GolfGTIforum.co.uk
Model specific boards => Golf mk2 => Topic started by: tony_ack on 17 July 2009, 23:01
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Sorry if this is a bit long, just thought I'd share my findings with anyone planning to get a chip for a Digifant!
I posted some time ago about whether or not to remove a chip I had in the ECU of my digi. In the end, I decided to change the ECU for a non-chipped one, as I suspected it was covering for a bad tuning set up. Several other jobs were done on the car at the same time as the ECU swap, and when I got it back, it felt much better (but any one of a number of changes could have caused this).
Since then, I've got the timing sorted on the car, and the CO there or thereabouts, and it drives like it should now. However I was intrigued yesterday when reading up on what powerchip actually does, and decided to try the chip again now that the car was running correctly, to see if it made any difference.
As many of us know, the Digifant is a pretty crude management system, and only a limited number of things can be changed by a new chip - specifically the rev limiter and the fuel maps.
I was interested to read that Digis tend to lean near the top end, and that one benefit of the chip was to adjust the map to account for this. People have also mentioned that the power delivery is smoother, and torque is better lower in the range, which I guess is also caused by the adjusted fuel map.
I'm not so interested in the increase in the rev limiter, as most of the power has gone before you reach that!
So, what I set out to test was:
1. Is there an increase in power lower in the rev range
2. Does the car accelerate more smoothly
3. Does the car pull any better at the top end
4. Is fuel economy affected
5. To sum it all up, does the car seem faster and is it nicer to drive?
The car - standard 8v Digi, other than a Jetex Panel filter. AFM is standard and unmodified, and tests within tolerances. Timing is correct.
The chip - The chip is in my old ECU, which is a DB code. The original chip on the bottom board has been replaced by the Powerchip. Swapping the ECU was a 5 minute job - would probably have been less if I didn't have to go into the house to get my 10mm socket!
Not very scientific, but I compared the car before and after by driving it hard (but safely of course) down some local country lanes. So, what did I find with the chip installed?
1. The car does seem to pull better from lower in the range. There was perhaps the tiniest hint of digilag before, but that's now gone.
2. The first thing I noticed was that the car just seemed smoother, and even more refined than normal. I didn't think there were any flatspots before, but I must have been wrong, as it feels a lot better now! I did however almost stall at a roundabout, as I didn't give it enough revs :embarassed: I'm putting this down to a change in the setup and I wasn't used to it :smiley:
3. The car pulls a little better between 5.5k and 6k, but it didn't exactly blow me away, and isn't really worth waiting for (still change up at 5.5k!). However it did seem noticably more eager between 4.5k and 5k. I didn't get to the limiter, so I don't know what it was set at.
4. Economy for my little drive (37 miles) was 37.7mpg, which when adjusted for the speedo overread is about 34mpg. This compares with about 38mpg (adjusted to about 34.5mpg) for similar driving previously.
5. To sum up the power delivery is definitely smoother now, and having more power lower down makes it easier to drive 'normally'. Performance-wise, the chip probably just about shades it, but there is in reality only a subtle difference. That said, it now feels like a different car to drive - not necessarily in a bad way, but not in a good way either. Just different.
I think because my chip is free, it's probably worth leaving it in, however I would have been disappointed had I paid a lot of money for it. It has enough benefits to make it worthwhile, but not essential.
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nice write up dude! :afro:
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A quick update...
Took it for another drive today, and got some slight popping from the exhaust on the downshift - suspect that the new map is causing it to overfuel slightly.
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Have you thought about getting it on a RR with both ECU's to see what differance (if any) it does make?
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Have you thought about getting it on a RR with both ECU's to see what differance (if any) it does make?
Thats a good idea but in theory you'd be hard pushed to get a fair test unless you really tried hard. Things like Room temp, engine temp etc etc all make the car perform differently. Plus the fact rolling roads aint exactly a cheap venture!
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But thanks for the write up chap!
I got one of these chips of ebay a while back and never had any problems, just smoothed out the accelleration a bit. Beauty is its just an EPROM chip so can now reproduce these at work whenever i want :)
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And how much would you charge for said reproduction???
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with one fitted to my old 8v it pinked like a b!tch...
it did go better though.
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it prob just whacks on more advance lower down and leans out the mixture a little.
Hence why it feels different..
I would get it on a rolling road and check the AFR across the rev range and make sure its not leaning out and what the power/torque curves look like.
With the MR2 with stock ECU it has a afr of around 10:1 at WOT, with the after market one Ive leaned it out to around 11.5:1 and gained 25HP and 20 lbs/ft of torque.
