DAZA engines blowing? Or cute advert for tuner?

[S3 Paul]

That would be me thank you for the kind words. I am new to YouTube, learning a lot along the way. Production quality improves with each video so please, bear with me! Trying to impart some of the things I've learned to you all.

Fun fact, we have over 500 cars globally running rolling launch control on the factory ECU, we have never lost an engine to rolling launch control other than one that was already running 700hp on the stock engine. Please have a little bit more of an understanding of what you are referencing exactly as you are bashing my product, there are different strategies that can be implemented to use rolling launch. Spark cut and fuel cut, also do a little bit of research into the nmax function. This way you will be a lot more prepared when going onto bash any companies RAL implementation.

Was not expecting this video to blow up as much as it did but I think some need to do a little bit of more real world research. I deal with a very high number of DAZA and DNWA engine failures on a monthly basis. Read the comments on that video, join the American RS3 groups on Facebook, there is a failure every single day no matter who the tuner is. Fact! We built 36 engines last year alone. Zero were tuned by us, we have not had a failure since we introduced engine safety algorithms 3 years ago. There are 30+ engine blocks with holes in them at my shop, countless crank, anyone is welcome to visit at any time.

The fact of the matter is that the stock knock control system on this engine is simply not enough to save the engine when things go wrong on tuned cars, the stock knock control system is designed for stock boost levels and stock ignition. It would be nice if this engine had ion sensing capabilities within the coil packs for added protections.

Ontop of that we find it to be common practice for tuners to be numbing down the knock sensors to make power. For example I commonly see 18 even 19 degrees of ignition at the top end with the waste gate pinned and cars running on 99 octane fuel (stage 2) with NO timing corrections. On the stock knock control sensitivity, it is not possible to run more than approx 15/16 degrees of ignition on 99 octane fuel. If you are running 18/19, your knock sensitivity has been dulled.

Please please do your research, another one worth looking into is the boost profile on the RS3 8Y vs RS3 8V. Boost comes in slower on the 8Y which again proves audi know about these engines shooting rods from heavy amounts of boost at low rpms, yet we have tuners making 2bar at 2500rpm. Just because the turbo can do it, does not mean it is safe for the engine. This is another reason why the stock turbocharger will kill more engines than any hybrid turbo ever will. The stock turbo is capable of creating an insane amount of boost at extremely low rpms. 2bar of boost at 2500rpm is very different to 2bar of boost at 7000rpm. Practical example, think about the strain on your knees on a bike going up a big hill in a high gear and low speed vs high speed.

It is commonly mentioned 'limit the torque to stop the rods from exiting on the engine' This is extremely vague and means absolutley nothing. Again as above, 700nm at 2500rpm vs 700nm at 7000rpm are very different things. Another issue is, all tunes making over 700nm on the stock turbocharger as over 700nm can only be made between approx 2500rpm and 3500rpm which is a danger zone, engine has little momentum. The stock turbo is not capable of making that kind of torque past 4k rpm, which is why it is normal to see the waste gate pinned past this point to try and create as much boost as possible.

If knock sensitivities were left alone, boost came in at 3300-3500 as per 8Y boost profile funnily enough, ignition was capped at 15.75 we would not see half as many failures as we do.

I advise everyone to log their cars. My understanding of this engine, what it can take and what it cannot take is a result of personally stripping over 75 engines over the last 5 years, analysing the software and identifying the root cause of failure on each car. I know why these engines fail.

Another one that gets me.. Rod bearing failure isolated to a single rod which we see a lot of. Always gets blamed on the oil pump by experts/professionals in this industry. WRONG. Rod bearings get chewed up from running too much ignition at higher rpms, out of all of the engines rebuilt by us we have only replaced oil pumps when a rod has gone through it. All of our engines go out the door with 3 year 40k mile warranties so go figure! We have never seen an oil pump fail on this engine to date. If it was oil pump failure we would see evidence of it across the engine, not just on one cylinder.

This reminds me of a time back in 2015, on another popular uk based RS3 forum, I purchased a pre facelift RS3 and posted about how catastrophically bad the braking system was on it. I got a lot of hate from all of the forum members and other owners of the car. I am starting to feel this is natural defence mechanism for most. Can people not handle uncomfortable truths about this car? I got banned from that forum. Fast forward to 2017 and it was widely known and accepted on how bad the braking system is on that car, hell, Audi even changed the design of the brakes completely on that exact same model of car, got rid of the wavey discs completely.

Don't even get me started about the transfer box which is a sealed for life unit on the 8V but a service every 20k unit on the RSQ3 and 8Y RS3. It is the exact same box on the 8Y and RSQ3. Audi make mistakes all the time!

Please, if anyone has any questions fire away. I'd love to answer them all for you.

Hi. Again thanks for taking the time to reply in person. Social media is a double edge sword for sure.
However... My 2018 rs3 DAZA is currently stock. Serviced as it should be and about 46k on now. I would like to maybe go stage 1 but nothing more. Maybe with the elbow and larger intake pipe? Your video doesn't make it clear if STOCK cars are likely to fail ? STAGE 1 cars to fail ? Is it at stage 2 or above the limits are pushed too hard by tuners? also... Which tuners? name and shame the ones that you have proof of dulling down of safety features? I have decided in my ownership an oil change by me every 6 months as well as the garage service plan can only help? is this correct?
I await your reply.
Thanks in advance for clearing up these questions for me/ us

 

[Aoon_M]

Stumbled onto this post. Are you saying even stock engines are at risk? Forgive me if I missed something.


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I am not saying stock engines are at risk. There have been cases of stock engines failing. A common failure point are the needle bearings inside the rocker arms. I have seen this on DNWA engines too. There have also been cases of stock engines that have shot rods, but I don't think this is anything out of the ordinary if we are comparing stock engine failure rates on this platform vs others in the grand scheme of things.

My point is, if your stock car is at 80,000 miles and an injector is weak or a coil pack is weak and there is a bad batch of fuel in the car and its a very hot day, you have 5 people in the car, the stock knock control system is simply not enough to save the engine in a scenario like this. But to be fair, this would go for any engine. Without the engine being able to talk to you, you have absolutley zero clue of the health of the engine really. This is why we commissioned our safety algorithm code. There are no disbenefits to having it, only benefits.

The thing with the CZGB (iron block engine) that everyone loves to go on about on how it is bulletproof etc, the material of the block does not change the overall strength of the engine in this case or make it any less likely whether its going to shoot a rod or not. The iron block is actually weaker for high horsepower applications as it has less main crank support, we see heavy main bearing wear on applications that are running over 800hp long term which mean they need rebuilt every 20k miles on a 800hp+ applications. They have 4 bolt mains vs 6 bolt mains on the DAZA/DNWA. The DAZA/DNWA engine is better in each and every way if we are comparing to CEPA/CZGB. The material of the block itself only affects one thing on extremely high horsepower applications, I'm talking 1200hp+... The cylinder walls are weaker so we see cracks. This is why people sleeve the aluminium block when going for that kind of power level. Under that, there is absolutely no need.

The iron block engines utilised turbochargers that even with the waste gate pinned from the day the car left the dealership, it could not create enough boost pressure or spool fast enough to damage things. If people fitted DAZA/DNWA turbos to the iron blocks they would see the same failures. The rods in that engine are actually lighter/weaker than the rods in DAZA/DNWA. So a lot of tuners got away with bad tuning. That engine was very forgiving. There was a lot of room for error. With the DAZA/DNWA, the stock turbocharger is an animal, it forgives no one. Zero room for error.

On earlier versions of DAZA software there is an error on the timing tables which not many tuners know about. In one of the ignition timing maps, when variable cams are offline (this happens after a flash or dead battery/no adaptions) and the car is at 250% load, the ecu will tell the engine to run 45 degrees of ignition timing. Knock control will correct 9-12 degrees but even on stock boost levels, this will damage your engine. So another piece of advice would be to be on the latest revision of ECU software, request that your car is tuned on latest revision Audi software and be asking the question if your tuner knows about this error and has patched it on older versions.

These engines also suffer from something called LSPI. When oil quality degrades they cause pre ignition, oil changes are extremely important. I do not agree with Audi's 10k oil change intervals, 10k turns into 12k quite quickly in peoples busy lives and Audi taking 3, 4 weeks to book cars in at times. I would not let my own engine go over 7k without oil changes.

Aoon, thank you for taking the time to do a comprehensive reply, couple of things if I may.
As I said above, I can see the merit in flashing the EML and reigning things in if certain things are not running right, makes sense. I can see that the stock turbo will spool quicker than bigger hybrid ones, same as the IS20 vs IS38 on the EA888.

Some seem to think they should be able to drive the car how they like and it not break but IMHO if you drive it like an idiot anything will break. If I need the rs3 to get a move on/overtake I change down to use the power higher up the rev range. I use the torque for easy relaxed driving. I don't use the low down torque for acceleration. This has always been a problem, if not in the engine it will be clutch gearbox or rear drive. Since I started driving tuned turbo cars in the 80s we have had to be careful how and where we used the power. I don't find people feel the need to think like that today.

I agree that having stupid low down boost can be an issue but that is down to mapping, are you saying the failures are down to combinations of issues that need both low down torque limits but also warning of bad components? A lot of cars seem to run fine for a long while before letting go and to me that screams maintenance. What kind of things are you seeing that you need to protect against in software?

I do not doubt there may be better ways to do RAL but when you look at what you are asking it to do it can't be a good thing for the car



Yes I agree, frequent changes of oil is never a bad thing on anything. I also found out the early RS3 does not have the revised rocker bearing either. I am under no misconceptions about the possible problems with this car, just like every one I have had.



As I said above IMHO if you don't drive it like an idiot and maintain it properly (don't leave the oil in it for 2 years for a start) you will be fine. If you do then anything will break. It may be harder to do on a stock car than a tuned one but it does happen

Here is another one for you, we have had cars that have ran tuned by xxxx for 1.5/2 years then one day gone lean and melted a piston, sent the injectors away for testing and they've come back fine. Put the same injectors back into the car after rebuilding the engine/retuning and sent it out with a 3 year 40k mile warranty. What does that tell you?

When I am tuning a car, I need to tune knowing that A) I cannot ever underestimate human stupidity and B) I cannot control how a client drives or maintains their car. The moment that car leaves my dyno, I have no control over how it is going to be maintained or driven. Not everyone knows not to lug the engine, you can't expect people to know that. So why not have more suitable boost control in the software in the first place. 700nm+ at 2500rpm is not okay!

Hi. Again thanks for taking the time to reply in person. Social media is a double edge sword for sure.
However... My 2018 rs3 DAZA is currently stock. Serviced as it should be and about 46k on now. I would like to maybe go stage 1 but nothing more. Maybe with the elbow and larger intake pipe? Your video doesn't make it clear if STOCK cars are likely to fail ? STAGE 1 cars to fail ? Is it at stage 2 or above the limits are pushed too hard by tuners? also... Which tuners? name and shame the ones that you have proof of dulling down of safety features? I have decided in my ownership an oil change by me every 6 months as well as the garage service plan can only help? is this correct?
I await your reply.
Thanks in advance for clearing up these questions for me/ us

I obviously can't name other companies, it would be unprofessional. I have all the datalogs to back my words. But as I said if you are running 18/19 degrees of ignition with no knock corrections on your stage 2 99 octane daza, your knock settings have been numbed. Seeing the DNWA engines being tuned was hilarious and brought to light all the copy and paste tuners in the industry. DNWA don't take anywhere near as much ignition as DAZA cars as they have completely different exhaust camshafts, copy and paste tuners were putting daza timing maps from onto the dnwa.

