promaxmotorsport chip for 968 - any good?

[944doc]

drove a 968cab this week - very enjoyable but did seem a little sluggish at the lower end of the rev range. after 4000rpm of course it went bonkers but almost seemed to have a turbo-lag quality to initial acceleration. I read on promaxmotorsport's site that they sell a ECU chip to smooth out the power delivery. Anyone have any experience of these chips, especially ref the 968?

and if I fitted one would it affect the insurance premium?

[Paul968]

Have a look here. 8 Pages is a lot, and not all about Promax, but the later pages mainly are.

www.porsche968uk.co.uk/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=522

Paul

[williamp]

to add to the above (I have a promax chip in my 944 Turbo- very worthwhile...) it might make a difference to the insurance premium.

Of course, have you ever heard of an insurance compnay opening up the ECU and checking? And how would they tell? One chip looks much like another. And what if you unwittingly bought a car which already had been chipped?

So many questions...

[silver993tt]

Well, if you have an accident where police are involved, they will get the ECU checked. Then you have no insurance - mega problems - not worth it.

[uktrucks]

Police check an ECU ? With what ? Porsche test equip ?

They will not have equip to check and even if they can get access, most chips' maps are very discreet.

I am not condoning defrauding an Insurance co but lets get real here !

I personally believe that as a nation we are being brainwashed into believing that an imbedded chip, designed to improve the driveability of a naturally aspirated car makes said car or driver a higher risk.

It is major BS. Insurance is about risk & reward, in most cases low risk for high reward.

Allan

[silver993tt]

Maybe I should have qualified it a bit better. If you have a major accident where someone is injured, the police will use the appropriate resource to check any modifications to the vehicle. Of course the police don't have the equipment themselves but they can (and do) call in any number of experts to the investigation who will have the equipment to diagnose any irregularities.

Better to declare it up front and pay a few more quid than all of the potential nasty business that may be on the horizon.

I agree, that a modified chip possibly doesn't make the car a higher actual risk. However, you have to play the game and I know I'd prefer to pay a bit extra to be clear of mucho hassle.

>> Edited by silver993tt on Friday 29th October 10:10

>> Edited by silver993tt on Friday 29th October 10:10

[ultra violent]

It has nothing to do with the chip and everything to do with the sort of person who fits a chip....

[saxmund]

The problem is that lots of insurers tell you they just won't touch modified cars. Or LHD.

[legaleagleboy]

I have one in my 968 and have been on a dyno before and after the installation.

There is a clear improvement across the 2000 to 6000 rev range, especially when used with Optimax for which the chip has been tuned to.

I did not however get any measurable improvements in max power right at the top of the rev range (some may be available in other cars, that was my experience) . NB the rev limit is raised by about 500 to approx 6950 in my case.

What you do get are a real; uplift in the torque and power curves plus a much smoother gradient -- all the way up to max revs. This does make the car much more drivable and eager -- most enjoyable.

For the money and providing everything else in the engine is working well -- IMO you will get the best value mod for a 968 that money will buy.

ps as the chip did not actually improve the max power at max revs -- i don't think it is a problem for the insurance company at all even if they were ever to find out. Ins co's are interested in things like bolting a turbo on or other obvious changes that dramatically change the max engine output -- so I have no problem fitting one and keeping quiet.

pps the dyno work did identify another problem with my engine, namely the valves were not seating well so I was down on power because of that. got that sorted and went over to a 5w-40 Silkolene racing oil and now the motor is really humming along. So get one soon, happy chipping!

visit www.968uk.com where there is a thread on this in the engine section.

paul f

>> Edited by legaleagleboy on Wednesday 10th November 15:20

[944doc]

[quote=legaleagleboy]
visit www.968uk.com where there is a thread on this in the engine section.
quote]

thanks for all the comments chaps (and chapesses?) where is this thread on 968uk.com? couldnt find it anywhere. the "engine section" just leads to some pics of the engine bay and the site search doesnt pick up promax. can u tell me the exact URL?

[legaleagleboy]

when you get to the front page, go down the left hand column until you see a blue box marked forum. click on that and you will get lots of info.

or click here for a direct link

www.porsche968uk.co.uk/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=522&start=0

just noticed that this link was posted earlier in this thread -- apologies to the other paul (hi) who got there first.

all the best anyway

r u coming to Donington on the 21st Nov, a few of the guys are turning up for a trackday. spectate or drive!

paul f

>> Edited by legaleagleboy on Wednesday 10th November 22:26

[sweetea]

Hi All,

968 owners, you need to be reading this...

www.porsche968uk.co.uk/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=2595

Regards,
Andrew
ProMAX Motorsport
www.promaxmotorsport.com

>> Edited by sweetea on Sunday 13th November 19:27

[lewistintin]

These chips are normally pretty good. However when you have a car that is effectively 70,000 miles old, and ten years old. The engine gets a little out of sink. For a little more money far better to get the car rolling roaded, and engine set up properly. Can be done for as little as £300 from someplaces, and it will be perfectly suited to your car. You can even "suggest" how strong you would like it to be. There is one in milnrow rochdale, cant remember the name but they set up a few cars for our race team.

