Okay.
Map your car, crash it and find out. Because you "doubt it" :)
Huh - my line of thought was NOT questioning the need to inform insurers of mods - my line of thought was merely to explore how you think insurers would have (a) the appropriate tools, (b) the technical know-how, and (c) know what the OEM baseline figures are - to specifically check for remaps?
Your last reply was a bit out of order - doncha think?
The line of thought was implying that you could get away with not declaring your remap on the basis of your personal doubt that the insurance company would not be able to detect it.
Anyone with any sort of remapping tool can download a map and display extrapolated power/torque graphs.
a) tools which you can download for very low cost if you know where to look - such as WinOLS
b) It's not hard to tell if a car is mapped - requested fuel and boost levels do not take a genius to work out
c) the standard baseline figures which are published everywhere when the vehicle is released.
True story: A quick search came up with a Mr Jeffries of Widnes England who was prosecuted at Crown Court in 2005 November.
Mr Jeffries had been driving a 2002 registered Astra Turbo sports car when he crashed into a parked car on Trafford Road at 11.35pm on June 16th.
Mr Jeffries was arrested at the scene with a female passenger and charged with driving with undue care and attention but in a landmark case Mr Jeffries was also charged with driving without insurance due to his extensively modified car.
Mr Jeffries had not informed his insurers N.I.G about modifications he had performed to his car including alloy wheels and an engine power upgrade.
N.I.G had checked the car for alterations and found the car to be producing in excess of 20% more power than it was originally built with and Mr Jeffries had failed to inform them accordingly.
Mr Jeffries was filed with additional charged of "Gaining pecuniary advantage", "Driving without a valid insurance certificate" and "Failure to notify".
He was banned from driving for 12 months, given 120 hours community service and ordered to pay �4300 compensation and court costs totalling �840.
N.I.G commented "We are becoming increasingly aware of people altering there vehicles without informing there brokers/underwriters and we will take appropriate action to stop this trend from spreading"
More info:
http://uk-mkivs.net/topic/5799-do-dealersinsurers-ever-check-for-remaps-routinely/?p=312890And the fact, as I've mentioned, I have seen FIRST HAND that insurance companies will check online for peoples "build threads" where the minute you say you've got a remap then your policy is void regardless of the debatable fact whether they can prove it or not. If in any doubts insurance company can (and have) removed the ECU's from cars and sent them to tuners for bench testing which will immediately reveal any modifications to the standard engine map.
As I've said before you should declare EVERYTHING and if you are not in a position to pay for this then don't do the modification. We have insurers who support this forum, who will go to the ends of the earth to help you insure your mods legally, but will crap on you from such a height if you break the rules. At my "young dude" age it would have cost me I think it was £180 to add a 280bhp power limit, for the remaining 10 months of the policy that I had at the time.
Every single mod on my car is declared and I would strongly recommend to anyone else reading that they do the same. It's not worth it.