sc42 on ecutek - is it worth it ?
 

Hi

Im at the point of buying a 400+ turbo having collected all the usual accompanying mods for my 2004 sti. (gt spec headers, harvey up-pipe, milltek exhaust, hdi fmic, perrin 3 port, fuelab fpr, colossus fuel pump, injectors, rcm induction kit, uprated inlet pipe. )

Will be pretty much a daily driver with the odd track days . All the suspension and brakes have been uprated.

Was looking at the sc42 and then the obvious remap .

This is where i probably havent done enough homework.

Having had all of these things done, would having an ecutek remap be a waste of time in terms of not fulfilling potential, or would spending £1500+ on an alcatek/syvecs remap be overkill for what i need ?

I know you pretty much get what you pay for, so do i buy a sc38 instead and downgrade a bit or push on with the sc42 which is only about £400 more and save for the alcatek/syvecs, or try the ecutek with the sc42 and see how it goes ?

Cheers for your help.

ecutek will do it, but can be issues with the standard ecu struggling to cope, found that out myself. Alcatek is a good upgrade, but is an issue to get tech support plus you have to send ecu off to be set for avcs and dont expect a quick turn around.

Syvecs is more money but the daddy. personally syvecs all the way but depends on if you want to spend that kinda monery

The maf can be the weak link with ecutek but there are plenty of 400+ cars running happily with this set up.

Alcatek is not £1500, it's a lot less
It's a very good Ecu for the money

This is the setup I'm after. I was advised by Scoobyclinic that the standard ecu wouldn't be able to get the full potential from a sc42/t36. I'm booked in sat for a Alcatek and its £1400 fitted, mapped with a/l l/c.

If you go straight for an ecu then you save paying to get the standard ecu mapped.

There are plenty of people who would dispute this statement re the standard ecu.

Very few who have done as many though ;)

my old forged 2.5 was mapped on ecutek and it always had little annoying traits, it struggled with the momentum of the bigger turbo coming to a stop which affected the idle, pretty much every ecutek map i have seen running higher power had a funny fuel spike, you still have to retain the maf to do the idle etc etc

Alot of the people who dispute it have spent hours and hours fine tuning it, change things around to make it work better etc etc

Only problem that regularly occurs with alcatek and syvecs, or any after market ecu is the cold start/idle setup. May take a return trip to set it up due to mapper only typically seeing the car when engine is already warm.

You're obviously right re Scoobyclinic but I was just pointing out that there are plenty of 400+bhp cars that run the standard ECU without problem. And if your Alkatek ecu needs work then be prepared to be off the road for a long time!

All of em do to fit new age mate, they don't come with avcs support in standard form, have to be returned for the mod.

I can't justify Syvecs on a road-only car and I've been warned off Alcatek because of the service problems. So Ecutek it is.

yeah theres a bit of a black hole in that area now. it's either syvecs or ecutek. so big bucks or not as capable

Hi there

Personally I would go with Syvecs without the questions if you want go with aftermarket ECU,Alcatek ECU is not bad ECU,poor service and mainly long turnarounds are problems for most common problems,if you want to add extra bits then you need send ECU to Alcatek which can be long as above guys pointed out

Above the features,Alcatek have features which you want,but Syvecs is bit better and have everything there and you don't need to send ECU to Syvecs

About the ECUTEK limitation,this depends on car and on ECU,as earlier ECU(16bit which are on earlier New age WRX/STI) you can have only one fuel map and two boost maps,on those ECU as above MAF limit can be issue which shouldn't be too problem,if you will go with larger MAF tube or you will be running Blown Through MAF,then you can run to limitation of the boost as stock ECU can see as max 1.6bar(what is limit of stock MAP sensor),but I think if you will fit bigger MAP sensor you should be OK,but this I would rather confirm with ECUTEK dealer and other limitation,this depends on mapper if he will struggle or not to make more power and mostly with good ECU you should be able make more power than on ECUTEK as aftermarket ECU have better map resolution without the problems

Hope this helps and good luck there

Thanks,Jura

Why not Carberry Rom?

For cost VS Performance very little comes close and it can do the mafless, LC, ALS multi maps etc too?

Is it true mafless? or does it have to retain the maf for idle control etc?

I have an SC42 mapped with ecutek by Pat at Scooby Clinic. I have the following mods, gt spec headers, milltek exhaust, injectors, uprated inlet pipe. Standard top mount, 2 port solenoid, standard fbr, 255lt fuel pump. Producing 401bhp, 1.45 boost, limiting factor is the top mount but I am happy with that. I can't justify the extra money needed for another ecu for a few bhp.

Typically ecu swap isn't about extra bhp at all matey

The late and much missed Simon Roe (JGM) reckoned my car would gain probably 15bhp max with an Alcatek ecu because of the ecu's ability to map cylinders individually. He then said he didn't think an extra 15bhp was worth £1k+ on a car already running well over 400bhp. He also said that maf failure was uncommon on Newage cars, unlike earlier models, so don't worry about it. Thanks Simon, I'm still not worried, still going strong! :)

470/460 with a 2.3 and t36 on hawkeye ecu. Runs perfect apart from throwing a Maf high input code on really wet and cold days if I'm boosting hard, which I tend not to in the wet so much now as its a bit of a handful.:norty:

Same setup ran 407/430 with top mount and 2.5 inch exhaust. In all honesty the feedback from drive ability and throttle response was much crisper so I'd say in this ball park is a more comfortable position for the ecutek ecu's.

Hopefully getting the Syvecs fitted and meth map sorted in the coming months.

there will be some gain typicly, but only a secondary benefit.

Aye it was the 99/00 mafs that were the most fragile

That can now be disabled, one of the codes mine kept throwing up that ecutek have now addressed i believe

its true mafless - install a manifold temp sensor and you can bin the whole maf assembly entirely. Or you can go hybrid mode and use the MAF for slow driving/cold start/idle and then switch to pure speed density when you hit boost. Same deal as the aftermarket ECU's though the cold start on pure speed density can be an annoyance to setup.

There have been advances in open source speed density for the 32bit ecu's too but the question as well is do you have anyone that can map it for you as well as how much it costs.

Who's fitting your Alcatek for £1400? The clinic?
Someone having your pants down at that price mate!

As for Alcatek I personally found Andy leach very helpful and great to deal with!

depends what year and if using a dyno or not mate

Yes clinic £1380 Al in. I shopped around and found not even £100 in it with other mappers doing a road map coming to me. It's a newage sti. The classics are cheaper. Done on the rollers too

I am well aware of that Tidgy being an engineer.

This Tidgy, My Sprint car is 400+ with Maf deleted using a temp sensor just before the throttle body, No issues with warm idle, cold start etc. Runs as you'd expect really even when driving down to the events in wind rain etc.

:thumb:

http://www.ramotorsport.co.uk/shopexd.asp?id=112

says alkatek supplied mapped fitted £850

mapped by Andy Forrest too

A/l and launch are optional extras. Then vat. Your not far off clinic price mate

That's a blow for the boys down South, no mention of VAT on the RA website!