If I did not own a tuning company, knowing everything I know today the only company that would be getting my business is APR.

If anyones engine is tuned, if you would like me to have a look at the log and give you my honest and unbiased opinion about what I think, please feel free to post here without naming the company who tuned it.

 

[flybynite]

So why not have more suitable boost control in the software in the first place.

I completely agree, and it is one of the reasons my car is bone stock, but I still say if you drive it like an idiot you will break anything! Launching with 5-up and bad fuel would do it.

If I did not own a tuning company, knowing everything I know today the only company that would be getting my business is APR.

Of the main players in the UK, I was always under the impression Revo were the most conservative, not many had their own cars for development. APR seem to get higher numbers that makes me suspicious, historically that did cause a few issues on the IS38 tunes and that has put me off a bit.

 

[S3 Paul]

Although i understand you might not want to name names so to speak but... I think part of the reason behind this video blowing up was that alot took from it what i did ... ALL RS3's WILL fail unless running your software. This will obviously caused more than a little panic and a fair bit of disbelief .
Being quite new to this car i was filled with both ! I was thinking of a stage 1 tune. With the forge turbo elbow and larger intake or open filter. Nothing crazy just a slight increase over stock.
I was unsure if to go REVO, MRC or others as a tuner that knows their apples.
Saying you have proof is hard for people to take you on your word without proof. With my old S3 1.8t the tuner i used highlighted what was wrong with the other 2 tuners i was planning on using. I was left confident with my choice. ran that and the following Audi for over 10 years with their tunes. Not pushing the envelope but a good healthy increase. This is what i want for ths car but the tuner i have used does not tune the RS3

 

[8YARWY]

Although i understand you might not want to name names so to speak but... I think part of the reason behind this video blowing up was that alot took from it what i did ... ALL RS3's WILL fail unless running your software. This will obviously caused more than a little panic and a fair bit of disbelief .
Being quite new to this car i was filled with both ! I was thinking of a stage 1 tune. With the forge turbo elbow and larger intake or open filter. Nothing crazy just a slight increase over stock.
I was unsure if to go REVO, MRC or others as a tuner that knows their apples.
Saying you have proof is hard for people to take you on your word without proof. With my old S3 1.8t the tuner i used highlighted what was wrong with the other 2 tuners i was planning on using. I was left confident with my choice. ran that and the following Audi for over 10 years with their tunes. Not pushing the envelope but a good healthy increase. This is what i want for ths car but the tuner i have used does not tune the RS3

Too many liars / cheats in the tuning business I’m afraid.
The RS3 does seem to attract a lot of he said / she said / this happened / that happened.

One thing I learnt from tuning my FL Daza, no one seems to want a ‘tuned’ RS3 come sale time.

I always think it’s better to concentrate on your own business, rather than scaremongering about what others are doing, leave em to it…….



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[Aoon_M]

Although i understand you might not want to name names so to speak but... I think part of the reason behind this video blowing up was that alot took from it what i did ... ALL RS3's WILL fail unless running your software. This will obviously caused more than a little panic and a fair bit of disbelief .
Being quite new to this car i was filled with both ! I was thinking of a stage 1 tune. With the forge turbo elbow and larger intake or open filter. Nothing crazy just a slight increase over stock.
I was unsure if to go REVO, MRC or others as a tuner that knows their apples.
Saying you have proof is hard for people to take you on your word without proof. With my old S3 1.8t the tuner i used highlighted what was wrong with the other 2 tuners i was planning on using. I was left confident with my choice. ran that and the following Audi for over 10 years with their tunes. Not pushing the envelope but a good healthy increase. This is what i want for ths car but the tuner i have used does not tune the RS3

Having 3 blown RS3 engines delivered on trucks over the course of 3-4 days isn't proof? Putting a blown engine back on the road within 7 days and providing a 3 year 40k mile warranty on it isn't proof? Pulling an RS3 engine out faster than most shops can service your car isn't proof? Having 5+ brand new aluminium engine blocks from Audi on the shelf isn't proof? If that isn't then nothing will ever be.

There are shops out there that take a year to do a rebuild. We aren't one of them.

We wouldn't be able to do any of the above if we hadn't done it hundreds of times before.

The proof is at my shop which you are welcome to visit anytime, I obviously cant post logs of other tunes. I'd get in trouble on this forum . I've stated what I see on other tunes, what is okay and what isn't.

I left plenty of pointers in regards to tuning here, once your car is tuned put a log up and I'll give you an honest unbiased opinion about what I think.

I am just trying to make people aware, everyone should invest in a datalogger and learn how to datalog at the bare minimum on these tuned engines.

 

[Aoon_M]

I'm feeling a bit generous tonight so I'm going to post some datalogs without naming companies and explain the three main types of failures on this engine.

Case study 1

Hardware on car - intake, intercooler, downpipe. A pretty normal stage 2 plus setup.

Rod bearing failure isolated to a single cylinder. DAZA RS3 at 38k miles, 3 months after being tuned, customer completes fresh oil change, fills up with v power, takes car for a stretch! Stretches the cars legs to an undisclosed speed and upon deceleration car engine starts knocking like crazy. Customer phones tuner, tuner tells customer oil pump has failed which has caused this.

