[Midnight Tboy]

hi all,

I'm new to the site, and must admit quite...no very....lame when it comes to my knowledge of cars. I can reflow circuit boards, electronics, and of course work with computers....so basically a computer geek....but I never had the interest in cars since childhood...I'd struggle bigtime to change a tyre...had a very disappointed father lol....please go easy on me lol

Anyways, about 9months back I bought a Zafira Design on a 56 plate. 1.9CDTI. It still has a few months warranty left on it (Sherwoods of Darlington). I believe it is a 120bhp.....but on looking at the DTUK site am now unsure to if I have the 16v which is supposedly 110 or the 8v 120 so I'll have to check that when find my book (at parents house cos they manage my car stuff so easier to keep there...I just fix their pcs instead ). It definately has a DPF tho (cos the bugger has already been back to dealers twice for the EGR valve!! - touch wood sorted for a few month now tho(!)

Now I initially upgraded from an Almera 3 door sport 1.8 petrol, because a) having 2 kids now and b) in thinking the fuel economy would be a lot better.....but in some ways I've been underwhelmed....it "feels" more "sluggish".....and my trip computer reports an mpg of 40.3 but on the brim to brim tests I'm pretty much around the 43-45mpg range...and thats when really trying to get most out of full tank. Thats driving usually 20mile trips to and from work mostly (about 13ish on B roads at 50-60mph average.....then slowish urban driving heading into Durham centre). When I do motorway trips I do generally stick to around 70 thereabouts and tend not to thrash the engine

Anyways, I'd heard in past of "chipping" your car...and of course thought nothing of it, but now stumbled across reading this site and the DTUK sellers of the Green and CRD2 chips...and the fact that its a removable item and not a permanant modification much more appealing to me, so I've read a fair bit on it the last couple of days....I'm stilll unsure of a few things however. Unlike most of you of course I am more about having the extra mpg improvement than being able to see how many points I can rack up lol ....but of course having the extra acceleration is always nice and useful....and to be honest the few times I've "stumbled upon" 80+ the engine doesnt sound too great.

1. What are the risks of using these chips? Like when overclocking a pc for example and tweaking voltages etc you do inevitably shorten the life of your mobo and or cpu/ram regardless of how well additionally cooled the system is. A lot of people do it for "gaming purposes" but if "stock speed" is enough to play what you want and do the work you want and the system will theoretically last longer then for some is it simply worth leaving it be? however believe I'm answering my own question here as as far as I've read so far there should be no adverse side effects. (It is a car I intend to keep for a good many years til I've run it to the ground tho - being a family man now )....well until the weekend (and return trips from work )

2. linked with question 1....what would happen in worst case scenario if I was messing with the settings and I accidentally set the highest setting for quite a period of time........would it potentially fry the on board computer / other issues? Not being an "expert" "enthusiastic" driver......dont really know if I would know if there was a problem lol.....my usual response to fixing noises is to turn the volume up on the radio

3. I was looking at joining this site...but as far as I can tell have to make a min number of posts etc (damn I should have posted each paragraph as a seperate post ) Am I allowed to ask what the member price is on the CRD2 here at the moment?

4. Whats the current price also (or rough figure) on the Simota Induction kit also? as the website doesnt list the price. I've read that dont get any performance boost, but thought whilst I was there if was getting a CRD2 then if cost wasnt too much then worth getting in 1 trip.

5. Is it worth waiting for my car to be officially out of warranty before putting this on? Presumably in the system logs it would show that something had been attached had something gone wrong?

There was another question but getting sleepy now as a busy day at work tmw!! and typically I'm actually working in Stanley tomorrow too!! (new NHS building thats nearly finished there)

Going to get some shuteye where I'll no doubt remember the oh so important question and will bug me til the morning when I'll forget it.

Thanks for reading and hope you forgive my random ranting
Strangely the more I read the more I like the idea of tweaking the heffalump til it goes like Colin McRae once did

cheers,
Tuck

 

[Mixman]

Hello Tuck and welcome to AON :wave:

I have a Zafira with a CRD2. It's the 150BHP but has a DPF.

1. I've had a CRD2 on for 45,000 miles and had no problems due to this. My DPF was checked recently for some work and was absolutely fine.

2. If you accidently chose the highest setting, it would still run but produce lots of smoke, may bring on the engine management light but you change the settings and will be fine.

3. There is normally anything between £50-£80 off the prices. It depends how good business has been or how generous Abyss is feeling (Y) But the £10 a year fee gets you a trade discount card too so you can get anything up to £50 off each service too.

4. The Simotas are hard to get hold of but I'm sure Andrew will reply. They make the breathing of the engine better and less smoky but obviously has to be changed if you have a picky warranty garage. I think they are about £150 ish but occasionally come up for sale in the 'For Sale' section funnily enough (Y) You see these extra sections when you join

5. Once the CRD2 has been removed there is no way of telling it has been fitted. There are no logs kept etc as the ECU is not changed (Y)

On a seperate note, you will gain 40-50bhp but the Zafiras need a good long drive at constant speeds, motorways etc, for the DPF to regenerate. In the long run, if you don't do this once a month or so, the DPF will become blocked.

Hope this answers your questions, when you wake up, if there are any more, let us know (Y)

 

[ABYSS]

Hi Tuck

Mickie has just about covered everything tbh...

Ive just dropped our 3 year old off at Nursery that is right next door to were youre going to be working..

As for warranty, i would recommend extending your warranty on your Zafira as if anything goes wrong with the 1.9cdti its an expensive engine to put right.

Pop down to see me as i have lots more i can tell you off the forum about warrantys etc...


Andrew