APR TSI K04 Software vs AWE/GIAC TSI K04 Software

[Arin@APR]

Arin, I have not spent much time looking at your posts in the past, but after researching a few over the last couple days, I am starting to think that you are obsessed with our company. All this attention...Listing the video as GIAC vs APR,etc, when you know that the AWE-Tuning car has a calibration created exactly to AWE-Tunings specifications for their kit. AWE asked GIAC several times during the calibration process to bring the power down throughout the rev range due to their concerns over EGT's and the longevity of the turbo. Todd from AWE has already alluded to this on other threads after your inflammatory posts. You have ignored them. That's expected as it serves your marketing purpose to do so.

It seems that much of your marketing lately includes GIAC but no other tuner, I can only assume that this is because you view GIAC as the market leader in performance software. You also choose very apples to oranges comparisons, attempting to make your company look good on the GIAC scale.

I don't fault you for trying to improve your company's reputation, in fact, I appreciate your recognition that GIAC products are the ones that you should try to measure up to. If you continue to show this one comparison of a GIAC custom calibration that had client-specified boost limits to the APR calibration with APR-specified boost limits and pass it off as APR potential vs GIAC potential, forum members will begin to wonder why this comparison is so important to you. We do lots of competitive testing of our general release programs vs. other tuners. I have many dyno plots of GIAC vs APR and others that prove that we are offering the best value to our customers. We generally do not publish these without serious provocation. It goes against our company culture to do so.

It appears that you do not subscribe to a similar level of professionalism, so it is curious that you have worked so hard to make the comparison between the GIAC custom program with specific boost and power mandates to your higher boost general release program. Incidentally, we are not against running high boost. We run higher boost on our in house car. As you may or may not know it is easier to put the boost request closer to 2550 than where we have it to meet AWE's requirements. When we release GIAC K04 programs for the TSI platform that are not associated with a specific kit, but sold directly to the GIAC network, GIAC customers will have choices similar those that our FSI customers enjoy. The AWE kit is a good kit that will most likely appeal to the majority of customers that track their cars on road courses, but we will have custom and general release options for dyno shoot-outs and quarter-mile supremacy as well.

Andrew

Andrew,

After months and months of AWE telling customers their K04 kit created power within the same range as that of the APR Stage 3 kit, I voiced my concern. Customer after Customer was tricked by their marketing into believing the power levels were in fact extremely close and as such the price difference between our kit and their kit was ridiculous.

I've known since day one this was not true. The AWE k04 kit did not make close to stage 3 power. I was convinced it was very far from it as well. I voiced my opinion on this matter and was met with constant bashing from AWE and customers for lying to people when in fact I was telling the truth all along. After having customer after customer after customer Email, PM, IM and contact me over the phone asking for K04 software it only backed my thoughts that something was not right with the existing options.

Finally we had a chance to produce K04 software for our customers. It started out as a simple question: "Would anyone like to try APR Software at H2O?". Given the overwhelming amount of people who've asked over and over to try our software, I gave them the opportunity to do so.

Dynos, logs, comparisons and customer feedback poured in. The results were so far above what I expected it was actually comical! I was told the software APR created, which is rated far LESS than what AWE rates was actually creating FAR more power. Not only were people pleased with the power output, they were pleased with the drivability of the software in comparison.

I had a customer come to me with your software and was able to test it first hand. I formed the same opinions as everyone else. What the customers told me was all true. It needs a lot of work my friend!

Naturally, we wanted to see how the two stacked up. A race confirmed the difference was monstrous. Given our K04 software is making less power than our stage 3 turbocharger system, my original concern over the AWE advertised power levels was compounded further. Nothing was adding up on their end. Nothing.

AWE was personally extended many opportunities to call a truce. We presented our data to them and asked they stop drawing us into the spot light in their underperforming dyno threads. If you are unaware, we were somehow brought up in all of their dyno testing to put the spotlight on us, not them.

We let them know of all our data, testing, and video evidence their kit was making no where near what they advertise. We chose not to post in any more of their threads and chose to not post the video for quite some time. It seemed they wanted to play nice. Ultimately they chose not to play nicely, so I let the truth out.

I work for a rather large company but I'm still an enthusiast. I don't care if I'm perceived as looking bad, I want to look out for my fellow enthusiasts. When they ask me why my expensive turbocharger system makes only a hair more power over an extremely cheap system, I must tell them truthfully why that's just not true even if it means putting down the competition. If that's unprofessional, I don't know what professionalism is.