We get the car in, rebuild it, strap it to the dyno, before I retuned I was curious to see the settings the other tune was running. I usually pull the software off the ecu which gives me a better understanding of whats going on, I spent 3 years analysing each failure to understand why. Putting an engine back together without understanding why would be a pretty pointless exercise. But this ecu was locked/inaccessible. Please see here - https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...ef673f235c3effd74f42e529e9a0835b7e2a965dc6949

1.9 bar at 3k rpm. We don't run anything anywhere near that at that sort of rpm. Wouldn't personally run that but thats not what caused the rod bearing failure. This car has an ignition target of 19.5 degrees with no knock corrections uptop. This is simply impossible to achieve on 99 octane fuel without numbing knock sensitivity within the ECU. FYI MBT on this engine is at 21 degrees of ignition, on ethanol.

This car suffered rod bearing failure from running too much ignition at high RPM.


Case study 2

Hardware on car - intake, intercooler, downpipe. A stage 2 plus setup with some cracking hardware. Some money had been spent on this car!

Cylinder 1 shot rod. DNWA TTRS at 12k miles. 99 octane fuel.

So many things wrong with this log. Please see here - https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...f9e2071eb35356df0697e51f1a510108e38bb2b139b1a

Boost overshoots target to 1.85bar at 3100rpm. Boost request then goes to 1.95 bar at 5000rpm. We don't run over 1.85 bar on any car running 99 octane fuel, ever. In my opinion that kind of boost isn't safe on ethanol either. Enrichment begins way too late, I see .87 lambda at 4100rpm?! The tuner must have been on crack! Pulled the software off this ecu, knock sensitivity was numbed, car was still correcting heavily on the log which means it wasn't completely blind to what was going on. If this engine did not shoot a rod when it did, it would have went lean and melted a piston.

The other type of failure is going lean and melting things.

These are from early 2022, I stopped analysing the software on blown engines as it as getting repetitive, everyone is making the same mistakes. I have loads more of these, lots of different tunes with different types of errors that caused the failures. if people want to see them, I'm happy to post them. Any questions ask away

 

[Aoon_M]

And here is as aggressive as we go on a Stage 2 plus well setup DNWA Engine. This car was running water meth injection. (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...8044e0629ee911566d186b9a197ef1deacdb3b132bcfe

I'm not sure why the start of this log is cut off, but we don't use this logger anymore as we have our own ram logger which can datalog things at a greater sample rate. Happy to send logs across to anyone via pm.

Here is a well setup DAZA car by us with octane booster (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...f6a58f5a45f5d89543a0a935efc8eeeefd2dadf279e58

Note ignition, boost, lambda. Both of these cars are with power adders and yet I still don't push ignition to crazy numbers because we have an understanding of what the engine can and cannot take long term.

I hope these logs help people calibrate these cars correctly.

 

[Dan_DJT]

And here is as aggressive as we go on a Stage 2 plus well setup DNWA Engine. This car was running water meth injection. (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...8044e0629ee911566d186b9a197ef1deacdb3b132bcfe

I'm not sure why the start of this log is cut off, but we don't use this logger anymore as we have our own ram logger which can datalog things at a greater sample rate. Happy to send logs across to anyone via pm.

Here is a well setup DAZA car by us with octane booster (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...f6a58f5a45f5d89543a0a935efc8eeeefd2dadf279e58

Note ignition, boost, lambda. Both of these cars are with power adders and yet I still don't push ignition to crazy numbers because we have an understanding of what the engine can and cannot take long term.

I hope these logs help people calibrate these cars correctly.

Hi Aoon_M

Its great to see some logs, thanks for sharing them. The logs from Stage 2 plus on DNWA, was that with a decat and the OPF removed ??

 

[S3 Paul]

And here is as aggressive as we go on a Stage 2 plus well setup DNWA Engine. This car was running water meth injection. (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...8044e0629ee911566d186b9a197ef1deacdb3b132bcfe

I'm not sure why the start of this log is cut off, but we don't use this logger anymore as we have our own ram logger which can datalog things at a greater sample rate. Happy to send logs across to anyone via pm.

Here is a well setup DAZA car by us with octane booster (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...f6a58f5a45f5d89543a0a935efc8eeeefd2dadf279e58

Note ignition, boost, lambda. Both of these cars are with power adders and yet I still don't push ignition to crazy numbers because we have an understanding of what the engine can and cannot take long term.

I hope these logs help people calibrate these cars correctly.

What would you say is a good logging tool? I have only used vagcom on my older cars and logged various measuring blocks.

 

[Aoon_M]

Hi Aoon_M

Its great to see some logs, thanks for sharing them. The logs from Stage 2 plus on DNWA, was that with a decat and the OPF removed ??

Yes it was!

What would you say is a good logging tool? I have only used vagcom on my older cars and logged various measuring blocks.

Commercially available equipment is nothing great, I flash a patch onto the ecu that allows me to datalog in high speed via the ram variables. VCDS is okay for hobbyist use if you use turbo mode, group UDS requests and log around 5 parameters at a time.

 

[8YARWY]

And here is as aggressive as we go on a Stage 2 plus well setup DNWA Engine. This car was running water meth injection. (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...8044e0629ee911566d186b9a197ef1deacdb3b132bcfe

I'm not sure why the start of this log is cut off, but we don't use this logger anymore as we have our own ram logger which can datalog things at a greater sample rate. Happy to send logs across to anyone via pm.

Here is a well setup DAZA car by us with octane booster (map 4) https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...f6a58f5a45f5d89543a0a935efc8eeeefd2dadf279e58

Note ignition, boost, lambda. Both of these cars are with power adders and yet I still don't push ignition to crazy numbers because we have an understanding of what the engine can and cannot take long term.

I hope these logs help people calibrate these cars correctly.

I'm feeling a bit generous tonight so I'm going to post some datalogs without naming companies and explain the three main types of failures on this engine.

Case study 1

Hardware on car - intake, intercooler, downpipe. A pretty normal stage 2 plus setup.

