BMW Dealers and Chipping

[dlk001]

Something interesting happened today. My 335i was at the dealer, for a light bulb change. One of the sales people was encouraging me to chip the car and said it would be no problem since the managers know about it. He told me as long as I service the car with them, it would be no problem.

I confirmed this with the servicing department manager who took me to the office of the person who facilitates the tunning. I'm not sure yet as to what form of tuning is done but it was interesting to hear that the dealer is open minded about tuning cars.

 

[Pravesh]

What happens if your car has a problem in another state or city and BMW on call take it to the nearest dealer...then you have a problem.

Read your BMW manual..they are very sticky about mods..be careful

 

[zaleonardz]

unless they give you the above in writing, which they will not, I would not touch this... not even close.

 

[nomercy]

I know the company they use and its a flash tune, wich is undetectable, its very very seldom that dealer would go looking for tunning and almost impossible to find!!
But they are making R3000 of you just for some piece of mind!!!
Tunning these cars are the way to go and if you whant something that's hassle free, with no imput from youself its the way to go!!!
Just save youself R3000 and go to xcede or frc and do it youself, don't tell anyone!!!

 

[Twinz]

Get a JB3 or JB+....Plug & Play...take our for visits...Map 3, peace of mind & fun:thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

[dlk001]

Thanks guys. So roughly xcede or JB3 will set me back +-R5000?

 

[nomercy]

Yes! But xcede is a flash and you have power all the time without any input from youself!!
Jb3 (which I have) is an interactive product that you instal youself, you switch between maps depending on your mods and fuel and do custom maps for alltitude and so-on!
So basically you have to decide if you whant to do the tunning youself or if you whant something that gives you power without any input from you!!!

 

[Kisho135i]

I smaak flash, excede or chiplogic, dont want to worry about maps or doing it myself it will just be there. Flash is great for someone who dont plan to tune that much flash, downpipes exhaust. When you mod more you find that you need more settings and options to get it perfect, jb3.

 

[JirenM]

Who sells JB3 locally?

 

[Scouse]

Who sells JB3 locally?

Contact Revo or Twinz, they are the agents for the JB3 and their service is excellent

 

[George Smooth]

If the flash tune is truly undetectable which certain flashes are I would not be concerned about motorplan issues. There is only one way to find out the car is tuned and that is by a test drive of a very experienced technician with boost logging equipment in the car which they do not have. They can also send the ECU to Germany which in my history with BMW have not heard of this happening before and they will not do it even for very large claims because if the ECU is stock they face huge legal implications.
If the dealer does test drive the car he will need your permission which you can object too. If they go without your permission keep in mind that the car has to be driven a minimum of 10km before the engine is in normal operating temperature which means it will be a hell of a test drive. Then they will have to tell by second guessing if the car is on stock boost or not. I find it impossible for BMW to go to this extent.
If things do go pear shaped and they play clever you can just take the car away from the dealership and flash it stock before it goes to the next. They are not allowed to withhold the car under any circumstance.
The piggy backs are far more safer in this extent with the only differencing being that it leaves physical evidence of tampering that one cannot argue easily.

 

[dlk001]

unless they give you the above in writing, which they will not, I would not touch this... not even close.

I was given a qoute for the official BMW Performance upgrade at +1R41 000. Does anyone have an idea what this package consists?

---

If the flash tune is truly undetectable which certain flashes are I would not be concerned about motorplan issues. There is only one way to find out the car is tuned and that is by a test drive of a very experienced technician with boost logging equipment in the car which they do not have. They can also send the ECU to Germany which in my history with BMW have not heard of this happening before and they will not do it even for very large claims because if the ECU is stock they face huge legal implications.
If the dealer does test drive the car he will need your permission which you can object too. If they go without your permission keep in mind that the car has to be driven a minimum of 10km before the engine is in normal operating temperature which means it will be a hell of a test drive. Then they will have to tell by second guessing if the car is on stock boost or not. I find it impossible for BMW to go to this extent.
If things do go pear shaped and they play clever you can just take the car away from the dealership and flash it stock before it goes to the next. They are not allowed to withhold the car under any circumstance.
The piggy backs are far more safer in this extent with the only differencing being that it leaves physical evidence of tampering that one cannot argue easily.

Thanks George for this information.

 

[Twinz]

Flash is great for someone who dont plan to tune that much flash, downpipes exhaust. When you mod more you find that you need more settings and options to get it perfect, jb3.

Your comment is not correct in terms of the JB3.

The JB3 has 11 default maps (3 - 13). We have customers with only the JB and no other mods. One customer has been running on map 4 for as long as he has the JB.

Tuning with the JB (map 1) is for those that want to tune their car to further optimise due to altitude or for race purposes. if you don't want to tune you can just select a map and stay on it for as long as you wish and if you want to choose a more aggressive map or race map when the urge bites you can switch to that map "pedal switching" in a couple of seconds.

With the JB their can't be signs of physical tampering especially with the JB+ or the plug & play JB3 unit. The JB3 "pin out" versions require some effort and know how around the ECU area but uninstalling it leaves absolutely no trace behind. :thumbsup:

 

[20VT]

I was given a qoute for the official BMW Performance upgrade at +1R41 000. Does anyone have an idea what this package consists?

---

BMW Performance upgrade consists of a "cooling" package which is a upgraded radiator fan / oil cooler / ducting and upgraded DME - that normally goes for around R20k - there are options for the BMW Performance exhaust etc.