Now, Andrew, maybe you care to enlighten us on something Austin said:

There is actually more room left in the K04 for power. We simply ran out of fuel with the OEM fuel injectors/fuel pump. We have made as much as 400bhp on a maha dyno with the Cupra R and previous generation TFSI engine.

Out of fuel on the TSI with the K04?

Are you backpedaling now? Fuel is suddenly there? How did APR do it? How did we create stage 3 years ago w/o any fueling upgrades.

So did AWE limit boost because that's where they wanted it or did they limit boost because you ran out of fuel? I'm sure you'll just say whatever works best for you. Call up AWE and ask first just to make sure you guys are on the same page.

----

I don't care if anyone makes more power than us on the K04, stage 1, 2, 3 etc. We never chase HP number or base our success on edging someone out by a few ponies. That was never the argument. The power we made is what we feel is safe and we are happy with those power levels. There is more room for a little more but not much w/o getting too dangerous in our opinions. If you make more power, be my guest! Sounds like you may have finally figured something out in order to shut us up.


Bottom line is the AWE kit does not make near stage 3 power. The AWE kit doesn't make even near APR K04 power. We have proven that over and over and it's looking like that debate is finally put to rest. It's a world of a difference between Stage 3 and the AWE K04 and customers need to know this when they make purchasing decisions.

And, last but not least, beyond power, the drivability between the two kits is night and day. We offer the software as a free trial. Would you like to try it out at any of our APR dealers? We have one 16 miles away from you. You'll see what I'm talking about and see I'm not just blowing smoke up your asses.

 

[Mr.Alex]

Im going to stand with Arin one this one. Somebody I had pleasure of doing business with was selling his AWE KO4 software and upgraded to APR Stage 3. And to my surprise his literal words were, "Its not even comparable" and "Its so much more powerful, I just fell in love with my car again."

I can't speak from my own experience but I can bring what his experience reveals.

 

[Andrew@GIAC]

Hello Arin,

I have not seen AWE launch a product and include comparisons with any competitor. "They started it" does not appear to be applicable here.

As for the following quote:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Austin@GIAC
"There is actually more room left in the K04 for power. We simply ran out of fuel with the OEM fuel injectors/fuel pump. We have made as much as 400bhp on a maha dyno with the Cupra R and previous generation TFSI engine."


Austin's statement appears accurate. We have run 330HP with race gas on our dyno with the AWE hardware installed on our in house TSI, but with substantial high pressure fuel deviations (negative) throughout the rpm midrange and up to the low 5ks, running what we considered a safe lambda. Even with a larger turbo, we wouldn't want to run the fuel system that close to the edge.

TSIPower, Axleman, Halvie, and Arin,

A lot of your questions are similar so I hope you don't mind if I answer them once here.

While Halvie's car is not running all the same hardware( including the wastegate) as AWE's test cars or our inhouse car, it was dynoed on the same octane and same dyno, which is great. The other comparisons that have been used on this thread, unintentionally I am sure, are different dyno's and different octanes. Set aside that 91 octane can really hamper power and that GIAC files definitely do take advantage higher octane levels. Our dyno is very conservative. A stock TSI runs in the low 180s for horsepower. Many other dynos, including some referenced by others on this thread show 197 to 207. The nominal difference can grow as you go to higher levels of power. We have dyno plots of our car with the AWE kit showing horsepower in the 290s on 91 octane that were shortly after dynoing 270 on our dyno. For the extreme example, a stock 997.1 turbo puts down around 387 hp on our dyno while we know of a 500SE Mustang in Arizona that shows 438 hp for the same stock 997.1 turbo. The point is that we do not get into to guaranteeing nominal wheel hp total on all dynos. Mixing and matching different dyno comparisons will not tell you what you want to know. Percent increase will give you a better picture.

I believe that AWE came to the hp claim they market for their kit based on what their dyno shows as a percent gain. They then factored in some of the MPH that the kit has been able to make in the quarter mile. Sounds reasonable to me. I do not know all the details of AWE's warranty program, but it was one of the main reasons they did not want to run the turbo, the fuel system, etc close to their limits. AWE intended for this to be a very durable track application, that would perform very consistently regardless of weather, altitude or what premium fuels are available.

Thanks,

Andrew

 

[Todd/AWE]

Have you told AWE that the DSG version makes way less power than the 6MT version? They sure don't indicate anything to that effect on their website and I've never seen them state such on the boards. Sorry, but something is not adding up here.

Notice that our chassis dyno sheet for this kit clearly states DSG.

