Eurocharged tuning?

[B8 Phantom S4]

I've been talking to Jerry from Eurocharged regarding a tune for the B8, I've just never come across any reviews from the Audi folks. I know he's pretty well known and respected in the MB community, and the opportunity recently came up to get my car tuned with his program. He said he's tuned about 3 B8s so far, but haven't seen anyone post anything. Any thoughts or ideas before I make my decision?

http://www.eurocharged.com/index.php...mart&Itemid=99

[Zed 2.0]

I'm skeptical - that would make him the first person outside of APR that's currently able to flash a B8 S4 ECU. If he can in fact do it, he should get on the forums and let us know as it would get him a huge amount of business.

[NWS4Guy]

Yep very skeptical also.

[ahcow]

Do they require the shipping of the ECU too? Haha

[B8 Phantom S4]

Yeah, they do require shipping the ECU, but he's coming to the Bay Area and said he could flash my ECU here so there wouldn't be any downtime.

[wwhan]

B8 Phantom S4,

Are you going to Dito's Motors, South San Francisco, Dyno Day Jan 8, 2011?

[Ray Khan]

Tell Jerry to make a trip to Boston

[madmadS4]

A cross post here:

http://forums.quattroworld.com/s4b8/msgs/17038.phtml

[B8 Phantom S4]

B8 Phantom S4,

Are you going to Dito's Motors, South San Francisco, Dyno Day Jan 8, 2011?

Yeah, I'm gonna try to make it to that. I'm flying in from LA tomorrow morning, so I probably won't be able to be there until around 1-130ish.

[SPR415]

Yeah, I'm gonna try to make it to that. I'm flying in from LA tomorrow morning, so I probably won't be able to be there until around 1-130ish.

what is it? and where at, i wanna go..

[B8 Phantom S4]

what is it? and where at, i wanna go..

Dave, I'll hit you up tomorrow when I head out. I'm gonna call Brian up too and see of he wants to roll through with us.

[S-FIZZOR]

Curious to know how it was? Was going to head out and check it out but plans changed...

[B8 Phantom S4]

you missed absolutely nothing...

I thought it was gonna be different with more cars and people. Everyone there was pretty nice though.

[primetime]

you missed absolutely nothing...

I thought it was gonna be different with more cars and people. Everyone there was pretty nice though.

So... did you or anyone get a B8 tuned? Results?

[B8 Phantom S4]

Nope. After seeing them pry open an ECU Using a heat gun and flat-head screwdriver, my mind was pretty much made up.

Jerry has nothing but good intentions, but he definitely needs more hands-on time with a B8 S4. They're supposedly picking up their own S4 to work on sometime in the next week or so. We'll see what comes of that.

He seemed to be under the impression that they would be able to get some amazing gains with a smaller pulley and a tune. That's when I realized he hadn't been following any of the developments with our cars.

[NWS4Guy]

Nope. After seeing them pry open an ECU Using a heat gun and flat-head screwdriver, my mind was pretty much made up.

Still curious what tune he has and how it was developed - the prying open is what APR has to do too from what I understand, it's called a bench flash, where they flash directly to the ECU using the wires that it's soldered to the cicuit board, this bypasses the protection chips.

If they have no S4, it tells us they didn't do this tune, it's someone elses.

[B8 Phantom S4]

Still curious what tune he has and how it was developed - the prying open is what APR has to do too from what I understand, it's called a bench flash, where they flash directly to the ECU using the wires that it's soldered to the cicuit board, this bypasses the protection chips.

If they have no S4, it tells us they didn't do this tune, it's someone elses.

Yeah, I'm not entirely sure how their tune was developed. It looks like right now, based on the link in my first post, that they only offer a 91 oct tune so maybe it's based on APR's tune for Stasis?

[primetime]

Nope. After seeing them pry open an ECU Using a heat gun and flat-head screwdriver, my mind was pretty much made up.

Jerry has nothing but good intentions, but he definitely needs more hands-on time with a B8 S4. They're supposedly picking up their own S4 to work on sometime in the next week or so. We'll see what comes of that.