Rod bearing failure isolated to a single cylinder. DAZA RS3 at 38k miles, 3 months after being tuned, customer completes fresh oil change, fills up with v power, takes car for a stretch! Stretches the cars legs to an undisclosed speed and upon deceleration car engine starts knocking like crazy. Customer phones tuner, tuner tells customer oil pump has failed which has caused this.

We get the car in, rebuild it, strap it to the dyno, before I retuned I was curious to see the settings the other tune was running. I usually pull the software off the ecu which gives me a better understanding of whats going on, I spent 3 years analysing each failure to understand why. Putting an engine back together without understanding why would be a pretty pointless exercise. But this ecu was locked/inaccessible. Please see here - https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...ef673f235c3effd74f42e529e9a0835b7e2a965dc6949

1.9 bar at 3k rpm. We don't run anything anywhere near that at that sort of rpm. Wouldn't personally run that but thats not what caused the rod bearing failure. This car has an ignition target of 19.5 degrees with no knock corrections uptop. This is simply impossible to achieve on 99 octane fuel without numbing knock sensitivity within the ECU. FYI MBT on this engine is at 21 degrees of ignition, on ethanol.

This car suffered rod bearing failure from running too much ignition at high RPM.


Case study 2

Hardware on car - intake, intercooler, downpipe. A stage 2 plus setup with some cracking hardware. Some money had been spent on this car!

Cylinder 1 shot rod. DNWA TTRS at 12k miles. 99 octane fuel.

So many things wrong with this log. Please see here - https://www.autotuner-tool.com/en/l...f9e2071eb35356df0697e51f1a510108e38bb2b139b1a

Boost overshoots target to 1.85bar at 3100rpm. Boost request then goes to 1.95 bar at 5000rpm. We don't run over 1.85 bar on any car running 99 octane fuel, ever. In my opinion that kind of boost isn't safe on ethanol either. Enrichment begins way too late, I see .87 lambda at 4100rpm?! The tuner must have been on crack! Pulled the software off this ecu, knock sensitivity was numbed, car was still correcting heavily on the log which means it wasn't completely blind to what was going on. If this engine did not shoot a rod when it did, it would have went lean and melted a piston.

The other type of failure is going lean and melting things.

These are from early 2022, I stopped analysing the software on blown engines as it as getting repetitive, everyone is making the same mistakes. I have loads more of these, lots of different tunes with different types of errors that caused the failures. if people want to see them, I'm happy to post them. Any questions ask away

Very interesting.

I’ve seen MRC tuned cars running 21+ deg of ignition…… scary.


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[flybynite]

Commercially available equipment is nothing great, I flash a patch onto the ecu that allows me to datalog in high speed via the ram variables. VCDS is okay for hobbyist use if you use turbo mode, group UDS requests and log around 5 parameters at a time.

Doesn't the Dynospectrum DS1 do high speed, wide band, data logging?

 

[Aoon_M]

Doesn't the Dynospectrum DS1 do high speed, wide band, data logging?

I believe it does and comes bundled with their tune! They will be flashing a patch onto the ecu for high speed logging like us so I don't think it will work with anybody elses tune. We have something similar coming later this year for Android and iOS.

 

[8YARWY]

Doesn't the Dynospectrum DS1 do high speed, wide band, data logging?

It also uses space in the ECU as a mini logger too, although this gets wiped at ignition off cycle.
Not quite as detailed as the full one they get you to use.


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[flybynite]

I don't think it will work with anybody elses tune.

They have OTS tunes which from looking at them are very conservative, but anyone can write a DS1 tune, that is the problem, still does not guarantee a good tune, there are more amateurs trying it than conventional means. No-one I have spoken to has filled me with confidence which is why I have not gone this route.

I don't need more power, car is fast enough for UK roads, all I want is a bit of drivability and the niggles fixing. That is probably quite rare amongst RS3 owners looking to tune their car and most people writing tunes can't understand it. So for now car stays stock.

 

[8YARWY]

They have OTS tunes which from looking at them are very conservative, but anyone can write a DS1 tune, that is the problem, still does not guarantee a good tune, there are more amateurs trying it than conventional means. No-one I have spoken to has filled me with confidence which is why I have not gone this route.

I don't need more power, car is fast enough for UK roads, all I want is a bit of drivability and the niggles fixing. That is probably quite rare amongst RS3 owners looking to tune their car and most people writing tunes can't understand it. So for now car stays stock.

It’s a great system from my experience with it.

Would I tune my car again, no.

Far too much hard work come sale time.


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[flybynite]

It’s a great system from my experience with it.
Would I tune my car again, no.
Far too much hard work come sale time.

For me the car is a keeper, I choose carefully and keep my cars a long time anyway but as it stands I can't see anything newer ever fitting what I need any better than what I have.

I think the DS1 system is fine in theory and very capable both John and Mitch have a good reputation in the industry from other types. I couldn't find anyone I would trust to write the tune as I wanted it. I have tuned turbo cars in the 80s and although I know enough to know tuning this is beyond what I have the time to learn to do now, I have a set of requirements and know the questions to ask, not found anyone that gave me the answers I wanted.

 

[8YARWY]

For me the car is a keeper, I choose carefully and keep my cars a long time anyway but as it stands I can't see anything newer ever fitting what I need any better than what I have.

I think the DS1 system is fine in theory and very capable both John and Mitch have a good reputation in the industry from other types. I couldn't find anyone I would trust to write the tune as I wanted it. I have tuned turbo cars in the 80s and although I know enough to know tuning this is beyond what I have the time to learn to do now, I have a set of requirements and know the questions to ask, not found anyone that gave me the answers I wanted.

I enjoyed doing it and it costs a fair amount, especially when running a E mix, I had mine checked out on Peron’s rolling road in Barnsley and the mapping was confirmed as being very good by Nick who is their calibrator.


