Do performance exhausts and induction kits require a retune to be effective?

[Shadeyman]

I've just had a visit from a friend whos had a fancy exhaust and induction kit fitted to his A3.
The place that supplied and fitted them said the car needed to be retuned in order for the car to benefit from the new flow of air though the engine. He's got the car booked in for a remap in Jan. Is this true, by bolting on performance parts are you upseting the balance of an engine so that it requires a retune?

 

[bredsticz]

It will still improve it but for it to run perfect then ideally it does need a re-map. No need unless your after maximum performance from everything and buying top range parts really

 

[Shadeyman]

Its a 2.0 litre petrol A3.
Induction kit was £300 and exhaust was £1280.

The car is fast anyway but since putting on the exhaust and induction kit it is quicker but he says it now has terrible flat spots and strange things happen when lifting the throttle and going straight back on it. The garage said all cars with an ECU(standard map) will try to adjust for the changes but most are far from capable of doing this effectively and end up with flat spots and even power loss.

I see loads of boy racers with huge dustbin sized exhausts and induction kits that sound like a Dyson. If this is true then their cars are just a noisey mess?

 

[dronenrs]

I see loads of boy racers with huge dustbin sized exhausts and induction kits that sound like a Dyson. If this is true then their cars are just a noisey mess?

you got that right what they actually do to there cars will actually make them perform worse.. smaller sized exhausts are better than big ones because all cars rely on a small amount of backpressure

 

[bredsticz]

That's why I keep my exhausts standard! The only thing I'd change is the exhaust tip

Thing is with a re-map. If you return it to standard or the part breaks the ecu is then mapped wrong and needs that part to be efficient again! Remaps aren't cheap either

 

[dronenrs]

mmmm.. if you had the software you could reset to a standard map yourself. im sure resetting would be a lot cheaper.

 

[Shadeyman]

Most places will set your map back to standard for free as long as they did the remap in the first place.

 

[bredsticz]

Ahh right. That's okay then. Nice that people have so much money to waste