A3 1.8t sport Tuning Plan

crazychris

crazychris

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Hi guys,

just wanted some help i'm making a basic tuning plan for the car so i know which way i wanna go with it and just wanted some ideas thrown i and some help i'm after around 230 bhp ish and spoke to awesome gti and mike there said its possible,

so heres the plan so far

Exhaust uk Turbo back including 200 cell sports cat exhaust
pipercross panel filter
forge/awesome DV valve
stage 1 revo remap,

then later

Forge TIP
K03s turbo
FMIC
tubular manifold(possibly)
Stage 2 remap,

now in your opions would this be possible, im planning to drop her on som nice 18's do i really need to lower the car as my mate has an s3 and i like the way it looks with 18's on and been told mine would look the same and i dont want to ruin the ride comfort as the roads near me are ***** and to get to and from my house i have to get over 8 speed bumps that are more like brick walls, also i was gonna fit s3 front bumper and fogs although struggling to find one for decent money, also is the s3 spoiler possible to fit to mine or does the tailgate need changing and not sure if to put s3 rear bumper on or just have the plastics colour coded, im not making it look something it isnt as im keeping all the 1.8t badges on, and apart from the lights and drivers is there anything else i need to convert mine to s3 xenon lights,
as for brakes was thinking just a set of fast road discs and pads and maybe braided line as the brakes are pretty good any way

so is there anything i've missed and anything you lot would suggest thanks for any feed back guys

Chris
 
it doesnt matter what car you have, if you have tyres with less height, it will roughen the ride.

IMHO, you might as well save the money and buy an S3, it will probably be cheaper! unless you are buying second hand, the total cost of the above will cost in excess of £2,500..... plus labour.

you can buy an S3 with around 100,000 miles on it for £5,000
 
plus, is your car a quattro? 200+ bhp on a front wheel drive is pointless, my mates type r was terrible at pulling away in the wet!
 
colicabcadam said:
plus, is your car a quattro? 200+ bhp on a front wheel drive is pointless, my mates type r was terrible at pulling away in the wet!
Click to expand...
Exactly my point my fwd a3 at the moment is useless in the wet for 200 bhp and over you need rwd or 4wd. But its your car and your money so dont let us put you off if its what you want to do :sm4:
 
Last edited:
There is a lot to be said for high powered A3s. I had one, and it was immense fun. That has pretty much the exact spec you plan to run...

Go for it IMO and be different....

Only thing is, don't bother buying the tubular manifold, send yours to Bill @ Badger5 and get him to port the OEM one for you....
 
Welly said:
There is a lot to be said for high powered A3s. I had one, and it was immense fun. That has pretty much the exact spec you plan to run...

Go for it IMO and be different....

Only thing is, don't bother buying the tubular manifold, send yours to Bill @ Badger5 and get him to port the OEM one for you....
Click to expand...

"i had one"

fact is you got rid of it and bought an S3, although it's all fun doing this and doing that, but he could save a LOT of money if he just buys an S3
 
tbf the only labour cost will be the remap as i never send it to a garage to have anything done, **** it id do the mappin if i knew where to start, i see what your sayin about an s3 but i simply cant afford one at the mo, i havent even got money together for the mods i have planned, i thought s3's where front wheel drive and the rears only kicked in when the fronts slipped a bit, and no mine is just fwd with and AGU lump cheers for the info boys
 
crazychris said:
tbf the only labour cost will be the remap as i never send it to a garage to have anything done, **** it id do the mappin if i knew where to start, i see what your sayin about an s3 but i simply cant afford one at the mo, i havent even got money together for the mods i have planned, i thought s3's where front wheel drive and the rears only kicked in when the fronts slipped a bit, and no mine is just fwd with and AGU lump cheers for the info boys
Click to expand...

add up the price of your mods, remaps and car..... i bet you could buy an s3 with it! just be patient and save, you'll benefit from it in the long run!
 
and you are sort of right

95% power to front wheels, 5% back, but once the front wheels slip (only for a fraction of a second, sometimes you couldnt even tell) the ratio turns into 50/50 or maybe 60/40 ??

it's a good idea as not much power is lost when it's in 95/5 mode. i believe the other audis are the same, but they dont use an electric haldex system, they use a mechanical torsen system.
 
colicabcadam said:
add up the price of your mods, remaps and car..... i bet you could buy an s3 with it! just be patient and save, you'll benefit from it in the long run!
Click to expand...

