The APR Conundrum – Stage 1 (v1.2 98 ron) Remap Review

When at high speed I can feel the car "dancing" a bit too much and this doesn't give great confidence. It feels like it should be more composed, less subject to bouncing. What would correct that? Stiffer springs, dampers settings?
 
Hmmm...you've already had the alignment checked so I'd say:

1. Front and rear anti roll bars, they help a lot.

2. Negative camber - good for turn in and cornering but it does increase tyre wear.

3. Coilovers - they make an incredible difference, go for top or electronically adjustable if you want to retain some comfort and wear weather adjustability.

I had AST top adjustable coilovers on my Scooby and they were superb, wind them to fully soft in the wet and the car was compliant and could put almost all of it's power to the road (and the standard STi could be a real handful in the wet). On smooth, dry tarmac, screw the suspension right down to the hardest setting and well the grip levels were just stunning, the tyres did suffer a little!
 
Thank you Mark. If I am the only one with an RS3 feeling this, I may have to get my standard setup checked/adjusted. Let's say that the roads are dodgy down south!

I look forward to your write up.
 
Glad to hear the v2 map has worked out, I now want to understand the differences and see what power gains you have.
 
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Hi Mate, have wandered over from the TT forum, currently driving a TT RS, hope you guys don't mind me hanging around here :w00t:

Have been watching this thread with interest, had the v1 put map on my car in december last and have had a number of issues with misfires and soft limp (car was only boosting to half way point)

Had the v2 map put on a couple of days ago and can echo MBKs thoughts, the car is even more of an animal now! Had a wee play yesterday and the car revs cleanly to the redline now whereas there was a soft limiter in place before.

Only issue I have had the clutch slipping a couple of times in 6th :crying: (car is a manual)

This was a couple of days ago however and has not happened since
 
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Many thanks for the great write up and good to hear about both the good, and the not so good.

The v2 map does sound good ... but I'll be waiting until my warranty runs out before being tempted (well I hope so anyway !)
 
wickedstef said:
...... If I am the only one with an RS3 feeling this, I may have to get my standard setup checked/adjusted. Let's say that the roads are dodgy down south! .
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No, you're not alone :yes:.. mine feels very similar at speed over fast undulating, bendy A roads. I noticed it straight away from new, after my previous AWD Golf R, which I have to say felt much more "planted" over similar roads at the expense of a slightly harsher, firmer ride. My RS3 does tend to feel like its wallowing and bouncing a bit more in comparison on these types of road.
 
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Thank you for the feedback Jonny. That's indeed not something I'd expect from such car. I didn't have an AWD before, but my Megane RS on the same road, with similar speed (although the build up of speed wasn't comparable) would not undulate like that at all indeed. I don't want to make it a big deal, but I must say I don't feel very happy about it.
 
wickedstef said:
Thank you for the feedback Jonny. That's indeed not something I'd expect from such car. I didn't have an AWD before, but my Megane RS on the same road, with similar speed (although the build up of speed wasn't comparable) would not undulate like that at all indeed. I don't want to make it a big deal, but I must say I don't feel very happy about it.
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Hi Mate - Sorry if I've missed it but have you had/checked your 4 wheel alignment?
Mine was out when new!
 
wickedstef said:
Thank you for the feedback Jonny. That's indeed not something I'd expect from such car. I didn't have an AWD before, but my Megane RS on the same road, with similar speed (although the build up of speed wasn't comparable) would not undulate like that at all indeed. I don't want to make it a big deal, but I must say I don't feel very happy about it.
Click to expand...

The thing is those Meganes are the class leaders when it comes to suspension and damping. As you know you pay a small price in comfort - with a cup chassis they are a pretty much rock hard ride but wow just wow when the road opens up. On lovely smooth track tarmac there isn't anything else I can think of out of the box that can match them. The Megane just inspire massive confidence to push on - and I 'only' had the R26.R - the later 250 and 265 are both quicker than that. I agree they track perfectly true in a straight line under power but the true magic is how they turn in and then the diff kicks in to pull you through the apex. Stunning track and fast road cars, if I owned one now I'd be quite happy mainly because I'd track day the wheels off it!

My RS3 tracked true - you've seen the on track footage - when standard but will certainly wander around a bit under full power with the APR maps, the wheels tend to find the camber of the road or the ruts created by trucks. I think if you want the RS3 to match the Megane you'd need coilovers and arbs.
 
CarrG said:
Hi Mate - Sorry if I've missed it but have you had/checked your 4 wheel alignment?
Mine was out when new!
Click to expand...

Where did you get your alignment checked Garry, I'd like mine checked with the extra go!
 
Hi CarrG,

The alignment was recently corrected along with changing the front tyres. It is exactly as JonnyG described it, wallowing and bouncing at high speed on uneven tarmac. I guess this is the standard set-up otherwise the car would be less able to hide the true state of some roads we have. I just wish it was a bit more "planted" as Jonny said.
 
Hi Mark,

My Megane wasn't the hardcore R26-R, not even with cup chassis, but it was lighter than the RS3 and rather firmer. So that could be part of the story. Don't make mistakes, I am happy with my baby!
 
