venom revision 2 motorsport 173 chip review...

[natorious]

so i installed this on my lunch break today...

thoughts so far:
definatley runs better than stock ecu... much smoother it seems... the stutter at idle when tapping the gas is still there but much less prominent... the car sounds significantly different... definatley has alot more grunt over the whole powerband and the motor screams up near redline... much more raw sounding and rips through the rpms faster... seems to shift more in the powerband now as well but maybe thats just becuase i have been heavy on the gas in the 10 miles or so i drove it so far...

problems so far....

idle is a little funky... after slowing down to a stop it some time drops to 500rpm for a moment and then back up and it idles between 850-1000 rpm now seems a little high especially since i have an auto still (not for long)


and my chip definatley had the notch in it so there was no confusion on how to install it like others have stated...

so far i recommend it.. very worth the money... definatley hand some heads turning when i was in the tunnel and dropped it into 3rd and let her rip.. the airbox mods along with the new sound definatley sounds mean. i was very suprised at how different it sounds...

shuld be interesting to see how it is with my e36 m3 injectors that are arriving tomorrow.. the injectors in there now are a clickety clicking mess.

[Jand3rson]

Where did you get it?

How much?

[natorious]

http://www.r3vlimited.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3183

[nando]

nice. i think mine is at the post office.. I'm going to pick it up, but I have to write a speech today so I dunno if I'll put it in right away.

I'm a little anxious about the idle, I don't think 850rpm is good for an automatic..

[natorious]

nice. i think mine is at the post office.. I'm going to pick it up, but I have to write a speech today so I dunno if I'll put it in right away.

I'm a little anxious about the idle, I don't think 850rpm is good for an automatic..

im not too worried about the idle... even if it kills the tranny... it wont be in there for more than two months anyways

[Matto]

Sounds about the same effect my chip got me. Makes the car feel so much better but I also noticed the high idle rev.

[bimmer8604]

I also installed the chip in my friends 89 325iS 5speed. The sound is a big change, sounds meaner as you said. I dunno, the one we got didn't have the notch in it, but just becareful and look before you install it. The idle was a bit jumpy for a while, but it has settled down sig. to about 850. I Def. reccommend this chip, as for the price, you can't really beat it!

Kyle

[natorious]

ok well i have about 100 miles on my chip.. my idle when in gear is about 950 still and when switching from drive to neutral it jumps to 1200 and then back to 950 again... so i dunno whats going on with that... i'll give it a few days... (keep in mind the car is currently an auto)

i have to say tho... this chip RIPS above 3k rpm i was coming down the onramp to the highway so i gave it full throttle and did a good 2800-6400 rpm run down the on-ramp onto the highway.... it pulls so much harder and sounds GREAT...

definatley a good investment in my opinion...

only took me about 12 minutes to get it installed too...

and just in case anyone was wondering my current perf. mods are

modified air box (10 1" holes along fender side of box) with fram panel filter (hey needed a new one and they didnt have an k&n in stock)
hartge design a wheels
venom chip
other than that BONE STOCK

[e30gumball]

Thanks for the review ;)

I would like to say that when you fit the chip your best to fit it then leave the car idle for 10 mins BEFORE you drive it.
this settles the ecu as you could end up with eratic idle for a few hours use if you dont do this.

if you have this problem just dissconect the battery for 10 mins then reconnect it and let the car idle for 10 mins and away you go.

cheers !

[nando]

hmm I might get adventurous and put mine in today. I'll post results and post the comparison to my ebay "bavauto" chip if I do :)

[nando]

alright guys I put it in today. mine was keyed (I think the guys who had it backwards must have never seen a flash chip before) so I had no trouble getting it in correctly. started up and ran fine, I let it run for about 10 minutes while I finished putting the ECU back in, then took it out for a spin.

The idle is a bit higher, it's not too bad but it does jump to about 1100rpm when I take it out of gear. the first thing I noticed is that it seems to rev a bit quicker, in fact I ended up bouncing off the 6900rpm rev limit cause it spun up faster than I expected it to! It seems like it has more power, but my bavauto chip seemed to have more down low torque and lower end, this chip seems to have more top end HP. it's really hard to tell on a butt dyno though. I'm not sure which I preffer.. I was actually pretty happy with the bavauto chip, but I thought I'd try something different. I'm going to leave it in the car for now and run it at the next autocross to see what I think, then I'll swap back the bavauto chip and decide from there which I like most.

right now I'm leaning more towards the bavauto, especially with my slushbox, since the down low torque is more useful since the tranny shifts at 6k anyway, unless I'm in 2nd or 3rd.

the only other mods to my engine are the supersprint exhaust and 19# injectors.

For $50, especially if you don't have a chip already, you can't go wrong :up: