bertolli

Hi All
I thought I'd share with you my experience on buying via Ebay a tuning device from a company called Abrieb.
First reason for buying was the low cost (?71 incl Shipping) and the promise that it would at least give my car 30+ Bhp Extra.
I figured that I'd give it a go for ?71. It arrived on Monday and installed it Monday evening (why wait eh? )
In any case I went for a test drive afterwards and noticed the difference immediately. A lot more response to the throttle and the accelleration is definately faster. The engine also runs fine in idle (so no revs fluctuations etc like described by other members on this forum. Maybe because I have a manual 6 speed ?)

Below a link to one of the examples:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BMW-Tuning-525D-E39-525D-E60-530D-E60-Chiptuning-Box_W0QQitemZ120250656896QQihZ002QQcategoryZ32094QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
Basically to summarize what Abrieb say:

FULL DIGITAL TUNINGBOX

smallest Tuningbox

on the market

newest Technology.

The Item proofed the Temperature from the Engine,before it gives the New Power to it.First System that so works,we are the one and only seller from this brillant system.

WE WORK WITH SOFTWARE,NOT WITH RESISTOR TUNING.

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So if you want to give it a try I'd say: go for it. Only disadvantage might be the manual for installation. It's very quickly done (they show pictures) however all the text is in German or broken English so a bit of knowledge on the German Language will make life easier.

Ok that's it. Let me know if you have any questions.

phelix

Where does it plug into?

bertolli

It plugs into the common rail injector.
Attached a picture of the engine
you just unplug the standard connector and put the little tuning box in between

providenceleaf

WOW...I wish we had something like that for our non-diesel engines! Nice gains!

adentonmiller

Just to add my $0.02 to this, I also ordered one of these for my 2008 E61 530D. My price was a little higher - ?81 inc. shipping.

5 mins to install, just undo the 5 hex bolts that hold the plastic cover ont he top of the engine, plug in the tuning box and away you go.

First impressions same as above - better throttle response, fast off the line and through the gears acceleration in all gearbox modes (mines a 6 speed SAT). Traction control coming on in 3rd and 4th gear if I pushed it hard. All in all, it feels much quicker and smoother. No problems at all with idle revs.

Abrieb say 20% improvement in both BHP and Torque - which would work out to +47 BHP and +100nm to give totals of 283BHP and 600nm. I have no way to test this as I don't have access to a rolling road, but it definitely feels significantly faster and more "meaty" if you know what I mean.

All in all, it seems amazing value for ?81!

zimguy

I would seriously consider one of these as I am wanting to do something/anything to get better throttle response and a bit more power...BUT

my concern is, our engines are pretty sophisticated bits of kit and it goes against every fibre of my body to introduce something which may have been cobbled together in someone's shed. ok so a bit dramatic but my point still stands...

what testing do these guys do, what proof do we have of this testing and most importantly what are the risks that this could make my engine go bang ?

the missile

<100 EUR !!

also there is no info on how the thing works on their german website - just a list of all the available versions.

too much risk for me...

adentonmiller

It seems to work well though - and is just the same as most of the other chip tuning "power boxes" - i.e. it just sits in the signal chain for the fuel pressure sensor? and (presumably) tells the ECU that the pressure is lower than it thinks it is, so I guess that the ECU sends higher values to the pump and so jacks up the fuel pressure (or something similar).

It's very easily removable, and I would imagine leaves no trace once it's taken out if there is an issue. Given that the same 3.0d engine is used in the 335d, just with an additional turbo and different software, it's obvious that it's operating well within tolerances in the 330d. Kind of like Xerox copiers where the same "engine" can be programmed in software to operate at all kinds of pages per minute rates depending on how much you pay.

Anyway - my car is a company vehicle, so is expected to be thrashed to breaking point. If it breaks, I just take the box out and play dumb. Then get a new car.

So far though, it seems to run better, which can only be a good thing.

Thinking about it, all you need for one of these devices is a programmable chip that will accept the data stream from the sensor and modify it before outputting the modified data to the ECU. The hardware probably runs <$20 so there's no reason why it should cost $1000 or so. I'd also imagine that there's a lot of public domain information on tuning these engines which means the maps themselves can be had for almost nothing. Kind of like the way you can pay <$1 for generic Ibuprofen, or +$5 for a brand name....

Anyway - if you don't wont to risk it, don't. If you want to pay more money for the same thing, feel free. If you want a pro, rolling road proven and emissions tested ECU remap, then go for that.

All I'm saying i.s that for <100 euro and for me, it works well. Your mileage may vary and your warranty may be effected!

the missile

Don't get me wrong - I hate paying more than I need to.

The way you described this thing working is in line with my understanding. But I find it extremely odd there is no info at all on their website on what the thing actually does - I read German and can not find any on the german side either. Doesnt reassure me at all.

The issue I have with all of these boxes is that they feed false info to the ECU and "fool" it into increasing the performance. I have been informed by someone in the ECU mapping industry (no surprises, but it sounds plausible) that if something goes wrong it has the potential to spiral out of control as they often also bypass some of the engine security systems in place. However, what I have never heard is what are the actual risks if something goes wrong ? Anyone have any experience ? I know that many are sold and appear to work flawlessly but it just seems too good to be true !!

This approach is VERY different than controlling data at the source like with an ECU remap. It just seems to me that fooling the engine into increase perormance is a dangerous way of controlling a multi 1000 EUR piece of equipment.

Finally one of the reasons I took the 525 is because it has the same block as the 535 and has massive potential to get an increase in HP and Torque.

bertolli

Hi All
As I started this topic let me go through my old mails and see if I can send the supplier a mail asking them to clarify how this works.

I've had this box now for I think 6 weeks or so and still seems to work fine.