I have a Ftype R, rwd, and added the tune only (no pulley) a couple of months ago. The throttle response is much faster and of course the power is increased and once I got use to the new throttle response, its a treat to drive.

With the stability control left on, I find that the car behaves well, even under hard acceleration and I am normally in dynamic mode. I also have the michelin pss tires which are far better for grip than the Pirrelli's.

If I had awd, I would go for the pulley too; as it is, I believe Stuart said he could amend the tune if I ended up adding the pulley, or maybe the pulley upgrade does not require a further tuning change, can't remember.
You do need to have good 4 wheel alignment though to launch correctly.
Lawrence

 

AWD makes a nice difference! On the track, mine was quite composed (with the right tire pressures of the rear +2psi vs. the front).

 

Has anybody applied the ECU tune to a leased car? Any tips?

Is it feasible or even recommended? Or is it just a bad idea? Would the dealership know and possibly do something about it?

Thanks guys.

 

Just curious if you have taken the leap yet???

 

Yes, had it three or four weeks now. Chris from VAP sent me an additional modified tune which smoothed out some of the throttle profile when in dynamic mode.I haven't bothered getting actual dyno numbers because my butt is satisfied with the result ;-)

 

Doing this to a lease car is risky, so it really depends on how risky you want to be no one can answer this for you. But installing a tune in general comes with some level of risk. I have had many friends tune a lease car and return the car and no questions were asked. I do not know anyone personally that experienced any issues tuning their lease car, but there are stories online where the lease did realize there was a tune and the leasing company hit them with a decent sized monetary penalty for the modification.

For high-end supercars the dealership is more likely to check for a tune, than say tuning a VW or 3-series BMW.

 

I guess the question might be a moral one. You don't own a leased car, you're technically renting it (unless you intend all along to buy out the lease). If you pay $1000 for a tune, then arguably it's costing you an extra $30 a month on your 36 month lease because once the car goes back, you don't recover the money.

I financed my car so although the bank has an interest in it, it's technically my property.

Many of the tunes, like those supplied by VAP, can be uninstalled with the same hand held gizmo that you install them with so arguably you can return them to "stock".

 

Do you think a dealership would be able to see a tune if you flip it back using the VAP tool? They may see that the ECU was modified, but would they know it was a tune? Or could you just say it was a snap on somebody plugged in?

I'm not really worried about the engine, because I know it is engineered to handle the tune that will be applied. It is just detuned so it can be sold at a lower price point.

 

If you restore the stock tune with the VAP tool, it does leave behind a code. My aftermarket tools don't detect it, but the VAP tool does and so does the tool the dealer uses. It indicates "non-factory calibration." It hasn't given me trouble, but I did have to do some 'splaining to the service folks at the dealer.

 

so what 'splainin did you do and were they satisfied?

 

I told them it was running the stock tune and to not worry about it. They didn't worry, but told me that because they had plugged the car in and that the machine automatically connects to JLR, that JLR had a record of it.

I've received some lengthy explanations about the code from the helpful folks at VAP, and think this may be due to a misunderstanding I have. I restored the stock tune, but the instructions for the V-Tech tool say to "flash the original file" before going in for service. I may have not done that part correctly. I need to investigate a bit more, although maybe someone here (Lance?) can point out the error of my ways.

Today is the second anniversary of my taking delivery, so it's due for service. I'm going to dig into this more today, and read carefully the messages I've received from VAP to see if my procedures were proper.

 

That doesn't sound good...


I wonder what would've happened if you flashed it the way VAP recommended. What would the dealer / JLR see?

 

I *thought* I did what was recommended, but as I say, I might have misunderstood the process. This is the first time I'd used a device like this. My previous ECU modifications were all done with open source software.

 

I managed to install the VAP tune ok, but I wonder how I did it as I am certainly not comfortable operating in a computer environment, in any way. I'm sure that those with computer skills would find it fairly simple.

Having to un-install the tune could be a challenge for me to do it correctly, before a dealer visit, although the mechanic at the dealer knows I have the tune and encourages it.

Would be useful to me if someone knowledgeable posted a video, in detail, showing the install, start to finish and the revert back to stock.
Lawrence.

 

pm me with your phone number. Easier to talk you through it.

 

So has anyone with a tune and both pulleys ( or one Pulley ).... taking it down the 1/4 Mile ?

Any results before and after...

Im still contempting these mods while at the same time trying to find a dealer that will look the other way when it comes to services etc.

 

So far mostly just before after dyno runs. A couple folks do hit the drag strip, but they have so many additional variables going on (tires, nitrous, etc.), I don't think anyone has any before/after 1/4 mile results for the simple tune/pulley mods.

 

I did on my V8. 11.63 as stock and 11.39 with the lower pulley and VAP tune.

Same track, similar conditions, but this still isn't a great representation. With the tune I started getting wheel spin on the track, and had fuel dump to cool the cats at high RPM which slowed down my times. I put one step colder plugs in afterwards and am going to lower air pressure with these tires until I can get some new ones and try again. The 11.39 run was the only clean run out of 4, and I really need more runs to get a better idea of how fast this is. I expect to get into the 11.2s with this setup, but my trap speed wasn't where I had hoped it would be, probably due to the fuel dump at the top end.

Something else to consider is that there's a guy on here who supposedly ran an 11.3x on a stock R AWD, so my car is far from impressive to begin with.

 

Considering that its " a guy " and not a few guys... I consider it to be an anomaly or BS.....

Theres no stock cars on the web trapping 11.3 stock.... not even the HPE600...actually havent seen any built motors, or anything over 700hp.... ( aside from the one v8s with gas running 10s )

new question @ Stolen, why not both pulleys and the decat.... ??

 

As enjoyable as it is seeing the low time on the 1/4, recognize that acquiring such a goal is a skill set that is not necessarily indicative of how capable your car really is. Don't beat yourself up silly over that - your trap speed shows your power (as I'm sure you know). Furthermore, every time I drive around and for whatever reason choose to press the throttle more than a little bit lightly - I grin. That's why I love these beasts!