Anybody fitted a van aaken smartbox to a defender 90

[vtrdaz]

I'm thinking baout fitting one of these smartboxes and wondered if anybody had fitted one.
Do/will they reduce the engines reliability/longevity?
Is the power increase worth the expense?
Any help/veiws on this matter would be appreciated chaps

[muddyweb]

I believe Darren Burgess has one fitted to his 300 Tdi Discovery, and seems happy with it.

I have driven the Td5 Defender from Allisport with their equivalent fitted and it's very nice.

I have no experience with the long term effects of them, but the suppliers ought to be able to give you some pointers.

[HiFonics]

What I have gathered from various sources is that ideally you want to fit an intercooler before you fit a powerchip due to it reducing the chances of a big bang.

I guess a lot of how you drive it will affect the reliability of he vehicle. I have heard of people talking about problems with head gaskets. The common problem with vehicles with the powerchip fitted tends to be the exhaust manifold leaking, I dont know what sort of cost is involved fixing this.

The chips and intercooler combination does make a huge difference. Someone I know has a 1999 TD5 110 thats done over 100k miles and it still flies along with its chip and intercooler.

Whoever you choose to do your vehicle I would make sure you drive a vehicle they have done to see if you like it or not.

Cheers,

Ben

[vtrdaz]

thanks chaps - think i'm sort of thinking it might be a bad/costly idea to fit one of these if the engine goes bang a few months/years down the line