SMG recalibration info

[M3Laith]

Just thought I'd share with you guys some handy info on the SMG box that's been developing over on the cutters site.

A lot of the cars there (including mine) suffered from a few SMG issues. Clutch slur, slow gar changes, juddering in first gear and rough changes is a good list!

The first solution was a change of gearbox fluid, which only really helped with the rough changes.

There was another solution: to do a paddle reset by holding both paddles in neutral at 40mph, but this doesn't do much either except reset the values that the SMG learns over time.

Anyway, with my car continuing to frustrate me at track days and round town, I decided to do some heavy research into the SMG.

As you probably know, the clutch pedal hydraulic arm is controlled by a computer that knows a certain biting point. The biting point of course changes over time and the computer adjusts for the clutch/flywheel wear.

But.. Most of the time, the computer gets it wrong and hence you get the symptoms.

Also when you drive the car hard, the actual wear is quicker than the computer's prediction.

So what's the solution? A full 3-point SMG reset at the Stealers will do it. This includes bleeding and repressurising the gearbox and clutch actuators via a computer, and also measuring all gears and the clutch biting point.

The Stealers will probably charge you up to £150 to do this (usually an hours rate and 'parts'), and that's without diagnosis. Of course if your car is in warranty then they will probably do it for free.

But I wanted this feature at home. So I researched more into the cable and software needed, and most are too expensive or not 100% reliable. So I ended up making my own cable an used software of a specific version (which took my ages to find) to do the resets.

On the plus side, the software (INPA) is the same code reader the factory uses!

Of course if you continue to drive hard, the symptoms can come back, so I've overcome this by doing the 3rd reset weekly.

Anyway, this has come in handy on the cutters forum, so I thought you'd like the info too. If you want more info, PM me, and I can also do a group buy if people are interested? Obviously I will be donating to the forum if I do a group buy!

Cheers, and hope that info was useful!

David
(M3Laith)