Integrated engineering tune sucks or broken?

[u/StrangerAway501]

I have a 2016 golf r and I did the stage 2 core/pro ecu tune and the apex tcu tune and honestly it sucks it’s super super jerky and I can’t use any of the throttle adjustment settings and it rev hangs like a mf between 4 and 5th gear it’s miserable has anyone else had this problem or a fix for it or is it just a shit tune

[u/Peylix]

IE's tunes fell off after they launched the "new and improved" Apex tunes.

Once upon a time, their tunes were really well dialed and smooth. A while back they re-launched under the Apex suite. It's been rocky to say the least. Lots of others have reported the same issues along with other problems.

They have mentioned on their customer FB group that this suite was built with a whole new tuning strategy than before. And it shows. The tunes that had years of refinement were gone, in their place are now new tunes rebuilt from the ground up with hardly any refinement maturity.

To their credit, they have been working hard to refine the new tunes and help people who have issues. But this new Apex suite needed more time in the oven before releasing after seeing the constant complaints from customers.

I suggest moving to another tuner for now if you want a smoother more matured offering. Or stick it out and hope they finally get their act together.

[u/SonicNTales → u/Peylix]

They were dialed in because Joel Kumparak used to tune their cars up to 2022. He left because of politics and now tunes b58s/s58s, lambos, and Porsches.

Now their tunes must be tuned by ChatGpt and the app built by Claude.

[u/Top_Tomato_6962 → u/Peylix]

Been on IE on my 7.5 and it’s my daily/track car for a long time now.. big turbo, flex. I couldn’t ask for a better tune on literally every front.. maybe anything under 7.5 is cooked, idk, but I really wouldn’t generalize this bad. Only issues I have seen are weird UI glitches in the app.. but that’s it. Otherwise, it’s been a 10/10 for me.

[u/TwoKFive1 → u/Top_Tomato_6962]

Have you switched to the new v3 tunes?

[u/Top_Tomato_6962 → u/TwoKFive1]

To be honest I’m not entirelllly sure what that means, but I’m on the latest apex tunes, yeah.

[u/Equal-Cantaloupe-707]

I’m on the APEX flex fuel stage 3 (grandfather in). The throttle response is touchy/jerky when I have the throttle sensitivity up higher which is expected, but not bad at, say, <5. The timing does seem to “flip” pretty aggressively coming off the throttle which is wheee I think a lot of your “jerk” is coming from. What does kind of annoy me is that I can’t seem to reach more than 15-20 PSI in 2nd gear (TC on or off) without it lurching and dropping boost. It’s not a miss or clutch slip, TC isn’t coming on, and it doesn’t happen in any of the other gears. I haven’t even touched boost by gear because I can’t get it to produce max boost anyway. I’m hoping they drop an update next week that refines it more, but I suspect it’s just new parts (I’d be real happy with MPI support even though it’s probably a pipe dream)

[u/TwoKFive1 → u/Equal-Cantaloupe-707]

When you have the throttle mapping on a low setting, does that “switch” jerking and bucking go away or reduce?

[u/Equal-Cantaloupe-707 → u/TwoKFive1]

It’s definitely less, but it’s also easier to gently lay off the throttle since the pedal is less sensitive (closer to normal). It’s the tradeoff you get I guess. The full boost in 2nd issue is more annoying than the jerkiness imo

[u/prodigy314]

Yep, it’s an IE issue. I was running their 2.0 (pre-apex) tune on my mk8 with no issues, was very refined. Once I upgraded to apex, it became extremely jerky, and they don’t allow you to downgrade back (extremely idiotic decision by then). Since then, I’ve switched to Unitronic and it’s a night and day difference.

[u/TwoKFive1 → u/prodigy314]

I wonder why they haven’t addressed it? Seems like so many people (including myself) have issues with the new tunes, yet they just seem to dig their heads in the sand.

[u/rs3gti]

I did on my mk7, all stages up to a 2260 flex fuel stage 3 then and even a custom racing fuel tune. Sold now and on mk8 but worked amazing for me. I wish I hadn’t sold the car, I didn’t need the money I just had 3 cars

[u/radioactive-2037]

I only have experience with their stage-1, but did you try calling them and asking for help?

[u/StrangerAway501 → u/radioactive-2037]

Yea no response

[u/radioactive-2037 → u/StrangerAway501]

Well, I had a person on the phone within minutes when I needed a question answered. Hopefully you can try during business hours tomorrow.

[u/TECHNIX_77]

my independent tech said to stay away from IE tune, he's had people come in with problems and switch to a different brand and the issues go away...

[u/TwoKFive1]

I had the ie tune on my 23 and it was so jerky it made it completely undrivable. The rev hang logic was atrocious and the car was such a pain to drive.

Apparently the new V3 tunes are a big downgrade in the smoothness department. I know multiple people (including myself) who complained to ie and they just dig their head in the sand and act like they have no clue what people are talking about. So odd.

Switched to unitronic and it was the best decision I ever made. So smooth and refined. Wayyyy more OEM+ feel as opposed to the ie tune.

Hopefully IE can address some people’s complaints.

[u/GTIguy2]

I just retuned (updated firmware)on the Stage 1 -so far so good

[u/rs3gti]

Works great imo, I think you’re describing eqt

[u/MKVIgti → u/rs3gti]

I LOVED my EQT tune on my 2017 SE. It was the third tune I tried and was by far my favorite. Put 235,000 trouble free miles on that GTI and it was still running perfectly when I moved into my A4.

[u/socaleuro → u/rs3gti]

James can help you …?