He seemed to be under the impression that they would be able to get some amazing gains with a smaller pulley and a tune. That's when I realized he hadn't been following any of the developments with our cars.

Thanks! Glad you checked this out for the forums as I am sure it will save some people $'s.... I still believe he is correct that a pulley will net some nice gains(20-30HP with retun)..... Time will tell though... Thanks again!

[S-FIZZOR]

you missed absolutely nothing...

I thought it was gonna be different with more cars and people. Everyone there was pretty nice though.

Ah ok, cool.... And thanks as well for the heads up on the tune. Did any cars even run the dyno ?

[madmadS4]

apparently they don't have a 4 wheel dyno at this time

[wwhan]

I don't know what kind of dyno Eurocharged has.

This recent Eurocharged dyno & tune was at Dito's Motors in South San Francisco, which is not Eurocharged normal location.
Dito's Motors has a 4Wd dyno.

Also one of the owners or employees at Eurocharged has an Audi B8 S4 on order, which should arrive soon. After they get the car, we will
see, if they can make it happen.

[Keith@APR]

I love these threads.

"Like, there is this guy that invented this car and it runs on water, man. It's got a fiberglass air-cooled engine and it runs on water."

Seriously though, this all sounds very, very fledgling. I'm sure over the course of the next couple of years the processes will get sorted and some of the concerns you guys have will be addressed.

I'm kind of excited actually. If Eurocharged can flash through the obd2, that means we can too!

The screw driver thing scared me though. These ecu's have a lot of epoxy holding the two halves together and the board itself is sandwhiched between them and epoxied to one half. If you don't cut the epoxy, you twist, pry and bend the board severely risking damaging it in a way that won't show up until later.

We have a 30+ step internal process for opening the ecu's that uses 5 different tools that have been modified specifically for this use with guards and stoppers that prevent inserting them in the wrong places.

Its starts with prying one corner of the ecu for access but after that, no more prying at all or you'll damage the board.

[wwhan]

Yeah, the Eurocharge guy indicated that opening the MB ECU is different than the Audi, due to the differences in the fill material.
Apparently the MB is easier & tends to re-seal after a few heat cycles.

Also, there was indication that Eurocharge tried to get more access to B8 S4s for tuning, but the owners flaked, so they really needed one
of their own to do work on. I get the impression, they have not done the B8 S4, yet and solving the encryption write issue, will be a learning experience.

I would not get too excited about Eurocharge B8 S4 ECU tune, unless they are wizards. It may take quite awhile to figure out the key.

[eurocharged]

The screw driver thing scared me though. These ecu's have a lot of epoxy holding the two halves together and the board itself is sandwhiched between them and epoxied to one half. If you don't cut the epoxy, you twist, pry and bend the board severely risking damaging it in a way that won't show up until later.

We have a 30+ step internal process for opening the ecu's that uses 5 different tools that have been modified specifically for this use with guards and stoppers that prevent inserting them in the wrong places.

Its starts with prying one corner of the ecu for access but after that, no more prying at all or you'll damage the board.

It was not an Audi ECU. It was a Bosch ME9.7 from an S63 AMG. There was no epoxy on the board, only in the seams on the ECU casing. I used a screwdriver to pry up one corner so the hot epoxy could be cut. When I was finished you couldn't even tell the ECU was opened. The people in the room were not prepared to see how an ECU is opened.

Please don't act like you guys are perfect. I've seen ECU's that have been sent back from you guys and they all had pry marks and bent ECU corners. I could tell how and where it was opened.

I was 1000+ miles away with limited tools. I did the best job I could with the resources that were given to me.

[Keith@APR]

It was not an Audi ECU. It was a Bosch ME9.7 from an S63 AMG. There was no epoxy on the board, only in the seams on the ECU casing. I used a screwdriver to pry up one corner so the hot epoxy could be cut. When I was finished you couldn't even tell the ECU was opened. The people in the room were not prepared to see how an ECU is opened.

Please don't act like you guys are perfect. I've seen ECU's that have been sent back from you guys and they all had pry marks and bent ECU corners. I could tell how and where it was opened.