Further, since our credibility is being called into question here, it is worth repeating a response I made on another forum:

Our product makes advertised power. There are multiple independent quarter mile results published out there that back up our claims. 108mph trap speed in the qtr mile on pump fuel and full weight cars. We are absolutely NOT misrepresenting the power output of this kit in any way shape or form. To do so would seriously undermine the premium reputation we have worked hard to achieve in the 20 years we've been in this industry.

GIAC absolutely has the ability to wring more power out of the K04 hardware we designed. They have done so. Is it safe enough to go 20 minutes on a road course in 100F heat? Not in our opinion. The headroom is simply not there to keep it from dropping into Limp Mode (or what other tuners call "Component Protection Mode").

We wanted to release a kit that could be used anytime, anywhere and perform without a hiccup. AND provide a full 12 month warranty on the whole shooting match. GIAC's higher output files are for dyno bragging and qtr mile killing, and they will sell software like that with full disclosure of the fact. What we are doing here is selling a 100% tested, abused, and warrantied KIT. You can see the video on our site of our test car being punished at New Jersey Motorsports Park in brutal 100F heat, running on 93 octane. It performed flawlessly.

There is no lying or deception here. We are tuning for you, the consumer, fully in mind. We are not tuning simply to make the competition look bad.

 

[Axleman]

TSIPower, Axleman, Halvie, and Arin,

A lot of your questions are similar so I hope you don't mind if I answer them once here.

Well, you didn't really answer mine. Your previous post seems to allude that your DSG program is different than the 6MT one and makes less power. Is that true? Or is there significantly more parasitic loss with a DSG?

 

[Arin@APR]

As for the following quote:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Austin@GIAC
"There is actually more room left in the K04 for power. We simply ran out of fuel with the OEM fuel injectors/fuel pump. We have made as much as 400bhp on a maha dyno with the Cupra R and previous generation TFSI engine."


Austin's statement appears accurate. We have run 330HP with race gas on our dyno with the AWE hardware installed on our in house TSI, but with substantial high pressure fuel deviations (negative) throughout the rpm midrange and up to the low 5ks, running what we considered a safe lambda. Even with a larger turbo, we wouldn't want to run the fuel system that close to the edge.

We are not near the edge of the fueling system on the TSI with the k04. If we were we would be completely unable to run more boost, produce more power, and run a similar AFR with the stage 3 kit compared to the K04 kit.

Looks like you guys were, just as Austin@GIAC said:

11+ms, with low boost? Yikes!!!!

The headroom is simply not there to keep it from dropping into Limp Mode (or what other tuners call "Component Protection Mode").

Limp mode and Component Protection are two totally different things.

Limp most is a mode where the car basically runs in a protection mode that extremely hinder the cars ability to do anything. Typically this means no boost, low timing advance, rich AFR and and only part throttle movement.

Component protection, that's actually the correct term and not something I made up, is when the ECU runs on different maps designed to cut engine power, engine temperature, coolant temperature and exhaust gas temperature. This is only a slight power difference. Most often people can't feel the difference on the road.

We wanted to release a kit that could be used anytime, anywhere and perform without a hiccup.

And we do the same. We have more motorsport data and testing with oem turbos than any other tuner in this market place. We know what makes turbos fail. We know the limit. We've pushed the limit and made turbos fail during our motorsport testing as we have to run on the ragged edge during competition all the time. Our race team is entering the 4th year of professional racing meaning we have over 3 years of brutal professional racing data under our belt. Beyond that we have collected our own internal testing as well as customer testing on the TSI and TFSI with k04 turbos years back. We have a perfect track record for k04 turbo life on the FSI and have never once crossed the EGT threshold for EGT's on the K04 turbocharger in any customers vehicle.

Our product makes advertised power.

This is where we have the largest deviation from reporting and representation methods and is the whole point to all of the comparisons I've preformed.

If the AWE kit with AWE/GIAC software makes 350 CHP then the following is true using AWE data collecting and representation Methods for APR Software/Hardware:

The APR K04 93 octane file makes ~400 CHP
The APR Stage 3 system on 93 octane makes ~450 CHP

:screwy:

 

[Todd/AWE]

Ack, looks like we have a mirror thread going on here to the one on Vortex.

For posterity's sake, here is my response cut and pasted:

Originally Posted by Arin@APR:
And we do the same. We have more motorsport data and testing with oem turbos....

I figured you would pull rank with that kind of statement, but given the stockish boost levels you are supposed to be legally running in Grand Am, I kind of don't see the connection here.

