An Insight into Tuning

Car tuning is usually the improving of performance or aesthetics of a vehicle, with engine tuning being the modification of engines for increase in output, economy or resilience. Production vehicles manufactured for the masses across the globe leave the factory with a standard setup for an average driver’s expectations and conditions. With tuning, the characteristics of the car can be customised to owners’ preferences for enhanced output, economy and handling.

Patric Simon, technical director of local tuning company X-Factor Tuning, shares some insights on tuning.

His specialisation in engineering is deep, having studied the fields of mechanical, electrical, electronic, computer and software programming. With 15 years of experience in this line and hailing from a software precision technology background, the Swiss engineer moved to Singapore four years ago. Having worked with the BMW Sauber F1 team before, he is familiar with high performance cars.

When cars are made in the factories, it’s a common setup for the ECU for the whole world. However, depending on where the cars are sent to, there are different climates, temperatures and petrol quality. Tuning will help to improve the standard setup of the car for smoother performance, better output and enhanced driving characteristics.

There’s actually quite a big market for cars in Singapore, with over 600,000 passenger cars on the roads, not counting the taxis, buses and goods vehicles. We saw how there is potential in the tuning market, especially with the right tools and services. Every modern engine has an ECU and most can be upgraded. We are also always updating our software and keeping up with the technology as it is important to stay on top.

Before you tune any car, you have to understand the technology and you have to know what you are doing. There are a lot of different maps and you must have the knowledge and not change the parameters anyhow.

It is not enough to have knowledge about cars only. For tuning, it is essential to have engineering, software and programming background as well. That way, you will truly know how re-mapping is done.

You cannot just do a three-day course and then become a tuner. It is easy to download and upload a file, especially with a device, but to do customised tuning you really need the knowledge.

We have professional data banks and professional equipment from Europe to carry out the tuning processes for high quality optimum tuning results. We will customise and change the performance of the car and there will definitely be a difference felt. Customers can expect better characteristics of the car, such as more power and more torque.

We have a seven-day money back guarantee where customers can come back and get a refund if the car’s performance has no improvement at all. We will always keep the original file, just in case we need to do a reverse tune to stock conditions.

We are able to tune all car brands, but to save time you don’t have to come all the way down to us. You can email us information of your car first. From there we’ll be able to know your standard ECU and the standard data, then we can create different packages for you.

50 Ubi Ave 3
#01-01/02 Frontier
Singapore 408866
(inside Cars & Stars showroom)
T: 9363 2455
E: info@x-factortuning.com.sg
W: www.x-factortuning.com.sg

Credits: Cheryl Tay