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has wideband controller :). need sensor :( . but can just datalog a run down the road will give same info.
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But thanks for the write up chap!
I got one of these chips of ebay a while back and never had any problems, just smoothed out the accelleration a bit. Beauty is its just an EPROM chip so can now reproduce these at work whenever i want :)
are you interested in copying me one ????
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If enough people get together, so 5 of ya i'll do them at £10 each delivered. :)
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Any chance you can email the map file from the chip? It's probably a file i've already got if it's an ebay chip but still worth being nosy :nerd:
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If enough people get together, so 5 of ya i'll do them at £10 each delivered. :)
I'd have one for sure.
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if its a power chips one it'll be an offset map, have quite a collection of hex files from chips as well
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if its a power chips one it'll be an offset map, have quite a collection of hex files from chips as well
I'd love to say that I know what your talking about but I can't. What the hay is a hex file???
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its the data thats written on to the eprom, often saved as .bin
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So you have a few of these files save'd then? Which would you recomend?
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i don't have an 8 Valve digi so cant coment do have a copy of the digifast chip tho that is apparently good, don't know if it's the original digifast tho.
just thought tho, how about of club/ fourum testing and do some propper testing on the chipping argument.
will need soem volonteers tho but the basic idea goes like this.
get paws on as meany digi 2 maps as possible. compare them all to find out how meany unique ones there are ( probably not that meany tbh )
the ppl participating in trial get sent said selection of chips ( of course one of them will be standard ) and mark them on various as yet undecided things and write the odd report if they wish. then for the carrot everyone who participates gets a free copy of the chip that's voted best
anyone up fot it. think i have enough 2nd hand eproms here if i can find a uv box or i'll stand the cost of some new ones.
then possobly flog a few to ppl on the fourm that din't take part in trial to cover cost ( if any incurred ) then possobly they chould go in club shop or something so any sales support the forum
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I'd be up for it would not mind sharing any cost in the name of science. Would be good to have engines in various states of tune aswell.
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just checked the maps i have, i have 2 to put forward for testing, most of the digi 2 ones were the same when compared, the other has v simlar maps but there are some quite big differances in the rest of the data so looks promising.
27c64 eproms arn't avalible new and not avalible 2nd hand for reasonable money,
i have 12 x27c128's that are useable whitch will do to start with and they are avalable 2nd hand for about 72p each :smiley:
27c256 eeproms are also useable and are commonly avalibel new for about £2 in low quanties. more expensive but new and i have shed loads of them here
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just checked the maps i have, i have 2 to put forward for testing, most of the digi 2 ones were the same when compared, the other has v simlar maps but there are some quite big differances in the rest of the data so looks promising.
27c64 eproms arn't avalible new and not avalible 2nd hand for reasonable money,
i have 12 x27c128's that are useable whitch will do to start with and they are avalable 2nd hand for about 72p each :smiley:
27c256 eeproms are also useable and are commonly avalibel new for about £2 in low quanties. more expensive but new and i have shed loads of them here
iirc the original chip and the 'higherpeaks' ebay chip were both 27c256's
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it shouldn't have been a 27c256. it may well have one in there but it won't be original if you read it you'll find the same data copyed 4 times
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If enough people get together, so 5 of ya i'll do them at £10 each delivered. :)
count me in for that
:grin:
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I have got a chip infront of me but can't remember if its standard or not.
M2764AF1
Will have to dig out my old ecu and get the date from that. Danny when I have the files, i'll send them over to you, and you wana send me yours we'll compare the figures and see whats what, that sound ok to you? To be honest i'm sure the values will be almost exactly the same but it'd be interesting to find out... Like hell i'm guna mess with them tho, could be a disaster waiting to happen :crazy:
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i have been through ALL my digifant II maps and found that there are only 2 worth taking note off.
all the ebay ships do apper to be the same, now been through 8 diffrent digi 2 chips 7 of them are identical.
so there are 3 chips to test atm who's up for it ?
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danny_p I'm happy to take part in this trial...would be pretty interesting to see the outcome.
I'm going to be putting the car on rollers nearing the end of summer so might see if i can get one run before and one run after with 'said' chosen chip. Would give pretty conclusive results on the chips effects.
Running 8v digi, only mod will be 4 branch and exhaust (not fitted yet)
If trial doesnt go ahead I'll put my name down for a chip anyway...
Keep me posted, cheers :)
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i'll have one
if it will work on a car with a cat equiped ECU ???
