Two weeks ago I set off up to Stockport, from Bridgend in South Wales,(53.8mpg average 52.5mph) I have followed Rick from Unicordevelopments for a fair length of time now and fully trust the reviews of his work. I left home at approx 6am and got to his place at around 10.30. Rick immediately started work on my car. We agreed before hand that he would do a run on the dyno with the Bluespark box connected and then one totally standard, that way we would have a benchmark figure.
The first run on the dyno was a revelation, BMW state the car produces 218bhp, it produced a figure of,,,,,219bhp. A whole 1bhp more than the factory figures, not bad for a £295 tuning box (more on that later). Rick then did a run with the box off, totally standard car, it produced 221bhp which was a nice surprise to us both.
He then went away to do his 'fettling' and worked on the ecu and did another run. After a fair amount of time he was ready to do another run, just under 250bhp was his first result. I was tired by this time and I went to my hotel for a rest after a long drive up. I returned at around 5 0'clock to see rick still working his bit. He did another run this time it produced 273bhp with a massive amount of torque increase. As he is a perfectionist he wasn't quite happy so he returned to his computer to fettle a little more. It was very late in the day for him, gone 7PM!! He finally did one more run after a few tweaks and the final figure he came back with was 276bhp complemented by 388 ft.lbs torque. This is a huge increase over stock.The drive back was interesting to say the least, the torque from low down is incredible and it just seems to rev right to the red line. I was too tired to push it much on the way home but the overtaking power is incredible and the roll on from 80mph ( on the bit of quiet private road I found
) is astounding! I simply cannot praise Rick enough for the remap, he could have stopped at around 250bhp after the first run, as many others may have, he was convinced there was much more to be had and he was proved right. He didn't stop working on my car until gone pat 8pm so was his conviction to the job. If anyone is thinking about a remap I can't recommend Rick enough.
The Bluespark box????
I purchased it the day I picked up my 125D and fitted it after driving home. I drove home in Eco pro mode as I knew no difference at the time. Therefore I didn't know the true potential of the car in Comfort or sports Mode. I fitted the box and was initially disappointed with the performance gains. Having spoke to the reps they instructed me to increase the setting to the max settings, which I did. I've been driving around 'thinking' that I had around 275bhp as advertised. Knowing what I do now I am very very disappointed. I have emailed Bluespark and spoke to them and they are astounded at the results, I have emailed copies of the dyno runs to confirm the zero increase. I accept that my unit maybe faulty and i will be sending it back for a full diagnostics to see exactly what the problem is. I am expecting a full refund on the price due to the fact it is not fit for purpose or as described. I'm not knocking Bluespark on the whole I may have just had a faulty unit.
Any questions, fire away.