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Boring Diesel


magumbo
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Following the release of the new 2.2 d4d with 148bhp and soon to be 168, does anyone know any ecu mods etc, than can improve my tedious 116 bhp (2004) avensis d4d. I can't believe the extra bhp of the new one is from the extra 200cc. Especially if it's still just the same common rail engine.

Thanx

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Yup, stick a high flow panel filter in it which gives you up to 5bhp because diesels love lots of air then stick a tuning box on it it. I have a Tunit VCR fitted on my 2003 old shape Avensis. I had it laptop tuned and it kicks out roughly 143bhp now. Of course yours might say 116bhp in the Toyota tech data but all engines are different and it might be putting out more in standard form or less. Mine is supposed to be 109bhp, but when it went on the rolling road before tuning it, I was lucky and it was 113bhp. The tuning box will give you roughly 25% more BHP and should give you better mpg. Plus I know for a fact that the sales manager at my local Toyota dealer has a Tunit fitted on his Avensis, so it shouldnt affect serviving or warranty, and anyway if you're concerned unplug it before it goes in.

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If your engine has a mod carried out on it (such as this Tunit) then it will invalidate the warranty. Just that if a dealers engine fails he's just going to refit a standard box and say "No govner, honest it's standard" when he makes the claim

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If your engine has a mod carried out on it (such as this Tunit) then it will invalidate the warranty. Just that if a dealers engine fails he's just going to refit a standard box and say "No govner, honest it's standard" when he makes the claim

The Tunit box just piggybacks the ECU, it isnt a modification to the ECU or engine itself, it just alters the injection cycle a bit, adjusts the torque curve and other parameters. It takes 10 mins to put on and 5 mins to simply unplug.

Tunit are one of the leading players in diesel tuning and are well respected, when I was there they were fitting out a BMW 530d and Range Rover, both only a year old, plus they put one on a VW Toureg V10 for Dieselcar magazine and in fact they have done loads of cars for Dieselcar magazine. I do not believe people would allow their vehicles worth over £30,000 to have the Tunit fitted if it damaged the vehicle or invalidated their warranties.

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Thanx for replying, got a K&N filter on order, couldn't find an induction kit tho. Had a look at Tunit, around £400 for an extra 24bhp, will bear that in mind. :thumbsup:

If your engine has a mod carried out on it (such as this Tunit) then it will invalidate the warranty. Just that if a dealers engine fails he's just going to refit a standard box and say "No govner, honest it's standard" when he makes the claim

The Tunit box just piggybacks the ECU, it isnt a modification to the ECU or engine itself, it just alters the injection cycle a bit, adjusts the torque curve and other parameters. It takes 10 mins to put on and 5 mins to simply unplug.

Tunit are one of the leading players in diesel tuning and are well respected, when I was there they were fitting out a BMW 530d and Range Rover, both only a year old, plus they put one on a VW Toureg V10 for Dieselcar magazine and in fact they have done loads of cars for Dieselcar magazine. I do not believe people would allow their vehicles worth over £30,000 to have the Tunit fitted if it damaged the vehicle or invalidated their warranties.

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Anything that modifies the power output of an engine is enough that a manufacturer would be within their rights not to honour the warranty. The engine is tested at it's designed output and the result of that testing is put into production with a warranty.

As output increases there is an exponential increase in the stresses and vibrations in the engine. things like the oil clearance between the con-rod bearings and the crank pin will be reduced because of the increased loading.

How can the manufacturer be expected to honour a warranty if you've modified the expected workload on the parts?

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Anything that modifies the power output of an engine is enough that a manufacturer would be within their rights not to honour the warranty. The engine is tested at it's designed output and the result of that testing is put into production with a warranty.

As output increases there is an exponential increase in the stresses and vibrations in the engine. things like the oil clearance between the con-rod bearings and the crank pin will be reduced because of the increased loading.

How can the manufacturer be expected to honour a warranty if you've modified the expected workload on the parts?

