You are more then right. Its a chance you take. Though if you start your car and it runs like crap then you go back to your previous tune. It is always an option. Really what is stopping anyone right now from doing that here on this website. It would defianetly **** some people off but, then again some others would be extremely happy(not that this would be right in anyway)

 

You can come across used Uni-chips for $250. The Uni-tune is less than $300. If you make a single change to your setup, it has paid for itself. ASSUMING you have tuning know how. I have been tuning UTEC and OS on Subarus since mine came off the boat in 2002. Uni-chip has been around for a reasonably long time (longer than UTEC), but they have a bad name here because of defective harnesses. I don't even think you can get replacement harnesses at this point. If you're not willing to cut into the stock harness in the event yours goes bad, then the Uni-chip may not be for you.

I know there will be heat for this, but the only reason a flash tune would run $500, is lack of competition. I understand that time and money went into reverse engineering the ECU, but that can be said about every other tuner platform. Until another company offers a flash option in the US, that price won't go down. Therein lies another problem, minis aren't popular enough for the other players to get into the game.

 

It is my understanding the Subaru and/or the people who perform the mods "open source" the ECU so there is no need to pay for it if you're willing to accept the risks therein. It works for Subaru and Mitsubishi because there are people who are willing to do the work and make it free to everyone. Frankly, there are far more people in subarus than Minis so they have a larger pool of people who might step in for this.

http://www.tactrix.com/ and http://forums.openecu.org/

I'm sure that someone on here *could* reverse engineer the ecu, make mods and open source it using the flash tool. However, that would be a significant investment of time and resources. I would welcome anyone who chooses to Open Source the MINI ECU tuning they perform but I highly doubt there will be anything like that for MINI.

Furthermore, there is more to tuning a car other than changing random maps. You can seriously screw up your car since EVERYTHING is run off the ECU from the engine to the windows to the radio. Tank the ECU somehow and you're looking at a costly replacement.

This is why the tune is $500 bucks.