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[flybynite]

I enjoyed doing it and it costs a fair amount, especially when running a E mix, I had mine checked out on Peron’s rolling road in Barnsley and the mapping was confirmed as being very good by Nick who is their calibrator.

I did speak to Peron but wasn't impressed, got the impression they were more interested in shifting boxes than doing tuning. Few messages back and forward with Darin and didn't get anywhere either, gave up on that in the end. Better solutions for what I want given willy-waving numbers are not what I'm after.

TVS gearbox map probably do much of what I want anyway. Stage 1 Revo would probably fix the rest but have not done it because can't believe it is so hard to take the map switching options on the Golf R and others and do them for the RS3.

 

[S3 Paul]

I looked at TVS map too. would you be going drive ability map or stage 2+ like i was recommended?

 

[Dan_DJT]

I did speak to Peron but wasn't impressed, got the impression they were more interested in shifting boxes than doing tuning. Few messages back and forward with Darin and didn't get anywhere either, gave up on that in the end. Better solutions for what I want given willy-waving numbers are not what I'm after.

TVS gearbox map probably do much of what I want anyway. Stage 1 Revo would probably fix the rest but have not done it because can't believe it is so hard to take the map switching options on the Golf R and others and do them for the RS3.

Hi, any Revo questions then please DM me, I do all the RS3 calibrations and would like to think I can answer any questions you have.

 

[flybynite]

Hi, any Revo questions then please DM me, I do all the RS3 calibrations and would like to think I can answer any questions you have.

Hi Dan, unfortunately can't seem to be able to DM on here any more, don't know what has changed to stop me since I last DM'd ?? How do I get hold of you outside of here?

If it helps I did call the office about this and was told what I wanted was not possible and no-one seemed that interested so I left it at that and started to look at other options, but I'm happy to run through it again.

 

[S3 Paul]

Hi, any Revo questions then please DM me, I do all the RS3 calibrations and would like to think I can answer any questions you have.

Hello. The above concerns regarding safety features being dulled down from some tuners. Can you confirm Revo's approach to this? I was swaying towards Revo but as mentioned the lack of map switching and the unknown "safety" of the software has me holding back.

 

[deepy]

Hello. The above concerns regarding safety features being dulled down from some tuners. Can you confirm Revo's approach to this? I was swaying towards Revo but as mentioned the lack of map switching and the unknown "safety" of the software has me holding back.

Taken from Revo website : RS3 FL Stage1

SWITCHABLE SOFTWARE1​

---

Using an SPS switch you can take advantage of the switch-ability of Revo software. The Patented OBD2 interface is the ultimate compliment to Revo performance software, giving you the ability to switch between 4 fuel quality modes via the vehicle OBD port.

• Setting #1 on your SPS sets your vehicle to Revo Performance mode Tuned for lower octane (95ron) pump fuel/poor operating conditions
• Setting #2 on your SPS sets your vehicle to Revo Performance mode Tuned for regular octane pump (97ron) fuel/poor operating conditions
• Setting #3 on your SPS sets your vehicle to Revo Performance mode Tuned for higher octane pump (98ron) fuel/good operating conditions
• Setting #4 on your SPS sets your vehicle to Revo Performance mode Tuned for high octane (100ron) fuel/ideal operating conditions

Simply select a program, plug in, wait a few seconds, remove the SPS device and start the car. It's simple and there's no fixed switch to install in the vehicle.

 

[flybynite]

I looked at TVS map too. would you be going drive ability map or stage 2+ like i was recommended?

Likely the Stage 2+ because I can see no downsides to increasing the clamping force with stage 1 torque even though it is below the theoretical capacity of the standard gearbox map. I am just waiting to hear if they are adding a few more tweak options to the map.

but as mentioned the lack of map switching and the unknown "safety" of the software has me holding back.

You have always been able to Map switch with REVO using the SPS, my complaint was the choice of maps in the 4 available positions. It seems like it may now be possible to change these.

DM Dan and he will send you some basic details of the map, they look fine to me, no concerns, but as I say if you drive like an idiot and ignore obvious signs you can break anything.

 

[wuta3]

That would be me thank you for the kind words. I am new to YouTube, learning a lot along the way. ...

I started this thread, primarily because I found the video confusing and a bit vague. The detail you added here does help, and I think the information about stock knock detection is useful and important.

And while I appreciate that trade secrets are important for business, more information on how your "protection algorithms" are implemented (not necessarily what they're doing) would be useful.

I think we can all understand overstrung timing/boost causing failures, and that all engines have weak points, I just don't have enough knowledge to understand how/what "protection algorithms" you mean, as opposed to just having a map with less timing/boost and so on. Surely the stock ECU limits the processing and value derivation you can do, so encoding an "algorithm" rather than having a sympathetic map sounds like two different things to me?

Can you say more about why the stock knock system is inadequate and examples of tunes you've seen being stupid with the maps?

I also think, as friendly feedback, the video would seem more trustworthy if it said more than "Engines are blowing EVERY DAY ... BUY OUR ALGORITHM!!". Maybe take us through the actual weaknesses (as you did in your reply) and inform us poor lowly DAZA owners of the concrete issues in detail, otherwise it just sounds like "Other tuners are s***t, we're the best, buy from us".

That might be true, but like me, most of us will stick with APR or something without feeling informed by someone claiming their product(s) are better.

Again, I really appreciate the reply, and should my block find itself with extra ventilation holes, you guys seem like a good choice for a rebuild. I just wanted more from the video, because in enthusiast circles, most of us want to go with people we learn from. A good example would be the DAZA engine build video(s) from REPerformance. Not trying to sell me anything, not trying to scare, just good information on what's going on. It means I would trample my own mum to get an engine refresh with them.

