One of the very frequent questions we receive is regarding the reliability of a tuned car. It is understandable that a brand new car is an expensive investment and we want to make sure we keep our rides on the road and not in the shop. Whenever we develop tuning solution and products for a particular platform we have development cars that we put through the ringer. We not only develop the products but also stress test the vehicles in the kinds of environments we know our customers will as well. Of course you can get unlucky (even stock cars fail), but our job as engineers and tuners is to explore the limits and apply sound principles to line up the reliability expectations of the customer with the build and tune we deliver.
A good case and point is our 2014 Performance Blue Focus ST. This vehicle has been our development test bed for the stock turbo tunes, E85, WMI, Aux Fuel, and a GTX2867 big turbo kit. We have always used high quality parts, proper maintenance, and of course tuned and built with the knowledge that we are pushing power levels above 200 hp per litre of displacement.
The car has 33,000 km (21,000 miles) of daily driving year round, datalogging, auto crossing, and drag racing. We clocked a 12.66@114mph in the quarter mile and are always improving at autocross.
We have a total of 759 datalogs of pulls (on average almost two datalogs for every day that we owned the vehicle). That does not include all the hooning, tracking, and having fun. We have 245 map revisions that were built, tested, and refined on just this vehicle. Below is our 759th datalog ran through the Virtual Dyno software.
The stock motor is still in place along with the OEM clutch. Ideal compression across the board.
While you can get unlucky and basing your opinion on a single vehicle is never wise, our overall experience with these vehicles has been very positive. So to answer the question – is it reliable? Based on the hundreds of vehicles we’ve tuned and our development cars – Absolutely it is … if built right, tuned well, and cared for!
We have been more than impressed with the reliability and resiliency of the Ecoboost motor and we have built and continue to build a wealth of data and experience on how to keep these motors together in the long haul. It helps that we are starting from a solid platform and we will continue to push, learn, and innovate.
Get out there and drive and enjoy your Ecoboost!