If that were really the case, how do you explain a manufacturer

such as Subaru who allow Impreza's to be tuned way in excess of standard tune, for example an Impreza Sti can have uprated exhausts, catalysts, even more uprated brake components and ECU remaps, yet Subaru do not have a problem with that under warranty at all. Mitsubishi are the same, Nissan with their Skyline and 350Z you can tune them all silly.

Personally I think the D4D is hugely tuneable, it is capable of way more power and I think that margin is built in.

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Easy to explain. Plenty of people who make tuned bit's a pieces to try and improve car performance. However fit those parts to the car watch it lunch it's engine and try and claim on the warranty and get ready to offended when they laugh in your face.

Example. A mate had a very hard tuned Subaru that had a piston shatter wiping out the short block and then launching the fragments out through the turbo scrapping that too. Subaru didn't want to know.

The only differnce can be if you have a company approved tuner do the work (think Brabus for Merc, AMG for BMW, Mugen for Honda, Nismo for Nissan) who've carried out suitable engine testing to maintain the guarantee. For example in this case the Japanese manufacturers have a gentlemans agreement not to produce cars over 300bhp however they make them very capable of developing well over that by fitting approved after market mods.

Just because companies do make bits to modify your engine doesn't mean they are OEM approved and suitable for the purpose

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I can see I'll be hanging by my eyelids before we will agree on this one :rolleyes:

However, I maintain an increase of 30-40 bhp is not going to damage a diesel engine. As far as I am aware the Toyota diesel engine plant in the UK exports all over the world, and the engines are no different to the ones sold in the UK, except that the servicing requirements are different. So for example a D4D in Saudi Arabia has to have its air filter changed every other week. So basically the engines are designed to take a lot of stick in extreme heat/cold. Which means they must have a built in margin of tolerance, enabling someone like me in this mild country to take advantage and get more power out of it.

Plus in the unlikely event it does blow up, I'll just unplug the box, bringing it back to standard and say "No govner, honest it's standard" :lol:

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Having to do a regular air filter change is a very different matter to increasing engine output. In a dusty environment the filter blocks up quickly reducing the air flow. To prevent adversely affecting performance you have to clean it regularly.

The engine is designed and tested to run under specific loads and conditions. Generally this is ±5% from nominal. 30~40BHP over is more like 30~40% over. Slightly outside the test specifications. The components will never have been tested to this level so who knows what effect it will have.

Also not quite true that the engines built in the UK are shipped all over the world. They're shipped to the UK vehicle plant and to the vehicle plant in Turkey so they're used throughout europe and extending out towards the middle east

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Having to do a regular air filter change is a very different matter to increasing engine output. In a dusty environment the filter blocks up quickly reducing the air flow. To prevent adversely affecting performance you have to clean it regularly.

The engine is designed and tested to run under specific loads and conditions. Generally this is ±5% from nominal. 30~40BHP over is more like 30~40% over. Slightly outside the test specifications. The components will never have been tested to this level so who knows what effect it will have.

Also not quite true that the engines built in the UK are shipped all over the world. They're shipped to the UK vehicle plant and to the vehicle plant in Turkey so they're used throughout europe and extending out towards the middle east

Just thought I'd add my experiences to this subject.

I've had a Bromley's Tunit on my Avensis D4-D since late 2001. I've done over 80,000 miles in it. Had it serviced as per schedule and I haven't had a single problem, in fact the emissions are less than before I had the Tunit fitted and of course it performs extremely quickly. No smoke, no funny noises and no dramas.

I think you're splitting hairs as regards UK Toyota engine exports, if they go out to Japan, then they'll end up in Australia and Saudi at some point anyway probably.

Oh, and AMG is the Mercedes tuning house and BMW's is AC Schnitzer.

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You've had a ECU mod done and it's not caused any faults. Good, I'm pleased it' performing well. My point is that IF it went wrong and you took it to the dealer with the modification in place don't expect them to honour the warranty.

