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The most awaited mod for my EcoSport Thunder; Other aesthetic updates

31st May 2024, 10:33 by Rahul Nagaraj

I paid about 160 Euros including shipping it to India.

BHPian jithin23 recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Some Tweaks to Keep the Red Dragon Relevant.

As the car has completed 1.1L kms, I periodically changed the timing belt so that the engine is at its optimal health. All the services till date have been done at FASS Only! Post this, I got the EGR cleaned by a friend of mine who was a former technician at Ford. He came home and it took us almost 4 hours to clean the EGR body as the EGR body was hard to open. I think if these 2 things are taken care of, the engines will last longer. People think above 1L kms, the car gets old but I believe that is the real test for the car and sadly many people ignore these points. Already numerous folks have posted pics in detail about EGR cleaning, so I'll be skipping this part.

India's only Race Red EcoSport Thunder Variant. Also the love it receives from EcoSport Clubs is immense. People have bought and still continue to buy EcoSport due to the confidence of the Red Thunder Dragon.

Finally I got my most awaited mod from Germany which was partly done by Fmods team. I got the OBD tool which displays critical engine data such as coolant and engine oil temp(for AT, even the transmission temperature can be displayed) as well as TPMS on the Sync 3 screen(very useful for Endeavour 2016-19, Aspire with sync3 and Freestyle with sync 3 as these cars do not display TPMS values directly. Aspire/Freestyle do not have TPMS from the factory but the TPMS frequency is same as the EcoSport which is 433Mhz and for the Endeavour it is 315 Mhz). This also displays Dpf and soot values which are useful for owners with Bs6 diesels. They have encrypted the OBD based on the VIN so that people do not clone their product and resell it. I paid about 160 Euros including shipping it to India.

I believe it is a super useful mod yet functional. Works with Android Auto/Carplay as well as an overlay. To make the mod working, first prep up the sync 3 by jailbreaking it and adding custom apps section. Then you need to procure the OBD from any of the admins in the Fmods team in Europe and then they will provide some files based on your vehicle and fuel type and you can flash that in your sync 3 and the OBD will get activated. Additionally for some CGEA cars we can change drive modes from the sync 3 screen(unfortunately EcoSport doesn't support it).

Drive modes through sync 3. I am still working on fully activating it from the sync screen

CGEA= Common Global Electrical Architecture Platform(Most of the Fords globally have this architecture)
C1MCA= Used mostly for European models such as Focus, S-Max, C-Max, Mondeo and the likes

The OBD from Germany(I've connected it to the back of the OBD and sealed it inside for a discreet look, plus the main obd can be used as well)

Some Pics for better understanding

All the engine parameters overlaying on the Android Auto screen

Home screen with info on the tpms(it's in bar)

A dedicated app in sync 3 by fmods for OBD parameters including turbo boost

The next mod was to change the Car's theme to the EcoSport Thunder Variant externally. The Thunder Variant was launched in 2019-20 in four colours only(White, Silver, Grey and Canyon Ridge). No Thunder edition was ever present in red, so I decided why not. From Start to Finish, it was an exciting challenge as the stickers were insanely expensive at Ford for the bonnet(12k for the bonnet sticker).So I asked a group member to bring his car for reference at a sticker shop at Hebbal. Took measurements of the decal and asked my sticker shop guy to replicate the same. We have created a template as well with the exact measurements for future reference. We did something similar for the Storm stickers too and it came out well. One of our friends was very particular about using Avery Dennison sticker material as it is meant for automotives and recommended by OEMs such as Toyota and Ford. To identify an Avery Dennison sticker, their company logo and Avery Dennison will be printed at multiple places on the back side of the sticker material. The entire stick design cost was about 5k.

Thunder Template

Storm Template

The stickers alone aren't enough for the Thunder variant, Ford being Ford as always did some tricks here too. They changed the entire running board for Thunder variant and the plastic cladding on the door as well. For the Thunder variant, EcoSport will be written on the rear door plastic panel. This took almost a month to arrive and the total expenditure for the door claddings and running board was about 11k(rear doors 800 each, front doors 1700, running board 3k each for left anf right and the fender plastic was 600 each).

I've attached the part numbers randomly

End Result for the side

The Decal and the Running board has been changed to the Thunder ones

See the difference between the stock door panels and running board(in black plastic) vs the Thunder ones I've installed(the cuts and creases). Such changes are the reasons for Ford's losses(too many part variations and wiring variations)

Here's Bhpian's Mad4bhp's EcoSport Storm

Bonus Mod: Fmods team came up with some games too under the custom apps sections. I downloaded minesweeper and a car game to kill time in the ever growing Bangalore Traffic. Since sync 3 uses QML architecture, I'm thinking if I can try to implement wireless AA+CP by running a program code(anyway the Chinese HUs have these functionality using an app called zlink)

The Custom Apps Section

Pipeline Mods: Sliding Armrest from the UK/US spec EcoSport(the whole armrest must be changed, not the center console, OE cooled seats(much needed now), custom maps for drive modes(I already have the digital cluster and the Mode button), OE rear disc(the 4x4 EcoSport Diesel in Europe has it), a glowing Shelby logo at the front replacing the current one and a full engine+gearbox swap to the 1.5 EcoBlue 4x4 diesel from Europe.

Refernce for the Shelby Logo

The reason why I didn't add a few mods such as ADAS is it does not fulfil my requirement of simple yet functional. Secondly, Insurance and RTO will definitely raise eyebrows if the car gets involved in a crash and the insurance and RTO come to inspect the car. I believe these need to come from the factory as they have the right calibration methods. Already I've burnt my hands once by changing headlights from The Automotive Lighting Experts which is run by Anton. My car had caught fire last year due to their incorrect wiring gauge plus a conked up ballast for headlight wiring. I barely managed to walk out alive(I'm not posting the pics here as it still traumatizes me). He hasn't taken any accountability at all nor provided a proper compensation and the insurance too took some time to get approved(I had to pull some strings to get the insurance approved) as they had mentioned that this bulb+ballast is aftermarket and we won't approve. Luckily things went well and after that I've been skeptical about aftermarket headlight upgrades. I'd suggest not to go to Automotive Lighting Experts for any Headlight related work, rather Motofocuz run by Satish in Chennai is far more professional.

No, I won't go for sync 4 too(too buggy as per forums and not very useful if you're upgrading from sync 3), I will wait for the sync 5(codenamed Phoenix internally) to launch and will go for it as it's leaps ahead of sync 4 and more fluid in response. Wireless charger too I feel will overheat the phone and will reduce the usable life of the phone.

Link regarding sync 5: https://www.macheforum.com/site/thre...de-look.31282/

On the Travel front, not much this year except for constant sprints to Chennai and one drive to Kodai(was super hot this time around). If time permits, I will complete the remaining NE circuit.

One of the club members from Kerala had gifted me this lovely poster! Kudos to his passion for automobiles (rare to find this passion in thr current gen kids) Being 15 yrs old, he took a bus ride for 30kms just to see me and get a ride in my car. Can't thank him enough for this poster though!