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think they will, will find a file from a cat equiped car and compare, TC is running an ecu with a lambda so that won't be hard to find.
so so far we have
sidecarphill
gloves88
russ-vdub
if we chould get 10 ppl or so i think it would be quite optimal but i'll see what teh list looks like in a week or so, if want to take part just add self to list so i know how meany chips i'll need to aquire
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I'd be up for one of these, definately. Count me in! :smiley:
I can pay whenever and however you wish... :wink:
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Count me in.
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list now.
sidecarphill
gloves88
russ-vdub
Goodwood_Andy
bullyboy
no need to worry about cash if your "testing" ( thats the carrot ) but if you want to help cover the cost of the chips i won't complain
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well i will need to "pay" for shipping :wink: :wink:
i live in holland , :cool: :cool:
but there will be a small donation to the "get my GTi quicker" fund :grin: :grin:
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list now.
sidecarphill
gloves88
russ-vdub
Goodwood_Andy
bullyboy
no need to worry about cash if your "testing" ( thats the carrot ) but if you want to help cover the cost of the chips i won't complain
Well i'd like to send you a few quid regardless, at least to cover your time, the chip and the P&P. Just let me know your paypal or whatever when the time comes. :smiley:
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Id be up for this and might be able to get some proper rolling road figures done for each if I stick at my new job. I should be able to get some decent AFR logs done as well (not sure our rolling road will do AFR as its mainly for noise testing) even if I cant do the rolling roading if I pop a wideband bung in my exhaust (got a tech-edge wideband reader/logger handy). Id also be happy to cover any costs if needed.
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DOA
got a few tec edge boxes here atm. there cheep enough but feck me the manual is crap the controlers seem to be fast enough tho just some what intresting to get the serial coms working :(
we best be carefull with AFR plots that would man an overwhelming tempation to tweek the chips, good job i don't have a digi 2 or would have been doing it.
rigth i'll go get some chips orderd if there any chips ppl would like to submit to the test drop me a PM can ether post the chip or eml me a file ( prefered )
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just thought if this turns out well will have to do it with the ABF chips to
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just thought if this turns out well will have to do it with the ABF chips to
Was hoping you would say that danny!! count me in!
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got a few tec edge boxes here atm. there cheep enough but feck me the manual is crap the controlers seem to be fast enough tho just some what intresting to get the serial coms working :(
I know what you mean, the unit im running at the moment is a self build one and they didnt even have a manual for it that told them how to re-set and re-program the eprom lol. Saying that, the company owner did ring me in person to sort it out!
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I'm interested in this, dumb question I'm sure, is this for the 16v ?
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mk2 gti (digifant 2) 8 valves ATM
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Ok Thanks :smiley:
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Been off on holiday for a couple of weeks, but I'm glad to see that this has provoked a debate about (and hopefully some testing of!) these chips. To throw another idea into the mix, would it be worth trying to hire a rolling road for the participants for the day - time and location to coincide with a nation meet? Might prove expensive, but I guess that at least all the cars and chips would be tested under identical conditions.
A quick update on where I am - I got back off holiday yesterday and picked up my car from my folks' house in Manchester, and drove back to Sheffield. Idle was sounding a bit unsteady and rich appeared to be running very rich. Whilst driving I still got a lot of popping on downshift, and it also started to pop a little under acceleration and lift off the throttle.
Ths morning I've gone back to the original ECU for now. It's weird - although the chip made the car feel a bit more eagar, and slightly smoother on acceleration, having the original chip back in is like putting on a pair of old slippers! I guess that setting the CO correctly with the chipped ECU could have stopped the overfuelling, but I'm back at work soon, so don't really have time to experiment - plus I don't want to pay a garage to adjust the CO once for the chipped ECU and once again to change it back if it still isn't right.
I might look at this again when I have more time, but good luck to the experimenters, and I look forward to seeing your results, which will hopefully end the arguements about chipping the Digi once and for all!
