Audi SQ7 Tuning

"Thank you for reading our Audi SQ7 tuning tips."

For now we have a super powerful diesel version in the UK but the US has a stunning V8 petrol powerplant.

To make a car this heavy go quickly you can either reduce the weight or increase the power. Thankfully Audi saw to it that the SQ7 puts down over 400bhp or 500bhp if you have the petrol version and it feels faster than many high performance saloon cars currently out there.

The SQ7 is a great project car to do. We see lots of DIY modders wasting money on their SQ7 doing the wrong mods and then having to start over. Follow our tips to avoid ruining your car

See our video which covers all the principles of tuning your Audi.

Handling/Suspension upgrades

Many SQ7 owners uprate the handling of their cars with uprated suspension parts as a priority, this will certainly increase your enjoyment of the car.

If you set the toe out to degrees on the front, and add slight negative camber then cornering will substantially be enhanced.

We suggest that you fit uprated suspension and lower the car by 28mm - 35 mm. Larger drops require arch work - especially on models already equipped with uprated suspension.

Top end power should be your overall aim with a nice fat wide peak torque band.

To be completely frank and honest, on the more modest engine sizes you are wasting your time spending money on modifications, so if this applies to you get yourself an engine swap then apply the following mods.

Power mods.

Typically these modified kits are usually carried out by our members, decide how far you want to push your car before you get going.

• SQ7 TDI 2016-
  3956cc 435 PS 429 hp; 320 kW 664 lbft
• SQ7 2020–
  3956cc  510 PS 500 hp; 380 kW 568 lbft

Getting the best uprated modifications for your planned usage of the car is vital. Stage 3 motor sport mods just won't work well on the road making the car difficult to drive.

Please watch our video which covers the 5 principles of tuning your car. Be sure to keep up with our latest YouTube content and subscribe.

Best Engine Mods for your car

1. Engine Tunes - engine tuning/remapping provides the most advantage in terms of cost savings,  aftermarket ECUs, and piggyback ECUs are all alternatives.
2. Fast road cams are one of the most significant mechanical changes, but they must be installed by someone who knows what they're doing and they are not always easy to source but you might find a local firm to regrind a stock camshaft.
3. Intake and Exhaust - Note that on their own these mods will NOT ADD POWER in most cases, but they can help enhance power after other mods by removing the restriction.
4. Upgrades to turbochargers and superchargers - forced induction is the most efficient approach to increase air supply, allowing you to burn more fuel and make more power. It is one of the most costly upgrades but provides the best gains.
5. Head work - The goals of porting and flowing the head are to get air flowing into the engine while removing flow restrictions and turbulence.

Typical stage 1 mods often include: Remap, Suspension upgrade (drop 28mm - 35 mm.), Lighter flywheel, Sports exhaust, Alloy wheels, Panel air filter.

Typical stage 2 mods often include: fuel pump upgrades, Fast road cam, Ported and polished head, high flow fuel injector, Power/Sport clutch.

Typical stage 3 mods often include: Adding or upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Competition cam, Internal engine upgrades (pistons/head/valves), Engine balancing, Sports gearbox.

Peak power is nice in motorsport but for a drivable and fun car you need a wide torque band and perhaps extending the rev range.

The aim of our articles is to give a little insight into the world of tuning modifications and point you in the right direction, our forum is where you can ask for more detailed advice and tips on your tuning project, the best tuning kits and all aspects of modding cars.One of the best mechanical upgrades you can do to your NA (naturally aspirated) engine is to fit a fast road camshaft .

The exhaust & intake durations play a huge role in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car challenging to drive in traffic. You'd need to follow a cam upgrade with other mods and finish with a tune/remap to fully release the power gain.

You will need to ensure that the engine is not starved of fuel so will need to ramp up the fuelling.

Frequently power losses, and erratic idling after kits are done can usually be traced to timing or fuel delivery issues. Improving the injectors is another beneficial modification and will deliver sufficient fuel.

A fuel pump will only deliver a finite amount of fuel, so you may need to uprate this if your injectors are demanding more fuel.

Intake and Exhaust Tuning.

Now we move on to the intake and exhaust and ensure proper flow through the engine. Please note that WE DO NOT FEEL YOU GET POWER GAINS FROM INDUCTION KITS, unless you have tuned your car massively and are finding that the standard air intake has become the bottleneck.

Maximum power gains come from a full induction kit with a cold air feed on heavily tuned engines, this can be sited within an air box but a panel filter should suffice for most applications. TorqueCars suggest you use a panel air filter as these are easy to clean and maintain and generally perform better than paper ones.

Sports exhausts balance the flow of air through the engine. But if the exhaust is too big, ie: it's over 2.5 inches bore, you will lose much of your flow rate and end up sapping power and torque.

Getting a professionally flowed (ported and polished) head with larger valves can fully maximise your power gains. In nearly all cases of SQ7 tuning your clutch will start to complain and this should be improved - read our tips on clutches for more information. The best mods in our experience for your SQ7 are Remapping or piggy back ecu, fast road cam and air intake and exhaust.

Remaps offer impressive power gains on all turbo charged cars. On NA (naturally aspirated) engines the benefits are doubtful. However a tuned/remapped ECU on a NA (naturally aspirated) engine will help unleash the potential if you have done a lot of mods. Adding forced induction will see impressive power gains but this is usually too expensive to be cost effective. Turbos are generally harder to add than a supercharger. With a turbo the boost curve is related exponentially to the engine speed making it difficult to map fuelling with.

The nice proportional boost and rpm characteristics of the supercharger make them easier to map. Alternatively you could fit water injection to minimise knock.

Alloy wheel upgrades.

The benefits of alloy wheels include lowering your unsprung weight and better brake cooling. If you are serious about performance then you will need to carefully choose your tires - ideally with a soft compound tire. Large SQ7 alloys can decrease performance. If you get big alloys you will be changing your final drive ratio.

Due to this aim to keep the overall rolling diameter of the wheel the standard factory sizes. In all cases we do not recommend going above 20 inches although 21's look great they really don't help the handling.

If you would like to know more, or just get some friendly advice on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss SQ7 options in more detail with our SQ7 owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Audi tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

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This article is flagged for an update, so please pass on specific tips below that I can include. All articles, and content was written by me, Waynne Smith TorqueCars founder. Some outlines are just too general so I appreciate your feedback and suggestions. This entry was filed under Audi. You can leave a response below or join our forum to discuss this article and car modification in detail with our members.

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