Vauxhall Agila Tuning

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We look at Agila tuning and show the best upgrades. Vauxhall Agilas provide a fun base for your project and with the ultimate tuning parts you can definitely increase your driving opportunities.

The Agila is a good car modification project to try. With the right mods your Agila can be transformed into an awesome motor. Don't waste money, do your homework and follow our unbiased guides to each performance upgrade to avoid disappointment.

Handling/Suspension upgrades

Handling modifications are top of many to do lists for the Agila.

We found that most Agila factory suspension setups need tweaking, a few degrees of toe out for cornering or toe in for stability, -0.8 to 1.3, and slight negative camber will substantially improve your cornering and handling.

We would go to a maximum drop of 23mm - 37 mm on most models. You risk compromising your handling if you go lower than this.

Turning our attention to the engine we need to get a bit more power out of the top end.

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.

Engine Tuning.

These are the sports upgrades are usually fitted by our members, decide how far you want to go before you get started.

Getting the right modified upgrade kits for your planned usage of the car is vital. Stage 3 motor sport parts just don't work well on the road difficult in stop start traffic.

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: Lighter flywheel, Engine Tunes/Remapping, Alloy wheels, Suspension upgrade (drop 30-40mm), Panel air filter, Sports exhaust.

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

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

Your goal when tuning the engine should be a flat and wide torque curve. You don't want all the torque to be at the top end of the rev range unless you are creating a motor sport car.

The whole aim of our tips is to give a starting base of customizing upgrades and point you in the right direction, our forum is where you can ask for more detailed advice and tips on your car tuning project, the best motorsport mods and all aspects of modding cars.A fast road camshaft is widely accepted as one of the best NASP power modifications you can do from a single upgrade to your engine.

It improves the intake and exhaust flow and pushes up the power if done right. Ideally you'd add other mods and finish up with a remap. We'd also caution you not to go with a motor sport cam as this affects the engines idling and general town driving characteristics.

When pushing up the power you will need to ramp up to the fuelling. More power needs more fuel.

If you find you suffer from flat spots and surges after your tuning mods you should check the fuelling and try a higher octane fuel as well. To get sufficient fuel you may need to upgrade the injectors on your engine.

Uprate the fuel pump to cope with the extra fuel requirements of your tuned Agilas uprated injectors.

Intake and Exhaust Tuning.

Breathing mods are usually next up. Air induction kits are only beneficial to boost power if your air intake is restricted! Adding an induction kit to most standard engines will see NONE OF A LOW END POWER GAIN AT ALL. If you have heavily modified your engine and it's need for air INCREASES DRAMATICALLY then an induction kit is the answer and will help remove this restriction.

For most Agila engines TorqueCars would suggest you just go with a washable panel air filter. On heavily tuned engines and turbo vehicles an induction kit will help release the power providing you address the problem of needing cold air.

Sports exhausts generally help improve air flow out of the engine but avoid an exhaust that is too wide or you might just stuff your flow rate and make things worse. So generally speaking, keep to a size of 1.5 to 2.5 inches for best results.

Getting the head ported and polished will further help more air into each cylinder. This is definitely a job for a pro with a flow bench. In nearly all cases of Agila tuning your clutch will start to fail and this needs to be uprated - read our tips onclutches for more information. The best mods we would do for your Agila are a tune/remap especially on a turbo, a fast road camshaft and sports exhaust, with a good air intake.

Remaps offer large 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.

We've also come across some owners playing with twincharging applications and making some seriously high power gains.

Despite the large cost involved adding forced induction to a NA (naturally aspirated) engine will give large power gains. It is often simpler to bolt on a supercharger than it is to fit a working turbo. With a turbo the power curve is related exponentially to the engine speed making it more challenging to map.

It is simpler to map a supercharger because the boost is proportional to engine speed on a linear curve. Alternatively you could perhaps fit water injection to reduce the risk of knock.

Alloy wheel upgrades.

Due to the fact that alloys are lighter they improve performance and they help to cool the brake disks. Further improvements can be made to your cars handling with the addition of soft compound tire. Large Agila alloy wheels can decrease performance. If you get big alloy wheels you will be changing your final drive ratio.

Because of this aim to keep the overall rolling diameter of the wheel the OEM setup. In all cases not going bigger than 15 or maybe at a push 16 inches with ultra low profile tyres but the ride quality and handling will be really harsh.

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 Agila options in more detail with our Agila owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Vauxhall tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

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