rumours that I have heard Lexus cars do not benefit much from ECU or chip upgrades. Maybe someone can enlighten us.

We nearly came a cropper when Churchill found out that we had a superchip installed after my wife had a little collision with a loose lorry tyre on the motorway. Luckily my answer was that the garage put it in when the Bosch chip failed and they did not tell me because the third party chip was half the price of the OEM. 🤞🤞🤓.  Otherwise be careful!!

[Linas.P]

Who is everybody? What is "stage 1"? What your chip box does? IS220d engine is beyond harming, it can't keep-up even with stock power nevermind tuning, so I am not sure what is your goal here - to blow it up... sure doable. 

The actual answer why remap vs chip tuning - that is because it is basically the same thing, you need to control your fuel, you can either remap the ECU or you can add the chip which captures and interferes with signals to achieve the same thing. Whichever way you want to achieve it - it is up to you, but at least in theory you don't need both, you just need one of them to do the job. Lexus ECUs were uncracked for long time, so chip was the only way, nowadays I believe it has already been cracked for diesel engine and thus it could be mapped without the chip, but perhaps the ECU can't hold more complicated mapping or multiple maps, in which case it may be supplemented by chip. The real solution here would be aftermarket ECU, but the car is not worth it, the engine is not worth it and it would be waste of money. 2AD-FHV is junk engine, weak heads, weak internals, weak injectors - it is work engine, not race engine... and even then it is unreliable at that. Toyota had solution for it - 2AD-FTV, improved head gasket and detuned to 150HP, that is what this engine needs to run properly, more power is just asking for trouble really. 

9 minutes ago, GMB said:

From the rumours that I have heard Lexus cars do not benefit much from ECU or chip upgrades.

That is correct for NA IS250 (or any NA car overall). Chipping/Mapping works well on Turbo diesel and can unlock 20-30% of extra power, VAG, BMW, MB engines are known to be conservatively tuned and can hold good power. As for Toyota diesel - they are already too hot out of the factory, unreliable etc. So they can still get the 20% power boost, but they can't handle it so it is quite pointless.

[Pumaemblem]

Well.. I'm not afraid of Mr. Churchill.. I've just done remapping last sunday.. So now there is 205hp instead of stock 174hp.. But problem is i can't really feel any difference.. That's why i'm thinking of installing the chip box.. Just don't know if that won't be harmful for the engine. 

[Linas.P]

10 minutes ago, Pumaemblem said:

Well.. I'm not afraid of Mr. Churchill.. I've just done remapping last sunday.. So now there is 205hp instead of stock 174hp.. But problem is i can't really feel any difference.. That's why i'm thinking of installing the chip box.. Just don't know if that won't be harmful for the engine. 

You asking wrong people wrong questions. Nobody here know what is on your chip, nobody knows what was programmed in your "stage 1". If the engine could handle more power, then why not just put it into ECU and forget about the chip?

Again - what you chip does? Is it set for stock engine (chips usually ship with set map/maps)? If so then yes - you will blow your engine, because you have ECU map which puts more fuel into it, and then on top you going to put chip which going to put even more fuel into it... best case scenario - you will run rich, will be down on power and be "coal rolling", worse case scenario - your engine will rapidly disassemble. Basically you will double apply the mapping change. 

You should say "supposedly" has 205hp, because unless there is dyno run to prove before/after it is pretty much means nothing. 

Could IS220d make 205hp - yes it could, it can even make 240hp, but not for long.

Go and ask people that know what they are doing and do the car specific map with before/after dyno for validation... that said anyone who really knows what they are doing probably won't touch IS220d, because it minimal gain and maximum liability game.

Sorry if I sound dismissive of entire affair, but you should have done research before getting IS220d, what car it is, what engine it is, can it be tuned, what it can achieve, who can do it... just getting TD and assuming it could get 30% extra power because it is TD is just looking for trouble. Yes there are cars who are really good with this, Lexus IS220d isn't one of them. Now you just throwing good money after bad basically.

[ColinBarber]

38 minutes ago, Pumaemblem said:

I have stage 1 remap on my Lexus. Also have chip box. If i install it.. Will it harm my engine?

Probably. The chip box is designed to modify a stock engine, not one that has been remapped. If it was remapped properly on a rolling road then you should have an optimum set up. If you want more power then your tuner will need to remap it again to further increase boost pressure, but you should make sure the engine internals are upgraded to handle the extra power.

Basic plug-in generic remaps aren't really recommended on this engine, it isn't a VW/BMW engine that is available in multiple power levels that you just unlock the next level.

[Pumaemblem]

That's basically what i asked for.. I also already booked dyno.. So it's supposedly have 205hp.. But who knows

[Linas.P]

205hp is realistic, but whenever that is beneficial is questionable. The key is where the power is achieved. If it get's 205hp at 4800rpm, then you won't feel much in normal driving, if at 1500rpm, then it would be huge... but only mapping may not be enough to achieve it.

Other issue - you should have done baseline before mapping... because let's say your car was down on power (due to age, wear other faults), say 160hp, you now run dyno and get 180hp and assume tuner who programmed the ECU did bad job, but it is not necessarily the case if the car was already down on power. So all the gains are always relative to where you started from, as you don't know where yous started from it will be hard to tell it either way.

Other problem could be measuring BHP vs. WHP, so IS220d supposedly makes 177 BHP, that will be less at the wheels and will wary wildly based on how each dyno is adjusted. That is why ideally you run car before and after tuning and measure difference, not the absolute power. 

[GMB]

4 minutes ago, Pumaemblem said:

That's basically what i asked for.. I also already booked dyno.. So it's supposedly have 205hp.. But who knows

It will be interesting to see what you really get. I would not be surprised by only a 10% increase at the crank with a 15% loss from that at the rear wheels as is normal. The engine will also be a bit worn so not giving full power anyway. The overall effect is approx nil.

Maybe that's why you did not notice much of an increase.

I recommend go-faster stripes and ditch unnecessary weight

[GMB]

When we had our car chipped the biggest difference was overall nicer smoother drive, better torque better mpg and just a bit quicker. Worth every penny of the £200 that it cost. 

100bhp Peugeot Xsi no turbo.