I was 1000+ miles away with limited tools. I did the best job I could with the resources that were given to me.

In no way, shape or form am I saying we are perfect.

The ME9 explanation was enough as we aren't even talking about the same EMS' anymore or even an ECU made by the same company as the one you were opening.

I assumed that the poster who relayed the experience was referencing a Conti SIMOS ecu but I was corrected later and I totally agree that Motronic ECU's are easier to open than SIMOS.

The process I explained we use applies to the SIMOS ecu's in B8 S4's. Most Motronic ecu's can be opened by monkeys with no damage so we don't have a very stringent opening procedure for those and most get opened just like the poster relayed you opened the ME9 ecu.

[b_desom]

Competion can never hurt anything, and its the American way, time will tell

[4ringking]

Talked to Jerry @ Eurocharged today, should be able to do OBDII port tunes in a few weeks!! Will be developing a 93 octane tune for the guys in NJ. I have seen what he can do with the RS6, the S8 and R8. I am sure the S4 tunes will come out real nice!

[wwhan]

Well it will be interesting to see how this turns out. FLASHing the older Audi ECU is not the same as tuning the new B8 S4, with the extra encryption methods. Jerry seems like a nice guy, very energetic and means well, the user community will be waiting for B8 S4 results. He did acknowledge that APR was first with the new B8 S4 ECU tune and applauded their results.

I just hope all the tuners can stay civil as this plays out.

[4ringking]

true true

[dims]

awaiting...

[PAT@RSW]

I would be wary of Eurocharged, we have had a few AMG customers that had their tunes. One being a E55 that had what Eurocharged called a "Custom" tune, the vehicle made it 80 miles and it had catastrophic engine failure. The engine damage was a direct result of the tune, at the time this was all public information over on MB World and well Eurocharged completely denied everything to the point where they had us / customer banned from MB World and all the threads that documented the damage removed from the forum, due to them being a high paying vendor.

Cost that customer almost $15,000 to build a new engine, but atleast she runs great now and putting down 10s quarter mile times.

Bottom line our dealings with them business to business have been less than favorable.

[richib86]

craigs car?

[Zed 2.0]

I would be wary of Eurocharged, we have had a few AMG customers that had their tunes. One being a E55 that had what Eurocharged called a "Custom" tune, the vehicle made it 80 miles and it had catastrophic engine failure. The engine damage was a direct result of the tune, at the time this was all public information over on MB World and well Eurocharged completely denied everything to the point where they had us / customer banned from MB World and all the threads that documented the damage removed from the forum, due to them being a high paying vendor.

Cost that customer almost $15,000 to build a new engine, but atleast she runs great now and putting down 10s quarter mile times.

Bottom line our dealings with them business to business have been less than favorable.

Could you link us to anything about that? Not saying you're wrong, just that I'm skeptical of a "Premier APR Installation Center" disparaging another tuner (and also, Eurocharged's reputation on the Merc boards seems pretty good).

[richib86]

i feel like that happens a lot. a premier mb tunner MHP royally screwed me over and fried my ECU's in my rs4(twice) and then told me that i tampered with there work, for anyone that knows me personally would know how much of a complete joke that is. they then stuck me with a large bill and disappeared behind there lawyers. never trust those MB guys lol

[NWS4Guy]

Not to bandwagon, but when I did some looking into them a while ago when this all started being posted about, I found out that they basically bought out LET Motorsports, and the first hit I get back when I looked at their history was a C32-AMG owner who lost a pulley due to the bearings freezing up and doing a good bit of damage to his car. No one stepped up to assume any responsibility for this.

http://www.crossfireforum.org/forum/...y-failure.html

Typically people who feel wronged are the most vocal, so finding info on bad experiences is not hard. Sure issues happen, but I have seen other sponsors on this site (more than one or two) step in and do whatever was reasonable to try to fix any genuine issues with thier product on a person's car.