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the dyno idea sounds cool
BUT ...................
i live in norhtern holland so it doesnt matter where in the uk it is .... i wont be there :grin: :grin:
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the dyno idea sounds cool
BUT ...................
i live in norhtern holland so it doesnt matter where in the uk it is .... i wont be there :grin: :grin:
Where's the effort?! :P :)
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the dyno idea sounds cool
BUT ...................
i live in norhtern holland so it doesnt matter where in the uk it is .... i wont be there :grin: :grin:
Where's the effort?! :P :)
we could do live testing around Assen's track LOL
thats only 5 mins from me :wink: :wink: :tongue:
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So anyone else up for this? :)
Think it would be a nice little experiment :)
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Any ideas when this might be happening?
i'll be interested in getting one for my mates car im building for him using my old 2ltr 8v. would love to help out with the testing but the car is going to be off the road for a while yet, but will definately have a finished one! :grin:
and with my mk2 now up and running with an ABF motor i'll be up for testing chips in my spare ecu whenever ready :cool:
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well thought i'd let it fester a while to see if anybody else wanted to join in.
so the FINAL list is :-
sidecarphill
gloves88
russ-vdub
Goodwood_Andy
bullyboy
DOA
plasticfantastic
dose ANYBODY have any digifant II chips they would like to submit to the test ether an acual chip ( you''ll get it back in a couple of days or a an image of chip ) if so please drop me a PM
atm there are 3 chips in the test ( and one is a controll ) . would have been nice to get 4 diffrent chips + control and 10 testers but hey off we go.
So dose any dody fancy drawing up a standard form to mark the chips on, i was thinking various catorgies and then tick box scale from 1-11 for each for it's performance, the center box been standard
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Is it to late to get in on the test , I've got a 91 8v only mod is an induction kit, engine regularly serviced and in great order, timming correct and so on ..
pretty please !!!
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don't think so,
not much has actualy happend yet, is any one feeling keen on decideing what teh chips are going to be scored on ?
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Depends on how deep you want to get into it really and how scientific. My own suggestions are:
Ease of starting, cold and hot.
Idle quality and stability, cold and hot.
Throttle response at cruise and full throttle. (could add in at different revs)
Fuel economy.
Drivability.
Torque and power curves.
Peak torque and power figures.
A/F ratios.
Enough to get started on anyway. The only thing with all of this is that you have to be sort of scientific about it to get really clear results, especially if your going to all of the trouble of writing and posting out maybe 40 chips so I think you need to consider what the rules are yourself :tongue: :smiley:. Im not suggesting any obligations but there do have to be some basic ground rules :nerd:.
I dont mind doing a form for any scoring if needed, Ive got several made up from uni work that would be easy to modify to suit.
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i don't want to make the rules, i'll do the chips because i can and it won't exactly cost me much.
and the test is more for the benifit of ppl on the fourum i thought some of them might be up for doing that bit of the experiment.
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Rolling road facilities available in the midlands when you're all ready :afro:
and if you bring the map files (including a stock one) on a usb stick or such, we can overlay them for you and show you exactly what and where the differences are.
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Depends on how deep you want to get into it really and how scientific. My own suggestions are:
Ease of starting, cold and hot.
Idle quality and stability, cold and hot.
Throttle response at cruise and full throttle. (could add in at different revs)
Fuel economy.
Drivability.
Torque and power curves.
Peak torque and power figures.
A/F ratios.
Enough to get started on anyway. The only thing with all of this is that you have to be sort of scientific about it to get really clear results, especially if your going to all of the trouble of writing and posting out maybe 40 chips so I think you need to consider what the rules are yourself :tongue: :smiley:. Im not suggesting any obligations but there do have to be some basic ground rules :nerd:.
I dont mind doing a form for any scoring if needed, Ive got several made up from uni work that would be easy to modify to suit.
I think this is a pretty good idea...
A form on which each chip can be scored would be best as that way we can make clearer comparisons between different peoples results
As all our cars will be running slightly different all chips will be rated against our own standard, setting up a scale would allow each of us to rate the chip so much better or worse for each section. If we have a section for what "standard" is in each of our cases it might give a clearer picture as well....
Should prob also finish it off with a small description of what we thought of each chip just to clarify some more.....
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Rolling road facilities available in the midlands when you're all ready :afro:
and if you bring the map files (including a stock one) on a usb stick or such, we can overlay them for you and show you exactly what and where the differences are.
This sounds like rather a nice opportunity...I'm pretty far away but if this were to happened I'd try make it down for it :smiley:
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Rolling road facilities available in the midlands when you're all ready :afro:
and if you bring the map files (including a stock one) on a usb stick or such, we can overlay them for you and show you exactly what and where the differences are.
And could be tweaked if needed....
I am sure I could contribute to this and make you all happy.