I respectfully disagree.

"fact is you got rid of it and bought an S3".... And?

I bought the S3, not for the Quattro, but because I couldn't get any more power of my A3 without big mods such as a K04 and all the associated parts. Around 225 bhp was the limit I could get to.

I bought the S3 for the heated seats and cruise control.

I bought the S3 because I wanted an S3.

Assuming I bought an S3 because my A3 wasn't enjoyable to drive, or because it was FWD is a bit forward IMO.

There are people out there running 400+ BHP Leons which are FWD without too many issues. Boost control in the early gears is the key.

A3s feel faster because they are lighter. Go out and buy a 210 S3, and you'll get walked all over by a 1.8T of the same spec as listed above.

Not to mention having to pay a lot more, and getting reamed on the insurance.

I can see what you're saying mate, I really can. BUT, there is a lot of fun to be had from highly tuned A3s.

Just ask Prawn.
 
calm down lads didnt mean to start a riot lol, cheers welly though so your telling me a3's can be as much fun, i just can afford the running costs of an s3 at the moment tyres running out quick and brakes due to it being 4 wheel drive haldex oil changes etc, and to be fair id love to wipe the smug grin off someones face when they go pffft its only an a3 when u mention S3 everyone starts to think twice, eventually i will get an s3 but in the mean time i just wanna play with this a little, i can get a brand new K03s for 550 delivered and like i said id do all the labour its only the remap ill need to take it to awesome for, also if i can find out bout porting my manifold i could get my step dad to do it as he's a CNC/Precision Engineer lol, what did u do to your a3 welly and how much fun was it

im not throwning all the comments about gettin an s3 instead to oneside im really not and i appreciate all the input from you guys i just simply cnt afford it at the moment, and i can never keep a car totally standard for long in the 7 cars ive had previously ive tried and i simply can do it lol but thanks for all the input youve all given lads
 
ooo and bearing in mind i am 22 with 3 points on my licence and an accident for being stupid when i was younger the insurance will rape me its costin me 700 a year as it is on the a3 lol
 
crazychris said:
Hi guys,

just wanted some help i'm making a basic tuning plan for the car so i know which way i wanna go with it and just wanted some ideas thrown i and some help i'm after around 230 bhp ish and spoke to awesome gti and mike there said its possible,

so heres the plan so far

Exhaust uk Turbo back including 200 cell sports cat exhaust
pipercross panel filter
forge/awesome DV valve
stage 1 revo remap
Click to expand...

This will see you at about 180-190bhp as the KO3 runs out of puff. Still a massive improvment over standard though. :) Those are the mods I have on my car but I'm already running a Forge TIP, its nice to drive and made 186bhp on the rollers last week. The only thing I dont have is a bigger downpipe but that wont make any more power, the turbo will just spool up a bit quicker.

crazychris said:
then later

Forge TIP
K03s turbo
FMIC
tubular manifold(possibly)
Stage 2 remap
Click to expand...

This is what I'm gathering parts for at the moment but I'm going for a bigger side mount intercooler rather than a front mount. Sack off the tubular manifold...you dont need it.

Just make sure your car always has nice fresh oil in it and all the boost pipes etc are in good order. How olds the car and how many miles has it got on it?.

As for just buying an S3...yawn. Spend your money on what you want to spend it on. A3 is lighter, cheaper to run, buy, insure, service etc etc. Dont get me wrong...I'd love an S3 but my cars pretty quick for what it is and costs peanuts to fix etc and has less to go wrong with it. 4 years ago when I got my car prices were much higher...if I was buying now I'd get a pretty tidy S3 for the same money but I still enjoy driving my car after 4 years and thats good enough for me.
 
