ok went to Subaru dealer to buy some oil filters but they say they dont’ sell it…ya I am in Kaohsiung and there is only one dealer here so they are pretty much monopoly here so won’t sell you shit…you gotta do all the maintenance there…so my question is are aftermarket oil filters ok?
redwagon: I installed EGT they drilled a hole in the uppipe…I guess the warranty is gone? I guess it is and I better get a new uppipe…u got a site or store that I can order it from ? thanks also where can I buy G-tech in Taiwan?
[quote=“ironfist”]ok went to Subaru dealer to buy some oil filters but they say they dont’ sell it…ya I am in Kaohsiung and there is only one dealer here so they are pretty much monopoly here so won’t sell you shit…you gotta do all the maintenance there…so my question is are aftermarket oil filters ok?
[/quote]I’ve heard that a lot of the aftermarket ones are garbage, including some big brands like Fram. The OEM ones are made by Purolator, so if you can find those in the parts store you’re set.
Subaru’s current PN for the filter is 15208AA09A btw. You could have them shipped from home if you get really stuck, they weigh almost nothing.
My local dealer has always sold me anything I wanted btw, they let me copy pages out of the service manual if I have to check between the local and foreign versions etc with no arguments. Mind you, I have put a bit of cash their way over the years.
Do you want to change the oil yourself, or are you just looking to do it cheaper than the dealer, or insist on a particular brand of oil? For the price of labor here (which is what it’s worth) I tend to let the dealer change the oil, but I take my own oil there rather than buy the overpriced rubbish they sell. No arguments about that. Ever.
[quote]
redwagon: I installed EGT they drilled a hole in the uppipe…I guess the warranty is gone? I guess it is and I better get a new uppipe…u got a site or store that I can order it from ? thanks also where can I buy G-tech in Taiwan?[/quote]You shouldn’t have any problem with the warranty unless you are claiming the uppipe itself is bad, or if you’re claiming on damage to the turbo itself. I bet you my kidneys they did not remove the uppipe to install the EGT probe and there is a small chance that the swarf from that operation will damage the turbine on it’s way out the exhaust.
Does the '06 have a cat in the uppipe? IIRC it got one more in the TBE in lieu of the one in the cat, so changing the uppipe won’t get you any gains in power at all. If it does have a cat, then deleting is probably going to cause you to run weak somewhere. We go back to EM again… you flow more air, you have to compensate with more fuel.
I don’t know what it’s like these days. Ta Ching were pretty tolerant when it came to modded cars and it seemed they would honor all reasonable claims. My area service manager was a very nice guy, and luckily he transitioned and now works for SOT. If it was obvious that abuse or stupid mods had caused the damage, he would (rightly) deny a claim, but it wasn’t like the attitude of a lot of SOA’s dealers of “any mod = goodbye warranty”. When my car went to the dealer all I got was nods of approval for what I’ve done to it (and greasy footprints all over the car). I don’t know what SOT is like on warranty wrt mods. Maybe nonsequitur has more experience there.
Well I called few dealers and they say installing the EGT and drilling the hole in uppipe will void the warranty…so I was thinking about doing oil changes in my local shop so they won’t see the sensor and hole…then later if I got problems I just install a new OEM uppipe heh…
ya TUN didn’t remove the uppipe when drillling the hole…after the installation I hear lifter noises…but a day later it was gone…it’s been 1800m since last oil change maybe the oil is getting old…and when he install the oil temp sensor some oil leaked out…it’s like 1/4 full between empty and full…hmm should I add any oil? don’t need to add till it’s below empty line? I wasn’t going to mod the uppipe I was thinking that if something went wrong in the car and I want the warranty to cover it then I will put a new OEM uppipe, so they dont’ see the hole…
hmm this guy says that ecutek with helix downpipe the car will be almost be as quiet as stock? I don’t want loud exhaust…I like to keep it as stock sounding as possible. maybe that’s what I will do…ecutek with helix…
Your dealers are covering their asses with this stuff. Go read the warranty if you don’t believe me. It basically says in there that problems that occur due to your mods are not covered by warranty. Of course the stealership will tell you any old horseshit to get out of processing a warranty claim. “That’s not factory air in them thar tires son, so your warranty claim on the electrical fire is denied!” It doesn’t matter what the dealer says, the decision on any significant claim is always made by a service rep from SOT. After all, it’s they who are stuck with the bills, not the dealer. If you are unhappy with any aspect of service work at an official dealer you just call SOT and complain to them until they send the service rep out. If the rep has a problem with you installing an EGT probe just ask him what PN 22629AA012 is. *
Now, the part I’m confused about: You’re worried fitting an EGT probe into the factory uppipe will void your warranty, but you’re not concerned about fitting an aftermarket exhaust or reflashing the ECU? Help me understand this. I agree with your plan of Ecutek + Helix DP btw, I just don’t understand how flashing the ECU could not void the powertrain warranty.
