– Car tuning: everything you need to know

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Audi engine bay

Car tuning

This guide will take you through every fundamental tuning stage. From finding a reliable tuning workshop to the steps that will tune your car’s performance to the next level.

Choose the right workshop

 

The first recommendation is to do some online research. If you live in or near Adelaide we obviously recommend our website which includes a powerful search tool that allows you to look for mechanics based on the service they offer and your location. You’ll only have to select your car manufacturer, “Performance upgrades” under the “service required” section and select “near my location” in the location field.

You’ll get a list of the best workshops near you, all specialised in car tuning for your car manufacturer. Clicking on each one of the names you’ll be able to read a quick description of their strengths and you’ll see photos of their past work. This should be the quickest way to get the info you’re looking for your vehicle and you can even directly contact them through the form in the same page. Could it be any easier?

Find the best mechanics in Adelaide, specialised in Car Tuning

If you don’t want to use our website, there’s always Google maps but it usually gives you a list of every mechanic in your area, not always related to what you’re exactly looking for, performance upgrades in this case.

A good car tuning workshop should have a modern test bench and obviously a lot of knowledge and passion about tuning & motorsport. Also, reliable performance workshops generally only install the best components from well-known manufacturers. In addition, they like to constantly develop their own products, based on their training and personal experience. 

Passion and technology in the tuning workshop

The enthusiasm of a tuner usually lies in fast vehicles and in making them even faster.  Modern tuners do almost everything that demanding tuning fans like and the possibilities are almost unlimited. From tuning through chip tuning to the meticulously constructed racing engine, almost everything is possible.

But be careful!

A great car tuning workshop has to find the right balance between performance and reliability. Nobody wants their engine to blow up because it’s overpowered or underbody damage caused by stiff suspensions.

Chip tuning

Chip performance upgrade
Auto mechanic using laptop while installing a software upgrade to a car (image by Drazen Zigic)

The software of the control unit is replaced or tweaked so that your car puts out more horsepower and torque. Tuning can also lead to better fuel consumption. The car tuning experts first measure all the necessary data in the tuning workshop such as the power dissipation, torque and engine output to name a few, and then overwrite them for a balanced increase in power. It is particularly important that the safety functions of the control of the engine generally remain activated in order to protect the engine from possible damage.

Engine and gearbox tuning

Engine tuning
 

If you want to go all out right away, you may get your own engine built directly by the tuning workshop. When building the engine, a good tuner only uses top-quality motorsport parts to make it stable and reliable.

When you tune your engine, it is also recommended to carry out an upgrade of the gearbox too.

In fact, torque readings, after the engine tuning, can be too high for the manufacturer original settings of the transmission which can result in limited torque and performance. This would make the engine tuning efforts vain.

Well done gearbox tuning would increase torque limits in the transmission which will “transmit” more power to the wheels. For this reason, it would be a good idea to install an upgraded performance clutch kit.

BeDI cleaning and Walnut blast

Audi Q7 before walnut blast

Audi Q7 after walnut blast

With a BEDI cleaning the tuner cleans the engine from carbon residues, which often build up in engines with direct injection. These residues can result in relevant power loss. In order for the engine to get fit again, the tuner frees the combustion chambers, intake paths, valves, EGR valves, idle controllers and the throttle parts from the deposits using chemicals.

A more efficient way has now been found and it is called walnut blast. The name is pretty self-explanatory. Crushed walnut shells are blasted through the engine using compressed air. The downside of this method is that not all the previously mentioned parts of the engine can be reached so it is often recommended to carry out both a walnut blast and BeDI cleaning in combination to achieve best results.

Connecting rods

Con rods and pistons

The connecting rods (or con rods) should always be inspected in order to prevent piston damage. In the best tuning workshops, the technicians can measure and angle the con rods so that you can continue to achieve full performance in the future. When the vehicle is being setup to achieve very high performance, with a big increase from the manufacturer specs, it is recommended to replace the con rods with upgraded ones, made from more resistant materials that can better support the increased power.

Injectors upgrade

The best car tuning workshops can also carry out the testing and cleaning of high-pressure injectors. Optimal cleaning with a nozzle test bench is usually sufficient to restore a smooth running of the engine and get a better fuel consumption.

Most of the stock injectors can support some light tuning but if you want to go a step forward, you’ll need to upgrade to bigger injectors. Please note that we’re going into the racing world here which means that you might start experiencing some idling or low-speeds issue. 

When upgrading the fuel injectors, you should be looking into upgrading the fuel pump too, otherwise the stock fuel pump might not be able to support them.

Conclusion

In this article we went through the main and most common performance upgrades but keep in mind that almost every car component can be upgraded to achieve better performance and the limits solely depend from the budget.

You’re now ready to find the workshop that’s going to make you achieve your dreams. Click on the link below to start your search.

Find the best mechanics in Adelaide, specialised in Car Tuning and Performance Upgrades