As i was parking my car at work a colleague in a 2005 BMW 2.5 twin turbo parked next to me - as we walked in he was asking about the XK etc - i told him a little about it and how it was limited to 155 mph etc and he said that he knows a guy who can remap and the car would be smoother,faster, not limited and even less mpg...
Now i know he doesn't know much about XK's and perhaps they can't be easily remapped like his BMW has been - so can the XK be remapped?
Any experiences ? I'd guess the super sensitive control system on the XK might prevent this?
Interesting thread i hope for u guys tho'.

 

No they can not be mapped properly, different maps can be uploaded and maybe one will work better but anyone who says they can do it is talking bollocks....

At this moment in time some have managed using a piggy back system this is almost like a standalone system which feeds information to your original ECU so you don't get codes or lights...... £3000!!! A bit eye watering...... However I do know of some guys who are trying to do something at a much cheaper cost, they have cracked the 4.2s but not the 4.0s but they say they are getting there, I am sure when they do word will spread quickly

 

Can be but nearly all claims turn out bogus so this one likely is too. Be VERY suspicious. Get money back deal or walk away.

 

Funny thing is that there are manufacturers like Hypertech and others that provide hand held programmers for quite a number of vehicles and then there are separate companies that provide programmers and piggy back boards for BMW. Granted you will likely not get anything more than modest improvements from these devices (Hypertech worked fine for my previous vehicle) but these were readily available and not all that expensive.

When it comes to the Jaguar I have come across a bunch of articles in Jaguar World Monthly for several Jaguar models (XKR--old series, XKR--new series, XF-R, etc.) where somewhere in the article it mentions that they were able to easily get xx more horsepower by some remap but the specifics are never offered.

Remapping/tuning at the level of Hypertech certainly is not rocket science these days and I wonder why there is not some simple affordable hand held programmer of some program that can be used via laptop and cable that can be used for Jaguar versus having to shell out big bucks for companies like Arden.

Doug

 

The offer from the friend will not be a reality, it is generally easy to find remaps for turbo cars, often offering another 30 or 40 bhp, but not for NA cars.

 

JWM (Jag World Monthly) retuning probably used Arden / Paramount / etc. Not necessarily cheap (or even still in business).

 

But it should be cheap!!! Handheld programmers and tuning software for laptops is very reasonable for tons of other vehicles. There should be nothing all that different about our cars that requires spending $thousands.

Doug

 

I am sorry but it's not so simple with our ECUs. 99.9% of the tuners give up with Densos. They are very, very difficult ones. Even Viezu is not able to tune them. Some years ago I got this message from a German tuner:

"We apologize: this ECU in your car has 2 Renesas Micro Prozesssor inside, which we are not capable of tuning anymore. There is some doubt about if anyone else can do that."

 

Clearly can be done but only if someone puts in the effort. Maybe they see a small market and a hard challenge...

 

It's really a shame and seems nonsensical. I remember before buying the Jaguar I was considering a BMW 335i that had just recently been introduced. So in my googling to find out information about it I found more than one site offering aftermarket piggyback boards to get more oomph out of the turbo engine. These were not all that unreasonable in price and it was amazing how quickly they were being offered by what looked like reputable aftermarket outfits. Same thing with Hypertech--hand held programmers are offered very quickly for most vehicles. Doesn't seem rational that there should be something so fundamentally different about the engine management systems in our cars.

Doug

 

i found one ex jag tech who now has his own garage and he re-mapped my car and took off the limiter,it now has over 410 bhp and does everything with ease

 

A little googling I came up with the production numbers for the 3 series BMW from the same time period as our XK8s and Rs.

There are roughly 40x the number of BMWs 3 Series as there are Jaguars XK8s and Rs.

Assuming that the percentage of enthusiast who would want to tune a car is similar (which it likely isn't) then we should nominally expect to pay 40x the price of the BMW tuning solutions.

As was stated before, it isn't that it can't be done but simply that most of these large tuning companies are, at the end of the day, businesses and they have determined that it isn't worth the effort to go after the market.

 

I understand the thinking that the production numbers of XK8/R versus BMW 3-series would make it look like the "effort" to develop a program was not worth it. However you really should weigh in the engine itself in terms of potential market. Didn't other models also use the 4.0 and 4.2 engines? Similarly, yearly Corvette C4 yearly sales numbers were not all that high (in the 20,000 range) but a variety of programming devices were readily available--likely because the LT-1 engine was also used in other vehicles.

I would think that the popularity of the latest gen XK might have generated more aftermarket companies who would also find it profitable to develop items for the old gen models.

Doug

 

I suspect people would like you to post his contact details.

 

as it all seems so sensitive and i do get the impression that when all is well and running fine - just leave it be - just check oil/water levels etc and cross your fingers you get no msg's on the dash ha ha.
I remember going to see a Lexus Soarer V8 with a view to buying it about 10 years ago - the guy said it wasn't 'limited' speed-wise so i get all the way there - 100's of miles and yep ... it was limited - just he'd never drove it that fast .. then he changed his mind on the already agreed price!
I'm not sure i like being told by Jaguar that i can't have my XK re-mapped if it is actually possible to make an improvement in overall performance ..
So XK chap in Yorkshire - pray tell us more

 

just google stuart day he has a garage in popham and races and restores cosworths

 

Continuing in the same vein, I don't have the latest Jaguar World Monthly but one of the stories is about some modified XKR. Here is the teaser:

Modified X100 XKR
A six-speed manual gearbox and a remapped V8 make this 2000 XKR very fast while its subtle body upgrades keep it reasonably discreet

In fact virtually all the stories of modern Jags that I have come across in JWM consistently mention how great the improvements were on this or that model solely based on remapping.

Doug

 

Far more can be had from a good intake and bigger maf (not to mention bigger mods), am still at the stock ECU, so think it’s somewhat overrated....

Nevertheless, even though small gains, it are gains and could help a specific setup if one would custom tune for it.

 

If thats a red XKR coupe then its the same one for sale on my website and I know a lot about it, it was running a piggyback system but it actually made it worse, they finally got the lights out on the dash and fitted another system which does work..... It was not cheap

The problem is the ECU is a learning ECU, Jaguar never released the codes to crack the programming, there is very little you can change, this is why avos has not had to worry about it, with all of the mods he has done the ECU taught itself to deal and did....... Who ever says they can is not giving you all the facts and if by some miracle they could, and it was legit, they would be advertising the fact and they would have a queue going out the door

 

[QUOTE=XKRacer;959004]If thats a red XKR coupe then its the same one for sale on my website and I know a lot about it, it was running a piggyback system but it actually made it worse, they finally got the lights out on the dash and fitted another system which does work..... It was not cheap





Hi - I am ready to commit my US$10,000.00 to putting a Link or a vipec piggyback on my 1998 - (modified) -XJR - What is holding me back is - I have not been able to locate anyone who has successfully done this anywhere in the world, and retained things - like cruise control - and eliminated all the trouble codes.
So far I have completely destroyed 2 engine blocks in less than 12 months, so ten grand is not that expensive to prevent it happening again. Both Vipec and Link are made by the same company in New Zealand, and I understand they are the best available.
Fully programmable Sequential injection is one feature plus Individual spark adjustment for all 8 cylinders and tuneable knock sensing which is also fully programmable.
I would love to hear from anyone who has fitted an aftermarket ECU successfully please.
Otherwise it is a scary project