Ford Remap Wiped of Car

[Thrustyjust]

Mate fitted a Bluefin remap to his Focus ST last week. He had it booked in for a replacement spoiler brake light under warranty as it was full of condensation this week. So he collects the car and they have done a free electronic healthcheck without his authorisation and the boost and map has now gone. Looks like Bluefin with reload a map for fifty quid , but he is obviously a bit miffed that they did this without asking him. Maybe he should have said 'just fix the light and nothing else' but just changing a light fitting is not needing anything else really to be done, so shouldnt have to.

I have told him to complain to the dealer and advise them of expecting an invoice for fifty quid and seems its another way of 'checking' and trying to make money from punters in my eyes . So, other than getting Craigs dog ( or Craig)  to urinate up all the showroom cars , whats a good way to deal with this ?

[Steve (sdh2903)]

Has he not got the bluefin handset? Or because ford have wiped it does it think it's a "new" ecu?

[Thrustyjust]

Yep, he has the handset. Reading on the Bluefin website, they can upload another map . He used to get full boost on the gauge after we uploaded the new map. It has now gone to half boost , as standard. Its pretty quick with the map and a totally different beast with throttle sensitivity, which he says has also gone.

[Steve (sdh2903)]

I've not had a bluefin for a while but you used to be able to upload the map as many times as you wanted to the same serial number ecu as it was saved on the handset . It used to be recommended to take the map off before the car went in the dealer for anything.

[Thrustyjust]

4 minutes ago, sdh2903 said:

I've not had a bluefin for a while but you used to be able to upload the map as many times as you wanted to the same serial number ecu as it was saved on the handset . It used to be recommended to take the map off before the car went in the dealer for anything.

We will try it at the weekend. I will email Bluefin and check that is the case. He isnt that savvy with cars, but just changing a sodding light , they shouldnt muck around with anything else. I did say to him to book a Saturday and sit and wait for them to fix things next time. Same dealer that screwed my car Focus ST 5 cyl up when changing the clutch under warranty. But the best of a bad bunch around here.

[Steve (sdh2903)]

The handsets used to come with the 3 or 4 different maps stored on them. Plug it in select which one you want and up load they're a doddle. They usually create a backup of the standard map when doing so. 

[Thrustyjust]

This one we had to upload the standard map to the handset, then email it to Bluefin. They then sent the remap back and we uploaded the map to the handset and then onto the car. You only get one map with this car. I guess we have a copy of the standard map on his docs and maybe the remap. Will plug in the handset and see what it wants to do.

[Kit Car Electronics]

Isn't there a risk that the car will lose its engine warranty if he admits to the Bluefin mod?

[Thrustyjust]

1 hour ago, Kit Car Electronics said:

Isn't there a risk that the car will lose its engine warranty if he admits to the Bluefin mod?

Yes, there is . He only has about 3 months left anyway. Bluefin will cover the warranty up to a year , for the vehicle , so he will be covered by them.

[John (Kernow)]

These software updates are standard practise and are usually improvements to the system not only the engine management side. It would be a ‘careful what you wish for’ if complaining!

[Thrustyjust]

18 minutes ago, Kernow said:

These software updates are standard practise and are usually improvements to the system not only the engine management side. It would be a ‘careful what you wish for’ if complaining!

I  didnt get an update on our Skoda this year , as the dealer wanted stupid money. it works , it steers, it does 50mpg, John. Sometimes these updates are a bit of a mis selling thing. Our Volvo XC60 used to go to Volvo and have updates and the only problem was less things worked when it came back, like i pod integration, sat nav and no one at Volvo knew how to fix it 

[stephenh]

12 hours ago, Kit Car Electronics said:

Isn't there a risk that the car will lose its engine warranty if he admits to the Bluefin mod?

Exactly what I was thinking. In fact, as he was having warranty work carried out by what I assume is a franchise dealer, they may be under instructions from the manufacturer to do exactly what they did, or advise the customer that the warranty had been invalidated by the re-map and therefor declined. The customer was almost certainly in breach of the warranty conditions.

Mind you, they ought to have advised the customer before carrying out any work on the car, so perhaps the legal argument then comes full circle, and therefor the customer may have a claim against the dealer, for failing to inform him before doing what they did. They should perhaps have given the customer the option of paying for the spoiler brake light and keeping the re-map on the car. That then begs the question how much would the spoiler light have cost, might be more than the £50 now faced to re-load the re-map?

[Thrustyjust]

Just spoken to a nice chap at Bluefin. He said that they work with Ford to get data and will fit Bluefin at new cars at Ford dealerships. They even instruct Ford engineers on data from cars. As for warranties, my mate isnt worried ! Apparently Bluefin said its very common that they do this at a service as they just plug in and if it says update, they say yes. He advised to plugging in the handset and see what it says on the car. It may say installing map, if it is happy with whats on the car , or removing a copy of map, which needs to be sent back to them for adjustments and will be emailed back to  go back onto the car. Either way it will get sorted, as my mate wont be going back to Ford as allegedly someone had been rummaging in the front cubby holes as they were open and gained a 3 inch scratch on the rear bumper when there. Bluefin said they will sort it FOC too. 

[Kit Car Electronics]

Sorry, but either Bluefin are spinning a line, confused, or something illegal is happening. New cars sold must comply with their homologations- installing new code at point of sale on a new car would be scandalous.

[Thrustyjust]

5 hours ago, Kit Car Electronics said:

Sorry, but either Bluefin are spinning a line, confused, or something illegal is happening. New cars sold must comply with their homologations- installing new code at point of sale on a new car would be scandalous.

Dont see why, its no different to how Mountune remap Ford vehicles and they work hand in hand with Ford. I can order a new car from Ford and have it Mountuned from 0 miles, so explain how that works Mike ?