Also the engines from the UK are not shipped to Japan (they have their own factories for that)

Good point well made on the Merc/BMW front though. Being a bit slack on my car tuners there :)

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At the end of the day, Toyota ain't gonna stand by the warranty if they find a mod. That's if you let them find one though.

However, lot's of people are choosing this route for mods, and it's down to personal choice really. Those who don't want one, don't have to.

If you want one, go for it. At the end of the day, it's not like you'll be driving the car on full wack all the time. It just comes in handy once in a while to have the extra grunt. So with it being used to it's full potential only now and then, then extra load on the engine will be minimal. Therefore the extra wear will only be minimal.

This discussion could go on forever.

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  • 5 weeks later...

Dont know how toyota warrantys work but im assuming its the same as most other manufacturers work- the dealer removes and replaces the broken part then at the end of the month all parts done under warrenty are returend to toyota and a claim is made against toyota for the work and parts. if they dont have the broken parts then tje claim is rejected. MOST dealers wont care what youve done to your car- you can tune its as much as you like as long as they have an OEM part which is broken to send to the manufacturer they are happy as its money for them. my last car was tuned to around 300 bhp and most of the engine mods were not stealthy. Also if the manufacturer does some how find out about your mods they have to prove they caused the fault- ie if you fit an induction kit and the stereo stops working they cant refuse to replace it! my last car, aloen had a few warrenty jobs done on it no probs.

how many tuners are there in the uk that do the 2.0 d4d? is it just the tunit box? what bhp torque figues are expected and how much?(i have previa by the way)

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Hi there

Here in Portugal Toyota gives you the option ok 136 bhp with a box for 1000€ and still you get to keep the warranty.

I rode one last march and it is better than our 116bhp one

It rides real faster.

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  • 2 years later...

Hi,

I've been reading this forum for some time now and have found a few diesel tuning boxes which you may be interested in:

http://www.dieseltuner.co.uk/toyota.html

http://www.tunit.co.uk/vehicles-supported.php

http://www.dragonperformanceuk.com/store/home.php?cat=875

http://www.diesel-performance.co.uk/vehicl...IS&type=Any

http://dieseltuning.uk.com/toyota.html

http://www.dieseltuning.co.uk/toyota-diesel-tuning.html

Tunit always gets good reports, but expensive (pays for what you get I suppose) :)

I sometimes read the Vectra forum (http://www.vectra-c.com) as these guys have been running tuning boxes on their diesel engines for some time without problems. The new spider box increases the fuel according to driving style, so is a little more intelligent than the standard type of tuning boxes.

I'd be interested to hear what the feedback on these tuning boxes for the avensis is. I don't own an avensis or vectra, but I'm thinking about it ;)

Cheers

Dave

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According to the Toyota manufacturing website, Deeside engine plant exported 438,192 engines, either fully assembled OR as units, not only to Burnaston, but to Venezuela, Brazil, Turkey, France, South Africa, and JAPAN

On to power chip kits. Unless provided by the manufacturer, a chip kit will invalidate the manufacturers warranty, end of, however, in reality they would have to have good cause to investigate a failure, and in most cases I suspect that a claim would go ahead because you wouldnt know a chip kit had been fitted. Chip kits work by altering the timing of the injector, it stays open longer, allowing more fuel through. In a fully mapped chip kit (like ours) you get around 20% increase in power which leads to a much smoother delivery, you dont end up thrashing the car, because you have more power to your pedal. Most people end up with improved fuel consumption a short while after having it fitted, because you get used to the smoother power delivery. TOC members who sign up to our website can buy any D4D chip kit at a special price. We have been selling our kits for some time and have never had an engine failure, we have had a couple of boxes go faulty, but all you do is unplug the loom and you revert back to standard, simple as that really.

Kingo :thumbsup:

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Hi Parts-King,

Can you tell me more about your product (BHP/torque figures for different engines)?

Is it an approved Toyota product?

How does it compare to the likes of TuneIt?

