I am often reading about people having to get chips soldered into these ECUs. There's an alternative if you have the right equipment.
I can supply lots of tunes for these ECU's, Phase 1 $749(standard hardware), Phase 2 $849(downpipes/intakes/intercoolers) and Phase 3 $999(K04 Turbo and major hardware changes).
The ECU can be shipped to me and returned in a few days. I'll even pay for the postage. I can usually get these back in the mail the day I receive them, so downtime is 3 days.
Having tuned many of these over the years, the base maps for Phase 3 conversions are pretty close at the start but if you are considering this kind of upgrade. Please get in touch before randomly buying things off the internet, to avoid things you don't need and hear my experiences of what does and doesn't work.
A few photos of what goes on for those that haven't seen it before.
06A906018CH ECU from a Golf GTI.
The ECU hooked up to the power supply, bench lead and flash cable.
Load in progress, takes less than 10 minutes all up.
If you are local to me in Brisbane, I can flash the ECU while in the car, through the OBD socket. Phase 1, 2 and K03s tunes available.
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