How to chip tune Kia Stinger.

[Yaro]

I want to share my experience how I chip tuned my Stinger.

Equipment

To tune Kia Stinger I used this equipment:
Tactrix OpenPort 2.0 adapter (the same adapter I used for Mitsubishi Evo tuning) revision "E", didn't work with older revisions ("D")

Bitbox software to read / write Sim2k 250 ECU (Kia Stinger 2.0) or 260 ECU (3.3). This software you can purchase here http://bitbox.ru/en . It costed me around 200 USD
Adapter Bitbox BS001 to read / write on the bench (50 USD) http://bitbox.ru/en/cable/5 (I payed in local currency, so it was a bit cheaper for me)

Difficulties

Main difficulty with Stinger is that you cannot flash it via OBD and you have to open the ECU.

The process

Ecu is located under the hood on the right side. Thanks to coreans that is easy to access it.

Thats the foto of our ECU

And this is the foto of opened ECU

It is a bit tricky to open it without damaging the box. I damaged it slightly but it is easy to bend it back to stock shape.

After this you have to connect the ecu to the adapter. To avoid soldering I bought chinese table for chip tuning (costed me around 35USD). With this table I got some needles which used for ECU connection (never flashed ECU's on the bench before).

This is how you connect to the ECU



This way you can read / write stingers ECU. Not that difficult.

Files

I was recommended to work with 2 EU chip tuning companies (friend of mine has a chip tuning company and worked with them before) Ziptuning.com and Sedox.com. Both of them provide files for our cars. Ziptuning offers ST1 file for 95 credits, ST1 + decat 110 credits (100 credits cost 130 euros). Sedox.com is a bit more expensive (but i guess more well know company based in Norway) and offers ST1 tune for 150 euro and ST1+decat for 180 euros.

I used Sedox services because my car is a Russian domestic market with specific software in ECU (restricted to 197 hp due to our taxes).

Why I wrote this

Some people might have experience with self tuning other cars (I used to tune my Evo's before) and want to work with Stinger by themself or don't see it possible to send ECU by post to another side of the world to get it flashed.

I found a great difficulty to find any information about Kia chiptuning "how to's". Also it was difficult to find software for Stinger without paying a fortune for it. And then I was recommended to try Bitbox (russian company who is specialised in software / hardware for reading / flashing ecu's). Other way to flash Stinger is to buy Ktag software from Alientech with cost several thousand USD or software / hardware from Magic Motorsport (also few grand for it).

P.S. Sorry for my english and thanks to everybody who helped me to get original US ecu file. Not needed anymore.

 

[OliverNuther]

I understood the first line. Everything else was totally incomprehensible to me. Man, you’ve got way bigger balls than me. No way I’m doing anything like that but more power to you for being able to do it.

Speaking of more power, don’t leave us hanging. What were the results of your surgery?

 

[Yaro]

I understood the first line. Everything else was totally incomprehensible to me. Man, you’ve got way bigger balls than me. No way I’m doing anything like that but more power to you for being able to do it.

Speaking of more power, don’t leave us hanging. What were the results of your surgery?

I will take the car to the dyno in 1-2 weeks time. Sedox says the result is something like this

286 hp and 418 nm torque. Which is way more then my stock 197 restricted ponyes.

 

[Terra]

That sounds scary, but we'll done.....

Can't wait for the results.

 

[Terry@BMS]

Good write up. This is how flash tuning is done without an OBDII flash crack.

 

[Yaro]

Good write up. This is how flash tuning is done without an OBDII flash crack.

As far as I know nobody cracked OBD for Sim2k 250 / 260 ECU. I contacted Alientech several times and the only solutions they have is similar to what I used (Ktag).

I would probably use your box, but my base file is 197 hp, so not sure if it would work with my ECU.

 

[washguy]

Way to go Yaro ! Keep us in the loop .... Wash

 

[Terry@BMS]

As far as I know nobody cracked OBD for Sim2k 250 / 260 ECU. I contacted Alientech several times and the only solutions they have is similar to what I used (Ktag).

I would probably use your box, but my base file is 197 hp, so not sure if it would work with my ECU.

It would, but if you are willing to flash anyway it's good to get the flash mapping closer if you can. Then use the JB4 within a +-30% range on power for fine tuning, logging, safety, etc, etc.

 

[Yaro]

It would, but if you are willing to flash anyway it's good to get the flash mapping closer if you can. Then use the JB4 within a +-30% range on power for fine tuning, logging, safety, etc, etc.

To be honest thats what i was thinking of. Because it is a nightmare to take apart the ecu every time I need to change something in the ECU tune.

Plus I want to run water-meth injection, and there is no way atm I can do this.

 

[brancky3]

Awesome info. So are there any 'off the shelf' 3.3 tunes available to start with?

 

[robz32]

excellent info.

following this closely

 

[Yaro]

Awesome info. So are there any 'off the shelf' 3.3 tunes available to start with?

There are. 2 Eu companies do 3.3 Gt's. Sedox.com (they charge 150 euro for st1) and Ziptuning.com . They charge around 130 euros.

You can look at their websites. There are graphs there. Sedox works with any clients, Ziptuning only with tuners.