The performance upgrade will improve power from 306ps (225kw) to 326ps (240kw) which is the same power level of the N54 engine in the F02 7 series

The DME tune is very mild with the emphasis on torque (auto gearbox tune makes more torque than manual)

 

[George Smooth]

With the JB their can't be signs of physical tampering especially with the JB+ or the plug & play JB3 unit. The JB3 "pin out" versions require some effort and know how around the ECU area but uninstalling it leaves absolutely no trace behind. :thumbsup:

I didn't mean to bash your product in anyway but what I meant by physical evidence I meant that it can be seen that the ECU compartment has been opened and in a high rate of cases there is evidence that the harness has been removed especially when trying to remove the slider unless the installer is ultra careful. The advantage though is that there is nothing that they can physically see as evidence besides the scratch marks etc which in my books is not proof enough. Everyone has the right to open up and have a look. :excited:

 

[rick540]

I'm just curious about exactly how it's undetectable?

I have been playing around with a few automotive diagnostic systems for a few years, so has leonard (LZ), I'm no major expert, but I do understand a reasonable bit how some of these more advanced diag systems work, some of them provide literally masses of highly accurate and very detailed information against factory specs from the ecu. (You gotta see it to beleive it, but really it does, it's so cool)

If I put a car on a dealer diagnostic machine, to troubleshoot something for example and start looking around just a bit, I will immediately see parameters that are out of factory spec, IE the modified parameters such as injector cycle, timing, any VANOS mods and some other stuff and I really would know straight away this thing has been chipped.

I have read, BMW's also have a little area in the ECU called shadow RAM/ROM that is supposed to permenantly and irreversably store a few things like max speed and max revs, max engine temp etc the car has ever atained in it's lifetime. The dealer or factory can get into this area (I can see it there, but I can't get in, I have been trying for a while to hack it, I really want to know exactly what it records)

I would guess an undetectable one is a system, where you can switch back to the standard maps before sending it in to the dealer. But then if I worked for a dealer, I would just cleverly look for a hidden map by comparing the checksum of the software with factory originals, it wouldn't take much effort.

I've often thought about how to make a software upgrade truly undetectable, it's getting harder as the new cars get more sophisticated.

The BEST is a spare engine ECU with the chipping, that you physically remove and replace with the original before sending the car to the dealer, but that solution is expensive and a pain in the butt, but it works

@ LZ. If you read this. Do you have any idea if there is a limit on synching the EWS to the ECU?

 

[George Smooth]

I'm just curious about exactly how it's undetectable?



If I put a car on a dealer diagnostic machine, to troubleshoot something for example and start looking around just a bit, I will immediately see parameters that are out of factory spec, IE the modified parameters such as injector cycle, timing, any VANOS mods and some other stuff and I really would know straight away this thing has been chipped.

This is a very valid point, but the diagnostic machine compares the parameters to the tuned parameters and which it thinks are the normal ones.

I have read, BMW's also have a little area in the ECU called shadow RAM/ROM that is supposed to permenantly and irreversably store a few things like max speed and max revs, max engine temp etc the car has ever atained in it's lifetime. The dealer or factory can get into this area (I can see it there, but I can't get in, I have been trying for a while to hack it, I really want to know exactly what it records)

The shadow fault codes are long term storage of certain codes. Majority of the time these codes that are stored are tuner codes or tuning fault related. Thus when a tuner says his software is undetectable at the same breath he should tell you that his tune has zero fault codes. If the car goes into limp mode all the time and you got continuous fault codes the software you bought is bad and you will get bust. There are devices that you can delete the shadow codes. Try out a BT Cable which shows them and deleted them out of the long term memory.

I would guess an undetectable one is a system, where you can switch back to the standard maps before sending it in to the dealer. But then if I worked for a dealer, I would just cleverly look for a hidden map by comparing the checksum of the software with factory originals, it wouldn't take much effort.
If the checksum does not match on a BMW you get a checksum error on the older cars and on the newer cars a coding fault. Then you really screwed

I've often thought about how to make a software upgrade truly undetectable, it's getting harder as the new cars get more sophisticated.

The BEST is a spare engine ECU with the chipping, that you physically remove and replace with the original before sending the car to the dealer, but that solution is expensive and a pain in the butt, but it works

@ LZ. If you read this. Do you have any idea if there is a limit on synching the EWS to the ECU?

 

[Kisho135i]

George why you bashing revo's product lol? Just kidding chaps. Revo someone told me that and maybe they talking nonsense, i dont know much about chipping and stuff. This chipping story is very simple. If you want to do it just do it? my heart says chip but my mind says no but my parents always said follow your heart so thats what i'm gonna do lol:clap:. You not special, These stealers dont care about you or your car, they wont go looking for tunes on your car unless you blow something big and unordinary chancers of that are slim but if that happens just pull out jb3 or just flash back to normal and just act outraged how can your bmw break downimp:. I know i will never be happy with my car if i know its potential and never feel it or unleash it.

 

[Coisman]

... You can always go bmw approved chip... :thumbsup:
It's going to cost you an arm and a leg but the motorplan stays intact.
JSN Motors, do AC Schnitzer chipping, all bmw approved.
Give them a ring, speak to
Jose' Pereira
JSN Motors BMW
AC Schnitzer Manager
Tel: (011) 700 9000
Direct: (011) 700 9037
Mobile: 083 635 5848

 

[Pravesh]

... You can always go bmw approved chip... :thumbsup:
It's going to cost you an arm and a leg but the motorplan stays intact.
JSN Motors, do AC Schnitzer chipping, all bmw approved.
Give them a ring, speak to
Jose' Pereira
JSN Motors BMW
AC Schnitzer Manager
Tel: (011) 700 9000
Direct: (011) 700 9037
Mobile: 083 635 5848

Last time I phoned JSN (ie) 1 mnth ago they tell me Jose no more with them..but they still do the Schnitzer goodies I bought springs for my m3
from them..they do a chip for the N 54