[sweetea]

lewistintin said:

...when you have a car that is effectively 70,000 miles old, and ten years old. The engine gets a little out of sink. For a little more money far better to get the car rolling roaded, and engine set up properly. Can be done for as little as £300 from someplaces, and it will be perfectly suited to your car. You can even "suggest" how strong you would like it to be....

Hi,

This is simply not true. Why? becuase the Dyno does not simulate the behaviour of a car on the road and it does not address the behaviour of the car under more sedate driving conditions. It is exactly for this reason why we have supplied ProMAX Motorsport chips to many 968 owners (and owners of other models) that have had rolling road re-maps carried out (with dissapointing results).

A rolling road remap is only suitable for getting peak bhp as it focuses on the wide open throttle map only (for fuel and ignition advance). The ProMAX chips are designed so that all fuel & ignition maps are addressed including idle and partial throttle maps. This ensures the car drives better, has better throttle response and smoother transition to peak torque.

Get onto the 968UK forums (www.porsche968uk.co.uk - select forums) to understand what I am saying. Further information at www.promaxmotorsport.com

Also how does an engine 'go out of sync'? - at 70,000 miles a 968 engine is likely to be in much the same condition as when it left the factory. I can say that from having supplied 247 chips to 968 owners worldwide. The 968 is controlled by the Bosch Motronic ECU - completly solid state. Nothing will 'go out of sync' there - so what do you mean?

Regards,
Andrew

[ninemeister]

sweetea said:

A rolling road remap is only suitable for getting peak bhp as it focuses on the wide open throttle map only (for fuel and ignition advance). Also how does an engine 'go out of sync'? - at 70,000 miles a 968 engine is likely to be in much the same condition as when it left the factory. I can say that from having supplied 247 chips to 968 owners worldwide. The 968 is controlled by the Bosch Motronic ECU - completly solid state. Nothing will 'go out of sync' there - so what do you mean?

Generalising on a public forum will always leave you exposed to obvious critisism, so since you asked for it Andrew....

In my experience a "live" remap of a Motronic ecu results in more power and torque than any off the shelf "chip" could produce. I think to date we have probably done more than 100 cars, and the only ones that fail to produce more have arrived with supermarket 95 octane fuel.

I cannot speak for others, but our live remap starts with part throttle fuel and ignition tables from 1000rpm/10% throttle to 7000rpm/100% throttle position (TP). By mapping with the dyno in fixed rpm mode, you start at 1000rpm and work through the TP from minimum to 100%; next step is 1500rpm and so forth. After around 5000rpm you have to switch to inertia mode and map on the fly, which is done for TP 70% to 100%. The results are improved power and torgue at all rpm and loads, definitely in contradiction to your suggestion.


I think your second statement reveals a possible misunderstanding of the functions within the later motronic ecu's. The 968 ecu is knock adaptive, so if it has run on low octane fuel for example it will sense knock and back off the timing. It also runs narrow band lambda feedback, so to some degree it also trims the fuel maps. However it cannot compensate for fuel pressure tolerances or injector flow differences at full load, therefore it is easily possible to see differences in engine hardware that affect the overall tune of the engine because of the ecu (eg one cylinder runs lean, knocks on that cylinder first and reduces timing overall). Therefore whilst the ecu may not go out of "sync", the engine certainly can, at which point a generic chip may not fully satisfy its requirements.

You sell chips, I tune engines, let's not confuse the two.

[lewistintin]

I think this is what i was trying to get at, but in non techno mechanical speak. Cars are known to loosen up as they get older, well at some point this must go the oppsite way. Personally speaking, from what the race team has told me. A chip is all well and good on the first car they set it up too, but to say the same chip perfectly suits every other car seems unrealistic. The race team always use a rolling road, and chip alterations based upon that. If it works on £100k Porker RS's, who am I to argue.
I have used chips in the past, and would continue to use them, dont get me wrong they are a good product, but when you consider that many 968cs at new didnt even put out the factory quoted power statistic, a generic chip perhaps doesnt suit a 968.

[ninemeister]

Just to put the record straight, I think there are probably enough dyno tests out there that show that the 968 Promax chip is as good as anything else commonly available, but I doubt that any chip could get close to a live remap.

[S2 Giles]

Hello !!

Ive ventured here from my usual TVR (no plastic jokes please) forum as I am interested in buying a 968 at some point.

Anyway I must add my two pennie worth and agree that a live remap is far better than a plug & play chip. I say this from my own experience of both. The great guys at Austec racing had my car for 2 days as they were not happy with every element, they kept going & went through a tank of fuel on the rollers. This was too achieve the best they knew they could.

An out of the box chip just cannot do that. I now have more power & torque at all parts of the rev range than TVR stated on day one & we all know they exaggerate in the first place.

Cheers folks

PS. any comments on changing to a 968 sport would be welcome !!!

[softinthehead]

ooh, this is an interesting post, i thought. i've got a promax chip, so i can contribute to this one........

then i remembered it was me that did the original post in the first place in a prior incarnation. will get coat....

[S2 Giles]

please tell me i'm wrong as i have no experience of Promax & may end up buying one to add to my 968 (when i make the chamge). But in TVR circles, particularly with Austec & Mark Adams, its always a mapping process for your specific car that wins over a box chip.

cheers