fubar phil

Hi,

I have an 08 STI hatch running around 460bhp and was wondering what peoples experiences were of moving to an aftermarket ECU at this kind of power?

Picking my car up from the garage recently, they recommended moving to one (specifically the link ECU) as they had been having good experiences with them and hatches around drivability and reliability. My car is my daily driver and although I’ve heard reasonable things about the stock hatch ECU, I’ve also heard that it’s not so good when running mods like a FMIC like myself. How much of a nice to have is one?

Thanks in advance.

Gambit

iTrader: (6)

I've a 09 sti running gt30, fmic intercooler, fuel pressure reg, bigger injectors, different intake, 3inch downpipe & exhaust on std ecu with ecutek/racerom

Have zero issues running on it and it's a daily driver all year round.

guess it's just what your mapper is happier (or good) at using 🤷🏽‍♂️

1509joe

iTrader: (2)

You do get to a point depending on mods where you do need to upgrade. Personably I would go straight to Syvecs cause by the time you buy all the extra ancillaries for the link your at the price of a link.

hedgecutter

iTrader: (5)

Was it Enginetuner who reccomended Link?

fubar phil

Thanks for the input. That's the thing though - my setup isn't so dissimilar to Gambits (running a sc46 turbo) and it it runs fine. Where is this grey area in the level of mods/power where you need to start moving away from stock? If people have moved away at the lower end where things are still OK on stock, what were the improvements?

For instance, does moving over to speed density that these ECUs allow (especially when running a FMIC), help things?

(this wasn't Enginetuner but another well respected garage on here)

matt-c

iTrader: (5)

If the car is running well on the standard ECU with MAF, then i would leave it. You might be able to push it a little further with a standalone ECU, but there could be other compromises.

Remember, with speed density setup it's an estimate of the amount of air going in, wheras the MAF actually measures the air.

4evascoob

I’ll be running around 450 on a 2016 sti woth mdx321t, injectors , intake etc etc and 3 mappers have never mentioned ecu.