Oh, and if you want it to corner better etc then look at dropping it about 40mm with some decent springs and shocks. I have Wietec ones on mine and its really nice, and KW anti roll bars...car drives really well now and goes around corners like its on rails. In fact I'd say doing all the suspension work on my car made it more driveable than any engine mods for sure :)
 
What i said was just my opinion as i do prefer rwd anyway more fun imo. Youve already got the car and if your doing it all yourself its not going to cost that much and you would feel better about making the car more powerful as to just buying a more powerful car i know i would. Just to clear it up i wasnt agreeing that you should get an s3 instead of doing this.
 
Bengal, thanks for clearing that up and i see you points

A3TOM: how come your going bigger side mount and not front mount
 
In answer to op, its a good plan for getting more power, as for you later plans maybe consider a ko3 hybrid instead of a k03s.

As to "is it worth it" thats done to personnel opinions, if its what you want to do you dont need justification from us, but I know theres plenty of members on here that will help you with any questions you have about undertaking the mods you've planned.
 
mk1chopper said:
In answer to op, its a good plan for getting more power, as for you later plans maybe consider a ko3 hybrid instead of a k03s.
Click to expand...

I completely agree with this. You can see up to 280 out of the K03 Hybrid, for not much more money than the brand new K03S that you are planning. Fits the same, requiring the exact same bits...

The only problem with the hybrid turbo is that it requires a more bespoke map than a generic Stage 2 (which the K03S will be ideal with). Also the hybrid will require S3/LCR injectors.
 
crazychris said:
A3TOM: how come your going bigger side mount and not front mount
Click to expand...

To be honest on the road you're not really going to need a full on FMIC IMO and the side mount will do the job well enough for me. If I was doing regular track days in my car (which I dont) I'd go for a front mount. Speaking to Prawn at the dybo day last week he said his car only really suffers with heat soak on the track and not on the road. Plus I dont like the look of the cheap FMIC kits so I'll get a sidemount and look at replacing the pancake pipe with something a bit less restrictive. The plan with my car also is to keep it totally stock looking from the outside...hence why I'm back to rolling on standard 16" wheels now. The only exterior mod to my car at the moment is the exhaust. I dont want to have to chop my front bumper up.

The hybrid is a good shout as well, I'm sorely tempted by one myself but I'll have to see what the cost works out at. I'd like to have one, purely because that amount of power in an A3 would be lots of fun.

If you're planning on running bigger power though I'd suggest a brake upgrade as well as all the handling mods. I wouldnt want to be running around in a 200bhp+ A3 using its standard wooden brakes and no rear antiroll bar and standard springs and shocks!. I'm doing my brakes next week as I'm getting some S3 carriers of jojo on here so I can run the bigger S3/TT brakes up front. Its an easy upgrade of you can find the carriers as you retain the original calipers and pads etc. You only need to buy the carriers and discs (under £200 all in).

T
 
AWESOME!!! well the brakes sound like a mint idea to me, whats the difference between a ko3s and a hybrid, also you asked earlier the cars done 120k now quite high i no but she still pull well never taps or smokes, full audi service history with receipts erc till 2008 and then at the last owners local garage for the last 2 years and ill be doing it from now on so he's been well looked after, so dropiing the car 30mm on springs is a big no go then i take it, i must say compared to my saxo and my vectra the car seems to handle quite well in standard form

i can see i will have lots of useful input from you all, which is better than some forums ive been a part of,

silly question but unfortunatly in my area we have one or 2 knob heads that just cant resist to have a pop what car are likely/unlikely to be beaten with mine in standard form as if i decide to play i wanna know what the chances are lol childish i know
 
you can drop your car 30mm if you want, mines dropped 40mm and its fine and there's plenty of speed bumps around here. You'll be fine if you run 18's and drop it 40/50mm...just watch out for the big ones.

