jcjmw

I am curious as to what kind of CHIPS and/or ECU upgrades people on this forum have made to their E55. Some of the prices that I have seen for the CHIPS and ECU upgrades are pretty $$$. Before I spend the money, I was curious if they actually work, if they are worth the money, and any drawbacks (like voiding the warranty)? I was thinking about evosports ECU upgrade. Any comments or suggestions? Thanks ahead of time for any feedback and comments. Thanks.

Mach430

Every ECU upgrade that have experimented with for that car has been useless. Gains are minimal if any. On Mercedes supercharged engines they seem to work fairly well, but ECU tuning gains on the E55 so far don't prove to be much.

While the ECU upgrade is on our website, it is currently not available, as we are waiting for one with better gains.

Shine

I used to drive a Volvo 850R, chip tunning is popular for those Turbo cars.... 40+ hp gain is easy.
My question is how aftermarket chips cheat the ECU, the O2 sensors feedback abnormal detected then system will refine
"a self retune cycle by ECU of modern cars"
that kills the performance which you expect from chips tunning.
The cycle takes 2~3 days, while dyno tells you "great" in day-1
so are the DM said.
The only thing I trust is delimiter, it works well.


Prolong the redline could be another doable, IMO.

pocholin

The best selling point for chipping the E55 is the delimiter and moving the rev limiter a little bit higher. that would be worth 400 to 500 dlls to me.

jcjmw

Wow, I am a little surprised that the chips or ECU reprogramming for the E55 will not provide a respectable gain in hp. I figured that the ECU modifications would result in some kind of "feel in the pants" hp gain on the E55, especially giving the $$$ that some of the vendors are asking. So, I guess the only modifications (regarding HP gains) that I can do to the E55 is (1) supercharger (which I will get later b/c of the costs); (2) K&N filter (which I already ordered); (3) the pulleys (which I will avoid due to concerns about possible detrimental affects on the engine); and (4) and providing a heat sheat to the air box - as discussed in this forum's topic "CLK and E 55 Performance tip." I would like to upgrade the exhaust. However, nobody has published or provided any reliable info on the gains that I could expect on a E55 from upgrading the exhaust. Am I correct or have I missed something? By the way, thanks for everyone's reply. Your info has been very helpful.

pocholin

jcjmw, I think you are correct, except that there was a guy in U.A.E. that removed the premufler and he claimed better response from the car. He then wrecked it!

Sleestack

Quite honestly, on a normally aspirated engine, a combination of chips, exhaust and air filters might get you 20 -25 hp, however, the only way you are going to get any significant performance gains is to supercharge it (Kleemann of course) or to do a full engine tuning with cams, headers, etc.

Shine

jcjmw

The exhaust upgrade could help ~8% hp up, it refers to
the whole exhaust system, front// middle//rear and it costs
$$$,said, ~ $5000
ppl who love the sporty tone, can upgrade the muffler
that change the "tone" well but it's minor to hp improvement.

jcjmw

$5K for a complete exhaust - mmmmm, I do not believe my wife will tolerate it - especially since we will soon have a new house. But, who makes the complete exhause that you are referring?

Mach430

JCJMW:

What possible detrimental effects on the engine are you talking about? As a performance upgrade, the pulleys would be the LEAST dangerous for the engine. They do absolutely nothing to make the crank spin faster, or the engine make more power. They only free up power from accessories that the engine provides power to. Doing so allows more power to reach the rear wheels. There is absolutely no upgrade less dangerous to the engine that gains HP. As for the K&N filter... that's like driving with your head out the window grinning your teeth. Dirt will get through.

Shine

I'm survey mine(CLK50K) this moment, and the dealer told me
that costs $$$
(1) MKB,exhaust is one of their V8 "55" upgrade kits
(2) Carlsson exhaust, they S/C the V8 engine, too.
(3) Special order from Sebring, they do OEM for many brands.

jcjmw

MACH 430

My understanding of the underdrive pulleys was that some of them required a replacement pulley for the crank. If that is the case, that could have a detrimental affect on the engine and how it operates. I am not familiar with mercedes performance parts. All the underdrive pulleys that I have seen (for other cars) and put on required an underdrive crank pulley. So, I am assuming that the underprive pulleys for the E55 for the mercedes also require an underdrive pullye for the crank. If I am wrong, please let me know. I very much want to increase the hp and torque. Also, do you have an underdrive pulley on your car? If so, from where and can you feel a difference?