 

[wuta3]

I am not saying stock engines are at risk. There have been cases of stock engines failing. A common failure point are the needle bearings inside the rocker arms. I have seen this on DNWA engines too. There have also been cases of stock engines that have shot rods, but I don't think this is anything out of the ordinary if we are comparing stock engine failure rates on this platform vs others in the grand scheme of things....

Thank for you the further information

I obviously can't name other companies, it would be unprofessional. I have all the datalogs to back my words. But as I said if you are running 18/19 degrees of ignition with no knock corrections on your stage 2 99 octane daza, your knock settings have been numbed. Seeing the DNWA engines being tuned was hilarious and brought to light all the copy and paste tuners in the industry. DNWA don't take anywhere near as much ignition as DAZA cars as they have completely different exhaust camshafts, copy and paste tuners were putting daza timing maps from onto the dnwa.

If I did not own a tuning company, knowing everything I know today the only company that would be getting my business is APR.

I don't think it'd be unprofessional if you have the evidence to back it up. Might be interesting if it went to court, but in engineering, you're not naming names ... you're pointing at figures. If I was working on a system that had massive mistakes, bugs, defects and so on ... I would name names. I can point to the issue. I can show that it is negligent.

 

[Aoon_M]

I will attach a snippet below about our safety algorithm for this engine below; there are videos on our YouTube of the safety functions in action. This is a good one to get up to speed -

Safeties can be fully custom calibrated to suit one's mods, build, or needs.

Our custom code for engine safeties is written entirely in-house and we have seamlessly merged it with the OEM ECU to offer an added layer of security when you choose our engine calibration. Engine safeties provide you with peace of mind that if you do get a bad tank of fuel, or that vacuum line does pop of your wastegate , your ECU will instantly catch an issue and switch back into the stock map to prevent damage. These engine safeties are now built into every Infinit Performance calibration we do and are only available through us.

To understand how the engine safeties work it is important to understand why the knock sensors on the car ****** ignition. The knock sensors are effectively extremely sensitive microphones bolted to the side of the engine block. They are calibrated by Audi and each stroke has a set audible frequency which is picked up by the knock sensors. These sensors continuously monitor the combustion cycle to ensure everything is as it should be and within Audi’s set tolerance. If it starts to pick up inconsistencies in the combustion cycle it (this is not necessarily a knock event) it begins to ****** the ignition timing on the car to correct the combustion cycle and bring it back into specification.


The current engine safety offerings will take into account

• Knock
• Overboost
• Differential Fuel Pressure
• Fuel Trims
• Lambda
• Early injector failure
• Early coil pack failure
• Misfire

 

[Aoon_M]

Thank for you the further information



I don't think it'd be unprofessional if you have the evidence to back it up. Might be interesting if it went to court, but in engineering, you're not naming names ... you're pointing at figures. If I was working on a system that had massive mistakes, bugs, defects and so on ... I would name names. I can point to the issue. I can show that it is negligent.

There are 6 fresh daza/dnwa rs3's at my shop for rebuilds, all with bent rods or have went lean. This is the number of cars we been dealing with for the last 3 years. I will be sure to do a workshop update on our next video. I will not be naming other tuning companies. It is not in my interest to name and shame tuning companies, if I was exposing manufacturing issues by Audi or a multibillion £ company it would be a different story but I don't feel like getting personal with other tuning companies.

I did not say at any point other tuners are rubbish buy from us. I said the stock knock control system is not enough to save the engine when things go wrong on tuned engines.

The stock knock control is designed for a stock engine running stock boos, fueling and stock ignition. It can save the engine when things are a miss at 400hp.

When you tune an engine to run 500/550hp, you upgrade the intercooler, downpipe, intake and so on right? Why do we upgrade these parts? Because they were not designed for power levels over 400hp.

The same can be said for the stock knock control system. It is calibrated for cars running 400hp. When running additional power, it is a necessity that additional measures are put into place to save the engine when things go wrong.

 

[wuta3]

I did speak to Peron but wasn't impressed, got the impression they were more interested in shifting boxes than doing tuning. Few messages back and forward with Darin and didn't get anywhere either, gave up on that in the end. Better solutions for what I want given willy-waving numbers are not what I'm after.

TVS gearbox map probably do much of what I want anyway. Stage 1 Revo would probably fix the rest but have not done it because can't believe it is so hard to take the map switching options on the Golf R and others and do them for the RS3.

FWIW the APR switchable maps and their stage 1 ECU and TCU tune have been great for me. I too was looking for more drivability, fixed shift points, and so on rather than more power.

APR did the job.

 

[wuta3]

There are 6 fresh daza/dnwa rs3's outside my shop for rebuilds, all with bent rods or have went lean. This is the number of cars we been dealing with for the last 4 years. I will be sure to do a workshop update on our next video. I will not be naming other tuning companies. It is not in my interest to name and shame tuning companies, if I was exposing manufacturing issues by Audi or a multibillion £ company it would be a different story but I don't feel like getting personal with other tuning companies.

I did not say at any point other tuners are rubbish buy from us. I said the stock knock control system is not enough to save the engine when things go wrong on tuned engines.

The stock knock control is designed for a stock engine running stock boos, fueling and stock ignition. It can save the engine when things are a miss at 400hp.

When you tune an engine to run 500/550hp, you upgrade the intercooler, downpipe, intake and so on right? Why do we upgrade these parts? Because they were not designed for power levels over 400hp.

The same can be said for the stock knock control system. It is calibrated for cars running 400hp. When running additional power, it is a necessity that additional measures are put into place to save the engine when things go wrong.

I get what you're saying, I am just saying how the video came across (to the amateur/owner/enthusiast like me) and why so many people had questions or felt suspect about the content.