Cheers

Dave

On to power chip kits. Unless provided by the manufacturer, a chip kit will invalidate the manufacturers warranty, end of, however, in reality they would have to have good cause to investigate a failure, and in most cases I suspect that a claim would go ahead because you wouldnt know a chip kit had been fitted. Chip kits work by altering the timing of the injector, it stays open longer, allowing more fuel through. In a fully mapped chip kit (like ours) you get around 20% increase in power which leads to a much smoother delivery, you dont end up thrashing the car, because you have more power to your pedal. Most people end up with improved fuel consumption a short while after having it fitted, because you get used to the smoother power delivery. TOC members who sign up to our website can buy any D4D chip kit at a special price. We have been selling our kits for some time and have never had an engine failure, we have had a couple of boxes go faulty, but all you do is unplug the loom and you revert back to standard, simple as that really.

Kingo :thumbsup:

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toyota do an approved tuning box as parts king says. the 2.0 unit for 116bhp is out now although it wasnt available when i enquired about 3 yrs ago. instead i went for a dimsport rapid unit and it is very good. more mpg and quicker. all of the units seems to give the same predicted increase. the reason i went for the unit i got was that i know the chap who fits them and he recommended it over the tunit one.

only costs approx £40 extra on the insurance.

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toyota do an approved tuning box as parts king says. the 2.0 unit for 116bhp is out now although it wasnt available when i enquired about 3 yrs ago. instead i went for a dimsport rapid unit and it is very good. more mpg and quicker. all of the units seems to give the same predicted increase. the reason i went for the unit i got was that i know the chap who fits them and he recommended it over the tunit one.

only costs approx £40 extra on the insurance.

At last somebody has quoted a figure for the additional insurance cost it would be interesting to know which company you are with !!! I just wonder how many people are riding about in modified cars and have not informed there insurance company

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i am with direct line. there was no way i was going to have the unit and not tell the insurance company. it isnt worth it. i could never live with myself if anything bad happened and i wasnt insured. i was suprised when they said it was only £40 but direct line seem to do it on % of increase in power. and it isnt like i had much bhp to start with. :)

i reckon alot of people havent told the insurance they think they can whip out the box if they crash but it doesnt work like that if you are in hispital and the insurance company checks the vehicle over.

Image2.jpg

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i am with direct line. there was no way i was going to have the unit and not tell the insurance company. it isnt worth it. i could never live with myself if anything bad happened and i wasnt insured. i was suprised when they said it was only £40 but direct line seem to do it on % of increase in power. and it isnt like i had much bhp to start with. :)

i reckon alot of people havent told the insurance they think they can whip out the box if they crash but it doesnt work like that if you are in hispital and the insurance company checks the vehicle over.

Image2.jpg

Hello Matty

No I was not suggesting that you would consider that and you are spot on with your comments !!! I just seem to have a bee in my bonnet about drivers who modify there cars and don't realize that if they have not informed there insurance company they are riding about in a uninsured car ( I just hope I don't meet any of them )

Yes that was a good price from direct line I think they have been fair with there loading of the policy

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toyota do an approved tuning box as parts king says. the 2.0 unit for 116bhp is out now although it wasnt available when i enquired about 3 yrs ago. instead i went for a dimsport rapid unit and it is very good. more mpg and quicker. all of the units seems to give the same predicted increase. the reason i went for the unit i got was that i know the chap who fits them and he recommended it over the tunit one.

only costs approx £40 extra on the insurance.

At last somebody has quoted a figure for the additional insurance cost it would be interesting to know which company you are with !!! I just wonder how many people are riding about in modified cars and have not informed there insurance company

My 2.2 was tuned by Diesel bob in Lancashire the unit cost £250 plus vat, was fitted in less than 5 minutes and changed the character of the car instantly. I now drive with a large smile on my face and have the car insured by emodified who have no problems as long as the BHP increase is below 20%. :D

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has that taken you to 177bhp then? i am taking my mod off this car when i sell it. i will give it a while until i fit it to the new one though, maybe a week :D . getting my 150 on sunday

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