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I finally figured out how to get the 'on road' performance measurement and dyno data to the screen. I know you guys like your data so here it is. This is a fairly typical run on the APR Stage 1 v1.2 map:

 
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wickedstef said:
My Megane wasn't the hardcore R26-R, not even with cup chassis, but it was lighter than the RS3 and rather firmer. So that could be part of the story. Don't make mistakes, I am happy with my baby!
Click to expand...
I don't know how recently you got your RS3, but it took me a year to get used to mine as compared to my TTS. The RS3 has much more movement and mass than the TTS had, but once I re-calibrated my expectations the RS3 has become just as confidence inspiring as it was.

The GoodYears helped significantly as well; prior to getting them I was seriously thinking about updating the ARBs on the car. Now I don't feel it is necessary.
 
wickedstef said:
Hi CarrG,

The alignment was recently corrected along with changing the front tyres. It is exactly as JonnyG described it, wallowing and bouncing at high speed on uneven tarmac. I guess this is the standard set-up otherwise the car would be less able to hide the true state of some roads we have. I just wish it was a bit more "planted" as Jonny said.
Click to expand...

All the same tyres or do you still have Contis on the rear? I'm wondering because I kept the rear Contis but changed the fronts to Michelin SS and sometimes get a skittering sensation that I blame on the rears - will be changing after Brands Hatch run around next month to all the same...
 
this has reminded me to get my 4 wheel laser alignment done asap
 
Hi dbm,

I will approach a year with the car but it's true that I may not be finding myself in the situation I described very often as both uneven road and speed are to match that "bouncing threshold". I have MSSP on the front and stil the Contis at the back. This could explain things a bit too.
 
Hi Marcus,

Yes I still have the Contis at the back, still plenty of life on them :-/
 
MBK said:
Where did you get your alignment checked Garry, I'd like mine checked with the extra go!
Click to expand...

Hi Mark, Bath Audi x2 and again recently at my Mates garage.

It was fine last the last check.
 
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MBK said:
I finally figured out how to get the 'on road' performance measurement and dyno data to the screen. I know you guys like your data so here it is. This is a fairly typical run on the APR Stage 1 v1.2 map:
Click to expand...

Thanks for posting ... I love to see these figure :) .... especially the 0-100mph and 1/4 mile times.

Looking forward to seeing the v2 map figures soon !
 
JonnyG said:
Thanks for posting ... I love to see these figure :) .... especially the 0-100mph and 1/4 mile times.

Looking forward to seeing the v2 map figures soon !
Click to expand...

Thanks, might take a little longer to get the big numbers this time. The private tarmac I used for these figure is busy this weekend. Next weekend, if the weather is dry, we have a chance. That 1/4 wasn't the best, I hit a slight bump around 75mph that unsettled the car. The rest of the numbers were comparative. The PerformanceBox read the 0-60 on this run as 3.71 and that is a good bit more accurate.
 
Hey! Don't you know it's not fair to compare power figures without a baseline dyno??? :p

Looking forward to your v2.0 review MBK!
 
And my response to that is, "if only the map had been switchable". I gave the map as fair a write up as I could and anyway the v2 map is quite a different proposition. The first part of my v2 review is up, more to come when the weather picks up.

I'm hoping, along with some other Gwent VW customers, to run the car on the APR HQ Dyno at some point too for absolute certainty.
 
Program switching is on the way, but these things take time as you can imagine :)
 
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I'm just getting to understand this Dynolicious app and found it can produce these lovely looking graphs:



Interestingly just as with the Dyno ploy you can see the momentary wheel spin at peak power. This shows the fairly consistent results of the v1.2 map, 3.7 to 60 and 12.2 @ 108mph for the quarter. As soon as I get the chance the v2 map figures will give us a direct comparison.

Also notice how remarkably similar the graph plot is to the dyno chart, even though the peak figures were different. I think that is quite impressive for just a £5 app, the PerformanceBox is a little more accurate but doesn't do a whole lot more for nearly £500, this is especially true now Harry's Lap Timer can create real time overlays so easily.

 
Hi MBK,

How you finding the remap ? still ok and do you think it'll affect the reliability of the engine in any way ?
 
I'm still happy with the remap, it just makes the RS3 that bit more responsive in D and more exhilarating in S. There is a lot to this learning ECU though because launch control is now back to holding at 3300rpm (it was 2200 after the map was installed, then 3000 a week later). On a dry road the S-tronic box will now hold on to each gear until the 7100 redline (up from 6900) and there is no delay in the shift. The thing I like most about the APR map is that it is just so smooth, no spikes or sudden bursts in the map just the same relentless pull as OEM just turned up from 8 to 10 on the scale.

There are quite a few RS3s and TTRSs running the APR, Revo and MRC stage I software and all seem to be running fine. The reality with remapping is there can be extra costs, even if it's just extra tyres and brake pads, All I can say is so far so good.

My car is in for a service in a few days so we will see how that goes with the dealer and if the map is overwritten afterwards.
 
MBK said:
My car is in for a service in a few days so we will see how that goes with the dealer and if the map is overwritten afterwards.
Click to expand...

There is no way they should re-flash your car without your permission. You own it and can do what you like with it.

I had a chipped S3 for several years and the garage never batted an eyelid (though I was out of the varanty period).
 
I agree, I doubt they will reflash unless there have been any updates from Audi that they need to install. It's just something I will keep an eye on.
 
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