Thanks for all the extra information, really appreciate you taking the time to expand on things.

 

[flybynite]

These engines also suffer from something called LSPI.

If that is something that is happening to these engines then should we think of ditching relying on VAG OEM grades of oil and go straight for the latest API SP rated oil, especially for anything tuned?

AFAIK none of the VAG compliant oil has the API SP rating yet

Personally I think leaving oil in too long is a major cause of LSPI especially if it contains carbon deposits. Changing the oil regularly will help but if there is a specific grade of oil known to be certified as helping with this (and your timing chains) then it has to be a good thing?

 

[wuta3]

If that is something that is happening to these engines then should we think of ditching relying on VAG OEM grades of oil and go straight for the latest API SP rated oil, especially for anything tuned?

AFAIK none of the VAG compliant oil has the API SP rating yet

Personally I think leaving oil in too long is a major cause of LSPI especially if it contains carbon deposits. Changing the oil regularly will help but if there is a specific grade of oil known to be certified as helping with this (and your timing chains) then it has to be a good thing?

I'm no engine engineer but you'd think even with the early spool characteristics of the stock turbo that you'd see LSPI on things like the EA888 tuning more due to direct injection with lack of port injection. The carbon deposits on those engine's valves reguarly find their way to burning up in the cylinder IIRC.

Either way I gather that while the root cause of LSPI can be a bit of a mystery on an individual basis (from oil particles to carbon, blow by, temps, hot spots, pre-ignition pressures, the moon phase) ... the early boost and people lugging the hell out of their engines, in combination with knock detection / retarding / advance issues in maps ... if the DAZA/DNWA are prone to LSPI by design when tuned ... it is a bit of a perfect storm.

It isn't shocking considering the hot hatch wars pre-WLTP were pretty bonkers. Big power, small capacity, low lag was the name of the game. 400bhp is pretty mad for a 2.5l hatch.

With regard to what @Aoon_M was saying, id be more interested in what we can all do when running modified DAZA/DNWA engines to better protect ourselves (without us all going on a road trip to Infinit hah!)

I also want to thank @Aoon_M again for the extra information and would LOVE to see a follow-up video where the LSPI root-failure cause, amongst others are laid out. Clearly a knowledgable guy, and I don't think the video referenced at the start of the thread does the knowledge justice (personal opinion).

 

[flybynite]

but you'd think even with the early spool characteristics of the stock turbo that you'd see LSPI on things like the EA888 tuning more due to direct injection with lack of port injection. The carbon deposits on those engine's valves reguarly find their way to burning up in the cylinder IIRC.

The EA888 has dual injection pre-WTLP and the IS38 is not as aggressive low down as the stock RS3 turbo.

I think the problematic carbon for LSPI comes from the oil film left by the scraper ring, not what falls from the valves. That is why they have developed an oil standard with a different makeup (less calcium) that is less prone to this. Changing it frequently means there will be less carbon in suspension.

I get what you are saying but my question is still that if there is an oil standard specifically developed for this why would we not be using it on tuned RS3s?

 

[wuta3]

The EA888 has dual injection pre-WTLP and the IS38 is not as aggressive low down as the stock RS3 turbo.

I think the problematic carbon for LSPI comes from the oil film left by the scraper ring, not what falls from the valves. That is why they have developed an oil standard with a different makeup (less calcium) that is less prone to this. Changing it frequently means there will be less carbon in suspension.

I get what you are saying but my question is still that if there is an oil standard specifically developed for this why would we not be using it on tuned RS3s?

Ah my mistake on the EA888, I thought they got the EA113 fuel layout. I think the US got an EA888 without port injection or something. Glad those Golf R bunch are getting their valves wet.

I did a bit of reading on this ... Castrol provide VW 502 spec and API SP / GA-6A oils branded as "Euro" in the US. Weirdly, digging through their literature, they say all their Edge (at least) oils are API SP complaint but they're rolling out the branding / licensed "compliance mark" slowly.

No idea how the GR Yaris is managing LSPI

 

[flybynite]

I think the US got an EA888 without port injection

Yes the US cars did not get port injection because they did not need to comply with emissions, easy retrofit though. UK/Euro cars got it until WTLP and when they added to OPF they also removed the port injection on the engine.

Another reason to get a 2017 car, and with the factory Akrapovic exhaust I nearly bought one instead of the RS3.

they say all their Edge (at least) oils are API SP complaint but they're rolling out the branding / licensed "compliance mark" slowly.

I think it will become more mainstream soon, I was looking at the Motul SP stuff and the VAG 502 is different (cheaper)

 

[wuta3]

Yes the US cars did not get port injection because they did not need to comply with emissions, easy retrofit though. UK/Euro cars got it until WTLP and when they added to OPF they also removed the port injection on the engine.

Another reason to get a 2017 car, and with the factory Akrapovic exhaust I nearly bought one instead of the RS3.

I think it will become more mainstream soon, I was looking at the Motul SP stuff and the VAG 502 is different (cheaper)

Slightly off-topic, but even with some weaknesses and limitations, I think the ~2018 DAZA generation / pre-WLTP RS3/TTRS will be seen as a real peak point in future and (maybe) gain 2JZ/Supra, R34 GTR, 22B Impreza status (if they're not already on there way to that now).

8Y and drift mode be damned.

 

[flybynite]

Slightly off-topic, but even with some weaknesses and limitations, I think the ~2018 DAZA generation / pre-WLTP RS3/TTRS will be seen as a real peak point in future and (maybe) gain 2JZ/Supra, R34 GTR, 22B Impreza status (if they're not already on there way to that now).

My thoughts exactly, none of the others are perfect either.

8Y and drift mode be damned.

 

[8YARWY]

Lol........get yer *** over to FB 8V RS3 owners, It's literally all going off.