TDCI means Turbo Diesel Common rail Injection. Instead of having a distributor pump with a separate pipe to each injector, the common rail is just that. A single pipe (or rail) connected to all four injectors. The fuel is allowed through only when the ECU triggers the injector. These common rail systems run at extremely high pressures (in excess of 25,000psi) so please do not attempt to dismantle one unless you have the relevant experience. You might very well seriously injure or kill yourself!
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When a manufacturer develops a new car they have to take into consideration all of the conditions it may be subjected to in all of the regions in which they intend to sell this model. This means instead of just optimising the ECU’s program or ‘map’ to deliver the best performance or the most fuel efficiency they have to make compromises to the map to take into account these potential differing operating conditions. These could include sub-standard fuels, extremes in temperature and altitude, differing emission laws and even the possibility that vehicle may not be serviced on a regular basis and in accordance with the manufacturers recommended instructions.
ECU remapping is taking a read from the ECU’s processing chip of the vehicles standard compromised map and adjusting various parameters within the map such as fuel pressure, boost pressure (on turbocharged applications) ignition advance and throttle pedal control amongst others to release the true performance from the engine. It is a completely safe process as it is just giving the engine the performance it should have had in the first place before all the compromises were applied to the original programming. Every engine will have its own unique map and by adjusting this we can fine tune the characteristics of the engine; unleashing more power and in many cases reduce fuel consumption too.
Unlike other forms of diesel engine, the TDCI offers a lot of boost to the engine. This helps it to reflect the speed and rapid gear changes of a gasoline car, although diesel will still hold in the same gear for a while. There have been more improvements in the TDCI recently, with the invention of an exhaust gas recirculation unit, which attempts to reduce the pollution produced by gasoline still further. The installation of catalytic converters also helps to reduce even the small amount of CO2 which the ordinary diesel car produces. There are significant reasons for purchasing a diesel car, including the fact that TDCI diesel car fuel is often lower in price than gasoline, and that most diesel cars now offer a better engine performance than the closest gasoline engines.
Many see the modern crop of Turbocharged diesels as the future of road car tuning. a nation famed for its love of the petrol engine is starting to come around to the benefits of turbo diesel passenger cars in particular. These engines offer fantastic potential for reliable low cost tuning without removing any of the appeal of buying and running a turbo diesel powered vehicle, such as economy, reliability and longevity.
Solenoid or piezoelectric valves make possible fine electronic control over the fuel injection time and quantity, and the higher pressure that the common rail technology makes available provides better fuel atomisation. In order to lower engine noise, the engine's electronic control unit can inject a small amount of diesel just before the main injection event ("pilot" injection), thus reducing its explosiveness and vibration, as well as optimising injection timing and quantity for variations in fuel quality, cold starting and so on. Some advanced common rail fuel systems perform as many as five injections per stroke.
Common rail engines require very short (< 10 second) or no heating-up time at all, dependent on ambient temperature, and produce lower engine noise and emissions than older systems.
Diesel engines have historically used various forms of fuel injection. Two common types include the unit injection system and the distributor/inline pump systems (See diesel engine and unit injector for more information). While these older systems provided accurate fuel quantity and injection timing control, they were limited by several factors:
Fuel needs oxygen to burn and the engine has to be supplied with huge quantities of air to get enough. You can solve this problem with a bigger engine – or you can solve it with a turbocharger – as in the TDCI. Driven by the exhaust gases, it squeezes air more tightly into the cylinders.
After being drawn through the turbocharger the air is then cooled by passing it through an air to air intercooler (cool air takes up less space than hot air), before entering the combustion chamber where diesel is injected directly into the cylinders at very high pressure through a nozzle. It’s this intensive mixing of highly atomized fuel with the cooled compressed air that leads to better, more efficient combustion.
Your driving experience is quiet and refined because effective sound insulation keeps noise to a minimum, while hydraulic engine mounts ensure smooth, low-vibration running.
When we remap a vehicle, especially when fuel saving is the priority we focus on improving the low end torque in particular and widening the power-band as far as we can.
This increase in low end torque will mean less throttle pedal input is required to maintain cruising speeds, when fully laden or when on a gradient. It will also mean that the vehicle will be more comfortable in higher gears at slower speeds as well requiring fewer gear changes overall.
If you combine these factors with adjusting your driving style to make the most of the extra low end torque you will see an improvement in fuel consumption. This is most effective on turbo-diesel engines where the savings could be as much as 20%!
We do not change any hardware in your vehicle, we just modify the operating parameters in the ECU’s program or ‘map’. In many cases the map stored on the ECU’s processor can be accessed via the on-board diagnostics port (OBD) in the vehicle, normally found under the dashboard. In some newer models the ECU will have to be removed from the vehicle and the casing opened, our technicians will then use specialist tools to read the original map straight from the processing chip.
The technician will then upload the original map to our map writing team who will adjust the parameters to maximise the performance, fuel economy or a clever blend of both. Depending on the vehicle and ECU type the chip tuning process can take under an hour and if at any time you wish to return your vehicles ECU to its original default settings, this can be done easily and free of charge as we always keep a copy of the original software as a backup.