22629AA012 is the factory EGT sensor installed on '01 and '02 WRX models, but apparently SOT doesn’t know this. Ask nonsequitur
well before I got the car the saleman say aftermarket exhaust won’t void the warranty…dp is part of the exhaust…and ecutek they can’t tell if I have it or not so…
factory EGT sensor that’s pre installed…and me it’s I drilled the hole…isn’t it a lil different, anyways if problems are caused by uppipe EGT hole then they woin’t cover it…other then that they should cover it…and this uppipe won’t mess up much but the turbine…so far it seems ok
[quote=“ironfist”]well before I got the car the saleman say aftermarket exhaust won’t void the warranty…dp is part of the exhaust…and ecutek they can’t tell if I have it or not so…
[/quote]Well, I kinda disagree with you on both points there… or rather I disagree with you on the second and the salesman on the first.
Changing the exhaust will change how much air you can flow, and your boost curve, and your peak boost value, and boost stability. I don’t know how the new 2.5l engine reacts to (say) a 3" catless exhaust but I know on the EJ205 cars you would probably see boost spiking. That’s bad enough even if you have done something to correct fueling. If you haven’t it’s really asking for trouble. If your salesman thinks it’s okay to slap a big ole TBE on there and make no changes to EM, he’s sadly mistaken. If I were the service rep and I had to ok or deny a warranty claim on a car than had broken ring lands or a melted piston, I’d sure as hell be denying it if the car had a modified exhaust because without supporting mods it’s 95% probable to be the cause. Maybe the salesman is oblivious to all this cause and effect stuff, but I bet the service rep isn’t.
Now, I really hope nonsequitur will chime in here because he used to perform Ecutek reflashes professionally. AFAIK the dealer will be able to tell if the ECU has been flashed and you can be sure they are going to deny warranty on the whole powertrain if the ECU contains code that Subaru didn’t write or if they can tell it was tampered with in any way.
[quote]
factory EGT sensor that’s pre installed…and me it’s I drilled the hole…isn’t it a lil different, anyways if problems are caused by uppipe EGT hole then they woin’t cover it…other then that they should cover it…and this uppipe won’t mess up much but the turbine…so far it seems ok[/quote]Yes, this was my point. The only thing your EGT probe could mess up would be the turbine, from steel swarf hitting the blades on the way out. Having the probe in there doesn’t affect anything else directly. They look at things from a cause and effect perspective, or at least they are supposed to. For example, you fit the sensor and next week your shocks spring a leak. They are covered under warranty since there is no possible way the one could have affected the other. But, if your turbo fails and on inspection it’s seen that the turbine blades are pitted to hell, they will point at your probe install and ask how the hole got there, and how come the uppipe shield bolts are untouched, and how you could possibly have gotten that swarf out of there without moving those bolts…
Oh, and please don’t go trying to wriggle the warranty with this ‘swap the parts back and pretend nothing was changed’ thing. It just makes it harder for everyone to process a claim when it is geniune. It’s like cheating on insurance, everyone suffers in the long run. Modify the car sensibly and you won’t break it. You up the power outputs enough and shit will start breaking. You gotta pay to play. But you know that right?