Originally Posted by Arin@APR:
This is where we have the largest deviation from reporting and representation methods and is the whole point to all of the comparisons I've preformed.

If the AWE kit with AWE/GIAC software makes 350 CHP then the following is true using AWE data collecting and representation Methods for APR Software/Hardware:

The APR K04 93 octane file makes ~400 CHP
The APR Stage 3 system on 93 octane makes ~450 CHP

Has anyone independently tested your Stage 3 vs your K04 software on the same dyno? I suspect that the power differences truly are minimal. They are both most likely running within 10hp of each other now.

And for the record, we never did try to compare our K04 kit to your Stage3. You were the one that was always overlaying our dyno graphs over your dyno graphs online as proof that your Stage3 kit made more power. What is curious is you are now using our same dyno graphs to "prove" that we were making this all up.

Listen, I'm not interested in arguing with you. We stand behind our power results 100%. Is APR making more power with 8 more psi? No doubt.

 

[Arin@APR]

I figured you would pull rank with that kind of statement, but given the stockish boost levels you are supposed to be legally running in Grand Am, I kind of don't see the connection here.

Stock boost PEAK boost levels, meaning we can run around 10 to 12 PSI to redline (depending what they allow). Does the OEM turbo do that? No. Also, we have to make more power by running everything WAY leaner and WAY hotter than anyone will ever see on the street.

Has anyone independently tested your Stage 3 vs your K04 software on the same dyno? I suspect that the power differences truly are minimal. They are both most likely running within 10hp of each other now.

I have someone working on that right now. Here is what I got. Just as I've always said, the Stage 3 kit makes ~50 HP more than the k04. In the mid range it's around 20 just like I always said.

Is APR making more power with 8 more psi? No doubt.

Yet we rate it at producing almost 20 HP less than you. So, Todd, what would you rate the power output of our software?



EDIT

Oh my I need to apologize. Apparently AWE rates their kit even HIGHER than the 350 I've quoted several times. I'll update my Estimates.

Delivering 360hp and 355lb ft of torque at the crank on 93 octane, this kit cannot be beat in terms of bang for your buck.

Using AWE's estimates for crank HP, the following should be true (rounded results):

AWE TSI K04 93 octane - ~ 360 CHP ----- (~265whp / .736) (265/360 = .7361111)
APR TSI K04 93 Octane - ~ 410 CHP ----- (~300whp / .736)
APR TSI Stage 3 93 Octane - ~ 460 CHP ----- (~340whp / .736)


That's absurd, right?

 

[Mr.Alex]

Link to vortex thread?

 

[Arin@APR]

http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthread.php?5027744

 

[KurtP1]

opcorn:

This thread is great. IIRC GIAC tries to run too much timing and attempts to make the compensation by dumping more fuel, which is a possible explanation as to why they "ran out of fuel system' for their chipset. The car responding by pulling timing would also explain why GIAC software usually drives like a complete bag of smashed ass on the street and why you get some guys at the track trapping high MPH's and some guys on the street performing like a basic stage 2 car.

Someone in the know correct me if I am wrong.

Pushing an additional few degrees of timing up top would make some decent changes to HP figures but if the car, due to heat/octane/etc wont allow that full timing value to be run, the performance will suffer. I would love to see a comparison between APR and GIAC and how much timing they are running from 5500 - redline. I would almost bet money GIAC is trying to push too much.


the thing I always loved about APR is that you can count on a couple things: 1- it will cost you out the ass to buy anything they make. 2- while they are extremely over priced, to their credit, everything they make fits, works, and performs exactly the way it should and exactly the way its advertised.

 

[marcopolo]

This is awesome, GIAC vs APR. I think a race is in order. Both companies can talk all day long about who is superior and flex their e-peens but how about a race to prove who provides the better mods :happyanim::thumbup:

 

[Axleman]

This is awesome, GIAC vs APR. I think a race is in order. Both companies can talk all day long about who is superior and flex their e-peens but how about a race to prove who provides the better mods :happyanim::thumbup:

Did you miss the video in the OP?

 

[Arin@APR]

This is awesome, GIAC vs APR. I think a race is in order. Both companies can talk all day long about who is superior and flex their e-peens but how about a race to prove who provides the better mods :happyanim::thumbup:

Um, lol... Post 1.

 

[marcopolo]

Um, lol... Post 1.

Im at work so no youtube. I figured this APR TSI K04 Software vs AWE/GIAC TSI K04 was sanctioned by APR but was referring to a more official race where winner gains bragging rights. Again Im at work so I dont know whats fully going on lol.