A hybrid KO3S is a KO4 in a KO3 body if that makes sense.

As for what you can beat and not beat...depends on who's driving! ;)
 
go with your plan mate, my a3 is running pretty much exactly what you plan to do and its epic fun to drive, even in the wet. its 10x better than a standard s3 and a damn sight cheaper too! just ask Prawn in the words of Welly :D
 
the mods you've listed above will make for an awesome car dude, go for it, you won't be dissappointed at all!



colicabcadam said:
add up the price of your mods, remaps and car..... i bet you could buy an s3 with it! just be patient and save, you'll benefit from it in the long run!
Click to expand...

Just a small example, of why those that are young, and on a tight budget, should seriously consider an A3.

standard, 100 000 mile, pre facelift S3 £5000. only 210bhp with around 200lbft of torque, about 1500kg. power to weight = 140bhp / ton

throw £300 at it for a remap, and if you're REALLY lucky, you'll end up with 250bhp, that'd give you a power to weight ratio of 167bhp/ton

What you'll then have, is a mapped S3, with shagged worn old suspension, bushes that knock like nobodys business, awful brakes which fade after 3 stops from the national speed limit, and similar understeer characteristics to a car ferry.



my A3, 2001 facelift, recaro seats, DIS, aircon, all it's missing is cruise (£70 to fit), on 90k: £3400 a whopping 150bhp standard, and 1200kg on the weightbridge at work. 125bhp/ton (how lame)

engine mods:

3'' ebay DP/decat mated to standard exhaust £110
jetex cone filter + silicon to fit £75
forge 007P DV £80
ebay silicon TIP £45
Rtech stage 1 remap with decat light mapped out £250
N249 bypass and catch can istallation £50

Total cost of engine mods: £610

224bhp / 233lbft at Badger5. This gives it 187bhp/ton (oh noes. SURELY it can't be more than a mapped S3?)

So, then you end up with a car that's cost just £4010. it handles as awfully as an S3, but it's got 20bhp/ton more, so is quicker without question. not to mention having 30lbft more torque to pull along it's lower weight.

So, to make it handle and stop:

jamex stainless bodied TUV approved coilovers £200
eibach ARB's front and rear £260. totally transforms the balance of the car, no more understeer.

BRAKES. being lighter an A3 will actually stop pretty well with S3 312mm brakes, a good setup could be fitted for £250, making a total car cost of £4710.

I chose to go all out on the brakes, and spent £800 on a set of porsche 996 front brakes with 330mm discs and Pagid RS19 pads. these are awesome. I've never known anything stop quite like it. that puts the total cost of my car (not including cosmetic crap like wheels I already had) up to £5210, or, about what you'd pay for a half decent pre facelift S3.

All that little lot above was good enough to get me (a novice driver) around the ring in 8:58 BTG, so it's not what you'd call a slow car at all. a group of guys from here went out around teh same time i did in mapped S3's, and were lapping around ten minutes or so.

I chose to buy my A3 instead of an S3. given my budget, I could build a far better car starting with an A3 than I ever could with an S3. I had 5k to spend, so it was either a standard S3, or a modified A3.

Sure, given the money, an S3 with similar mods to the A3 would probably be awesome, but the mods I've done to the A3 would cost double for similar parts on an S3, aside from the brakes.

On top of that, the A3 is cheaper to run, I can get 38mpg from mine easily. it's also cheaper to insure, and servicing costs are lower as you've got half the number of drive train parts.

