Its not easy owning a Figo when your best friend is a FIAT fan and happens to own a Punto. Oh he is a bhpian too.
You just keep hearing a lot of your Figo being under powered on open stretches and how the Punto is more powerful and stuff like that.
Now faced with the odds, I could do three things.
- I could deny that I had an under powered car and argue that Indian roads were not good enough for high powered cars etc. figo was good for the roads I drove on (kerala roads. Do i need to tell more ?)
- I could sell the car and buy a Punto, but then in the city the Punto felt like a sitting duck and that would mean dealing with a seperate thread of problems starting from the A**
- I could do modification or put in the RACE Chip.
And So I did!!!!
Story goes like this
I bought my Figo in Aug 2010. Did 33K kms. very happy and satisfied apart from the irritating rattles that comes and goes every now and then.
Figo was always a driver's car the thing that was lacking was the power plant. the suspension and the steering said they could handle more but the powerplant was just out of breath when all of the things came into place.
On the figo, you could do normal city ride due to the nice huge torque, low turbo lag and nice gearing but when it came to the open highways it just lacked the punch.
I was constantly being teased for having a car with not so good top end performance when I would invariably end up driving every weekend. I could still do 120-140kmph but the car felt strained
Last time we bhpians met at Kochi, I had asked my bhpian friend "coolclouds" about purchasing the chip (because he had his friend returning from Germany and then somehow the timing was not perfect.
This time I got my friend returning from Germany to get this when he returned.
On Sep 28th I laid my hands on this chip and the wiring.
Installation
The installation is pretty easy if you look at the installation manual. Things are different when you get to the engine bay. Figo has a tight engine bay and you cannot even put your hands through. Now I had the chip and I knew where to put it but I had no means of reaching there.
The Rail Pressure sensor output, where I was supposed to fix the wire, harness and the chip was out of plain sight because the airfilter box and the tubes sits above it and also because the whole fuel rail is behind the engine and the firewall is very close by. So just practically I could not reach there.
It was like the fuel rail was singing "catch me if you can"
I decided since I could not reach the rail from the top I would try and reach from the bottom. I went to a service station, put the car on a hydraulic lift and tried reaching from the bottom. This time the the transmission case was preventing me. I could just pinpoint and touch the sensor but nothing further.
So the only way was to remove the air filter box and the air inlet pipes.
So i got the mechanic in the service center to remove these things. He had no experience opening it up and that was evident from the "is this ok ? Shall i do it ? " looks that he was giving me.
I got the air filter box out and reached the sensor, connected it and checked if everything was working fine. Then connected the Race chip. SUCCESS
I HAVE THE POWER !!! I yelled like He-Man..
Experience after connecting the Race chip
I would not rate the changes in the drive as something as transformational as a rabbit to tiger sort of thing. It is more subtle than that.
The areas where I used to drive previously I drive at a higher gear (3rd instead of 2nd and 4th instead of 3rd)
I can do 100kmph without any sweat. Previously I could do 80Kmph without sweat and 100 just crawled in. The engine did not feel strained and felt like there was more.
The fuel efficiency should increase now cos the gearshifts are lesser.Have not checked it. Will do it over the weekend.
At 120kmph i am using half+something throttle there is certainly more punch. Previously my throttle was floored at 120kmph.
Driving has become effortless since lesser number of gear shifts.
Previously the car used to jarr/jerk/resonate at 50kmph in 5th gear. Now the car is very smooth at 50kmph in 5th gear. The jerking due to gear mismatch is gone.I can shift to 4th at speeds just above 30 and expect the car to just flow on. Previously this was not the case and car would jerk so much.
Car can do more than 160kmph now. I reached 160kmph on my way to office. There was still punch left. I fastest I could in stock version was 155kmph.
The car reached 100kmph in less than 14seconds. I could not time it accurately to say 100kmph in 14 point something. Again will do this over the weekend.
All speeds were calculated with GPS speed sensors on android.
No change in the turbo lag but then when did Figo suffer from turbo lag ?
Now I feel the need for ABS, bigger brakes, fatter tires and spoilers on the car.
I did not take the pics of how I installed it.
Pics after installation to come up soon.