Peugeot 2008 Tuning

"Tuning guide to the most effective Peugeot 2008 modifications."

Based on the PF1 platform it shares much with the 208 and we first saw the 2008 in 2012.

It was designed to be a subcompact crossover SUV and it ticks the boxes quite well, and has become quite popular selling over one million units.

The 2008 is a good tuning project to try. If you do your research then you can create an awesome 2008 but don't be fooled there are lots of performance mods out there that will simply not suit it read our unbiased guides first.

The 2008 is a good project car to execute. The key to 2008 tuning is doing it right you can waste loads of money if you do it wrong.

Top end power should be your overall aim on the 2008 with a nice fat peak torque band.

The best power gains come from larger engine sizes. The more you start with the bigger the return on investment so engine swaps are good value mods for small engined cars.

Engine Tuning.

These mods kits are usually carried out by our members, decide how far you want to go before you get started.

Getting the correct grade of performance mods for your planned usage of the car is a time and money saver. Stage 3 competition upgrades just don't work well on the road and will make the car undrivable.

First generation 2013-2019

• 1.2 e-VTi/VTi 82 ch
• 1.2 e-THP 110/130 ch
• 1.6 VTi 120 ch
• 1.6 THP Flex 165/173 ch

Diesel

• 1.4 HDi 68 ch
• 1.6 e-HDi 92/115 ch
• 1.6 BlueHDi 75/100/120

2nd Generation from 2019

• 1.2 L I3 75 kW (petrol)
• 1.2 L I3 97 kW (petrol)
• 1.2 L I3 115 kW (petrol)
• 1.5 L I4 75 kW (diesel)
• 100 kW electric (in the e-2008 version)

Please watch TorqueCars Video tutorial on car tuning. And be sure to subscribe and support our new channel.

Stages of Tune

Stage 1 mods: Panel air filter, Alloy wheels, Suspension upgrade (drop 30-40mm), Sports exhaust, Lighter flywheel, Remap.

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

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

Your aim when tuning should be a wide torque range. You don't want all the torque to be at the top end unless you are creating a competition car.

In this article we shall give an overview and introduction to the best modifications for your car, but we'd encourage you to spend some time on the site looking into the details of each type of performance upgrade.A fast road camshaft usually works out as one of the best NASP power mods you can do with a single part fitted to your engine.

The intake and exhaust durations play a large part in your cars power band, but be careful here, getting this wrong can upset the idle and make the car impossible to drive in traffic. You'd need to follow a camshaft upgrade with other mods and finish with a performance chip for the best performance gains.

Don't forget to ramp up the fuelling when you are increasing the power - it makes the car more thirsty.

Frequently power losses, and erratic idling after tuning mods are done can usually be traced to timing or fuelling issues.To get sufficient fuel you may need to improve the injectors on your engine.

A fuel pump will only deliver a finite amount of fuel, so you may need to uprate this if your injectors are demanding more fuel.

Intake and Exhaust Tuning.

Now we move on to the intake and exhaust and ensure proper flow through the engine. Please note that WE DO NOT SEE IMPROVEMENTS WITH INDUCTION KITS, unless you have tuned your car massively and are finding that the standard air intake has become a restriction.

Maximum power gains come from a full induction kit with a cold air feed on heavily tuned engines, this can be sited within an air box but a panel filter should suffice for most applications. TorqueCars suggest you use a panel air filter as these are easy to clean and maintain and generally perform better than paper ones.

Sports exhausts will certainly help air flow from the engine but do not go too big or you may end up will reduce the flow rate. Stick to 1.5 to 2.5 inches as a rule of thumb.

Head porting and polishing the head will allow you to maximise your air/fuel charge. Leave this to a professional though with a proper flow bench and machine tools When you heavily modify your 2008 you will usally see that the standard clutch starts to slip so get an uprated clutch. The best mods that we recommend for your 2008 are Remapping or piggy back ecu, fast road cam and air intake and exhaust.

NASP engines do not achieve big power gains if you remap them, unless you have done extensive modifications. With turbocharged engines this is another story. A remapped turbo will give big power gains and fully release the potential power of the engine. The most significant power gains for NASP engines usually involve the addition of forced induction. Turbos are generally harder to add than a supercharger. With a turbo the boost curve is related exponentially to the engine speed making it more challenging to map.

The nice proportional boost and rpm characteristics of the supercharger make them more straightforward to map. Decreasing the engines compression ratio will allow you to add forced induction, water injection may also help prevent detonation.

Handling/Suspension upgrades

Many 2008 owners uprate the handling of their cars with tuning suspension upgrades as a priority, this will certainly increase your enjoyment of the car.

We found that most 2008 factory suspension setups need tweaking, a few degrees of toe out -0.9 to 1.5, and a little negative camber will radically enhance your cornering and handling.

Drop the car by as much as 30mm - 36 mm and fit sports stiffer dampers, bigger drops will need other modifications in most instances.

Alloy wheel upgrades.

The benefits of alloys include lowering your unsprung weight and more efficient brake cooling via the extra air flow they allow. Pay attention to your choice of tyres (tires) for your car, a good directional tread pattern tire can really enhance your cars handling. The drawback to large alloy wheels on your 2008 is that you alter your effective final drive ratio and this will have a detrimental effect on acceleration.

Although some people have installed larger rims without problems we would restrict ourselves to a 17 inch rim size as the maximum.

There is a more updated version of this 2008 Tuning article on TorqueCars.com.

For more information on Tuning your car please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss 2008 options in more detail with our 2008 owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased Peugeot tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

We need your help improving this article, so please send us your feedback in the comments box below and pass on any tips, points or facts we have wrong or have not covered. We really do love seeing our visitors car projects and which mods work best for them, this site is very much a community effort, and we remind our visitors of our non profit non commercial approach to running this site. All of your comments are used to improve the accuracy of these articles which are continually revised, tweaked and updated.

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This article is flagged for an update, so please pass on specific tips below that I can include. All articles, and content was written by me, Waynne Smith TorqueCars founder. Some outlines are just too general so I appreciate your feedback and suggestions. This entry was filed under Peugeot. You can leave a response below or join our forum to discuss this article and car modification in detail with our members.

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