I'm not about to tell everyone to go out and sell their S3's for A3's, that's just stupid, we all know the S3 IS more luxury (not by much though really) and certainly has the A3 beat in terms of credibility and all weather ability, but that said, I've got ESP in the A3, and it does a grand job. Driving briskly on the roads I never have a problem any weathers.
Sure, it'll spin the wheels if you nail it in 1st off the lights, but who on here is 17 still? I think we've all grown out of the traffic light grandprix stage.

having driven jojo's S3 last weekend, I was REALLY impressed, I loved it, i won't lie. it made 250bhp from a CC1 map, which seems ultra rare, but it had also had thousands spent on the suspension setup. I loved it, but it wasn't as exciting to drive as the a3. I'm sure if it had a full stage 2 setup it'd be a different story though. I'd love an S3, but it'd have to be either BT or something fully sorted suspension wise with a ko4 hybrid or something, otherwise it's just not worth the change.
 
Yep, why spend money on a tired S3 that WILL give you strife when you can get an A3 thats a minter and (quicker) with a few mods.

Mine made 205 ft/ib too....which isnt bad considering its running the smallest turbo in the world with a basic generic map at the minute. I've had a few tussles with S3's and I'll be honest...its not as far off as you might think.

T
 
Thats me well and truely convinced prawn, jesus that **** could of convinced schumacher lol, let the modding commence, all i need now is cash, to be fair i rekon i got a mint deal though from exhausts uk, 350 fitted from turbo back and it'll look and sound exactly like a milltek system awesome, also is the airbox something thing worth it and ive de grilled the maf is something wrong with the car now that im flowing 11.8g/s @ 3000rpm?????
 
Retain the airbox and get a panel filter. I use a green cotton one.
 
11.8g/s at 3k sounds a little like you could have some kind of leak, but then again, I don't know how de meshing the MAF effects things.

Ko3S on an AGU is a really good upgrade though, I loved my last car, it was awesome. and the new AUM is shaping up to be just as good!
 
Prawn said:
my A3, 2001 facelift, 150bhp standard, and 1200kg on the weightbridge at work. 125bhp/ton (how lame)

engine mods:

3'' ebay DP/decat mated to standard exhaust £110
jetex cone filter + silicon to fit £75
forge 007P DV £80
ebay silicon TIP £45
Rtech stage 1 remap with decat light mapped out £250
N249 bypass and catch can istallation £50

Total cost of engine mods: £610

224bhp / 233lbft at Badger5..
Click to expand...

What? yours was 150bhp and now its 224bhp?
mines a 150bhp standard and now it 196bhp with a custom code map.
Dump valve and cone filter doesnt give you much more Bhp so how did you get the extra30bhp more than mine? surely the ebay silicon TIP £45 and N249 bypass and catch can istallation £50 wasnt to blame was it?

im jelous.
 
hmm ill have to do some data loggin tomorrow and see what happens, i was planing on a pipercross panel filter just wonder why some people on here have somethed the ridges out of the air box surely it cant make that much difference
 
nice long post btw,

most of the people saying get an a3 and tune it up are themselves a3 owners.... so i think it's biased

you've spent £5,000+ on your car, but, how much will it sell for? less than you paid for it orignally! this is what i am trying to stress all those performance parts mean nothing to the new owner, infact non standard cars are harder to sell

i've had a remap on my s3 and fixed all the problems with it (most of which was under warrenty), when i come to upgrade to an rs4 or something similar i wont loose out on too much money!

and now people are saying a tuned a3 is faster than an s3, why don't you compare a tuned a3 to a tuned s3......

you say you have 224bhp is this at the wheels, if it is are you telling me your car has around 250bhp at the crank? a 100bhp increase from spending £610?

can you pump 350bhp through an a3 1.8t engine without changing system internals? from what i have read on the internet you cant, apparently the s3 has no problems as it has different system internals (correct me if i have researched incorrectly)

if you plan on keeping it for a while do it, if in 2 years time you know you are going to sell it, don't!

it's your money at the end of the day, but remember you work hard for that money so make sure you make the right choice!
 
smoothed airbox is well worth it with an uprated panel filter is well worth it, although if you want the sound, a cone filter is definitely where it's at!

I recently fitted a jetex cone filter under the bonnet, and got a great improvement in terms of airflow, plus it sounds awesome.