Nick
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As all our cars will be running slightly different all chips will be rated against our own standard, setting up a scale would allow each of us to rate the chip so much better or worse for each section. If we have a section for what "standard" is in each of our cases it might give a clearer picture as well....
that is sort of the reason why 1 of the performance chips was going to be a copy of a standard chip :) i was thinking just number the chips that get sent out, eg 1,2,3,4 it would be very intresting to see how people rate the standard one in there as well and it will show up any placebo effect. the reason i like the idea of scoring on a scale out of 11, the std chip should score 6 on everything. i like the sugested form idea tho
when the next chip lands i'll open that up in win OLS and compare it to the others marked for the trial allready. of all the various aftermarket chips i've looked at all have been the same except 1. whitch is the digifast chip as raved about by the yanks. the code i diffrent on that one and it's soposed to make the digi II box do more stuff. as rolling road seems to be
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that is sort of the reason why 1 of the performance chips was going to be a copy of a standard chip :) i was thinking just number the chips that get sent out, eg 1,2,3,4 it would be very intresting to see how people rate the standard one in there as well and it will show up any placebo effect. the reason i like the idea of scoring on a scale out of 11, the std chip should score 6 on everything. i like the sugested form idea tho
Yeah like that idea, so only you would know what each chip was and which was standard, could be interesting lol
DOA - did you say you had a uni form you could modify? If you were able to do a first revision of it based on the categories you suggested that would get the ball rolling....
These would need a RR to test them so dont need to be on the form (or maybe have a different section for them on it)
Torque and power curves
Peak torque and power figures
A/F ratios
So main list would go something like:
Definition of 'standard' (i.e what mods are fitted etc)
Chip 1
Ease of Starting
Cold
Hot
Space for Notes
Idle Quality + Stability
Cold
Hot
Space for Notes
Fuel Economy
MPG value
Throttle Response (pick up)
Cruise
Full throttle
Space for Notes
Drivability
More power - low revs
More power - high revs
Acceleration (smoothness)
Space for Notes
General
Feel faster
Driving Experience
Chip 2.....
Setting a scale of 1-11: 6 being just like normal/standard, 1 being Much Worse, 11 Much Better <--- more specific than that?
Ideally each chip should be run for a couple of days to get a feel for it. I often travel the same routes so I will try and base my comparisons when driving these routes - we should try minimise the number of variables during each test, i.e only the chip changes not our driving style etc.
Ratings should be made based on a collaboration of country driving, duelcarrageway/motorway driving and town driving.
Once each chip has been tested we can graph the results (i dont mind doing this) then compare this to some rolling road tests to see if there are actually gains etc.
If anyone has any other ideas/recommendations fire away
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Ive done a simple excel workbook on the assumption most peeps dont mind using excel :nerd: for the scoring based on the following factors so far:
Ease of starting from cold
Ease of starting from hot
Idle quality from cold
Idle quality when up to temperature
Idle stability coming off throttle cold
Idle stability comming off throttle when up to temperature
Throttle response on light throttle
Throttle response on full throttle
Drivability from cold
Drivability when up to temperature
Fuel economy
Peak torque figure
Peak power figure
Rev limit
Torque curve
I think the final four factors should be scored by Danny_P or maybe RTechUK if we get any of these figures together as Danny is impartial and RtechUK will have a better idea of what most customers actually want but that we should all set the weighting for these factors as well as the rest of the elements (sort of like Gloves88 mentioned).
The scoring is seperated for each chip onto seperate sheets (makes making notes tidier) with one global results page which should make compiling any further sadness data analysis easier. Ive also got the basis of a results compilation workbook that should make the overall analysis easier. Ive also popped the main scoring page into word in a printable size if that works better for peeps (not a lot of space for notes but hey....).
If anyone wants a look, PM me your email address or tell me how to post the form up here and Ill fire it thru/post it here for your comments. Any alterations or additions to the scoring elements that anyone wants, just let me know.
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hey where can i get me a chip from?
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just read through this thread & its very interesting! id definitely be keen on hearing of any results you guys might come out with. will you guys still be going ahead with the testing?
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testing will be going ahead, appears liek i will have to some organiseing :( ( i'm crap at organiseing )
i'kll have think about a report form and chuck it up on website at some point
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Randomly stumbled onto this. Did anything ever come from this experiment?
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it sort of died a death. quite a few people wanted a free chips for various other engines but not meany came forward with digi2 golfs. then work went tits up
still something that needs to be done, at the moment i have the "boreing blue GTi" whilst it's still standard try and do something with, I know of 1 more digifant that can be used.
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well with me included we have 2 digifants. This test should get up off the ground again, there are potentially more chips knocking around now 4 years on nearly from the original test.
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Love my powerchip :cool:
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Thread revival, let's bring this back. I have my money in my hand, someone take it and let's find out what these chips do. Maybe a day trip to some rolling roads.