AFAIK, all '04 and onwards WRX have stock EGT sensor fitted on the uppipe. I remember it clearly since I had to have a hole drilled on my aftermarket uppipe to accomodate it. Kinda useless though since the thing went bad right afterwards. I tried to purchase a new stock EGT sensor but when I took the car to SOT, the chief mechanic said there was no such thing. When I popped my hood and pointed the sensor out to him, he asked “When did you install that? We don’t sell aftermarket EGT sensors…”
My advice to you is to just forget the warranty if you are going to mod your car.
As far as the other mods go… the Helix DP will help performance a lot. Just make sure you remove the cat and replace everything with an aftermarket exhaust system. Simply changing the DP will not give you much performance gains. If you don’t want a lot of noise, then I suggest using the Greddy catback system. It’s pretty quite as far as rex exhaust systems go. You will get some boost surge if you do not get a tune from Ecutek.
Regarding Ecutek, just tell the guy you want a street tune. Nothing for the track. I’ve always used 98 gas. It’s safer.
Oh, and the HKS SQV… just leave the thing on. Don’t be removing it and putting it back on all the time. If you think the sound is too loud, just remove the tri-fin thingy from the inside.
With all this car talk it’s like you guys are speaking Chinese…ohh wait…I speak that…umm, it’s like you guys are speaking Latin.
But with regards to the aftermaket pipe. Doesn’t FI automatically adjust for the extra air…the same as it would adjust to less air at a higher altitude?
Yes, today’s cars have onboard computers that automatically adjust the fuel/air ratio. This can be manually adjusted by using either a piggyback aftermarket computer (ex. e-manage), a standalone replacement computer (ex. F-Con), or reflashing the original computer (ex. Ecutek).
The stock EGT sensor on the rex monitors exhaust gas temperatures so it can richen the air/fuel mixture if necessary. The normal rex’s exhaust temperature rarely exceeds 700C but a modded rex can see temperatures of more than 900C. High exhaust temperatures mean more energy released… translating into faster turbo spool up. Basic tuning procedure adjust air/fuel ratio to lean at low rpms to increase exhaust temperature and help the turbo to spool up richening up a bit from mid to high rpms with a small fuel dump during off-throttle (ie. gear change) to help cool off things. That small fuel dump is what causes the small fireball to appear during gear changes in rexs.
I think I remember reading somewhere that the USDM EJ255 and 257 engines did not get an EGT sensor, so I’m pretty sure the STi and FXT models do not have them. The '06 WRX I know very little about. AFAIK Taiwan is importing US-spec Subarus.
Mordeth, the ECUs on most EFI cars run in two modes. One is closed loop where the fuel/air ratio is monitored by an O2 sensor in the exhaust. The ECU has maps for various parameters such as rpm, throttle position, boost, airflow, coolant temperature etc etc and then trims fuel based on these maps. The O2 checks the ECU’s work and provides feedback so the ECU can modify the way it interprets the maps, or modify the maps themselves, within limits. This is a really good way to get the engine to run cleanly and efficiently at a stoichiometric air/fuel ratio, but it doesn’t do well at all under heavier loads. Any one of the maps will trigger the transition from closed to open loop control under increased airflow, higher rpm, throttle position or manifold pressure. IOW, once you put your foot in it the ECU basically quits trying to save money and trees and starts cramming as much fuel through the injectors as it thinks there is air enough to burn.
Once in open loop the O2 sensor gets ignored completely since fuel/air mixtures are going to be allowed to get rich beyond the point where the normal narrow-band O2 sensor can read. In this realm the ECU relies almost completely on the maps for TPS, rpm, boost and load. In nonsequitur’s WRX the EGT sensor would keep an eye open for dangerously high temps which is one of sensing that the engine may be in danger of melt down. Severe engine damage can and does occur from detonation which can happen in an instant and before the EGT sensor alerts the ECU to what is going on. Some reflashes may move the EGT limits upwards so they are not so easily tripped. Most ECUs also stop listening to the knock sensor in open loop mode since there’s so much mechanical noise the ECU can’t tell knock from piston slap at those revs. The factory maps are rather conservative and push more fuel than is necessary into the cylinders because it’s a simple and reliable method of keeping the temperatures down and preventing detonation. When people start dabbling with turning up the boost or allowing the engine to breathe more air than the maps anticipated it’s pretty easy for something very bad to happen before the CEL comes on, and that often ends in melted or broken parts.