Regarding the K&N, I have always had good experiences with them. I have them on all my cars. One of my prior cars, which was a turbo, the dyno should the K&N resulted in a 5hp rearwheel gain. Ever since then, I used K&N on all my cars. The K&N seems to be doing a pretty good job of filtering, as I have never seen any differences with more dirt or so forth with the OEM air filter. Also, K&N never needs replacinng. I just clean it twice a year and, if needed, reoil it once a year. I save $$$ from having to keep buying air filters.

Mach430

Many underdrive pulley kits include crank pulleys. Ours do not. We are the only manufacturer of MB underdrive pulleys, and we spent the time to design a kit that does not need additional help from changing the crank pulley. This is why they are so reliable! With our pulleys, you will have an increase of 15HP at the rear wheels instantly when flooring it at a standstill. Our Evosport Underdrive Pulleys work great on my car, and every other Mercedes we have installed them on. Our BMW pulleys have been featured in numerous magazine articles including European Car, and are already on hundreds of BMW street and race applications.

If you have any other questions, feel free to email me!

Thanks

Ben

jcjmw

MACH 430

Ok, looks like I will be getting the evosport underdrive pulleys. I am in las vegas, can you recommend anybody to do the work?

Mach430

Any shop should be able to do the installation for you. Email me your contact information, and we can go over everything on Monday.

Pierre32///AMG

http://www.hs-elektronik.com/datenbl...s-e55-amg.html

380 hp, 405 lt, $US 1,250 here and you should send the ECU to germany, and of couse delimitated.



Pierre32///AMG

Mach430

Those are virtually impossible claims for a naturally aspirated Mercedes. Especially with US gas.

Ted Baldwin

.........I'm interested in more info regarding chip tunning for a superchrged V6. I have generally avoided chip tunning because I thought that the claims of HP gains are bogus. But it sounds to me that some on the forum think that chip tunning for a supercharged MB might result in more HP gains. If so, which is the best Chip and how much HP gain for a supercharged V6. Thanks.

Ted

JasonH

Check this out:

http://www.perfectpower.com/Products/smt6.asp

Newest version of a piggy-back ECU system. I am running the previous version SMT5i on my car, and can say this system blows away & is cheaper than chips. Give's you complete tuning control via your laptop.

Jason

pocholin

Many times that can be a bad thing if you don't know what you are doing like most of us

Ted Baldwin

...............pardon my lack of sophisc\tication on this matter, but if i want to use this SMT6 what exactly do I do next? how do I connect the program to my car? From my laptop? If so what cables do I use and specifically where do I purchase these things?

Ted

JasonH

Hi Ted,

The actual unit (small box) has to be wired into your ECU. (In most cases I was splicing into wires). So either you or a perfectpower dealer would have to install the unit. If you have a dealer (they are listed on the website) near you, I would suggest going that route. In my case, I didn't have a dealer nearby, so my local shop and I worked with a dealer (via phone when we had questions during install & set-up that we couldn't figure out from the manuals). However, if I had a dealer with a dyno in my area I would have certainly gone that route because I ultimately would have saved both time and money.

The perfectpower folks were very prompt in getting us a wiring diagram that identified which wires (from pin location on ECU) needed to be tapped or spliced into. They didn't originally have my diagram, but got it for us in one day when we requested it.

Overall, I have been very pleased with this unit. It definitely does what it claims to do. I would suggest going through the information on the website, it will answer most of your questions. You can also download maunuals (installation & software operation) to see what it's all like.

Jason

Ted Baldwin

Thanks.

Ted

Mach430

We underdrive the alternator, power steering pump, and water pump. Each accessory is left at reliable performance levels, in order to keep the stock-like quality of the car. Your lights will not dim at idle unless you have a large power drain (ie big aftermarket stereo).

E55 KEV

jcjmw, have you looked into the Performance Packages/ECU upgrades by Renntech for E55:

Package 1 $3,495:
374Hp
415 Torque

Package 2 $4,195:
380Hp
421 torque