[ashman78]

Here's my rationale:

When a chip was an actual, physically soldered piece of hardware on the ECU, it had a lot more value--namely, it could be sold to other people once you no longer wanted it. It also couldn't be simply reflashed by the dealer if the mood struck them.

So everyone moved towards reflashing over the last couple years. This is a great idea in many ways: Cost savings, better odds of good results (lower errors), lower maintenance, software updates, etc.

But the chips still cost the same--or more--than they did before. How do customers tolerate this and how do the tuners justify it? Now, if the dealer reflashes you, you have to HOPE you have a tuner rep nearby. I live in a city of a million people, but the closest APR rep is...wait for it...APR themselves, 2 hours away.

There's probably something very obvious I'm missing out of ignorance. I hope.

 

[Purplezr2]

Because they can. Plan and simple, the demand is there and always will be so they will contunue to charge it,

 

[ashman78]

Because they can. Plan and simple, the demand is there and always will be so they will contunue to charge it,

Then they're idiots for not charging MORE back when it was soldered. Something just doesn't compute.

Note that I'm not saying it isn't WORTH $600 for 50hp, just that there's a disconnect in the pricing system.

 

[pass-variant]

No disconnect. You are being charged for the convenience... B4 you were being charged for the labor/hardware.

Now because you can bop into the shop and in 10 minutes leave with 50 HP... you pay the same... shit, for that they should charge you MORE!

 

[Tom Parish]

Because they can. Plan and simple, the demand is there and always will be so they will contunue to charge it,

Who said capitalism was fair? Ever wonder how stores can have 60% off sales and stay in business? It's called markup.

 

[ronaldmcdonald]

it's not necessarily about being unfair either. tuning companies have have overhead and r&d costs to cover too. unless you look at their books, you have no idea how well they're doing financially.

but still, even $700 for 50hp on a non-extensively modified daily is still a great deal. That is one of the joys of having a 1.8t/2.0fsi. If I had that option for my evo or 240sx, I take out the CC to buy something asap!! $100 price increase is no fun, but by no means devastating either. think of the poor souls who need to get a $1,600 standalone, and spend another $500 or so on dyno tuning to get their car run properly.

 

[HermanH]

You can't get that kind of HP for that cheap. As Adrian said, this is the joy of the turbo cars regardless of displacement. For me I'll only get about 10 out of a normally aspirated 3.2L from my A5 is the same price. I could spend another $1,000-2000 on the exhaust and a functioning cold air intake and get what? 10 hp? I'd probably get more from the power to weight gain by dropping the resonator. After that, I'm done.

On average, you're seeing about a 25% in horsepower for $600-700.

For my car, 25% increase means going from 265 to 331HP!!!! And in all truth, if that's the case, I should have simply bought the S5 with 345HP for only $10K more. This in fact is cheaper than trying to mod. the A5, which I guess is the point of Audi's pricing scheme.

 

[ronaldmcdonald]

Herman, lol how many turbo cars out there even have the option of making 25% more power for less than a 1g? And this while maintaining the reliability, emissions, and civil drive-ability you would get from a chipped 1.8t. my old sti and my current evo would probably cost around 1.5k (full turbo-back, intake, and software) to make an extra 25%. And even then, it would probably get really bad emissions and fail smog.

Haha, yes I agree the S5 is tempting. but then again for a street car (you already have track-ready ride iirc), how much power and performance do you really need? On the other hand, lower insurance premiums and better mpg are always nice. The A5 was probably a bit more sensible, but still very cool nonetheless.