In a way you are right. The ECU would adjust for most changes as long as it were in closed loop mode… but we don’t mod vehicles for crawling around trying to save gas! That’s why it is still necessary to somehow adjust the open loop fueling to better match the amount of air the engine can breathe, or the level of boost it may reach after being modified. One way or another, more fuel has to be injected to burn the extra air being ingested or engine go boom boom very soon.
Wow, great explanations Nonsequitur and Redwagon. Helped me a lot…as well as others I’m sure. I’ll probably copy and paste those answers in a few other forums.
If I ever decide to have a kid…could either of you donate some sperm? I’d like for it to be smart.
[quote=“Mordeth”]
If I ever decide to have a kid…could either of you donate some sperm? I’d like for it to be smart.[/quote]Uh, I might not have any left. All that jerking off y’know… I bet nonsequitur has some. He’s better looking than I am anyway.
lol, forget about the sperm, just by listening to them you and your future kids will be smarter already lol
yeah redwagon I guess it’s to mod it and forget about the warranty or just keep it stock…or make sure I know what I am doing first before modding it, hehe I have a lot to learn.
so on a stock car EGT should be less then 700c…how about with ecutek and helix DP? what will the temp like with that.
oh anyone know where I can get a G-tech in Taiwan?
[quote=“Nonsequitur”]:lol: I was trying not to get into the closed/open loop thing with Mordeth…[/quote]Don’t let his… er… unconventional… ideas about road safety fool you, I’m sure he can keep up with most anything.
I specifically went into the closed/open loop thing because it seems the OP (or at least his salesman) aren’t up on the effect of just bolting parts on an otherwise stock engine. This just reinforces my opinion that auto salesmen are by and large woefully uneducated on their product. I’d like to see if that guy would put it in writing that the exhaust can be changed at will without doing anything to compensate for it. Not that SOT would honor it, but it would be funny to have it on paper.
That’s the truth, when I took my TDI in for it’s 1000km service the VW customer service manager proudly announced that Esso cheapo rubbish oil is for Turbo Diesels and the expensive German VW OEM oil is for gas engines… I though the was trying to pull a fast one since I had negotiated 2 free services and oil changes before I signed on the car, but he actually seemed to believe his VW OEM is only for gas engines lark… needless to say after some shouting they used the VW oil at 3x the price of Esso… idiots…
With a decent Ecutek tune and the Helix DP, you shouldn’t see temperatures higher than 800C. You’ll only see temperatures of 900C in a highly modded rex.
Regarding the salesmen and customer service manager… this should actually include the entire company’s staff. There have been too many instances where I’ve called for a guy’s supervisor because I thought he knew nothing about the product only to find out that his supervisor knew even less. :fume:
Nonsequitur should I get the delta dash so I can datalog myself to see if it’s knocking? which and what do you recommend? I think I will just do ecutek and a DP…later maybe full exhaust…and then more much later…
so after the ecutek I will be using 98 always? or can I switch between 95 and 98? and dealer can see that I did ecutek how about I think the delta dash package I can switch back to stock map? is that a good idea
Cha-bu-duo is Chinese for “close enough”. It’s refered to often in these forums to describe their lack of detail in almost all fields here in Taiwan.
There is even a book with a Taiwanese author with this title which describes how low the Chinese people have fallen from what they once were (the greatest nation on the planet). And it points out this Cha-bu-doa attitude as being their single biggest flaw.
*
I was trying not to get into the closed/open loop thing with Mordeth…