Reptor: as Tom says, having a ko3S on mine means it can make much more power than the ko3 on an AGU
 
reptor245 said:
What? yours was 150bhp and now its 224bhp?
mines a 150bhp standard and now it 196bhp with a custom code map.
Dump valve and cone filter doesnt give you much more Bhp so how did you get the extra30bhp more than mine? surely the ebay silicon TIP £45 and N249 bypass and catch can istallation £50 wasnt to blame was it?

im jelous.
Click to expand...

chances are the dyno he got the print out from was broke lol
 
colicabcadam said:
most of the people saying get an a3 and tune it up are themselves a3 owners.... so i think it's biased
Click to expand...

But you own an S3, so surely your view point is just as biased? Welly owns one of the fastest S3's on this site, yet he is still making a case for the A3, having owned both.....

colicabcadam said:
you've spent £5,000+ on your car, but, how much will it sell for? less than you paid for it orignally! this is what i am trying to stress all those performance parts mean nothing to the new owner, infact non standard cars are harder to sell
Click to expand...

I'm not interested in resale value, at all. I keep my cars for a long time, and get an awful lot of use from them. Covering around 500 miles a week for work, no car I own will ever hold it's value, simply due to the intergalactic mileage they will all inevitably reach after a few years. so that's a non issue, for me at least.



colicabcadam said:
and now people are saying a tuned a3 is faster than an s3, why don't you compare a tuned a3 to a tuned s3......
Click to expand...

I have detailed why in great depth above. we are not comparing mods here, but more what can be achieved with a set amount of money.

As I have proved a tuned A3 can be built to a high standard for the same, if not less money than an average priced, standard S3. it WILL be faster, and it WILL handle better, despite costing less money.

Obviously, if you throw enough money at it anything will be fast. as I said above, modifying an A3 can be done for less than stock S3 money, and modifying an S3 generally costs loads more money, so that's not a valid argument either.

colicabcadam said:
you say you have 224bhp is this at the wheels, if it is are you telling me your car has around 250bhp at the crank? a 100bhp increase from spending £610?
Click to expand...

No, people don't quote power at the wheels generally. a 210bhp S3 is 210bhp at the crank, much teh same as my A3 is 150bhp at the crank standard, and now 224bhp at the crank.

colicabcadam said:
can you pump 350bhp through an a3 1.8t engine without changing system internals? from what i have read on the internet you cant, apparently the s3 has no problems as it has different system internals (correct me if i have researched incorrectly)
Click to expand...

You'll find with a bit more research that the A3 and S3 engines are basically identical. APY/AMK/BAM S3 engines and AUM A3 engines have the same internals, featuring 19mm gudgeon pins in the rods. and small port heads. AGU A3 engines have 20mm pins, and a large port head.

Basically, all are the same, A3 or S3, but you'd be foolish to try and put 350bhp through any of them without a set of rods.


chances are the dyno he got the print out from was broke lol
Click to expand...

The rolling road was done at Badger5, and all results can be seen here: http://www.audi-sport.net/vb/a3-s3-forum-8l-chassis/104378-dyno-day-badger-5-november-6-a-7.html

As you can see, many S3's ran on the same day, so power figures are 100% comparable.

Now please mate, I'm not looking to turn this into an argument, my post was entirely factual, and I've already said I'd love an S3 but couldn't afford to throw the £10k+ at it that it'd need to be half interesting to drive.
 
colicabcadam said:
chances are the dyno he got the print out from was broke lol
Click to expand...

Im pretty sure badger5's dyno is not broken, as Prawn stated there is a thread posted with the results from a recent rolling road day and all of the other results seem pretty accurate
 
jeeeessss lmao i only asked some advice didnt want to cause world war 3 lol, didnt realise it was such a sensitive subject, thanks for all the info though guys im glad the forum have guy that are so passionate about there cars, may have to looks at smothing the air box, im assume its hard to do and very time consuming lol
 
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