[Keith@APR]

i feel like that happens a lot. a premier mb tunner MHP royally screwed me over and fried my ECU's in my rs4(twice) and then told me that i tampered with there work, for anyone that knows me personally would know how much of a complete joke that is. they then stuck me with a large bill and disappeared behind there lawyers. never trust those MB guys lol

A lot of times those that work with Bosch Motronic EMS' on other makes than a VW Group product think they can work with the VW Group applications just like they do the other makes only to find out its a lot different and very difficult to simply apply a direct transfer of their previous knowledge and experience.

What concerns me the most about your experience is that they didn't know for certain they could flash your ecu's before they told you they could.

That's another widespread issue in this industry as a whole, R&D in the field by using the customer's resources while the customer is under the impression its a production worthy product. Another way of saying this is that the companies that do it are dishonest.

Everyone think about this.

You've invested in securing a B8 S4 for ecu tuning development.
You've invested in the tools you feel are necessary to make the product.
You've done your research, you've scheduled your dyno time, you've done your road calibration and its time to measure the results.
You strap the car on the dyno, you see if what you did on the road made good gains, you run your final testing and verification protocols like maximum exhaust gas temperature thresholds, allowance for variations in fuel quality and octane ratings....etc...

So, time for the selling and marketing to begin.

If what I listed is the bare minimum necessary to make an ecu upgrade, wouldn't you have dyno's, at least one customer testimonial, know for a fact whether or not it can be programmed through the port or on the bench, know what version of the ecu software you have available, know what octane gas its meant for etc. readily available at the same time you start telling the public you have a product?

Otherwise, what part of what I listed as the bare minimums to make the product broke down or failed and why would you continue with any marketing and selling exercises before the issues with product development were corrected?

[S4DIT]

Amen brother! Exactly what I was thinking.

[loungn14]

I would be wary of Eurocharged, we have had a few AMG customers that had their tunes. One being a E55 that had what Eurocharged called a "Custom" tune, the vehicle made it 80 miles and it had catastrophic engine failure. The engine damage was a direct result of the tune, at the time this was all public information over on MB World and well Eurocharged completely denied everything to the point where they had us / customer banned from MB World and all the threads that documented the damage removed from the forum, due to them being a high paying vendor.

Cost that customer almost $15,000 to build a new engine, but atleast she runs great now and putting down 10s quarter mile times.

Bottom line our dealings with them business to business have been less than favorable.

Pat, I would choose your words wisely from here on out. The reason the threads were removed from Mbworld was because the statements made by the customer and you were not true. We asked for the injectors to be sent to us for testing and we never received them. After his motor failure we did our own investigation using other E55's and found that the injectors were static at the top of 3rd gear. We now sell upgraded injectors as a direct result of this incident.

We did not have you banned from mbworld, you banned yourself for making false comments about a vendor without proof. We do not own mbworld, nor are we a high paying sponsor (lowest they have actually) and we do not have the ability to ban you. You cannot publicly accuse our company of the engine failure without proof that it was a result of our software. Continue to make these statements and we will be forced to escalate this. You're clearly trying to destroy our reputation here and we are prepared to take any and all action to end the clear case of libel on this site. I have notified our attorney and the admins of this site.
I have personally tuned over 1400 Mercedes and this same "base" file is still being used on multiple 10 sec 55's that I have tuned.
Have a great day!!

Jerry

[loungn14]

Not to bandwagon, but when I did some looking into them a while ago when this all started being posted about, I found out that they basically bought out LET Motorsports, and the first hit I get back when I looked at their history was a C32-AMG owner who lost a pulley due to the bearings freezing up and doing a good bit of damage to his car. No one stepped up to assume any responsibility for this.

http://www.crossfireforum.org/forum/...y-failure.html

Typically people who feel wronged are the most vocal, so finding info on bad experiences is not hard. Sure issues happen, but I have seen other sponsors on this site (more than one or two) step in and do whatever was reasonable to try to fix any genuine issues with thier product on a person's car.

This is a known issue with the 3.2L motor. If you overtighten the idler pulley bolt, it puts stress on the bearings, causing them to fail.

Just to clarify....

[loungn14]

For the record, our B8 S4 software has not been released to the public. We are still in the testing phase at this point but it's almost ready. There is no OBDII flash available at this time, only a bench flash. The ECU will need to be removed for the tune.

Thank you everyone.